How local is your beer? Craft brewers increasingly employ seasonal, regionally grown ingredients

Mmmmm, beer. That was the philosophy of Homer Simpson, and many Americans would agree. One of the great food and drink stories in recent years has been the rapid rise of craft beer. Today, independents represent about eight percent of total U.S. beer sales, and the number of breweries in this country just topped 3,000, a level not seen since the 1870s.

With thousands more being planned, that number is likely to keep going up. So have we reached our saturation point? The nonprofit trade group The Brewers Association certainly doesn’t think so – their staff beer economist (best title ever) calls it a “craft beer non bubble.” The group points out there are 7,000 wineries in the U.S., yet very little talk of a wine bubble.

The Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerThe Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerThe Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerThe Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerThe Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerThe Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerThe Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerThe Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerThe Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerThe Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerThe Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerThe Brewers Assoc. charts NASDAQ against beerCraft beer is in many ways a reflection and driver of the local food movement. In an age of massive corporate brands, people are thirsty for experiences like riding your bike to the local brewpub and quaffing a beer produced there. The beer boom has not only created jobs, but also played a key role in the rise of local restaurant scenes and neighborhood revitalization.

Yet how local is your beer? Most wines are grown on local estates, yet the ingredients in beer often come from a catalogue. It can be difficult to find locally-grown hops, barley and other ingredients in the U.S. and Canada. North American hop production is concentrated in the Pacific Northwest, while a lot of barley comes from the Dakotas.

That’s starting to change as brewers seek out more local ingredients. The rise of the local food and drink movement has led to a surge in beer made with items like local honey, fresh fruit or local “wet” (green) hops. There are also an increasing number of breweries trying to source items such as local barley, and that’s helping to fuel production of these plants.

Cincinnati Infuses Creativity

As many of Cincinnati's breweries become more established, they find themselves experimenting with more atypical ingredients. But ingredients don't always come from afar—they're often sourced locally.
 
For local brewery Fifty West, a number of their concoctions have been a result of local collaborations. Their Coffee Please Stout, for example, uses an infusion of cold brewed coffee supplied by Coffee Please in Madeira. A collaboration with Zip's cafe resulted in Fuzzy Feeling, a peach wheat ale that contained hand-cut peaches, and a partnership with Colonel De's Gourmet Herbs and Spices led to Azar's Seaside Saison, a spicy brew with spearmint and raspberry.  Another brew included blueberries and milk sugar added to a bourbon-barreled imperial stout, made with Quaff Bros.
 
Oak chips, coconut, vanilla, cherries, pawpaw, cinnamon and toasted pecans—the list doesn't end anytime soon.
 
Any ingredient that doesn't adhere to the German beer purity law Reinheitsgebot—which limits beer ingredients to hops, barley and water—is considered adjunct, and is used often, says Fifty West brewer Max Fram.
 
To channel some of their creative energy, every Thursday night Fifty West brewers experiment with new adjunct ingredients. They call it Motha' Firkin Thursdays.
 
"As brewers, this is our weekly outlet to get really fun with ingredients," Fram says.  "We have done anything from Fruity Pebbles in a wheat beer and graham crackers in a porter to licorice sticks in a stout and all kinds of fruit in IPAs, including watermelon and pineapple."
 
Likewise, Rhinegeist's experimentations vary.  Among other tests, they've used Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Zinfandel barrels from the Hendry Ranch Winery to age a wide range of beers.  They've sourced spices from Colonel De's and teas from Churchill's in Findlay Market.
 
"We’re constantly asking growers to send us samples of their newest experimental hops," says Bob Bonder, co-founder and president of Rhinegeist.  "Most recently we brewed a pale ale called #05256, which was the lab name that the grower gave to this citrusy, dank hop strand."
 
The brewers also plan to use their coffeehouse backgrounds to make custom roasts to match the profiles of potential beers.
 
"We haven’t done much of this yet, but we’re moving the Tazza Mia roaster into the brewery and are all huge coffee fanatics," Bonder says.  "I met Jim [Matt], our head brewer when he used to come into Tazza Mia and we’d geek out over the best ways to home roast different beans."
 
While the brewers are still figuring out details, they expect their prior coffee roasting experiences to create more possibilities.
 
"The two beverages and our approach to them are very much aligned," Bonder says.  "It also really does open up the door for opportunities for more interaction between the two beverages.  It's still something we're just on the cusp of figuring out, but I know we all have a lot of ideas."


Brewing innovation in Philly

Dock Street Brewing Co., a brewpub on bustling Baltimore Avenue in West Philadelphia, has always prided itself on sourcing locally -- the beef for their burgers comes from Lancaster County, and during the warm-weather months the menu bursts with inventive salad specials and veggie-heavy pizzas. That ideology also extends to their ever-evolving roster of beers.
 
