414: Hill Farmstead at 15—A Conversation with Shaun Hill
Craft Beer & Brewing Magazine Podcast
Brewing Balance: Perfection vs. Character
This chapter explores the tension between perfection and character in brewing, particularly through the lens of hazy IPAs. It emphasizes the role of texture and imperfections in enhancing flavor, while discussing the influence of the Lorien hop variety and the brewers' evolving philosophy on recipe development.
Few breweries in the 21st century have been as influential as Hill Farmstead on American craft beer. This rural Vermont brewery, built on the family property just outside Greensboro Bend, captured the beer world’s imagination upon opening in 2010, and enthusiasts have flocked there from all corners of the world ever since. Their IPAs helped to change the trajectory of the style, and their saisons—trademarked as Farmstead Ales—have received numerous honors, including a Beer of the Year nod from Craft Beer & Brewing in 2018.
Founder Shaun Hill has a reputation as a philosophically driven brewer who isn’t afraid to speak his mind on a broad swath of subjects, and in this episode he covers a wide range:
- changing Edward from an IPA to pale ale 10 batches in
- defending hazy beer in the early 2010s while making contributions to the development of mouthfeel and texture
- making the jump from Conan to London Ale III yeast
- using New Zealand hops effectively
- the origin of the term “Farmstead Ale”
- early iterations of the brewery business plan with a focus on Brettanomyces beers
- finding a Hill Farmstead voice in mixed-culture saison
- acid contributions from Chad Yakobson’s Brett strains
- building beer that maintains peak flavor at 10 years in the bottle
- process refinements while getting back on the brewdeck during the pandemic
- intentional sustainability in the brewery
- balancing consciousness and presence in a demanding brewery environment
- developing a manufacturing philosophy
- weighing needs of the self versus feeding the business machine
- employing a “best known way” philosophy rather than standard operating procedures
- reassessing what creativity looks like
And more.
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