EP-214 Stuart Winstone and Jasper Tupman of Yonder Brewing & Blending

It’s fair to say that mixed fermentation is having a moment in the U.K.
Natural wine is buzzing like craft beer once did, and its beer equivalent
is starting to do the same.

I mean, no one knows what to call it—mixed ferm, farmhouse, wild ale, sour
beer, barrel-fermented beer, low intervention beer. They all mean subtlety
different things that never quite cover all the bases. Each brewery seems
to pick its own word as they launch their side projects, using the volume
and margins of clean beer to let their brewers off the leash and appeal
once again to the ever-demanding beer geek bubble.

But for me, Yonder have come to define what it means. With a focus on
foraged ingredients, mixed culture yeasts and hands-on brewing it’s not the
afterthought or a the playground for some brewers. It is their
lifestyle—their very reason for being.

Stuart Winstone and Jasper Tupman met working at Wild Beer Co, the OG
mixed-ferm brewery in the UK. They had both been there since the start and
bonded over a love of using unusual ingredients and yeast strains, often
local to them in Somerset.

As Wild Beer Co grew though, the production side became increasingly
commercial and the proportion of clean beer being made grew. Stu and Jasper
felt that to continue producing the beers they loved, they had to go it
alone.

With no outside investment, putting the pieces together took a long time.
There is starting a brewery from scratch, and then there is literally
buying secondhand parts as they came on the market, plumbing them in
yourself, gathering your own ingredients, designing your own brand and
sticking the labels on the bottle you just filled. Stu and Jasper did all
that themselves. While it sounds like a lot of work, it seems that when you
do everything yourself, finding a cohesive identity is a very natural
process.

I joined them on an expedition in the Mendip hills with the brewery terrier
Taco, gathering nettles and dandelions for a new Pilsner they were brewing
the next day.

This is Stu and Jasper of Yonder Brewing & Blending. Listen in.