At Cooking District we are pretty passionate about supporting members of the culinary community who are trying to accomplish cool things. Case in point is Wolves & People Brewery, founded by professional beer and travel writer Christian DeBenedetti. He has transformed his family's farm in Newberg, Oregon into a truly farmhouse brewery. It's takes it's name from the game of nighttime tag he used to play with his siblings and cousins when they visited the farm. Also from the fact that Ancient Romans called hops the “little wolf among weeds” (because they’re so fast-growing).
The brewery will focus on sour, barrel-aged farmhouse, fruit, and other experimental styles using indigenous wild yeasts harvested right on the farm. Here's a peek at the beers in planning stages:
Coup de Foudre: Meaning “lightning bolt,” or “love at first sight”, a wild golden ale fermented in foudres in the barn and seductively dry-hopped.
Sebastian: Dry-hopped saison made with estate yeast “Sebastian”, harvested from our oldest plum tree and aged in pinot barrels for at least 4 months. Later versions will transform with farm fruit additions.
Lupercal: Meaning “she-wolf”, this is a refreshing, complex, spruce-tip infused wild ale with fresh lemon peel, subject to a mixed fermentation with Brettanomyces, Lactobacillus, and our house wild yeast, Sebastian.
Brutaal: Brutaal, meaning “bold” or “audacious” in Dutch is our homage to De Ranke’s XX Bitter, which is itself a tribute to the original character of Orval, the Belgian pale ale that first captured our founder’s imagination and inspired his love for Brettanomyces beers.
Corylus: Imperial hazelnut stout with Magnum, Columbus, and Mosaic hops aged on estate hazelnuts in a mix of bourbon, port, and sherry barrels; approx 11-12%abv.
Landbouw: Meaning “farming” or “agriculture”, this is a dry-hopped, harvest beer based on grisette with a sociably low ABV of around 2.8% ABV.
The brewery is off to a good start and has much of the equipment already, but they are raising funds on CrowdBrewed to finish the job of converting the old barn into a working brewery. Watch the above video to see what they have planned and then
click here to donate. The campaign ends on December 5th.