Local brewery toasting success

Trinity Brewing is toasting another honor…a bronze medal at the Great American Beer Festival.

“The Great American Beer Fest is the apex, it’s the pinnacle of American beer,” said Jason Yester who started Trinity Brewing in 2008.

The breweries “Elektrick Cukumbahh” medaled for the second year in a row.

“55-hundred different beers and out of 55-hundred different beers only 240 got medals, or 230-something got medals, so we’re doing pretty good,” said Tom Brown, the head brewer.

Brown says Trinity was one of the first breweries to use cucumbers in their beer. Each batch has 240 pounds of fresh cucumbers the brewery buys from local farmers. Trinity says they pride themselves on buying local ingredients.

“There is a lot of thought behind it. When we’re making relationships with local farmers, when we’re timing exactly the right three days when we can use cucumbers every year,” Yester said.

This year the brewery will produce about 1400 barrels of beer. That’s compared to millions of some major breweries like Coors or Budweiser.

“It doesn’t take much size to make great beer,” Brown said.

And Trinity isn’t a brewery that focuses on six-packs or volume.

“We wanted to do something better with beer,” Yester said. “It’s a lot more sophisticated than normal beer. We’re making some of the best beers in the world.”

The medals hanging discretely on the wall by the kitchen show that others agree.