Linden Street Brewery's Custom Brews | San Francisco
Linden Street Brewery's custom creations
We've heard of bespoke suits and bicycles.
Now, meet Adam Lamoreaux and Andrew Ritter of Linden Street Brewery in Oakland, who are custom-brewing for two Bay Area restaurants.
For Bar Tartine, Lamoreaux inoculated his Deep Roots Red Lager recipe with Tartine's sour bread starter, which contains the same wild yeasts that give the bakery's loaves their signature flavor.
The resulting brew, named Daily B(red), has a malty aroma. The beer is dry, almost wine-like, and very lightly carbonated ($6 for 16 ounces). Bar Tartine chef Nick Balla uses the spent grain from the brewing process to make pickles; it's culinary synchronicity at its best.
When James Syhabout wanted a house beer for Hawker Fare, the Linden Street brewers looked to the restaurant's rice bowls for inspiration, creating a beer with forbidden rice, lemongrass and shiso leaves.
The beer they created, Supafly, gets its lushness from the residual rice starch, and has a citrusy, grassy flavor, finishing with the clean, minty taste of shiso ($5 for 16 ounces).
The brewery has a tasting room where you can become acquainted with Linden Street's signature brews. But for the custom creations, you have to go to the restaurants that inspired them.
Linden Brewery, 95 Linden St. (at W. Embarcadero), Oakland, 510-812-1264 or lindenbeer.com; Bar Tartine, 561 Valencia St. (at 16th St.), 415-487-1600 or bartartine.com; Hawker Fare, 2300 Webster St. (at 23rd St.), Oakland, 510-832-8896 or hawkerfare.com