I remember a couple of years ago, when hazy IPAs were becoming a “thing.” There was a fair amount of angst in brewing circles over whether a style, that frankly violated a lot of our training, was really worth doing. We were already making hoppy beers that didn’t look like crap, so why did we have to make these rather gross-looking concoctions? This turned out to be a misinterpretation of the style in general, as these beers had significant differences from the West Coast IPAs we were use to brewing.
Anyway, the angst West Coast brewers experienced over hazy IPAs is nothing compared to the industry-wide dismay (?) at the notion of making “hard seltzers.” But no dismay here! We’re happy to jump right on top of these. They’re refreshing.
Making seltzer has been a particularly interesting project for us. While you would think fermenting sugar is quite easy, beer yeast looks for micro-nutrients in malt that sugar doesn’t have. It turns out there’s a real dance between the sugar source, yeast strain, and secondary nutrients to drive fermentation. We learned a lesson on our first, very slow fermentation, but we learned! Now we’re looking forward to making more.
Our first release in what we’re tentatively calling the Drake’s Spritz program (I don’t like the term “hard seltzer”) will be Hooked on Tonics, a gin and tonic inspired spritz that features prominent flavors of juniper, lime zest, and spruce, as well as subtle hints of coriander, cardamom and rose hips. We plan to continue on the cocktail-inspired theme (thus spritz) and are already preparing for an “el Diablo” inspired spritz.
We’re going to have fun with these and match our sugar source for the fermentation to the sugar source used in the distilled beverage we are mimicking (so agave in the el Diablo). Then, in general, take our inspiration from the world of cocktails. O, and sparkling Pruno!
– John Gillooly, Drake’s brewmaster
