498: Andrew Sabatine of Around The Horn Builds Classic Through Lines to Anchor Modern Lagers and West Coast IPA

Andrew Sabatine of Around the Horn (Groveland, CA) may have learned much of his trade at breweries on the hazier and more fruit-driven side of the brewing equation, but serving a small mountain town with a huge tourist population means making all the beers that people might want to enjoy. Lagers play an ever-growing role in that product mix, but Sabatine doesn’t fully throw out the rulebook when crafting hop-driven lager, preferring to add Noble hops through hot side additions while pushing more pungent aromatic hops in the dry hop, even in more modern hop-driven styles like West Coast Pils.

In this episode, Sabatine discusses his approach to West Coast Pils and West Coast IPA, along with experimental projects like West Coast Red Pilsner. Along the way, he discusses:

finding ways to build character despite only being capable of single infusion mashes

blending pils malts to tweak lager body

first wort hopping with larger volumes of lower IBU Noble hops for more integrated bitterness

cementing modern pils styles like West Coast and New Zealand pils with Noble hops hot side

brewing West Coast Red Pilsner with Columbus cryo first wort, Hallertau Mittlefruh hot side, and New Zealand hops on the cold side

fermenting colder to control ester production in West Coast IPA

And more.

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Berkeley Yeast