Get to Know: Deux Fermes
Collaboration brews are an important part of what we do here at Alesong. Learning from our peers, seeing their equipment and procedures, and likely making a beer that is better than the sum of it's parts is usually the name of the game. We've worked with several of our friends in the past three years, so when the fine folks at Logsdon Farmhouse Ales suggested we brew with them and explore the world of spontaneously fermented beers, of course we didn't say no!
Brian worked closely with with Shilpi, Logsdon's head brewer, to plan out a beer that could be brewed at their farm brewery outside of Hood River Oregon, and then split up to be finished, hopefully on regional wine grapes, at each of our respective breweries.
Step one happened roughly 18 months ago when Brian and I ventured up to Logsdon in Pedro, our trusty box truck, and an empty tote for hauling the wort back in. We brewed the base wort with Shilpi and his assistant, Mark, on a cold early spring day when we knew the night air would be cool enough to innoculate in the coolship. (a Coolship or Koelschip, is an open topped, flat bottomed, shallow vessel that holds hot wort to be cooled by Mother Nature and allows the local organisms in the air and in Logsdon's barn to start their journey of turning sugar into alcohol.) The day was long and adventuresome to say the least, but the "Gueze-mosas" that the gentlemen treated us to were enough to make the brew go smoothly. Or at least that's how I remember it!
The next morning we hauled the innoculated wort back to Eugene where we'd let it ferment for over a year and mature in barrels. In the meantime, Brian and Shipi made their wine grape plans and placed the orders with the growers. Logsdon's version of Deux Fermes ('two farms') was refermented on Oregon Tempranillo grapes while ours saw Syrah grapes from Oregon's Applegate Valley. After this refermentation and maturation, both versions of Deux Fermes are ready to go and will be debuted together on October 19th at our 3rd Alesong and Friends event happening at our tasting room. As this is our 'Harvest Edition" all beers are wine/beer hybrids. There are definitely some unique and rare beers that you will not see served in Oregon. And if you can't make it to our Alesong and Friends event, consider joining our Blender's Circle club since this little blend will only be available to the club this time around.
Cheers!
Matt
