Tag: Reason Beer

Categories
Culture

Reason to believe

Mark Fulton left a desk job to learn the brewing process before founding Reason Beer with college buddies from UVA. Photo: Eze Amos.

At first, making beer was just a hobby for Mark Fulton—when he finished punching the calculator during his day job as an accountant, he’d head home to his lab. Then, in 2010, the amateur beer enthusiast snagged a craft brewing apprenticeship with the American Brewers Guild. He untied his tie, quit his accounting gig, and moved to Maine to brew beer full time. Before long, he was the director of brewing operations at Maine Beer Company.

The mountains of Maine were beautiful, but the Blue Ridge called Fulton back. In 2017, he returned to Charlottesville and joined two friends from his student days at UVA—Patrick Adair and Jeff Raileanu, both avid home-brewers in their own right—to start Reason Beer.

Fulton says the business has enjoyed the support of the Charlottesville community since day one and is also seeing growing support throughout Virginia.

The brewmaster credits the popularity of Reason Beer to a focus on approachable and balanced beer, with recipes designed to produce depth and complexity while remaining complementary to food. The current offerings at Reason include a large range of classic beer styles, but also a wild ale program that focuses on beers aged in barrels obtained from local wineries.

When asked, Fulton says he believes the current popularity of hazy New England-style India Pale Ale is here to stay. For the future, he sees a growing interest in and demand for lower calorie, lower alcohol beers (known as “session” beers). Reason currently offers examples of each, a double-NEIPA style known as Unreasonable, which comes in at 8.5 percent alcohol by volume and the aptly named and contrasting session India Pale Ale named Reasonable, which is a lighter drinker at 4 percent ABV.

Unreasonable is a big, bold beer that is full of both flavor and alcohol. It manages to present a fine balance of biscuit and citrus fruit flavors while maintaining a nice mouthfeel despite lower alcohol. If you are looking for other styles of lower alcohol beer, Reason also has a blonde ale that comes in at 4 percent ABV (Hoppy Blonde), a German-style pilsner with 4.3 percent ABV (AOK), and a Saison farmhouse ale at 4.5 percent ABV.

On September 18, Reason celebrates its fourth anniversary with a block party at the brewery with new releases, food trucks and other programming. As if you needed another reason to check it out. 

Categories
Living

Learn culinary traditions from the masters at folklife showcase

Third-generation candymakers Gene and Dave Williams of H.E. Williams Candy Company make sweets the old-fashioned way in their family’s Chesapeake factory. Gene is one of the masters featured in the Virginia Folklife Program Apprenticeship Showcase that takes place this Sunday, May 6, at James Monroe’s Highland. Photo by Pat Jarrett/Virginia Folklife Program

For those of us who prefer to eat our way through Virginia history, the Virginia Humanities Virginia Folklife Program Apprenticeship Showcase, which takes place Sunday, May 6, at James Monroe’s Highland, is a must-attend annual event. It’s a chance to see how different Virginia culinary traditions are preserved as they are passed down from master to apprentice, and this year’s lineup is pretty sweet.

Third-generation candymaker Gene Williams of H.E. Williams Candy Company is famous for his peach buds, cinnamon swirls, fancy Christmas candy and other old-fashioned delectables, which he and other family members make by hand in Chesapeake. He and his apprentice, his cousin, Lee Bagley, will be on hand to share how the colorful, glossy treats are made (and, of course, how they taste). H.E. Williams Candy Company has been in the Williams family for nearly a century, and it’s one of the last remaining family-run hard-candy factories in the country.

But wait, there’s more! There will be tastings and demonstrations from master baklava maker Sondus Assas Moussa of Harrisonburg and apprentice Sanaa Abdul Jalil; as well as soul food cooking master Tina Ingram-Murphy of Henrico County and apprentice Cheryl Maroney-Beaver. The Ingram family of Richmond will prepare and serve a soul supper and the Proclamation Stew Crew will ladle out real Brunswick stew while Frances Davis fries apple pies. As for what to do when you’re between meals, take in some of the music and craft offerings as well.

Expanded menu

City Market smoothie seller FARMacy LLC has recently revamped and expanded its offerings to include not just superfood smoothies and no-bake, gluten-free peanut butter brownies, but Mexican cuisine made with organic, locally sourced ingredients. It’s all available at the weekly market, with a food trailer coming later this year.

Taking stock of new owner

Calder Kegley is now the owner of JM Stock Provisions, the butcher shop at 709 W. Main St. focused on locally sourced, sustainably raised meats. Kegley, who doesn’t plan to change much about the shop (except for the fact that it’s now offering the tasso ham biscuit all day every day), takes over ownership from Matt Greene and James Lum III, who founded JM Stock four and a half years ago.

Another Reason to cheers

Local brewery Reason Beer, which founders Mark Fulton, Patrick Adair and Jeff Raileanu opened in Charlottesville in August 2017, has been named one of Beer Advocate’s 50 Best New Breweries of 2017. The lineup, announced in the craft brew magazine’s spring 2018 issue, was selected by the publication’s writers, subscribers and followers.

Goodbye, Greenie’s

Greenie’s, known for its vegan barbecue and collard wraps, has left The Spot at 110 Second St. NW. On Wednesday, April 25, balloons and colorful signs reading “Happy Final Day” and “Well Done Greenie’s” decorated the front of the tiny takeout window. Greenie’s owner Kathy Zentgraf says she’s accomplished what she set out to do when she opened the takeout window a few years ago, and it’s time for her to move on to something new and similarly unusual. “I [will] miss—without adequate words—so much, seeing our Spot people every day, from the guys at The Haven who stopped by to remind us to keep our tip jar inside the window, to our regulars who shared news, worries and plans.” Julie Vu’s Vu Noodles aren’t going anywhere, though, and will remain at The Spot as well as at The Jefferson School Café.

