Your hometown favorites, Macon Beer Company, will also be debuting their new seasonal offering at the Macon Octoberfest. Eager to know more about their next offering, I sent a few questions over to Jeremy Knowles to see what they have in store. Here's what Jeremy had to say.
What is the name and style of the beer you're brewing for Macon Octoberfest?
The brand is HOMEBREW. Using this brand as a medium, we plan on identifying up and coming homebrewers by showcasing a developed recipe and making it commercially available. This batch is our first and the homebrewer is CJ Holmes. CJ won last year's Octoberfest homebrew competition and he won with a peach IPA.
What all can you tell us about the Octoberfest beer?
This round of HOMEBREW is a Peach IPA. It is a 7.3% ABV, has around 70 IBU's and is hopped with Millennium and Glacier hops. Macon Beer Company partnered with Lane Southern Orchards to get the peaches from the Ft Valley location.
When were the peaches added to the beer and why did you choose that stage in the brewing process?
Peach puree was provided by Lane Southern Orchards and we added it to secondary fermentation. At Macon Beer Company we propagate our yeast from batch to batch so adding the peaches before secondary would likely result in our next few batches having some peach aroma or flavor. We didn't want to continue the peach theme but we wanted to have active yeast on the peach to get the flavor profile most closely matching the homebrewer's recipe. It made the most sense to rack the beer with some active yeast onto the peaches.
Macon Music seemed to be a big success, is this beer similar to Macon Music?
Though both MUSIC and this year's version of HOMEBREW are both IPA's, the comparison really stops there. MUSIC was more of a traditional IPA where hop overtones are the focus. HOMEBREW has a deep fruit aroma and finishes slightly tart but peach is really the focus.
After the Macon Octoberfest, will this beer be available around town?
The beer will be debuted at Octoberfest and will be featured around town. Supplies are limited but the brand will be available after Octoberfest.
What's your favorite thing about the Macon Octoberfest event?
The support the Octoberfest leadership offers to the Macon community through donation and engagement is really my favorite thing about the festival. It's also great the festival showcases Georgia craft beers. Georgia's, and really the southeastern US craft beer scene is booming. Not many festivals have caught on that Georgia has great craft beer and even fewer are brave enough to limit the breweries to only Georgia craft.
When will the next Macon Beer Company seasonal beer come out? Can you give us any details about it?
Macon Beer Company is still a company in startup mode. We're going to take some time to better equip ourselves for the upcoming year. Our next seasonal will be Macon Love and will be released in March in conjunction with Macon's Cherry Blossom Festival.
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Congratulations to CJ and we all look forward to trying out your recipe as the very first Macon HOMEBREW! The Macon Octoberfest is this Friday and Saturday and it looks to be a great weekend for it. Tattnall Square Park is the location, and yes, the Atlanta German Polka Band will be playing both Friday and Saturday. It's not Octoberfest without beer steins and polka!
