Tired Hands Reach Across the Atlantic.

A few weeks back I trekked over to Europe to join friends in Belgium and Denmark to craft four very different beers that pay homage to our deep-running roots in this global brewing community. The beers we brewed at ‘t Gaverhopke and Fanø Bryghus (Grassroots) reflect our sensibilities as brewers and should also serve as a bit of a sample of things to come.

I first met Gudrun and Bruno of ‘t Gaverhopke at their brewery/cafe over two years ago. My wife, Julie and I were biking through Northwest Belgium, and stopped in at their cafe on a whim after arriving in Kortrijk. We showed up later than expected, and only anticipated having an hour or so to sample their beers. An hour came and hours went. We spent the majority of the evening sitting around a small table with Gudrun, Bruno, and a few locals sampling their vast portfolio of outstanding beers. We knew had struck up a friendship when these very secretive brewers brought out three bottles of “prototype” beers for us to try (these proto-beers would later go on to become Koerseklakske – their “session” summer seasonal). Ironically enough, during this initial meeting, we spent a good amount of time discussing the merits of hoppy beers. At the time, they didn’t have any hop-forward beers in their line up, and I had brought a very hoppy barleywine with me for us all to enjoy. We sat, tasted, and discussed. Eventually, the hop discussion went by the wayside and the evening gleefully meandered on.

Almost one year later, Bruno came stateside for Philly Beer Week. Luckily for both of us, he was able to set aside some time to visit me and sample some of my hop-forward beers. I sent him home with a bottle of my Double IPA, which he went on to share with Gudrun, and soon enough they were converted; I had created hopheads. It wasn’t long after Bruno’s visit to the states that we began discussing what a double IPA would taste like from ‘t Gaverhopke. We tossed ideas around, and eventually we assembled what I thought would be a true confluence of technique; essentially our Double IPA, brewed with ‘t Gaverhopke yeast on their system! Soon after I sent the recipe over for their consideration, we purchased my plane ticket. The resulting beer will be a blonde double IPA named “Bittersweet Symphony”, and should arrive stateside mid-to-late June.

While in Europe, I would have been foolish to not visit my long-time friend Ryan Witter-Merrithew at his Fanø Bryghus in Denmark. Ryan also brews all of the beers for Hill Farmstead’s sister company, Grassroots Brewing, in Denmark. I met Ryan almost seven years ago while working at Weyerbacher. I made the beer, and he sold it through Tanzo’s Beverages. Ryan and I have always shared an interest in brewing with strange ingredients and utilizing unusual techniques; from our days home brewing in the parking lot next door to his house, to present day (head brewer and brewery builder), not much has changed in our approach to the brewing process. As you can imagine, Ryan also shares a fondness for saison. Prior to my arrival in Denmark, we had penned three VERY different saison recipes with one common thread; each saison was to be fermented with our Tired Hands saison yeast. The beers included:

Do Saisons Dream of Electric Yeast? – A dark rye saison brewed with whole rose flowers, hibiscus, and chamomile flower. (We also primary fermented this beer in a used brandy barrel with a whole slew of microflora. This beer will be bottled and will be named “Bladerunner”.)

TUFF GHOST – a red rye saison fermented in used red wine barrels with Brett from our good friend Chad Yakobson from Crooked Stave brewing in Colorado.

Whachu Saison – A saison brewed with long-grain red rice, spiced with schezuan peppercorns, and conditioned on yuzu fruit puree.

My trip to Europe was exceptional for a number of reasons. The hospitality and kindness shown by both Bruno and Gudrun AND Ryan and Mahalia was truly humbling. From croque-monsieur and late night beer deliveries to world-class beer bars in Belgium to pork galore (my first time eating cracklins) and cornhole (a horseshoe-like game that involves throwing beanbags at big slabs of plywood with holes in it) in Denmark, I had a stunning time with great friends.

The scope of my brewing experience on this trip was vast. The ‘t Gaverhopke brewhouse is a very hands-on system; extreme care and consideration must be given by its operator at every step in the brewing process. It is very similar to our system in its simplicity. Beer is boiled over a direct-fire kettle. The Fanø brewhouse was impressive for entirely different reasons. Being a Kaspar Schultz system, the brewery kind of comes with a brain. The integrated on board computer and comprehensive HMI are capable of automating the brewing process with a few exceptions (hop additions, graining out, etc). The system contains an internal calandria, which is a device that recirculates the boiling wort up and over a steam heated element, effectively increasing surface area contact between the wort and heating surface and resulting in one of the most vigorous boils I have ever seen (if you opened the manway door to smell the beer, the boiling wort would immediately gush out… a lesson I learned the hard way).

You can expect to see DSDOEY? and Bittersweet Symphony in select bars in the Philadelphia area within the next two months. TUFF GHOST and Wachu will both slowly make their ways over to our fair city within the next six months. I will keep you updated. Again, I should reiterate that these types of collaborations exist on the fringe of our business model. While localization guides all that we do, it is important that we pay homage to the forces and friends that made us who we are; that have helped to push our perceptions of what beer is and can be, regardless of their geographic positions (also, it is important to note that the majority of all the beer that I brewed in Belgium and Denmark will stay in those countries!). We would be nothing without one another.