Last night a local brewery sent out a call for help with their first ever hop harvest. Most breweries don't grow their own ingredients, but this Sacramento brewery, Ruhstaller, wanted to do just that. Since their just getting started with the project, they looked to some of their patrons for help, so I got up before dawn this morning and drove out to a farm to help out. It was a lot of fun, and I had no idea what I was getting into!
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| It was a beautiful and cool morning before the sun came up. |
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| Since these were brand new vines, they weren't too lush yet and only took a few hours to strip clean. |
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| Hops are a flavoring and bittering ingredient in beer, and it's really the oils inside those green "cones" that provide what brewers are looking for. |
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| A snazzy harness made holding onto the bag easy. |
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| Then, all of a sudden, the farm owner came and encouraged us to take a breakfast break. He ushered us to a spread of delicious locally baked pastries from the nearby town, Winters. |
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| Other people on the farm and the rest of the hop pickers all sat down and it was a very friendly and fun environment. |
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| The farm is a beautiful place with a lot of good, earthly, and communal energy. |
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| The guy in charge of the hop growing, and the son of the farmer, took us on a tour of the property, which is next to Putah Creek. |
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| These hops were vacuum sealed and will eventually go into the "wet hop" beer "Hopsac" by the Ruhstaller Brewery. I can't wait to try the results, and it will be even more enjoyable knowing my fingerprints are on the process like this. |
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| Of course the brewery owner obliged us with some free beer. These were unlabeled cans of a beer they haven't even released to the public yet. It was neat getting a behind-the-scenes experience like this. |
