via Pryes
Jeremy Pryes didn't even realize he was on this path.
Before he got around to creating Pryes Brewing (as the largest soley self-distribution brewery in the state), he was a line cook, a bouncer at bars, a graphic designer, an IT guy for Apple, and then a brewer. That's not even the end of the journey, because now he's into some bug magic.
Pryes has carved out a side hustle in his popular and successful brewery. Mixed culture, bugs (as in yeast strains), Bordeaux barrels, and the like have invaded his mind. When I say carved out, I mean that literally, as he's built a bit of a mad scientist lair within the brewery's distribution warehouse so that he can spend time making wild sours and beer-wine hybrids under a new label: Idyll Forest.
wine barrels and tools in a room
Jeremy Pryes in the Idyll Forest lair.
"Getting to play with all these different ingredients is really cool, because eventually it's gonna be a spontaneous beer made with the air outside," Pryes told me last week, "which is crazy that you can make alcohol with the air outside."
Mixed cultures, or sour beers are just more interesting to Pryes than the fruity beers being made right now in the beer world. "Sours give you flavor. Anybody can take a blonde ale and add mango to it, and it tastes like a blonde with mango. Kinda boring to me. But if you take a mango that's overripe and gushing out, that's the flavor you should go for, that's what culture gets you. You let the bugs do the work to get it to that almost rotten place, and you get a complexity and depth of flavor that is almost the true essence of mango."
Sour beers are nothing new, in fact they're pretty ancient. Other local breweries, notably Boom Island and Fair State, have been playing successfully with mixed culture for years. But Pryes is also messing with what beer can become with grapes and bugs in the mix. Locals such as Wooden Hill Brewing have taken a crack at it, and Indeed's Wooden Soul: Pinot Heartbreak or Inbound Brewing's always evolving Halucidation might be familiar to wine-leaning-beerists, but hybrids have yet to really capture the mainstream's fancy. In his French oak wine barrels, Pryes believes he's got some interesting stuff cooking. He's calling it a wine hybrid wild ale, and the first one to be released to the public lands this Saturday in the Pryes taproom.
two bottles in a tasting room
Soirée Sparkling Cabernet Sauvignon, vintage 2022, was made with imported California cab grapes. Pryes combined the grape must with an already aged golden wild ale, and rested that mix for a while longer in the oak barrels from Bordeaux. This hybrid actually goes through a third fermentation with bottle-conditioning as a finish, which gives it that nice bubble. It has a big 12.2% ABV, close to the average alcohol by volume for regular wine.
I got a taste last week, and for a girl who loves her pet-nats, this definitely feels pet-nat adjacent. Fizzy and alluring, a big ruby red color leads to a bit of berry on the sniff. But when you dive in, you get tart and acidic funk with an underlying tone of cab richness. Each time I went back for a new sip, I found different complexities and flavors. It feels light and bright, but at the same time tannic. It made me want a fatty ribeye to eat with it.
bottle and glass
Can we have a moment for the magical label art? Longtime friend Michael Carina is the artist.
There's more. Parasol Sauvignon Blanc made with blonde ale delivers a sparkling waft of stone fruit. Look for that coming this summer in two versions: original, and original that's been rested on Satsuma oranges. And a pinot noir hybrid is coming too. I also got a sip of the Champs de Framboise which has been secretly available at the taproom if you knew to ask for it. The raspberry wild sour ale fully triggered the memory of picking and eating backyard raspberries at my mom's house. Also available now, his Foret de Cerise is a juicy wild sour ale made with dark Balaton cherries from Michigan, and the Temps de Célebration which is just a fruit party. But it was the blueberry loving Le Bois de Reves wild sour ale that won a bronze medal at the U.S. Open Beer Championship in 2021.
"I was invited to do a collaboration in Peru, I just got back from a collaboration in Detroit, my stuff has been selected to go to Hof ten Dormaal in Belgium and I get to hang out with Rudy at Rodenbach." Pryes said all of this in one breath. He's off to the Leuven Innovation Beer Festival in Belgium at the end of May, but is planning a whirlwind trip around the region to meet up with other brewers as well. This is clearly a passion project for him, and the co-owners of the brewery are giving him time and a budget to see it through.
"You're never going to move forward if you play it safe." I can tell you, I tasted from a lot of barrels in that mad scientist lair, from rosé to apple cider experiments, all in process. He's building outdoor contraptions to capture the air and looking for a space of Idyll Forest's own so that it can keep innovating as Pryes Brewing grows. Knowing what Pryes has built since leaving the Apple IT-guy life, and seeing how invested he is in this passion project, Idyll Forest is clearly a label I'm going to keep my eye on.
Soirée will be available in bottles at Pryes Brewing starting on Saturday, April 30th at 11am. Quantities are limited.
