Get to know your beer: Pêche

We are in the heart of winter in the Willamette Valley: It’s another cold, dark, and rainy January day. Fruit trees have been pruned back to almost nothing and vegetable gardens are covered with mulch and completely saturated with water… It’s always around this time that I find myself longing for the fresh flavors of summer – that juicy tomato, crisp cucumber, or bright peach. And that feelings is what makes the next beer in our winter release so special...

Our Pêche started out as a Belgian blonde ale that was matured for over a year in French oak barrels with a blend of brettanomyces and lactobacillus. We then added 2lbs/gal of whole, local, veteran peaches from Detering Orchards at their peak ripeness and waited another 2 months to bottle the beer. Refermenting beer on whole fresh fruit like this locks in the aromas and flavors of the fruit. It also adds a unique fermentation flavor from the wild microbes that are on the skin of the fruit. The result is an incredibly aromatic beer that gushes with the tastes and smells of a fresh peach and finishes refreshingly tart and clean on the palate.

It’s hard to escape the reality that we are in the middle of winter. But when you close your eyes and experience this beer, you are suddenly in your backyard on a sunny day, a juicy peach in hand and maybe even a few drips running down your chin.

Cheers!

Brian