Interview: brewmaster Iacopo Lenci (Birrificio Brùton)

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Craft Beer Italy

Brewmaster Iacopo Lenci brings his signature style to the Italian craft beer community. [Birrificio Brùton]

INTERVIEW CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS PAGE

I respect every brewer. Speaking about my personal tastes I love breweries such as Birra del Ducato and Birra del Borgo from the major ones, but we have a great number of microbreweries making incredible products: I think about BiDù, Orso Verde, Amiata, Olmaia and many others. Plus, for the reasons I explained before, Baladin. And I’m sure I’m forgetting some, it is so difficult to quote them all: Italian beers are basically GOOD beers. But these are only personal tastes, all of us demonstrate passion and love, there is no other reason to make beers in a wine country such as Italy, and this is absolutely to be respected.

What is the newest beer that you brewed, and what was your approach?

The last creature of the family was the Bianca, our wheat beer. And I’m not a fan of spiced beers, so I made it in the way I like, working on silky and velvety sensations using spelt as well (IGP from Garfagnana, the hills just behind Brùton Brewery, totally organic) and white pepper. It came out quite well: we just won the first prize given by the Italian Craft Beer Association in its category.

After that we had to wait for some time before experimenting with new beers because of the success we had: having no free space or free fermenters, we had to produce for a year all our beers. Now we have completed the expansion of the brewery and we have time to make new stuff, including some cask/oak edition of some of my beers. But this is still a secret. You’ll probably see that soon.

Were there any beers that you enjoyed or were surprised by during your visit to America?

I’ve always been a curious drinker of the American craft beers. I like them! Again it is quite difficult to quote just some of them but those that I really love are stuff like Terrapin, North Coast, Allagash, Left Hand and Lost Abbey. Or marvelous little regional breweries such as the Brooklyn settled Six Point. And there are so many that I can’t quote just ’cause I still haven’t tasted them all.

If you had to drink only one more glass of beer, what would it be?

Thomas Hardy’s Ale, as aged as possible.

Where are your beers available?

We make a total of approximately 200,000 bottles annually. Five of our beers are now available in the U.S. and Canada and there’s St. Renna (9% alcohol) that’s a seasonal Christmas Ale. You’re welcome to visit the brewery and restaurant in Lucca. We don’t do formal brewery tours but call or email ahead and I can arrange it. ([email protected])

Brùton is now served at Il Capriccio on Vermont, Terroni, Angelini, Library Ale House
(Santa Monica) and Rock n Brew (El Segundo). And is also available at K&L Hollywood
and select Whole Foods stores.

Find more of Kathy A. McDonald’s writing at Eastside Eye, along with Variety and several other publications.

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Blog Comments

Hi, it is me again. I am so glad you are doing well with your beer. I live about 135 miles from San Francisco, south in the Vegetable Basket of the World, SALINAS, CA. Trucke go in and out; 24 hours a day.I worked in selling imported foods in North Beach for over 10 years. We sold a lot of wine. And we carried 65 imported beers. I did this for over 40 years. I have diabetes and I had the lower portion of my right leg removed just below the knee.I would love to get to Lucca to meet my relatives. Maybe next year.

I love beer. But that is not what this is about. I was checking about family from Lucca. My Dad was born there in 1906.He had (4) sisters and (1) brother. I have not had the oppurnity to vist Italy. My grand parents owned the Lenci Bakery. My Dad came here aboard ship when he was 12 years old.Family met him when the ship came in and packed him up and sent him to San Francisco. Was raised in North Beach. Little Italy. A lot of Chinese are moving in that aera and taking over.

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