The Urban Hop Project: Making Beer with Hops Grown in the Bronx
The Bronx Brewery, the latest craft brewery to come out of New York City, announces a new partnership with The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG), a number of Bronx-based community gardens, and the Cornell Cooperative Extension on an Urban Hop Project, bringing hop growing and an Urban Hop beer to New York City.
A diverse group of Bronx community gardens, including several community gardens in NYBG’s Bronx Green-up program and a Catholic parish, have planted 125 Cascade hop plants this spring to be grown and harvested for a special Urban Hop beer to be brewed and released by The Bronx Brewery later this year. “I’m very excited to work with these community gardeners and develop a beer that spotlights the local character of these hops,” says Head Brewer Damian Brown.
All proceeds from the sale of the Urban Hop beer will be donated to the Bronx Green-Up program (http://www.nybg.org/green_up/) to support continued growth of community gardening in the Bronx. “Bronx Green-Up is extremely grateful to The Bronx Brewery for their planned donation,” said Ursula Chanse, Director of Bronx Green-Up. “The funds will help Bronx Green-Up’s efforts to support urban gardeners by providing valuable growing information and planting materials, keeping the community gardens beautiful and viable.”
The project was founded by The Bronx Brewery, in collaboration with The New York Botanical Garden, to bring together local gardeners and a local brewery to grow local hops to be used for a local beer. Few New Yorkers realize their state was once the largest hop producing state in the country, providing nearly 90 percent of the hops back in the 1880s. Reviving that industry and bringing renewed interest in local sourcing for one of beer’s most important raw materials has been the mission of Steve Miller, a hop expert from the Cornell Cooperative Extension, who put on a hop growing and harvesting workshop for the gardeners, for most of whom this is their first foray into hop growing (pictured).
Says Miller, “When Damian and Chris[Gallant, General Manager of The Bronx Brewery] asked me to be involved I said yes right away. What a great idea to capture the flavor of New York City. The gardeners are all excited because hops are such an unusual crop. We have a new industry starting up all over the state, bringing endless nuances of flavor to New York beers and now we even have hops in the Big Apple. I can’t wait to try the end product!”
The Bronx Brewery is a craft brewery and distributor based in the South Bronx. It was launched in 2011 by a small team with two things in common: a maniacal focus on creating high-quality beer and a passion for the Bronx and New York City. Its traditionally-crafted ales use only premium and minimally-processed materials to create fresh, bold beer from a borough known for its own uniquely bold character. The team is enthused to bring a rich brewing tradition back to the Bronx and craft a beer that the people of the Bronx and New York City can be proud to call their own.
Bronx Green-Up, the community outreach program of The New York Botanical Garden, provides horticultural advice, technical assistance, and training to community gardeners, school groups, and other organizations interested in improving urban neighborhoods in the Bronx through greening projects.
