Dwinell has quickly gotten the Pacific Northwest beer worldâs attention with their rustic wild ales but up until now you had to drive out to the middle of nowhere, i.e. Goldendale, to taste their beer. Thatâs not the case anymore. Dwinell is now selling their barrel-aged and wild beers at bottleshops around town, including The Beer Junction, Chuckâs Hop Shop in Greenwood, and Teku Tavern. I caught up with Jocelyn Dwinell Leigh, co-founder and co-owner of the brewery with her husband Justin Derek Leigh, to celebrate the arrival of this new brewery to Seattle and find out a little more about what Dwinell is up to.
The Dwinell in your name comes from a family name, but where does the âcountry alesâ come from? Why refer to your beers as âcountry alesâ?
Jocelyn Dwinell Leigh: We use the term âcountry alesâ to describe our approach to making farmhouse, mixed-culture, and wild ales. When we werenât able to start the brewery on a farm like we wanted to, it was still important to us to live out in the âcountryâ and have direct relationships with the farmers who were going to supply our ingredients.
Youâve said that Dwinell is about creating âsimple beers that welcome all kinds of drinkers.â The mixed-culture beers you make are often elevated and thought of as the most complex types of beersâwhat does âsimpleâ mean to you?
Itâs true that mixed-culture, barrel-aged beers are often more complex, and hopefully along with that, more balanced as well. While the time, ingredients, and uniqueness of each beer likely warrant a higher price, ultimately, these beers are meant to be enjoyed rather than coveted. Weâd prefer to make mixed-culture beers and then have people enjoy drinking them. Stop by a small town in Belgium on a Sunday afternoon, and youâll find ordinary people in their local bar enjoying a Gueuze or Lambic because itâs what they know and love. Why should it be any different here?
How important is it that you use local ingredients?
Itâs deeply important for us to only use local ingredients, as much as we possibly can. The majority of our ingredients are sourced from within a short trip of our brewery and we work closely with the farmers. Most of our beers feature grain from Mecca Grade Estate Malt, which is 100 miles south in Madras, Oregon, and has a very similar climate to ours. We source hops from the Yakima Valley, located 45 miles north, and we buy all of our fruit from a local, family-run orchard and vineyard 12 miles south in Maryhill, Washington.
The majority of our beers are fermented with native yeast strains that weâve captured, or yeast and bacteria that occur naturally on the fresh fruit we use. For us, when weâre surrounded by all of these amazing ingredients, it doesnât make sense to import hops from New Zealand or specialty grain from Europe. We want to make unique beers that reflect where we live, and using local ingredients is the best way to do that.
How hard is it to find enough support for a high concept brewery in a rural town like Goldendale, a town with less than 5,000 people?
Thankfully, our neighbors donât view us as a âhigh conceptâ brewery. For most people, weâre the place in town to meet with friends, relax on the patio with your dog and kids, or to hold a community event. At our tasting room, weâre happy to educate everyone about our beers and work tirelessly to create an inclusive community-driven space. In doing so, weâve managed to convince most people in Goldendale that the beers we make are, well, ânormal.â A regular recently told us they visited another craft brewery in the region and they were shocked that the brewery had no wild beers!
What Dwinell beer should I pair with the trashy Rancho Bravo burrito Iâm eating right now in Cal Anderson Park?
Definitely go with the âHappy Camper,â our take on the top-fermenting golden ales that originated in Cologne, Germany. This beer is made with Pelton and Lamonta barley malt from Mecca Grade. For a light, crushable beer, the malt character is surprisingly flavorful, creamy, and full bodied. And instead of using the traditional earthy, spicy German hops found in a Kölsch, we used super fruity Idaho 7.
What Dwinell beer should I pair with the Un Bien Cuban sandwich Iâm eating at Golden Gardens right now?
Definitely grab a bottle of âPast Tense,â a blended barrel-aged wild ale, which weâre releasing this week in Seattle. It started off as an open-cooled beer we made in December 2017, which we then aged in freshly dumped red wine barrels for a year before bottle conditioning. Itâs got a great balance of oak, light acidity, and a touch of funk that would be perfect with a rich, savory pork sandwich.