Searching for intersections between the worlds of beer and wine has been a hot trend for craft beer as of late, with beer-wine hybrids taking the form of things like beer aged in wine barrels, beer brewed with wine grapes, and even a beer from Dogfish Head called Mixed Media that, at 49 percent wine grapes, came as close to being a wine as a beer is legally allowed to be. But over the weekend, Stone Brewing took the idea of the crossroads between wine and beer more literally, officially opening a brewery in the wine bastion of Napa, California.
The new 10-barrel brewery is being led by Steve Gonzalez, Stone’s six-year veteran Small Batch Senior Manager of Brewing & Innovation. “Fortuitously, Steve also had a former career as a winemaker, making him uniquely qualified to bring together the two industries in unique and special ways,” Stone wrote in the announcement. “This will manifest itself in brewing techniques that include wine-barrel aging, beer recipes that include wine grapes, as well as interesting botanicals from the region’s diverse ecology.”