Farmer’s Reserve No. 3

As we’ve brewed our various beers over the past eighteen months, we’ve regularly stashed away beer in what is now an impressive collection of 250 various wine and spirits barrels. We check on each barrel regularly and wait for just the right time to say, “ready”.  After more than a year of waiting, we are thrilled to release the first three beers in our new 375ml Farm to Barrel Series.

Barrel Noir

This oak-aged ale is our love letter to bourbon barrels. Barrel Noir is a sumptuous, inky ale that celebrates the velvety texture and subtle heat that only Kentucky charred oak can impart. Born from a blend of American imperial stout and Belgian-inspired dark ale aged in bourbon barrels, this rich brew can be paired with braised beef dishes and dark chocolates. Enjoyed best in front of a warm fireplace.Barrel Noir

Farmer’s Reserve No. 1

Our first California wild ale is brewed with a blend of Cabernet & Muscat Grapes from Alfieri Farms, Concord grapes from Hamada Farms and plums from Twin Girls Farm—all located in the fertile San Joaquin Valley. Aged for over a year in used wine barrels, this sour ale blends rich flavors of the 2011 autumn harvest with farmhouse funk. Enjoy with aromatic Taleggio cheese and rich duck confit.

Farmer’s Reserve No. 2

This barrel-aged ale is a celebration of the California autumn harvest. Brewed with heirloom pumpkins from La Tercera Farms in Bodega Bay, crisp Fuyu persimmons from Hamada Farms in the San Joaquin Valley and fresh ginger from the Santa Clara Valley, then aged for over a year in white wine barrels to create a deliciously complex wild ale. Enjoy with delicate white fish and roasted squash.

We’re happy to announce that we are bringing our beers to sunny Southern California starting January 1st, 2013! We’ve partnered with California Craft Distributors to distribute our Farm-to-Bottle beers in Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego counties.  We’re thrilled to be expanding availability outside of the Bay Area and getting our craft beers into the hands of our thirsty Southern California friends.

Southern California has a phenomenal craft beer scene, and we’re very excited to become a part of it. In addition to our seasonal and upcoming barrel-aged offerings, our California Table Beers including Honey Saison, citrus-infused Extra Pale Ale and new Biere de Chocolat are all perfect pairings for Southern California’s sunshine, beaches and year-round delicious seasonal produce and cuisine.

SoCal restaurants, bars, retailers and beer lovers—interested in getting some of our hand-crafted ales?  Drop us a note and we’ll make it happen. Cheers!

We’re proud to introduce our year-round, farm-to-bottle California Table Beer Series.

Our Honey Saison and Extra Pale Ale are the first Almanac brews available year-round in convenient 12oz. bottles. Perfectly balanced, these beers are brewed with California barley, hand-selected additions from local farms, citrusy hops and a touch of oak. Whether shared with friends over a celebratory dinner or afternoon picnic, we invite you to enjoy a new line of beers that could only come from California. Available in bottles and draft in Northern California starting late August 2012.

Honey Saison : 4.8% ABV

Our Honey Saison is a beer for all seasons. Brewed with Bay Area honey from Marshall Farms, wheat, California two-row barley, French oak and fresh, local ginger root for a hint of spice. Balanced with earthy Mount Hood and Saaz hops, this is a refreshing brew enjoyed best with your favorite seasonal fare.

Extra Pale Ale : 6.0% ABV

Our Belgian-style Extra Pale Ale is brewed with heaps of sweet Mandarin oranges from Blossom Bluff Farms and California two-row barley. We dry-hop with generous doses of aromatic Cascade and Columbus hops and finish the beer with a hint of lightly toasted American oak.

Taylor tasted our new Biere de Mars with Fennel and almost instantly knew what he wanted to do with it.  Building on the fennel base already in the beer, he created a lightly smoked cooked salami that layer beer and fennel on top of the natural sweetness of the pork.  Finally the stuffed salami is lightly smoked and steamed in the beer for one last layer of beer-goodness.

Sliced thin on a crostini with a small salad it’s a great accompaniment to the beer, puling out the earthy fennel flavors and bitter backbone.  Available this spring at the SF & Napa Fatted Calf stores.

