I’m pretty proud of our track record with brewer interviews here at OA. We interviewed Gabriel Magliaro just before Half Acre opened in 2009 and then did a great interview with the Pipeworks guys in 2010 when they started their kickstart campaign. Both of those companies have brought something truly unique and uplifting to Chicago’s beer scene, be it through recipe, attitude, or unique turns on how to think about what a brewery should be. Which is why I wanted to make a point to land an interview with Dryhop’s Owner and General Manager Greg Shuff.

I’ve shared more than a couple beers with Greg over the past few months turning over his ideas and watching Dryhop evolve from it’s initial concept into what is soon to be a truly unique brewpub experience in the heart of Lakeview. More than a true and passionate love for craft beer, Greg’s knowledge base and passion extends well beyond beer to see the larger picture of the beer drinking experience and, I promise you, he’s raising the bar more than a little on what to expect from your neighborhood brewery.

I’ve tried Dryhop’s beer and it’s fantastic. But Dryhop’s experience is going to be much more holistic than just good beer. His space is well considered and should be awesome. Their growler packaging – a medium of beer delivery that is typically flawed at best – will be the best in the city providing growler beer that can stay fresh, literally, for months. And their food, their food is going to knock it out of the park. Everybody loves hotwings and french fries, right? But that’s been done. So how about the marrying of French market fare and amazing, fresh, craft beer? If that doesn’t make your knees pickle a little bit then you’ve probably had your taste buds removed by Mennonites who thought they were circumcising you.

There’s two opportunities during Craft Beer Week to try Dryhop’s beers, Monday at the Northdown Cafe & Taproom for what should prove to be a great event and Tuesday at Fountainhead’s now infamous Cask Night. I’ll see you at both of those.

Without further ado, I’m stoked to introduce you to Dryhop’s Greg Shuff:

Tell me about Dryhop.
Dryhop is Chicago’s first gastro-brewery. We’re all about doing whatever it takes to connect with our neighbors though creative ales and inspired food.

What size system are you running on?
We have a ten-barrel brewhouse, six ten-barrel fermenters, and six ten-barrel serving tanks.

What’s your expected yearly output?
We plan on brewing about 800 barrels over the first 12 months. Theoretically, the system can manage about 1,500 barrels/year before we’re totally maxed out.

How are you going to differentiate yourself from other brewpubs in Chicago?
I try to avoid using the word “brewpub” at all. I love brewpubs, don’t get me wrong, but they come with a very specific set of expectations.

There are a number of things that make Dryhop totally unique.

The first point obviously has to be the beer. Our Wheat IPA is to die for. And Brant (our Head Brewer) is prepared to kick out over 60 one-offs and seasonal beers in the first year – including our single hop series. You’re really going to love the creative beers in the lineup.

The second point is our kitchen. We have a world class Chef; Pete Repak formally of Charlie Trotters. Working with Pete, we’ve grown the menu out of the tasting room concept. Thinking about how great it is to sample small amounts of a variety of different beers, why not do the same things with our menu? 80% of the menu we’re doing tapas style. How about a small plate of Wild Tuna, lightly poached Quail Eggs, Watermelon, and warm Yuzu Vinaigrette with our Cream Ale? Hell yes. We’re all about pairing food to beer as oppose to matching the beers to the menu. After all, we’re brewers first.

Third is the space it’s self. We really want it to feel like you’re in a brewery enjoying beers and food from the brewer’s table. For instance, all the serving tanks are stacked behind the tap handles and there is a 15-foot tasting bar up front used only for filling growlers (which, by the way, we fill in counter presser fillers – i.e. no oxygen ever touches our beer and the growler shelf life becomes months as appose to days).

What does your beer program look like right now?
We have 6 house beer and 3-4 guest beers on draft at all times. We make an awesome Wheat IPA and a Cream Ale, so we’re keeping those two on at all times. The other four house taps are all about seasonals and one-offs.

What’s your background? What’s your brewer’s background?
For me, it all started when a professor told me to “write a paper about anything that turns you on about sustainability.” So I started writing about breweries, how brewers can use their resources more efficiently, and how beer drinkers can do their part by simply buying beers from their neighbors.

In 2010 I opened the Last Bay Beer Company, a one-barrel nano brewery in the last bay of a garage down in Indianapolis. Making the world’s best beers has always been my number one goal (and should always be the number one goal of any professional brewer). So when I peaked out on the one-barrel system, I new that the next tool I really needed in my arsenal was a better education. So I closed shop and went to Siebel and Doemens Academe in Munich in the middle of 2011.

Now I’m here in Chicago opening Dryhop Brewers.

Brant Dubovick is a GREAT brewer. Brant is the former Head Brewer at Church Brew Works in Pittsburgh, PA – a very unique and beautiful brewpub built inside of a Roman Catholic Church. Before Church, Brant brewed at Lancaster Brewing Company where he started his professional career in 2004.

Brant and I met through probrewer.com where we started discussing how great it is to personally connect with people through a brewery’s tasting room. We discovered that we both have the same passion for introducing people to great beers in a face to face environment, so it was only natural that we team up for this project.

How did you come to choose Lakeview as your location?
Lakeview is awesome, I love living and working here. My apartment is only one block south of the brewery. Besides the soft spot I have for Lakeview, the neighborhood is experiencing a kind of renaissance. A lot of “experiential” one-off businesses, both preexisting and newly opened, litter our corridor. By extension of that, we feel that Dryhop complements and grows the unique personality of this community.

