As co-founders of Lost Cause Meadery, Billy and Suzanna Beltz drink a great deal of mead, an ancient fermented drink made with honey and usually classified as a type of red wine. However the alcohol material of mead often encounters double digits, giving it a credibility as a more “celebratory”beverage rather than a casual one, discusses Billy.
“We weren’t always putting a bottle away on a random Tuesday night, “he says.Instead, the set often discovered themselves grabbing red wine, especially red wines that he calls “for lack of a better term, crushable.” These lower alcohol, younger, lower intervention beverages appealed to them as customers and makers, and because their existing license allowed them to produce wine, they started experimenting with making their own in 2020, calling the brand-new pursuit Oddish Wine.
From the start, the Beltzes knew they wanted to break away from stuffy, major mainstream wine tradition.”The idea for Oddish was that we remove away all the essential guidelines, the limits, the dogma of wine making, but stick to the spirit of winemaking, which is to concentrate on the component and
showcase that ingredient as a dry fermented drink. What would that appear like?”he wondered.To them, it looks like co-fermenting grapes with blueberries, pineapples, quince, guava– any seasonally readily available fruits sourced locally when possible, but constantly fermented dry with ABVs as low as 5.4 percent. In short, “fun, adventurous, almost pointless” things to consume with buddies, says Billy.He’s quick to point out that frivolity will stay strictly on consumers, guaranteeing that Oddish means to maintain the same high-quality reputation they developed at Lost Cause. “It’s taken us a year to get it right,” he states, indicating their education relating to the wine making process. “We wish to put a really great product out there from the outset.”
Oddish Wine opened to the general public throughout a soft opening stage beginning on Thursday, November 17. Their place at the Bay Park communal area The Gärten is currently house to a brewery (Deft Brewing), a Lost Cause tasting room, and a pizza vendor (Pizza Cassette). With the addition of Oddish, Billy guarantees “it’s hard to come here and not find something you truly like.” And, he adds, they’re ready for curious guests who come with concerns about their progressive wine making technique.
“I believe we’ll have to spend a lot of time informing people on wine. A blueberry white wine is not a white wine with blueberries added. The sort of style we make, they’re not conventional fruit red wines that some individuals have had with sugarcoated back in … we’re really taking the meaning of red wine and broadening it, however also keeping it really actual– fermented fruits just.”
He thinks San Diego is prepared for something various. “I believe San Diego has shown they’re naturally adventurous drinkers over the last two decades,” he says. And after constructing Oddish for almost 2 years, they’re all set for feedback. “We’ll take the very first year to see what individuals like,” he says. However he’s optimistic with their starting lineup. “All the patterns we’ve seen have informed us we’re onto something.”
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