ONE on AaronKleidonandMarikaJosephson

Co-owners, Scratch Brewing Company

How do you source foraged

ingredients?

AK: We gather from our property and from family friends around here, so most of our stuff comes off of probably 100 acres. We try to harvest what won’t kill whatever we’re harvesting, so leaves and seeds we can harvest after the plant has died. Or for certain leaves, we can prune those branches in the spring. We use a lot of species that have been naturalized and are invasive in nature, so there will always be plenty.

MJ: Certain ingredients we know when to harvest and how to keep throughout the year. For instance, today we’re brewing with sassafras leaves. We realized that, at the end of the season, if we can collect branches before they die, we’ll have them to brew with for the rest of the year. So we’re using what we harvested in the fall in this beer now, when it’s barren in our woods.

What flavor profiles can foraged ingredients bring to the beer?

MJ: Each part of the hickory tree lends a different flavor and aroma. We toast the bark to get this kind of campfire, marshmallow sweetness. The leaves give more of an earthy spice, sometimes fruity character. And the nuts themselves lend a nutty character.

AK: Cherry bark has some stone fruit qualities. It gives the beer a dark reddish color and kind of an amaretto flavor.

What items do you most look forward to harvesting while foraging?

Celebrating its 10th year anniversary this April, farmhouse brewery Scratch Brewing Company has grown into its southern Illinois surroundings and blossomed into a thriving local business. Co-owners Aaron Kleidon and Marika Josephson have streamlined their foraging approach to get more mileage out of harvests and utilize as many parts of the plants as possible to craft their brews. “It’s always been part of our mission to not just showcase the flavors here, but to keep things as local as possible,” Josephson says. “This way of making beer – where we’re ordering less from far away, supporting local farmers, nurturing plants that grow natively – those all help to create a more sustainable lifestyle.”

MJ: Mushrooms. We were low last year because it was dry, and we just didn’t collect a lot of chanterelles. Most years, we get as much as 120 pounds, so we’ll definitely be dancing if our harvest is better this year. People will ask when our Chanterelle Biere de Garde is coming out, and the answer is, we’re not making one – or not the one we normally make – because we simply didn’t find enough mushrooms. It was too warm, and there wasn’t enough moisture during the right time of year. For us, it’s also a way of just telling the story about plants and the environment and what’s going on.

Scratch Brewing Co., 264 Thompson Road, Ava, Illinois, 618-426-1415, scratchbeer.com

Must-Try Beers From Scratch Brewing Co.

The

dry-HoPPed SaSSaFraS

This lightly tart farmhouse beer is dry-hopped with Illinois-grown Mackinac hops that complement the tropical lemongrass-ginger aroma.

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