NEIGHBORHOODS // Small Town, BIG Beer Scene

How one tiny sound sound city has gone from zero to four breweries in less than a year

Story by Heather Reese // Photograph by Beckie Kirker

Four new breweries in seven months, and to think just last summer that number was zero. Poulsbo, Washington has long been a weekend destination for Seattleites looking for a change of pace, but now the tiny Norwegian-inspired, Viking-themed port town is one of the West Coast’s fastest growing craft beer cities. How can a town with a population of just 9,000 support such a boom? Turns out the writing’s been on the wall for decades.

Located an hour west of Seattle by ferry, Poulsbo is the original home of Thomas Kemper Brewery. And if Kemper is
the godfather of the Poulsbo craft beer scene—it seems that Tammy Mattson is the godmother. “What Thomas Kemper did was expose people to good beer,” Mattson says, “and when [Kemper] was bought out by Pyramid [in the
mid-1990s]—they left a giant hole.”

After Kemper moved out of town, Mattson credits Silver City Brewery with re-kick-starting the local beer scene when it opened in nearby Silverdale in 1996. Still, Poulsbo residents needed a local watering hole with a quality tap selection. “We always felt what was lacking [in downtown Poulsbo] was a bar with a European feel,” Mattson recalls. So she and her husband Rob DiFilippo opened Tizley’s Europub in an old apartment building five years ago, and later Europa Bottleshop in the space downstairs. More recently, the pair took over operations of nearby Hare and Hounds Public House where they host a brewer’s dinner every month during the “off” season (non-summer months), and offer a healthy selection of regional and international taps at both pubs. Their tap lists—of course—always include Poulsbo brews, too. “We’ve got this pocket of extremely talented people,” she says. “We appreciate being able to showcase our local talent.”

Mattson also knows everybody in town. When I told her I had a hard time getting ahold of Dave Lambert, owner and brewmaster of Slippery Pig Brewery, she packed me into her car and took me down to the farmers market “where they are every Saturday.”

Dave’s wife was tending the stand that day, where they sell homegrown flowers and other goods from their farm. To find Dave, she directed me up a nearby dirt road, where I needed to “just keep driving, even if you think you’ve gone too far.”

She wasn’t kidding. Once I finally reached the top of the seemingly never-ending road, a few small signs pointed me toward a couple of barn-like structures and what looked like an outdoor bar. That’s where I found Lambert in the middle of brewing a dandelion bitter beer made with flowers grown on the property. He explained that he puts at least one ingredient that they’ve grown in every beer. “People love the Rhubarb IPA,” he says. His ultimate goal is to brew a 100-percent estate beer.

He opens his tasting area a few days a week for people to fill up a growler or hang out for a pint. You can also stock up on homegrown eggs or visit the on-site pig farm. “We want it to feel like your home away from home,” Lambert says. And while he’d like to expand his operation, he’s not looking to get too big. “We always said, ‘if we can supply our neighborhood, we’re good.’”

A fifth-generation Poulsbo resident, Lambert says he’d love to be one part of the big system that gets more people to visit his hometown. He even encouraged his fellow home brew buddy Steve Roerig to start up an operation of his own, and soon Battenkill Brewing Company was born.

“I’ve been friends with Dave for a long time,” Roerig laughs when I ask him about being in competition with his good friend. “All the breweries are supportive of each other—it doesn’t feel competitive at all.” A friendly yellow lab greeted me as I walked through Roerig’s backyard to the barn he built from the ground up. When I visited, he had had a license for only two months, making Battenkill the newest Poulsbo brewery. “This is it!” he said as he gestured to the brewing equipment. “The amber ale is really my main beer,” he explains, but he also brews an IPA and a pale ale.

A home brewer for 15 years, Roerig would love for Battenkill to be more than his “overtime job.” “When I see people enjoy my beer, it makes me want to do more,” he says. There’s no tasting room at his barn, but you can find the beer on tap around town. “My initial goal is to be on 10 taps,” he says, “and then we’ll go from there.”

A couple miles away resides a brewery with giant plans for the future. As of June, Sound Brewery had 54 accounts—and counting—scattered all over Puget Sound. Not bad for an operation that was licensed just six months earlier.

“I think once most home brewers make a beer that’s good—they want to do it for a living,” says Brad Ginn, the brewer at Sound Brewery. And he’s lucky enough to be the only Poulsbo brewer I talked with who’s been able to quit his “other” job in exchange for becoming a full-time
brewer. However, Sound’s general manager
J. Mark Hood still has his day job.

Ginn and Hood met years ago through the West Sound Brewers club. Started almost 20 years ago by Don Spencer—longtime brewmaster at Silver City Brewery—the home brewing club is a widely considered to be the launching pad of many Kitsap County breweries. “People have dreams,” Spencer says, “we’re all supportive of one another.”

Ginn and Hood agree that the club has been pivotal to the early success of Sound Brewery. “I don’t think there’s a brewery in the region that’s focusing on Belgian styles like we’re trying to do.” Ginn says. And it seems to already be paying off, as their Monk’s Indiscretion Belgian Strong Ale won third place in the People’s Choice category at the spring 2011 Washington Cask Beer Festival. Operating under the motto “Tradition Liberated,” they count the Indiscretion and their Belgian Tripel among their early flagship beers. “It’s so gratifying when someone comes in and says, ‘I don’t like beer,’ but then they try the Tripel and say, ‘but I like that!’” Ginn says.

Sound Brewery is located in a giant warehouse that also houses their tasting room. The pair says they don’t mind sending customers to the other breweries in town, and although the plans for Sound have long been laid out, there’s no denying that they opened in the middle of a brewery boom. When I asked how the brewery boom started, Hood explained, “Jeff showed a lot of home brewers that they really could start a small operation.”

He’s talking about Jeff Holcomb, who told me he wanted to be the first new-generation brewery open in his hometown. He achieved that goal when Valhöll Brewing was licensed in August 2010.

Holcomb says his Stouty Stouterson might be the fan favorite of the seven beers that he regularly brews. Inspired by Dogfish Head Brewery in Delaware, he says he doesn’t want to be pigeonholed into a specific style of brewing. He makes a few traditional Belgian-style beers, but also isn’t afraid to add different spices and fruits into the mix—something he says has been described as “culinary brewing.”

He opened his tasting room in an old sign shop in January, outgrew it by June, and has plans to move Valhöll downtown by year end. “I want to go as far and as fast as I can,” he says.

And a big brewery deserves a big mascot. The Viking face that takes front and center on Valhöll’s logo is perfect for this hometown operation. Poulsbo: home of Viking Fest. Poulsbo: home of the North Kitsap High School Vikings. Poulsbo: home of Jeff Holcomb. And he couldn’t be more proud. “This is what I always envisioned for Poulsbo—to be a beer destination,” he says. “The four [breweries] are all so different that we can really give an education on what beer can be. The beer renaissance is here…we’re here, it’s happening.”

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