Is This Love

Origin Story

Mike Baltzell: I got all of my inspiration for this beer from my fiancée Emily, soon to be wife on the 10th! She cannot have gluten or she will become sick...for days. This is a relatively new problem that started a few years ago. Before that we could sit down to a cold frosty one together and relax. When I started working here last year we had bugged Joe, a couple of times, about having some gluten free stuff on tap at the pub, not knowing that StarCut was coming out right around the corner. Needless to say Emily was super pumped about that news, and continues to enjoy awesome ciders today. However she has confided in me that she misses the days when she could drink a beer like everyone else and not get sick. Now at this point you may be saying "Mike! we have gluten reduced beers already!!!". First off calm down already, secondly I also understand that "Gluten Free" means a lot to some people. If it doesn't say, "Gluten Free", gluten free people arn't going to touch it. Its just not worth the risk to them. So with that in mind I wanted to make a beer that Emily could drink AND surprise her with it at the wedding (I told her I wouldn't be able to make a wedding beer). Now, this is also very special because its my first beer that I conceived in my brain and am seeing it as a finished product. So with the help of Ryan and Tony, I decided I would use another beverage Emily enjoys, green tea and honey. I wanted quinoa in there to try something new, threw in some lemon peel on top of that and Tony decided sorghum would work best for what I wanted to round it out. So after bugging Tony and Ryan for months about getting a recipe down and a brew date, it ended up coming together and I couldn't be happier!...well...until the 10th of course.