E-Malt.com News article: USA, VT: Four Quarters Brewing opens four barrel brewery in Winooski

Four Quarters Brewing opened in Winooski last weekend. Its beers — including Janus, Horn of the Moon and Opus Dei — alternately resurrects historical styles and evokes mythological figures, Sevendaysvt.com reported on March 18.

Founder and brewer Brian Eckert is not only a beer geek but a mythology and astronomy buff. "My interests outside of beer and food are sort of just trying to wrap my head around the universe," says Eckert, who declares himself fascinated with the intersection of religion and beer — that is, with beers brewed by monks.

To wit, he's brewed a patersbier — which means "father's beer" — a low-alcohol abbey ale traditionally brewed by Trappist monks to be consumed within their monasteries. (Eckert's version, called Opus Dei, is a sessionable 4-percent-alcohol beer.)

Eckert borrowed the Latin name for hops, Humulus lupulus, for his Opus Humulus, a 3.9-percent-alcohol-ale "that retains a spicy character from the yeast but has a good healthy dose of hops," he says.

His brewing sometimes draws on unusual techniques. Smoked malts lend their flavor to Chrysalis, a smoked, hoppy red ale. "When it's freshly poured, there's a big aroma of hops, but they're sort of fleeting and drift away as the beer warms up and the smoke character comes out," Eckert says. Unsurprisingly, the first batch is already gone.

Other Four Quarters beers include Horn of the Moon, a witbier brewed with barley and wheat and flavored with orange peel and zest. Despite its seemingly mystical moniker, it's actually named for a pond near Montpelier.

Janus 1 is a "rustic saison" brewed with oats and chamomile, while Janus 2 is the same beer brewed with red wine yeast.

Currently, visitors to Four Quarters can taste samples and fill growlers, but Eckert plans to start bottling soon. Restaurateurs desirous of kegs may not want to hold their breath, however. Eckert is committed to self-distribution to a small number of accounts, but not for a few months at least.

Beer-wise, Eckert has yet to roll out Fleur de Lys, which he calls "kind of a hybrid between a Berliner weisse and a saison," and a series of sour beers.


19 March, 2014