Here is how he made it:

One highlight of the farm is Grant’s collection of vintage (but still in use!) tractors and farm equipment. Lined up along the fields in various states of repair, these old beasts are loaded with personality. If only we could find a way to get one to the brewery!

We visited the farm at the height of citrus season just before the new year to pick out the perfect blend of oranges for our brew. Cliff proudly displayed his wares as they came in from the field, and showed us around much of his beautiful 180 acre plot.

A highlight of our day was Cliff’s tour of his Buddha’s hand trees.  Buddha’s hands are a citrus with a sweet pith, aromatic zest and long octopus-looking fingers. Cliff showed us how to select good ones (no black or white soft spots) and handed us a pair of clippers to pick our own case.

Dotted with retired vintage cars and trucks, the long legacy of the Hamada family working this land is plain to see, and evident in the bountiful fruit they grow.

Local black cod is seared, then moved to the oven to finish.

In another pan he cooked a handful of seasonal beans, including Haricot Vert, Romano, Cannellini and Cranberry beans.

He added fresh shiitake mushrooms, and a stock made of mushrooms and Umeboshi – cured and pickled Japanese plums. The cured plums added a slight sweetness to balance the earthiness of the mushrooms.

The finished dish is topped with shiso leaf, to bring out even more aromatics.

Twin Girls Farm is an amazing place. Located just southeast of Fresno against the foothills of the Sierra Nevada, it’s a patchwork quilt of organic farmland pieced together over several decades by the Sanchez family. Nestled in the quiet town of Yettem, California (population 211!), Nacho and his wife Cassi run a great operation—one they take great pride in showing off. On a hot, late summer day in September, we drove down to walk through the orchards, taste the fruit right off the trees and meet the people who grow our food.

Founded in 1989, Twin Girls Farms is a family project through and through. While Nacho oversees the orchards, his wife Cassi runs the office and books (where she proudly points out that her shoes stay clean). The farm has grown organically, literally, over the years—adding an acre of land here and there. The result is a patchwork quilt of orchards spread across the surrounding valley. Plums are just a part of what is grown at Twin Girls Farms. In fact, they grow a huge variety of organic fruits, allowing them to have a year-round harvest. This also means that rather than bringing in a large number of seasonal workers for each harvest, they can instead have a small team of full time employees. Before we headed out to the orchards to taste the last plums of summer, we tried a few other treats—such as early season pomegranates and jujubees, a super-sweet small apple.

We loaded up into Nacho’s truck and headed into the orchards where the last plums of the season still clung to the trees. On our walk through the groves, we learned that plums are picked while still firm to ripen post-picking. We also learned that plums hold up to cold storage very well.

The natural, white, waxy coating of the plums is called “bloom” – it’s a natural wax that the plums develop to protect themselves from the elements. It’s easily rubbed off, revealing a brilliant purple skin beneath.

After tasting the fruit from the trees and sweating in the hot Yettem sun (100º+), we drove back to Nacho’s cold storage location where just-picked fruit is stored until it’s ready to deliver to regional farmer’s markets. Plums can be stored cold for weeks without any degradation to the fruit. Cases of yesterday’s harvest were brought out for us to sample. We worked with Cassi and Nacho to find the right balance of sweet and tart plums for our brew.

Stuffed to the brim with plums, we packed the trunk of our car with more samples for further tasting and “research” (read: plum crisps, homebrew and crumble for weeks) and headed back to San Francisco. When we see the Twin Girls stand at the Ferry Building Farmer’s Market, we don’t just see a myriad of jewel-like fruit, we see the culmination of Nacho and Cassi’s dreams and incredibly hard work. Working with small California farms, meeting the people that grow our food, and seeing where and how it grows are the best parts of our brewing process. Twin Girls Farms has been a sincere pleasure to work with and we can’t wait to go back with a bottle of our Farmhouse Pale in hand to share what we made with their glorious harvest.

What Kai captured on film (or, digital film anyway) was us transforming from two guys who wanted to start a brewery, to two guys who did start a brewery.   Then he edited the whole thing together to make it look like we planned it that way the whole time.

Farm to Barrel from Turnstyle Video on Vimeo.

Thanks Kai for making us look so good, and helping us tell the story behind Almanac so well!