Linus Hall of Yazoo Brewing

BC: Tell us a little about your new wild beer program.

Linus: We are pretty excited about our Embrace the Funk wild and sour series, and we now have a barrel warehouse about five miles away. We make the wort here and truck it over to fill a variety of barrels in the new space. We’ve got a Flanders red-style ale aged in freshly dumped red wine barrels, and our Deux Rouges cherry version won a bronze medal at the 2014 Great American Beer Festival.

BC: How did you become interested in Belgian-style sour beers?

Linus: My wife and I always dreamed of a trip to Belgium, but with two kids, life always got in the way. Finally, we took a couple of weeks off, biked around the Flanders area, drank some remarkable beers and came home with a new appreciation for the styles. I knew I wanted to try my hand at making sours at Yazoo, and when my talented homebrewer buddy Brandon Jones researched yeast and bacteria culturing techniques and isolated and banked some cultures for us, we jumped into sours right away. These beers will never be a big part of our production, but I think they’re worth the special effort.

BC: What’s your strategy for making the Yazoo tasting room a fun place to hang out?

Linus: Construction around our brewery has blown up in recent years, with condos going in all around us. We’re getting big crowds because our tasting room is a comfortable meeting place to visit after work. There are no TVs, no live music, no kitchen — just fresh beer from the source, food trucks, fun tours and great conversation. With Tennessee Brew Works, Jackalope and Czann’s breweries now close by, people can walk to four breweries in one afternoon in our local brewing district.