Salt & Straw Brewers Series of Ice Cream/Beer Collaboration Flavors
Portland, Oregon’s internationally recognized ice creamery Salt & Straw is collaborating with five different well-known craft breweries from across the country on The Brewers Series of beer ice cream flavors.
Founded in 2011 in Portland, Oregon, Salt & Straw has been on the forefront of innovative ice cream flavors, unique and off-the-wall combinations, and adventurous gastronomical creations. Their ice cream shops were an almost instant hit, and they have rode the wave into major investments from the likes of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and appearances on national TV and media coverage the world over. But many don’t know that Salt & Straw has been playing with craft beer flavors since the beginning. I actually remember meeting S&S co-founder and head creative officer Tyler Malek before they had launched, and talking him through the brewing process and discussing ways to integrate, hops, malt, fruit, and more. Beer Collab are nothing new for S&S, beginning with their Portland Beer Week flavors all the way back in 2011. But this June 2024 “The Brewers Series” is their biggest step to date into the world of craft beer.
For the month of June, Salt & Straw locations across the country will feature rare specialty flavors inspired by beers from breweries including Métier Brewing Company in Seattle, WA; Breakside Brewery in Portland, OR; Russian River Brewing in Santa Rosa, CA; Monkfish Brewing Co. in Torrance, CA; and Cerveceria La Tropical in Miami, FL. Salt & Straw and each brewery worked together to translate the liquid fermentation artistry in malt, hops, yeast, and water, into churned ice cream flavors that capture their essences in a family friendly non-alcoholic scoop. The flavors don’t just combine beer and ice cream, but instead celebrate the different beers by deconstructing each one and putting them back together. All five breweries selected are known for something different, each with a distinct identity, and each ice cream based on a distinctly different style of beer; porter, barrel-aged stout, lager, Lambic-style sour, and hazy IPA.
Métier's Black Stripe Porter & Bread Pudding
Made with Seattle's Métier Brewing Black Stripe Coconut Porter
Métier Brewing in Seattle is one of the country's only Black-owned breweries and has become an influential model of how breweries can build community through beer. Salt & Straw wanted to integrate their silky-smooth Black Stripe Coconut Porter with a secret recipe for bread pudding from Marjorie's, their favorite restaurant in Seattle. To do this they essentially make an unfermented soup of the key ingredients, using 3 different types of malt and 1 type of barley, they add toasted coconut and boil them in water for 20 minutes. Then strain, add hops and steep for 10 more minutes before straining again. This concentrated syrup creates an unfiltered coconut beer (similar to beer wort) that replicates the flavor profile of their Black Striple Porter that’s added to our ice cream base with heavy cream with a splash of the beer. Finally, S&S adds little bites of crispy brioche toffee on top of the gooey bread pudding for an unforgettable finish.
Breakside's Barrel-Aged Chocolate Stout
Made with Portland's Breakside Brewery Barrel-Aged Stout
Oregonian’s need no introduction to Breakside Brewery, one of the most award-winning and best-selling craft breweries of the past decade. Breakside was one of the first beer makers to collaborate with Salt & Straw in the early days, and so it was a natural choice to partner with them again on highlighting a first-of-its-kind barrel-aged stout to make the ice cream. Breakside in turn, turned Salt & Straw Ice Cream into a flavored barrel-aged stout called ‘Shasta Taffy’ available now in 22oz wax dipped bottles.
Salt & Straw approached their Breakside collaboration by steeping cocoa nibs in Breakside’s stout for 4 days and then dried them out in an oven. They then folded the nibs into a velvety chocolate coating to make a bark. Using the leftover beer from the steep and turned it into a tres leches cake by adding cream and sugar. The final ice cream flavor has a swirl of barrel-aged stout tres leches running through each scoop. Added all together, you get this unique chocolate malty taste that’s just, like, triple intense.
Russian River’s Supplication Ale with Manchego
Made with Santa Rosa's Russian River Brewing Supplication Ale
Northern California’s Russian River Brewing is one of the most famous breweries in the world. They originated the style of Double IPA with their world-famous Pliny the Elder, and helped bring Belgian-style beer and Lambics to America with their influential ‘tion series. So even Salt & Straw was starstruck when they had the opportunity to collaborate with Russian River on a frozen yogurt flavor with one of the aforementioned ‘tion sour fruited beers.
Supplication Ale is Lambic-inspired sour ale brewed with bacteria and wild yeast, aged 12 months with dried cherries in Pinot Noir barrels. Released just once a year, it is a bonafide classic and an important introduction of Lambic beers to U.S. audiences. Salt & Straw makers approached this frozen yogurt flavor with reverence, by making it into a beer fudge swirl with their time tested in-house recipe, only using Supplication instead of water. The fudge is handled with a light touch to let the beer reveal itself, with a touch of manchego cheese, and add a ribbon of marmalade made with the same tart cherries used in the beer. It's fresh, tangy, and calm-tasting—all things considered—and that beer fudge is the star of the show.
Monkish's Space Cookies & Cream Hazy IPA
Made with SoCal’s Monkish Brewing’s Space Cookies Hazy IPA
Possibly the Los Angeles area’s most sought after brewery, Monkish Brewing started out as a Belgian-centric brewery before pushing the boundaries of hops in Hazy IPA’s. Monkish founder Henry Nguyen's Monkish Space Cookies is one cool beer, triple-dry-hopped to taste like ‘nilla wafers in a super dank IPA. It gets its iconic hazy profile from a sharp use of English yeast, and Salt & Straw wanted to nail the unique hop flavor with our own proprietary pastry techniques. They did so by creating a hop syrup in the same way that bartenders make a simple syrup, only inspired by the double-dry hopping that makes these beers extra potent aromatically. They simmered hops, strained, added in more, letting the pungent and juicy aromas stickiness seep into the beer. Finally they added fresh grapefruit zest, and a swirl of 'nilla cookie butter. You'll be a Monkish space case, too.
La Tropical's La Original Lager with Guava
Made with Miami's La Tropical La Original Lager
Originally established in Cuba in 1888, Cervecería La Tropical was the country’s oldest brewery before it migrated to Florida. In 1897 the beer started to be produced in Florida, and then the Cuban embargo and incoming competition from Anheuser Busch and Schlitz forced the shutdown of the brewery in 1961 and the family was forced to flee to Florida in the revolution. Fast forward to 2016 and the brand was relaunched under contract, and a new brewing facility was built in 2017. La Tropical's original flagship La Original Ámbar Lager is proudly being brewed again in Miami, and gets the Salt & Straw ice cream treatment in The Brewer’s Series.
The bready, graham-cracker-like flavor profile of this La Original Lager beer inspired Salt & Straw to toast its historic recipe with the taste of homemade flan and a lightly sweet guava drizzle. Using the same technique as in making other beers ice creams, S&S made a hop syrup to get the underlying malt-driven notes of honey, perfectly balanced with noble hops, it will make you raise your cone and cry "Viva La Tropical!"
The Brewers Series will be available in all Salt & Straw shops and online for nationwide shipping at saltandstraw.com.
