437: Happy Birthday Simcoe! Vinnie Cilurzo and Jason Perrault Look Back on 25 Years of the Ground...

This year marks the 25th birthday of Simcoe, and when Russian River (https://www.russianriverbrewing.com/) cofounder Vinnie Cilurzo suggested recording an episode of the podcast in Yakima to celebrate it, we weren’t going to say no. Rather than sit around a table, we took to the experimental hop rows at Perrault Farms (https://www.perraultfarms.com/) and recorded while walking the field. The result is a wide-ranging conversation that covers history, business, agriculture, creativity, pivotal craft beers, hop evolution, and more.




In this episode, Cilurzo and Perrault discuss:





• how Simcoe was bred by pioneering hop breeder Chuck Zimmerman



• its establishment on three family farms at the time—Carpenter, Perrault, and Smith



• how Simcoe brought the families’ kids back to the farms



• developing the Pliny the Elder recipe around this hop



• the evolution of Simcoe over the past quarter century



• virus-free Simcoe and its flavor and yield impacts



• the impact of pick date on Simcoe flavor and aroma



• Simcoe’s relationship with Mosaic



• selecting Simcoe and processing it into modern flowable formats



• how Pliny the Elder and the new Simcoe 25 beer use Simcoe in new formats






And more.




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