1889 August | September 2018

Dwinell
Country Ales
Open for less than a year, Dwinell
Country Ales in Goldendale
is pouring a lineup of
quenching, slightly tart
and funky brews, perfect
for drinking under
Goldendale’s famously clear
desert skies. Cofounder and
brewer Justin Leigh said
Goldendale, an agricultural community
of fewer than 3,500 residents, makes
more sense for a country brewery than
“under the train tracks,” in say, Chicago.
Much of what’s now on tap has been
fermented using the “wild” inoculants
now offered in the catalogs of most
major yeast labs, with a steady trickle
of brews incorporating local fruits and
their yeasts. Leigh takes an experimental
approach to wild fermentation, finding
ways to merge laboratory sophistication
with hand-harvested yeasts from
the countryside. For example, he
and cofounder-wife Jocelyn Dwinell
Leigh picked Yakima Valley apples,
spontaneously fermented them into
cider, and had the yeast analyzed and
propagated by Gresham, Oregon’s
Imperial Yeast. He’s incorporating
these local wild yeasts and bacteria
into shorter fermentations, adding
complexity and soul to clean-drinking
and accessible ales.
In the brewery behind the airy,
sunny taproom, an old dairy tank—his
makeshift coolship—sits in the middle
of the room as a wall of oak barrels sits
aging various spontaneous and handharvested
wild ales. These are the longterm
projects, which will eventually be
blended with one another or with local
fruits and re-fermented. The beers on tap
already taste like the place where they’re
made and served, and with time spent
living here, taking on the microscopic
wilderness all around, they’ll become
part of the landscape.
1889 WASHINGTON’S MAGAZINE 63