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Jester King Forthcoming UK Collabs
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Jester King has been one of our most exciting brands to import this year and with the pandemic seeming like a distant memory and travel back to green light status, we knew we had to capitalise on their 2022 European visit.
Having had great support from our trade friends for March’s Jester King Sponzee Day event we knew there was an appetite for this titan of sour brewing and as such, we are continuing the story with two UK-based collabs with Burning Sky & Pastore.
As craft beer wholesalers it’s extremely important for us to introduce brands when they visit and see what collaborative magic can happen. We are as invested in this process as much as the breweries themselves and believe in fostering relations in order to deliver more quality craft beer into the market.
It allows for learning, creative expression and most of all fun. After all, how many businesses go out punting on the River Cam in the Pastore company punt with a cold can of Limone after a hard day’s brewing beer together?
Pastore are about to release their 1st two versions, the rest of these collab beers aren’t quite ready yet as the barrels & time have to do their loving work, but we thought we would give you a glimpse into the production process and a teaser for what will be released soon from the creative forces of these three breweries.
Over to Pastore and Burning Sky for the lowdown on their brewing processes for these exciting collabs.
Jester King x Pastore
‘We’re planning to release two beers, one from stainless steel on this summer’s strawberries and one aged in sherry barrel with both breweries cultures for next year’s release.
Suffice to say Jester King are massive inspirations of ours when it comes to new world wild ales. Having the chance to chat production techniques especially when it comes to fruiting in wild beer was incredible.’
The brew itself was a rustic saison. We brewed a rustic golden beer with wheat, oats, spelt, torrefied wheat and raw barley from a local farmer in the grist. Texan-aged hops, Pastore aged hops and honey from a local beekeeper were added to the boil.’
From here the base beer went its separate ways with one batch dosed with a Pastore and Jester King mixed culture and destined for a sherry barrel sleep over till next year. Whilst the other was transferred to steel for two months, before being laid onto 150kg of local strawberries.
Given the summer we’ve had, expect some exceptional sweet notes to come from the strawberries, counterbalanced by the aged hops from both breweries. The sherry barrel aged beer is planned to be released unblended, with both breweries house yeasts hopefully finding their rhythm together and creating something bigger than the sum of its parts. Watch this space for further details on that.
Jester King x Burning Sky
‘The beer was made using our standard single infusion mash for 60 minutes. The grist consisted mostly of extra pale Maris Otter as the base malt with some spelt and wheat for character. For hops we used a mix of East Kent Goldings, Saaz, Celeia and some aged Columbus pellets brought over from Jester King.
Initial fermentation took place in stainless steel FV with Burning Sky mixed culture (saison yeast, brettanomyces and lactobacillus). One week later it was moved to the barrel store where the Jester King culture was added. Eight oak barrels were filled (approx 1700L) and 1000L was placed into a holding tank. Next week we will receive 300kg of apricots and these will go into another tank. The remaining 1000L will be transferred onto the fruit and allowed to macerate until fermentation is finished and we feel that it is ready (approx 2-3 months).
We will then blend all, or a portion of the barrels back with the fruited beer, give it some time to settle and then bottle. Best case scenario, the beer will be available mid-October but that is optimistic! Ultimately it will be ready when it’s ready!’