So much is happening in Chicago right now with beer with so many new breweries opening, how is this going to work to Dryhop’s advantage? How is this going to pose challenges, if at all?
As they say, a rising tide lifts all ships. The biggest advantage of new and growing breweries is the increased awareness of better beer. We all know that inside the craft beer community there is very little brand loyalty, which is great. So the more brewers that are out there converting the macro beer drinkers into craft customers the larger Dryhop’s customer base becomes. For us, there is no downside to the Chicago craft beer boom. We’re just really excited to be a part of it.

I saw an earlier post from Dryhop saying that it was going to function as an “Alternating Proprietorship”. Are you still going that route? If not, why?
The Alternating Proprietorship idea was an earlier business model named Last Bay. Last Bay’s plan was to open Growler Filling Stations supplied only with beers brewed by us. In order to brew those beers we would partner with existing breweries that have excess capacity and we would come in during off hours to brew our beer on their systems.

I still think that it’s a wonderful idea, but execution proved to be just this side of impossible, especially in Chicago. First, no one local has excess capacity. Second, in the state of Illinois you can only sell growlers from the site of production. We had some elaborate schemes in mind to deal with the second challenge, but in the end it proved not to be worth it. So now we’re about to open a Gastro-Brewery. I couldn’t be happier about the change in direction.

What is Dryhop going to do to expand people’s understanding and appreciation of beer? How are you going to make the beer world a little more interesting?
For one, we’re building an expositions brewery in urban Chicago. We’re bringing the craft brewery experience to our neighbor’s back yard. Every step in the beer making process in on full display either behind the bar or next to the tables, our food menu expands the understanding of beer and food pairings by linking the small plate food fare to the beer list, you can try any beer we have for free (I hate paying for samples), we’ll give tours to anyone who asks, and you can expect us to host a number of beer and food focused events around the neighborhood all year. There isn’t a lot we aren’t doing to expand the appreciation of better beer.

From the perspective of the already initiated beer geek, you’re going to find our pairings and growlers the best in Chicago. We’re smashing together the ideas of the gastropub with the ideas of the brewery tasting room. The result is craft beer being placed on the highest pedestal possible without getting all fussy about it.

Do you have any plans to expand beyond the tasting room/brewpub concept? Why or why not?
No. If I live my life right, you’ll never see a Dryhop beer on a shelf in Binny’s. Dryhop is all about expanding the world’s front porch. We started the business out of the idea of a tasting room – where customers personally interacted with brewers, where you can casually sample all the wares, where the community comes to build and grow relationships… We’re excited about sharing our passion, and we don’t believe that we can effectively do that from a cold case.

That said, there’s a Binny’s down the street and I love it. I’m not knocking small packaging; it’s just not our thing.

Any plans for more locations?
We would love to share Dryhop with as many people as possible. That said our hands are really full opening Dryhop v1.0. For now, 100% of our attention is going into making the best beer possible and improving the quality of life for our Lakeview and Chicago neighbors.

What challenges have you run up against so far in creating Dryhop that you did not foresee and how did you handle them?
I have no love for the legal processes that govern our industry. For us, the biggest challenge has been the city liquor license process. Luckily, we’ve been able to get the support of our neighborhood, the Chamber of Commerce, and the Aldermen. Building those relationships has been great and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. But I’d be lying if I said that I’m not anxious to be built out and open.

When you’re not drinking your beer, what do you like to drink?
This is probably the hardest question here… I find myself trying all sorts of beers all the time. A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to enjoy Russian River’s Supplication. Not surprising, it was one of the best Wild Ales I’ve ever had. Coming down from the crazy world of sours, I really enjoy super dry Pale Ales and IPAs brewed with Pacific Northwest hops, and I’ll always have a man-crush on hefeweizens. So if you’re looking for a Christmas present, any of the above would be great.

Other than your events coming up this week, what events are you looking forward to during Chicago Craft Beer Week?
On May 24th, Sun King is going to be doing a tap takeover at Haymarket. I’m from Indianapolis and besides the fact that they make really great beer; I’m really excited to see one of my home town breweries doing so well so quickly. That event is my top out-of-house priority.

And as you commented, we’re doing a “meet the brewer” on Monday at Northdown Café and Taproom that I’m really excited about (our very first beer tasting!) and we’re part of Tuesday’s Local Cask Night at Fountainhead on Tuesday.

Here’s an easy one, I like to ask everybody this…. What’s your favorite beer moment that you’ve had in your life?
My favorite beer moment has to be the moment that I discovered sour beers and all of their glory. A couple of years ago I was on a golf course in St. Louis with the Schlafly brewers and they had the wisdom to pack in a few large format bottles. One of the bottles was part of New Belgium’s Lips of Faith Series. After a failed punch shot from behind a tree, they handed the bottle to me saying “all good beers are session beers, here try this one.” The combination of being knee deep in pine needles, chasing a little white ball back and forth across a never ending field, hanging out with fun people, and drinking La Folie strait from the bottle was like a lightning bolt to the senses. Sour beers were heaven.

Since then my tastes have evolved exponentially, but I wouldn’t trade a sour beer in the woods for anything.

Cheers.