Why Breweries Are Using Winemaking Techniques | Wine Enthusiast

This story was published in 2018 in Wine Enthusiast magazine.

Brewers aren’t bashful about playing in winemakers’ sandbox. They’ve infused IPAs with Syrah must, seasoned saisons in Chardonnay casks and fermented beer with Champagne yeast. Now, they’ve filled brewhouses with massive wine-aging vats called foudres (pronounced FOOD-ers).

Traditionally, some winemakers (especially those in France’s Rhône Valley) have favored the colossal wooden containers that impart less oak flavor because of their large surface area. For beer makers, though, foudres are storehouses for cultivated colonies of Brettanomyces yeast and souring bacteria. The vessels allow brewers to make bigger batches, so they can craft more consistent wild creations, drawing off fermented liquid and refilling with fresh beer as needed.

Charleston, South Carolina-based Revelry Brewing recently opened a facility, dubbed the Hold, dedicated to aging beer in foudres and barrels.

“The product in the foudre is the steak, and the beers in my smaller barrels are my salt and pepper,” says Ryan Coker, the co-founder and brewer.

Nationwide, you’ll notice numerous brewers sourcing foudres for flavorful experiments. (They’re buying them secondhand from wineries or new from makers such as Missouri’s Foeder Crafters of America.) In Colorado, New Belgium’s foudres are crucial to sours such as La Folie, which ages for up to three years, while Denver’s Crooked Stave uses foudres to fashion rustic, vinous farmhouse ales.

Of course, not every brewery uses foudres for sour beer. In Brooklyn, Threes Brewing makes Kicking and Screaming, a foudre-fermented pilsner with a marshmallow note. Meanwhile, the Illinois-based Two Brothers Artisan Brewing has made several foudre-aged IPAs, like the pleasantly oaky Resistance.

No matter the style, sometimes the tallest oaks produce the tastiest beer.