Read how Greg Hall, formerly the brewmaster with Goose Island, is switching to Apple Cider:
Everyone wanted the brewmaster to stay. Greg Hall was 45 and savvy enough to help Goose Island Brewery through the transition after Anheuser Busch purchased the brewery for $38.8 million in 2011. Plus, Goose Island was consistently successful, and with new money and ideas injected, the possibilities were endless.
But Hall didn’t stay. He left Goose Island and surprised everyone by becoming a serious cidermaker. Hall founded Virtue Cider during 2011, but his goal with the fledgling cider company is not what you might expect.
Why did you leave Goose Island? Everything was going great.
Back in 2000, I took six Goose Island brewers on a trip to England to visit English brewers. On our second to last night there we were in the city of York and we went into a pub that was listed as one of the best pubs in England. They had about forty ciders on cask. And I had always liked the idea of cider. But I never found a cider I liked.
I felt like you just couldn’t make good cider. There was something with the apples that didn’t create enough flavor. Well, we had the first twenty ciders the first night, and we canceled our last brewery visit so we could go back and drink the last twenty ciders the second night. We came back from that trip almost more excited about cider than the beer.
Read more via Midwest Wine Press.
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