Oakhart hosts wine dinner

On Thursday, May 10, Oakhart Social will host a ticketed wine dinner featuring a four-course tasting menu with 12 wines from Flying Fox Vineyard, Early Mountain Vineyards and Lightwell Survey Wines, a raw bar and, as chef Tristan Wraight promises, “crazy snack stations.”

Firsthand farming

On Sunday, May 6, at 2pm, Doniga Markegard, California rancher and author of the book Dawn Again: Tracking the Wisdom of the Wild, will visit The Living Earth School and Farfields Farm in Afton to discuss how knowledge of the wilderness and permaculture can inform farming practices. Tickets to the event cost $10 in advance and $15 day-of.

Categories
Living

Cookie-focused company settles into new home

Found. Market Co., which doubles as a remade furniture workshop and bakehouse, specializes in cookies as well as farmhouse-style baked goods such as muffins and tea cakes. Photo by Tom McGovern

Calling all cookie monsters: Found. Market Co. at 221 Carlton Rd. (the former Kathy’s Produce spot) is here for all of your cookie needs. In addition to functioning as a gathering space and remade furniture workshop, Found. is a bakehouse specializing in cookies—pick up some salted rosemary shortbread, a batch of classic cookies or frozen cookie dough to scoop and bake at home whenever a cookie craving strikes—as well as farmhouse-style baked goods such as muffins and tea cakes, plus comfort foods like Bavarian pretzels, chicken salad and pub cheese.

If that salted rosemary shortbread sounds familiar, it should—Found. started as a wholesale bakery under the name The Bees Knees Kitchen, and it’s been selling shortbread-style cookies at Feast! and Blenheim Vineyards for a few years. The Bees Knees Kitchen eventually grew out of its certified home kitchen and into this larger, industrial-sized space and new name, says co-owner Kelsey Gillian.

Having managed an organic farm for the last 16 years, the Found. team’s “nature is to cook and bake from the field, gather for family dinners and share good food with friends,” says Gillian, adding that it’s all about creating homegrown, handmade “tasty food, imperfections and all.”

New food pairing

Charlottesville has plenty of cuisine options—Mexican, Italian, French, Indian, American—but even in our chock-full-o-restaurants city, it’s rare to find two very different cuisines under a single roof.

Vu Noodles and Pearl Island Catering have teamed up to serve lunch at the Jefferson School City Center café at 233 Fourth St. NW from 11am to 2pm Monday through Friday. (Don’t worry—Vu Noodles will still be served at The Spot/Greenie’s, and Pearl Island isn’t abandoning its catering.)

The menu is a relief for those who can’t decide on just one type of cuisine for their midday meal (or is that just us?). Vu Noodles’ spring rolls, the banh mi sandwich, tofu caramelized onions and various noodle dishes are on the menu alongside Pearl Island dishes such as the Caribbean-seasoned, slow-roasted pulled pork, Haitian-inspired sweet and spicy chicken with gravy, Creole beans and fried plantains.

One more Reason to love beer

In a town where breweries rival Starbucks in numbers, yet another place to imbibe in new brews will open in June.

Childhood friends and Charlottesville natives Patrick Adair, Mark Fulton and Jeff Raileanu are teaming up to open Reason Beer in a warehouse space next to Costco. Adair, director of sales, says the more breweries the better.

“Charlottesville is getting a reputation as a beer town, and that’s awesome,” he says. “We are fortunate enough to be at a time when craft beer seems to sell itself these days.”

To understand the brewery is to understand head brewer Fulton’s background as former head brewer at the venerable Maine Beer Company. In the early days of craft beer there was a focus on making IPAs as bitter as possible but breweries like Maine Beer Company were pioneers in producing beers with balanced hop and malt profiles. Fulton will bring this perspective to Reason, where they will focus on low-alcohol, fresh, hoppy beers.

The brewery is installing a 30-barrel (that’s 930 gallons) brewhouse and will also put in a bottling line that will package 16.9-ounce bottles, a format Adair says is just the right size for drinking by yourself, but also big enough to share.

“I think our focus on balance, approachability, innovation and food pairing will be what distinguishes Reason Beer,” says Adair.—Derek Young

The toast of Tom Tom

Six of Charlottesville’s top chefs went head-to-head in the Iron Chef City Market competition for which each had to create a 100 percent locally sourced dish with a budget of $50, 20 minutes to shop and 30 minutes to cook. Chef Chris Jack of Wild Wolf Brewing Company took the title with a dish of pan-seared duck heart, spicy chocolate granola-crusted duck liver and sautéed oyster mushrooms with purple scallions, wilted arugula and spicy strawberry rhubarb jam.

In the craft cocktail competition at the Tom Tom Founders Festival, Patrick McClure of Lost Saint won over the judges with his Lil’ Rhuby Fizzle, made from sweet strawberry juice from Agriberry Farm, tart rhubarb juice from Radical Roots Farm, Boar Creek Appalachian whiskey and Homestead Creamery cream and egg white. The Flora, a Baker’s gin, strawberry shrub, mint and basil syrup, lemon, cava and cracked pepper cocktail concocted by Oakhart Social’s Brendan Cartin, was the crowd favorite.