LONG BEACH, CA - While the winter blues are still bringing us in the States down—just ask my dog who has been looking longingly out the window waiting for the sun to stop going down at 5 p.m so he can play outside—summer is raging on in Chile, and with it, some of our favorite seasonal flavors. Grapes, peaches, nectarines, cherries, blueberries, and plums are plentiful in the Southern Hemisphere—so plentiful in fact, that our friends at the Chilean Fresh Fruit Association (CFFA) have had the opportunity to get creative with their bounty. Behold—plum beer!
A Chilean plum beer has been born from a new partnership between the CFFA and the Long Beach Beer Lab Brewery, and the duo have produced and distributed a total of 4,000 16-ounce bottles throughout California. Steve Hattendorf, Western Region Merchandiser for the CFFA shared how this fruity brew came to fruition.
“The key focus of the CFFA is on retail promotions, but this was a really fun and creative way to utilize Chilean plums,” he explained. “An importer donated the plums, and the Beer Lab created a delicious beer out of them. We look forward to potentially working with the Beer Lab on other fruit-forward beers.”
“What is this Beer Lab and can I buy a house right next door?” is what you’re probably asking yourself right now (or is it just me?). Headed by a real life beer scientist and BrewMaster, Dr. Levi Fried, the lab is a brewery dedicated to fermentation-forward beverages, including sours—a personal favorite of mine and a growing category in beer, the CFFA said.
According to Nielsen, for the 52 weeks through May 20, 2017, dollar sales of sour beer styles soared 49 percent in off-premise outlets. And luckily for whoever manages to get their hands on a bottle, fresh fruits such as Chilean plums can be a perfect addition to sours, Dr. Fried said.
“Chilean plums were the perfect addition to our crisp farmhouse ale, Milk the Mustache,” he shared. “Blended with our sourdough ale and aged for three months with the delicious hand processed Chilean plums, the end result was a crisp, complex, and satisfying beer. We look forward to teaming up with Fruits from Chile in the future on more ‘exbeeriments,’ adding other great tasting Chilean fruit to our beer.”
So, sorry Franklin, our trip to the dog park will have to wait another day—I have a Chilean plum beer to track down.
