379: Cinderlands Builds Full Dynamic Range into Fruit Beer and IPA by Thinking Beyond Purée and Pellets
Sep 20, 2024
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Paul Schneider, head brewer at Cinderlands in Pittsburgh, dives into innovative techniques for brewing fruit beers and IPAs. He discusses a shift from sweeter, thicker fruit beers to flavorful light lagers, aiming to balance process and taste. Schneider emphasizes the importance of ingredient sourcing, achieving genuine fruit flavors, and layering hops for unique flavor profiles. He also reflects on adapting brewery strategies to consumer trends, showcasing a commitment to quality and creativity while navigating the evolving craft beer landscape.
Cinderlands Brewery has shifted its fruit beer program to feature balanced, lower-calorie options that reflect current consumer preferences.
The brewery emphasizes the use of advanced hop products to layer complex flavors, enhancing both their IPAs and fruit beers effectively.
Cinderlands' ability to quickly adapt its business model during the pandemic showcased their commitment to quality and consumer needs in challenging times.
Deep dives
The Journey of Cinderlands Brewing
Cinderlands Brewery, founded in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, began with the vision of offering a world-class brew pub to the city. Paul Schneider, the founder, initially moved from teaching to brewing, deeply inspired by the Chicago beer scene during its vibrant phases. His passion for brewing flourished as he embraced connections within the industry, leading to valuable experiences at various breweries, including Solomoth. This foundation laid the groundwork for Cinderlands, emphasizing a welcoming atmosphere in a city that was eager for innovative and quality craft beer offerings.
Evolution of the Fruit Beer Program
Cinderlands has notably restructured their fruit beer program to adapt to changing consumer preferences and market trends. Initially, the brewery focused heavily on sweet, heavily fruited Berliner Weisse but recognized a decline in interest for overly sweet offerings. In response, they transitioned to creating more balanced, tart fruit beers that maintain a refreshing quality while lowering ABV. This evolution has also seen the introduction of lower-calorie fruit options such as Little Cinder, which incorporates fruits that resonate with consumers, ensuring a vibrant yet approachable product.
Crafting Unique IPAs
Cinderlands emphasizes variety in their IPA offerings, particularly integrating fruit flavors into both West Coast and Hazy IPAs. The West Coast IPAs focus on classic hop profiles, while Hazy IPAs integrate tropical and fruity characteristics for a juicy finish. The brewery uses advanced hop products alongside traditional T90 pellets to enhance flavor while maintaining balance. This approach allows them to capture hop-forward flavor profiles while appealing to a broad audience, reflecting the dynamic preferences of craft beer drinkers today.
Utilizing Advanced Hop Products
Cinderlands employs advanced hop products, such as Dyna Boost and hyperboost extracts, to enhance their beer profiles by layering complex hop flavors. This technique allows for improved flavor intensity and helps achieve the desired hop character in their beers without sacrificing quality. The team has discovered that the right balance of various hop products can create unique sensory experiences, ensuring each pint reflects a full range of flavor expressions. This flexibility and experimentation have become integral to their brewing philosophy, driving innovation and creativity.
Navigating Post-Pandemic Challenges
The COVID-19 pandemic significantly impacted Cinderlands, forcing them to pivot their business model towards packaging and retail. The brewery's initial plans had to be adjusted as they transitioned to home delivery and grocery sales, which required a fast adaptation to changing market demands. Cinderlands took advantage of their canning capabilities to keep up with consumer interest in convenient packaging, allowing them to weather the challenges of the pandemic effectively. This shift reinforced their commitment to quality and responsiveness to consumer needs, solidifying their presence in the Pittsburgh market.
Future Directions for Cinderlands
Looking forward, Cinderlands aims to deepen its connection to the Pittsburgh community by continuing to innovate its core offerings while exploring new opportunities in the craft beverage space. The brewery is focused on enhancing their unique beer experience while expanding production capacity and diversifying their product streams. There is a commitment to maintain high standards of hospitality and creativity in brewing, ensuring that Cinderlands remains a vital part of the local craft beer scene. Plans include developing new seasonal flavors and expanding availability to enhance their brand connection with consumers and the vibrant Pittsburgh culture.
Paul Schneider of Cinderlands is an optimist and a realist—but first and foremost he’s an analyst, studying the evolution of consumer trends and working tirelessly in the brewhouse to find creative and process solutions. He’s not afraid to use all the tools at his disposal—pulling solutions from food science, where necessary—while testing, honestly evaluating, and ensuring that everything they produce at Cinderlands meets the expectations of their drinkers.
The Pittsburgh brewery drastically overhauled its fruit beer program for 2024, moving away from sweeter, thicker fruit beers in favor of flavored light lagers and “beyond beer” beverages, but—as Schneider explains in this episode—that shift required significant research in the food-science space. He’s also been an avid adopter of modern hop products, and here he shares their approach to layering hops in a variety of formats to achieve a variety of goals—from value-engineering IPAs for wider distribution to maximizing intensity in brewery-only releases.
Over the course of the episode, Schneider riffs on:
designing fruit beers to hit different value tiers without sacrificing flavor
altering processes and bitterness in base recipes for balance with specific fruit additions
light lager as a base for fruit beer
sourcing juice and purée concentrate for more survivable and ranging fruit flavors and aromas
using natural flavor top-notes in conjunction with other fruit formats
adjusting dosing down in production batches from bench trials
using flavor psychology to bolster fruit flavors without sugar
value-engineering hop flavors and aromas for production IPAs without sacrificing quality
saturating hop notes in the UHD (Ultra Hop Definition) series
And more.
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