Last January, Metropolitan Brewing’s Doug Hurst was getting ready to dump about 28 barrels’ worth of improperly fermented Dynamo Copper Lager down the drain. “The carbonation level was too low and it was a little too thin in the body,” says Hurst, who runs the fledgling Ravenswood brewery with his wife, Tracy.
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In Austria, where Robert was born, and in central Europe in general, beer-based spirits aren’t unusual, and age-old distilling traditions that use all sorts of grains and fruits have never been interrupted by such an inconvenience as Prohibition. By contrast, much of the United States’ early and varied distilling culture was lost as a result of the Great Experiment, and until recently small craft distillers like Koval, North Shore, and Death’s Door have been scarce.
Birnecker’s grandfather is a farmer in northern Austria who grows his own grains and fruits and distills them into a number of liqueurs and brandies, or Schnaps (not to be confused with the syrupy liqueurs known as schnapps in America). His pear-apple beer, Most, has won several regional competitions. “I spent a lot of time on the farm just working with them,” Birnecker says. “That’s where I was exposed to all of this.”
In January the couple and their five-month-old son, Lion, moved into Sonat’s parents’ house. Not everything went smoothly at first. Their initial attempt to distill pear brandy was foiled when a shipment of pears froze en route, arresting the ripening process. Enlisting family members and friends, they stemmed and mashed the pears anyway and distilled them in a trial run. The result—which they’re not releasing—tastes and smells like unripe pears, says Sonat. They won’t try again until they can get some fruit from closer to home in season.
Thu-Fri 4/30-5/1, Koval Distillery, 5121 N. Ravenswood, 773-295-4454, kothe-distilling.com, $559.
Kothe Distilling Technologies Spring 2009 WorkshopMon-Tue 5/4-5/5, $399.
