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Fruit Guide

Most breweries eventually get around to making a fruit beer, but we kind of did it backward: we started with the fruit and never really left. After a few years, we ran into a funny problem. There simply wasn't a word for what we were brewing, so we had to invent one. This guide is a breakdown of that term, the density scale behind it, and where everything else we make fits into the picture.

The scale

If you ask a brewery that makes a fruit beer how much fruit they use, they'll usually just say "a lot." Very few will give you the actual numbers.

When we build a Fruit Tart, the fruit isn't just an ingredient, it's the main event. We even put an adjective in front of the name to tell you exactly how heavy-handed we were, measured in pounds per gallon.

  • Fruit Tart, under one pound per gallon
  • American Fruit Tart, one to two pounds per gallon
  • Midwest Fruit Tart, more than two pounds per gallon

At the top end of that scale, you're looking at more than three ounces of real fruit in a single 12-ounce can. It’s definitely not the easiest way to brew, but it’s the only route we’ve found to get the flavor we want. Take Gadget, for example, there are roughly sixteen blackberries and raspberries packed into every can. We know that because we actually sat down and counted them.

Why fruit

The candid answer? We just really liked it, and we wanted to be incredibly good at one specific thing. Back when we started, a lot of people were making the same handful of beer styles extremely well. Fruit was uncharted, difficult, and weird, which is a polite way of saying almost nobody else wanted to deal with it.

But it suited us perfectly. It turns out that to do this right, all you need is patience, an unreasonable amount of curiosity, and the kind of personality that enjoys arguing over whether we should use Blenheim or Patterson apricots.

What makes a Fruit Tart

Think of it this way: a "fruited gose" is a gose that happens to have fruit added to it. A "fruited sour" is the exact same deal. The style of the beer is decided first, and the fruit just shows up later, like a guest at a table that’s already been set.

A Fruit Tart is built completely in reverse. We pick the malt and the yeast based on their willingness to step aside and hold the door open for the fruit. Nothing goes into the recipe just on its own account. If a grain doesn't make the fruit taste more like itself, it doesn’t go in the tank. That right there is the whole difference, and it’s exactly why the standard craft beer dictionary just didn't work for us.

Seedless

Seedless is our non-alcoholic Fruit Tart. It’s built with the exact same fruit and the exact same philosophy on density, just without the ABV. To be honest, it might not drink much like a traditional beer, but that was entirely on purpose. Most NA beers spend their whole budget just trying to do an impression of a beer, and that impression usually falls apart pretty quickly. We decided to put that money into the fruit instead, since that’s the best trick we know, and let the "beer impression" fend for itself.

Capy Snacks

Where the Fruit Tarts lean tart, Capy Snacks is fruit-forward and unapologetically sweet. It has its own opinion on what a fruit beer should feel like. It’s not trying to compete on the density scale with anything above it on this page, and honestly, nobody drinking it seems to mind.

Cincinnati Black Raspberry is usually the one people try first, often because a friend handed you a can. If the tart side of things has never been your vibe, this is your front door. The capybara on the can won't judge you for taking it.

The Dino Series

These are traditional, clean beer styles that feature real fruit. It's a completely different job. Stego is a Golden Ale, Spino is an IPA, and Missing Linck is a prickly pear Mexican Lager. Here, the base beer takes the lead and the fruit plays a supporting role. "Fruited beer" is actually the honest, perfect description for this lineup, which is why we keep them totally separate from everything else on this page. We spent a decade earning the other distinction, so we like to keep our definitions straight.

And yes, the names keep getting shorter - Stego, Spino, Ally -because absolutely nobody has ever successfully ordered a Pachycephalosaurus in a loud, crowded taproom, and we decided to stop asking people to try.

How to read a release

Core. These are our year-round staples. Always in the cooler, and they lead their respective categories. (Gadget, Teak, Capy Snacks Cincinnati Black Raspberry, Stego, Spino, and Missing Linck).

Seasonal. Think of this as a rotating slot rather than a specific beer. Five or six different releases will pass through this spot over the course of a year, so what you get entirely depends on when you stop by.

Windfall. In an orchard, a "windfall" is the fruit that drops from the tree on its own and has to be used right away before it turns. Our Windfall releases are exactly like that. They show up without much of a plan, stick around for a few months, and then disappear for good. There’s no waiting list, and they rarely come back. If one of them happens to be the best thing we brew all year... well, that’s just the risk you run by drinking somewhere else on a Tuesday.

A million pounds of fruit

We process over a million pounds of fruit through this building every year, and every single ounce of it ends up in a glass. Over the years, we’ve worked with more than 200 different fruits, from berries and stone fruits to stalks.

But every Wednesday, we do something different. We tap a Fresh Fruit Tart. It’s real fruit, chopped and blended right here, and pitched directly into a keg of neutral base beer. There is no second batch. These kegs give us a playground to learn about different fruits, weird seasons, and new blends.

Wednesdays are also the only days some of this fruit gets to tell the truth about its color. See, fruits like prickly pear, beet, and amaranth get their color from betalains rather than the anthocyanins that make most berries red. Betalains are tough enough to survive the pH drop of a sour beer, but they completely quit when exposed to heat. Missing Linck goes into the can a shocking, vibrant pink, but because our cans are pasteurized on the way out the door, it pours the color of a sandy beach. A Wednesday taproom keg, however, never sees the pasteurizer.

So, if you want to know what a million pounds of fruit a year actually buys us? It buys us the freedom to spend our Wednesdays making something that won't survive the weekend.