Hi all,
Sean here, our head brewer and head of talking about, thinking about and drinking way too much of our beer!
I wanted to let you all know before I get into things that the last 24 hours has been a whirlwind. Yesterday we launched our website and social media pages and the responses have been numerous and overwhelmingly supportive. We apologise during this initial rush if we're not able to get to everyone's messages as quickly as we'd like but you guys have been SO supportive that it's an impressively hard job to keep up, and we love it!
In light of this support we wanted to give something back, in the form of a bit of a teaser!
Our values as a company reflect that of us as individuals. Passionate about local independent craft beer. We believe, especially since COVID, that the beer-drinking majority are swinging this way too. People shopping in their local shops, buying independent beer from their local bottle-shop and drinking at their local brewery. This is wonderful as it keeps the local economy alive, almost a return to village like times of old.
This notion is what led us to create our first beer, Magic Stick, which is inspired by this concept.
Years ago beer was not predominantly a recreational drink as it is nowadays. It was made often by farmhouse brewers as a way of treating water to make it safe to store. The alcohol, along with the pH and other properties within the beer (especially when hops entered the fray) kept nasty bugs out of the water so farmhouse workers wouldn't get sick. So the farmhouses made a low ABV beer to quench and nourish the workers in the fields without getting them sloshed.
How cool is beer?!
This was in an age where we had no knowledge or concept of that which we can't physically see, namely yeast. The brewing process around this time was colloquially known as "godisgoode" because there was no explanation as to how this magical transformation came about. Now of course we know that yeast eats sugars and produces alcohol and carbon dioxide as byproducts so we intentionally pitch yeast into our beer to begin its fermentation process. But back then they had no knowledge of such things. They instead stirred or steeped beer with what they literally called a Magic Stick. If they didn't stir it with the stick, the beer would not work.
Pretty soon the best breweries began to really value their sticks and some would even be passed down the generations to carry on the family brewing business or would be used in a bartering system amongst several farmhouse breweries within a village. This created a whole community and society with beer and brewing at the centre of it all acting as a facilitator. An incredibly simple process of bartering that would become so powerful and deeply ingrained in culture for generations to come.
We firmly believe that there is an opportunity to return to this and support local people and indeed other businesses to create a better community for all. Which is why our first beer, Magic Stick had to reflect this.
Coming in at a cool 3.5% it is easy to drink a little more carefree and remain responsible. Brewed with Kveik Voss, originally a farmhouse ale strain, and plenty of new world hops, we like to think it is a modern take on a very traditional style and truly pays homage to generations of brewers that came before us.
To beer, community and magic things to come. Thank you for such amazing support over the past day and a bit, here's hopefully to many more!
Sean
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