Dwinell Country Ales reopening after 3 Years, now making Lagers, Cider & Wine

Gorge brewery’s renovated retail space to offer signature wild ales, slow-fermented lagers, heirloom ciders, and new low-intervention wines.

 Pacific northwest farmhouse brewing favorite, Dwinell Country Ales, is reopening after a full three-year hiatus. The Goldendale, Washington brewery near the Columbia River Gorge, is reopening their tasting room on Friday, May 12th, 2023.

Those who previously visited Dwinell’s Goldendale tasting room will likely notice several updates to the space’s look and feel. And to accompany these changes, guests will now have a unique opportunity to experience Dwinell’s expanded beverage offerings—many of which will remain exclusive to their Goldendale tasting room.

On its beer menu, Dwinell’s rotating curation of seasonal, rustic and wild ales will be complimented by a new selection of exclusive, small batch lagers and hop-forward ales.

Apart from making beer, the Dwinell team farms a low-density apple orchard about a mile from its production facility and has developed a reputation for its annual production of wild-fermented, pét-nat ciders.

Along with its beer and cider offerings, Dwinell has been quietly developing a small wine program with a focus on low-intervention fermentation techniques, including skin-contact wines and spritzy piquettes.

Dwinell’s May 12 tasting room reopening will mark both the release of their 2022 vintage ciders and commemorate the official launch of their winery brand.

“As we prepare to reopen with not only beer, but also our own homegrown cider and wine,” says co-owner Justin Leigh, “we’re making an effort to reconceptualize and present our space as more than simply a brewery tasting room and rather as a kind of tasting room writ large that showcases beer, wine, cider, and other fermentations.”

Dwinell’s tasting room, located 100 miles east of Portland in downtown Goldendale, will operate on a seasonal basis. During the summer, it will be open Friday, Saturday, and Sunday from 12 pm to 6 pm. For more information and current hours, visit www.countryales.com.

More about Dwinell:

Dwinell, which opened in August 2017, quickly made a name for itself as one of the “Top Three Small Breweries” in the country according to beer writer Jeff Alworth for Craft Beer & Brewing magazine and one of the “The Six Best Washington Breweries Outside Seattle” by The Stranger.

Due to the pandemic, Dwinell owners Justin and Jocelyn Leigh made the difficult decision to keep their tasting room closed. Instead, they focused the company’s efforts on developing canned versions of their saison-inspired and wild beers, and heirloom ciders, while expanding the company’s distribution footprint within the Pacific Northwest, as well as to California and international markets in Denmark and South Korea.

Dwinell Country Ales owners Justin and Jocelyn Leigh

These changing business conditions gave Dwinell an opportunity to build off the initial momentum they experienced by developing a small yet devoted cult following for their beers, while also winning numerous Gold Medals at the Washington Beer Awards, the National Honey Board’s Beer Competition, SIP Magazine’s Best of the Northwest, and, most recently, at the Best of Craft Beer Awards.