DARTMOOR Brewery this week played host to Gabrielle Cappadona and Tito Castelli, who run a craft niche Brewery in Sicily specialising in bottle fermented beers.

They came to Dartmoor to study methods of brewing although their first task was to acclimatise having left a sun drenched Sicily with temperatures at more than 40C to a misty rain, swept Princetown shivering at 12C.  

Mark Shackleton of Dartmoor Brewery said: 'Despite our climate there are many similarities — their water  runs off the volcanic rock of the famous Mount Etna while the granite rock of Dartmoor is the result of volcanic activity under an ancient ocean. This culminated in the lava and pumice volcanic rock plug of Brent Tor — luckily Dartmoor is totally inactive.

'The climate on the higher slopes of Etna is more like ours, cool with a lot of winter rain, so could be suitable to growing hops and cereals.

'The biggest difference between brewing here and Sicily is the beer tax – we pay 75p per litre, they pay approx 5p per litre!  In addition to this if you use local produce in the making of your beer there are tax exemptions!'