Way down yonder in the pawpaw patch

An exciting day is coming in the prodigious world of pawpaw. This Saturday, Weathered Ground Brewery makes the state’s first big commercial release of a pawpaw flavored beer. The fruit gods will surely be lining up for their Pawpaw Pride Farmhouse Ale.

Pawpaw, that mysterious, wild fruit that loves to grow across our mid-Appalachian region. With a taste something like a cross between banana and mango and papaya custard, it provides a rare tropical twist to the flavor palette of our regional cuisine. And it goes great in a beer too.

Q & A

Brilliant Stream spoke with Weathered Ground Brewery co-owner Sam Fonda, who also heads brewing operations there, and asked him about his pawpaw experience and the making of this beer.

1. Q: When you were growing up in Mississippi, did you all have pawpaws there?
2. Fonda: There’s no pawpaws in Mississippi to my knowledge. The climate is completely different down there, and I’m not aware of any pawpaws outside of Appalachia.

What are your earliest memories or awareness of pawpaws?
I’d have to say my earliest memory of finding out about PawPaws was actually in a beer… which might tie into the next couple of questions as well. Carolina Custard was a beer I enjoyed while living in North Carolina. It’s a mixed fermentation wild ale from Fonta Flora Brewery that is still one of my favorite beers.

What attracted you to make a pawpaw flavored beer?
I hadn’t thought about making a pawpaw beer until I was sharing a bottle of Carolina Custard here in WV with my friend Eli. He said, you know I have a friend with a lot of pawpaw trees. Twice since then Eli has brought me coolers of pawpaws that we’ve used in small batches of beer. Once in a sour beer that we had for the grand opening and another time mixed with other fruits in a single wine barrel that was known as “Table Funk.”

The folks at Integration Acres in Albany, Ohio, are definitely the King of Pawpaw. What was it like buying pawpaw fruit from them? How likely are you to buy again?

Buying from Integration Acres was great. I was put in contact with Chris Chmiel (co-owner) through a mutual friend. I met Michelle Gorman (co-owner) at the farm, and she was very hospitable. We talked pawpaws and possibly other ingredients like spicebush berries to buy in the future. The ride to the farm was just beautiful and exciting. I made a weekend trip out of it and stayed with a friend in Athens, which was a great time all around. I would love to buy from Integration Acres again and have sort of an annual Albany/Athens weekend trip every year.

Let’s talk about the actual beer you made. Describe its style, ingredients, fermentation, aging.

The beer we made is what we are calling a Farmhouse Ale. The barley is all from Riverbend Malt House and, believe it or not, there’s a decent amount of hops in it. Mandarina Bavaria and Nelson Sauvin are both used in the boil and whirlpool. The beer fermented for a bit in stainless with the same culture (saison yeast, brettanomyces, and lactobacillus) we used in our Weathered Robot, the collaboration with Wooden Robot Brewery from Charlotte. We then moved it to fresh chardonnay barrels to pick up some oak and wine character before racking the beer back into a stainless steel tank full of processed pawpaw from Integration Acres.  We used close to 100 lbs. of pawpaw pulp, and the beer slowly fermented and rested for over two months.

On bottling day we added more sugar and yeast for bottle conditioning and recirculated the tank throughout the day to ensure that the yeast and pulp made its way into the bottles. The bottles are full of pawpaw pulp so you can expect it to be extra pulpy. I mean that in a good way. The beer should be dry with wonderful wine characteristics as well as some sharp Brett notes. The Pawpaw adds an element of fruitiness and in the final product that I think would otherwise be absent. ABV: 6.5% [NOTE: The bottles then sat and conditioned for several months until Fonda deemed them ready for release this fall.]

What does it taste like? Please describe. 

The fresh Chardonnay barrel is the first thing that sticks out to me. The finish is dry and a little tart. Fruitiness from the pawpaw and yeast is there but it is light bodied. It’s plenty carbonated despite the head quickly dissipating.

It’s one of those beers that you want to take a few sips of and then let it warm up. You know, taste it throughout its entirety and have fun with it.

Name of the beer? Packaging? Will it be distributed? Quantity? Release date?

PawPaw Pride is the name of the beer. We made a 7-barrel batch. We packaged it in 500 ml bottles. I think we have close to 60 cases that we’ll distribute in the taproom, as well as to outside retailers. There will be kegs going out but those will be limited distribution. We want the beer to go all over the state. A lot of people in West Virginia are familiar with pawpaw and grew up with it. Our goal is for anybody who wants to buy it to have a chance to buy it.

Release date is Saturday, September 19th at the brewery in Cool Ridge.

What can folks expect at the brewery for the beer release day?

Saturday, we’re open from Noon to 10:00 p.m. The menu is as usual: salads, beer cheese and pretzels, chips and queso, wings and brick oven pizzas. Unfortunately we aren’t doing anything out of the ordinary for beer releases like music or anything because I think we are trying to not cause large gatherings. We hope for a lot of business but also hope that folks have a beer, eat, and then buy a lot of beer to take home instead of possibly having too many and not following the COVID guidelines.

Pawpaw Pride pricing will be $8 for a 500 ml bottle and $5.50 per pint for draft.

[NOTE: Weathered Ground is fortunate to have a large outdoor-seating beer garden and patio that have a capacity of 140 people with proper social distancing. Sam adds that there is another entire section at the rear of the backyard with open space for blankets if you really wanted to distance yourself. Mask/face covering required at all times outside and inside except when seated at your table. Limit: 6 people per table.]

That’s a good looking label on the bottle. What was it like working with the versatile young West Virginia artist, Rosalie Haizlett?

We met Rosalie at an event last year at The Station in Fayetteville, and I said we gotta use her for a label one day. She’s extremely talented especially with nature themed watercolor and seems to be a very down to earth person. I told her a little about the beer and she nailed the artwork on the first try. She told us she was psyched to do this label because pawpaws grew all over her parents farm, and she grew up picking and eating pawpaws. When I texted her about the release date the other day, she said she was currently eating a pawpaw.

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More WGB Beer

Another reason to visit Weathered Ground this Saturday: canned beer selection. If you have trouble finding Weathered Ground 4-pack favorites in your local market, this week’s can selection at the brewery could be your salvation.

Current 4-pack selection

1. AJ’s Festbier, Oktoberfest Marzen, 6%
2. Haggard IPA, IPA with El Dorado Hops, 6.5%
3. 16 Shots in Munich, German Pilsner, 5.4%
4. More Scrappy than Scrappy, Rye Double IPA, 8.8%
5. Enniskillen, Dry Irish Stout, 4.5%

Brilliant Stream’s West Virginia Beer Roads podcast included AJ’s Festbier in its recent Oktoberfest beer tasting. Check here to find out what we thought about it and four other WV-made Oktoberfest beers.

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Weathered Ground Brewery

2027 Flat Top Road
Cool Ridge, WV 25843

Brewery website link
Taproom Beer Menu on Untappd