USA, NY: Nanobrewery FLX Culture House to be launched in Geneva by a husband-and-wife team

Two of the most well-regarded restaurateurs in the Finger Lakes will soon try their hand at brewing, the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle reported on May 11.

Christopher Bates and Isabel Bogadtke, the husband-and-wife team behind Geneva's FLX Table and Dundee's FLX Wienery, announced plans this week for FLX Culture House, a nanobrewery at 20 Linden St. in Geneva.

Like the couple's restaurants, the brewery will be small with a very unique focus. Bates said the 400-square-foot brewery will focus on longer fermentations, sours and wild ales, blending and barrel aging.

And the Culture House won't be brewing at all. Instead, Bates said they will be fermenting, blending, and barrel aging. Geneva brewery Lake Drum will actually make FLX Culture House's wort, which will then be transported to the Linden Street nanobrewery.

“We’re a fermentation house,” Bates said.

Like India pale ale, sour is often a misnomer. It's a wide-ranging, far-reaching simplification of a style that spans different countries, different traditions and different brewing techniques. There are the five broader styles generally associated with sours: Berliner weisse, American wild ales, Belgian-style sours (Flanders red ale and Flander oud bruin), lambics, and gueuzes.

FLX Culture House will be focused on longer fermentation and blending of old and new beers, including some beers that may take three or more years. Bates will tap into his experience in wine, both a master sommelier and winery owner (Element Winery in Arkport, Steuben County), to "focus on fermentation. It's a really simple little project and tiny. The goal is to release one barrel a month."

FLX Table bested big-city competition to be named the country's best new restaurant earlier this year in the USA Today 10Best Reader's Choice poll. The restaurant has one communal table for 12 guests. It's located right next door to the nanobrewery.

Bates said the Culture House will release bottles and limited kegs. He added they will probably release no more than 20 cases per month. Most batches will be 60-90 gallons. "The goal is to take our time and take that time to do something like a three-year souring process," he said. Eventually, he wants the Culture House to produce a traditional Belgian-style gueuze.

The brewery is essentially borrowing barrels from the winery. Bates said he doesn't envision a traditional tasting or taproom. "Our goal is to eventually end up with 24 barrels in the system at a time and then eventually bottle one of them every month," Bates said.

The average age of the beers will be 2. The brewery will be run like a solera, where each finished beer could be a mixture of young and old beers. Bates said a couple of table beers could be released in the next six months before some of the mixed fermentation creations. They are starting with a Flanders-style red ale.

He said starting a brewery like this is a natural step in his burgeoning (but small) Finger Lakes food and drink empire.

"I grew up fermenting," Bates said. "In the wine industry, it's hard not to be into beer. I've been a passionate beer consumer for a long time." More recently, Bates said he's been homebrewing and experimenting with long-aged sours. "I think it's an integral step in the next phase of the Finger Lakes, focusing more on the geekier styles of beer."

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