According to Dock Street's Marilyn Candeloro, they purchase almost all of their brewing ingredients domestically (certain recipes do demand the milder English hops). And, when they can, they narrow their food shed even further, incorporating products from Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, and even West Philly itself.
 
Every fall, Dock Street brews their wildly popular Satellite Espresso Stout using locally roasted organic fair trade beans from Standing Stone Coffee Company in Huntingdon, PA. They've also teamed up with the Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia on the limited-run "A Beer Four All Seasons" series.
 
"For those beers, some ingredients were sourced from the Four Seasons," says Candeloro. "It could have been from their rooftop garden or a local purveyor that they work with. For the 'Spanish Fly,' they grew the verbena, the ginger and the wormwood for us."
 
Dock Street Brewing Company's Whiter Shade of PaleDock Street Brewing Company's Whiter Shade of PaleAnd if that's not local enough for you, last year Dock Street tapped a batch of "Born and Raised."
 
"Around fall, all the brewers do a fresh-hopped beer, because that's when the harvest is," explains Candeloro. "It turns out our neighbor Frank Winslow -- who works at Yards Brewing as their quality assurance brewer -- grows his own hops at home, and last year he couldn't use them because he didn't have enough to make a dent in a Yards recipe. So, he gave us the hops. Most often, you're overnighting them from Washington or Oregon, so it was really awesome that we got them right around the corner."
 
Of course all this experimentation is enabled by an increasingly beer-obsessed customer base boasting adventurous palettes.
 
"We have a great audience for the beers we put out," insists Candeloro. "They're very receptive, and give us great feedback...People like to connect dots. With the espresso, they like that it's made right in PA. It makes them proud to drink it."
 
In a couple weeks, Candeloro herself will drive out to New Jersey to pick up a truckload of white and yellow peaches. They'll be roasted in the Dock Street ovens, and thrown into a batch of "Whiter Shade of Pale," a berliner weisse due in late August.

Beer explosion in the Twin Cities

In 2013, 14 new craft breweries opened in the Twin Cities. So did Minneapolis’ first micro-distillery, Norseman Distillery. Many of the startups take pride in incorporating local ingredients into their creations. While crafting its first batch of Strawberry Rhubarb Gin this spring, Scott Ervin, Norseman’s founder and head distiller, put out a call on Facebook for more local rhubarb.
 
Summit Brewing Company, which has been crafting beer since 1986 and is often credited with introducing microbrewing to the Twin Cities, has long been crafting seasonal and specialty brews with homegrown ingredients. Last summer, Summit’s State Fair IPA, available only in its booth at the Minnesota State Fair, incorporated corn and wild rice from Minnestalgia Foods, raw wildflower honey from Bare Honey, and Cascade hops from Hippity Hops Farms. 
 
Mark Stutrud of Summit Brewing CompanyMark Stutrud of Summit Brewing CompanyMark Stutrud of Summit Brewing CompanyBack in 2010, Summit brewed an Imperial Pumpkin Porter with organic pumpkins grown on the Wisconsin farm of a packaging line employee. This year’s brew in Summit’s ongoing Unchained Series, Herkulean Woods, is being made with maple syrup from Wild Country in Lutsen, Minnesota, and spruce tips from Iowa.
 
Summit has also “worked with Rahr Malting in Shakopee as our primary maltster since the early days of our brewery,” explains Carey Matthews, Summit’s marketing coordinator. “They are using malt from North America and doing the malting on site at their Minnesota facility.”
 
The reason for sourcing locally is simple: “We try to partner with Minnesota companies as much as possible,” Matthews says. “We value working with our neighbors and contributing even more to the local economy!”
 
Matthews regrets, however, that there aren’t “barley or hops farms in Minnesota that can support large scale commercial brewing needs” like Summit’s. Still, for home brewers who want to volunteer, the Longfellow Community Garden in Minneapolis has a plot solely devoted to growing hops. Later this summer, the gardener/brewers will reap their reward.
 
The brainchild of Andrew Schmitt, executive director of the Minnesota Beer Activists, the community hops garden was planted last year with donated cuttings now growing on 16-foot arbors (donated by Hippity Hops) and an aluminum-cabling-and-twine trellis to hold them aloft. To water the hops, the volunteers create a rainwater catchment system that collects rain off nearby buildings.
 
“Beer is fundamentally a community beverage,” Schmitt says, “and with this hops garden we’re extending the community aspect of beer right down to how the hops are grown.”
 
“Everyone is excited about brewing beer with hops this fall that are fresh, right off the plant,” he adds. “I would love to see our community hops garden start a movement in other cities.”

Canada's craft beer culture

Toronto, Ontario is a city where it’s not hard to find a unique craft brew. Over the past few years, craft brewers have been popping up from the west to the east, with each neighborhood slowly having a brewery to call its own. In a city with a passion for local food and local drinks, the rise of craft brew culture has been a welcome edition to the foodie scene.