On any given day, you can scroll through Instagram and find brewers adding all manner of odd, yet flavorful, ingredients to the mash. These processed foods, from marshmallows to Fruity Pebbles breakfast cereal to fried chicken to dozens of donuts, are gimmicky, yes, but also usually provide some flavor to the overall beer.
And just when you thought we might be nearing the end of this creative deluge, a brewer comes along and grabs our attention anew. In this case, it’s Imprint Beer Company, a still-small, relatively new operation northwest of Philadelphia, that has kicked the creative can a bit farther down the road.
Rather than add a special ingredient to a traditional mash, Ryan Diehl, the owner and brewer at Imprint decided to use “a yummy fruit-flavored drink” (as described by the manufacturer) known as Little Hug as the only source of brewing and sparge water.