Boneyard Brewing Company's Plum Saison

Boneyard Beer Company recently observed its 11th anniversary, and celebrated by releasing two beers, 11th Anniversary IPA and Plum Saison. Boneyard is best known for its hop-forward India pale ales such as RPM IPA and Hop Venom Double IPA, but a saison is fairly unusual for the brewery .

Naturally, I was curious about this beer, so I bought a crowler of Plum Saison and reached out to Boneyard to find out more, starting with what inspired the choice of style.

“Saisons rock and I haven’t had much experience with them so… why not?” said owner Tony Lawrence via email. “I love wild yeast and fruit together and we have brewed many styles with both… but not a saison interpretation.”

Originally a rustic Belgian farmhouse ale brewed for consumption by farm hands working the fields, saison was a lower-alcohol beer brewed with local ingredients—many if not all of which were grown on the farm. Farmers brewed with multiple grains and whatever herbs and spices were readily available. Wild yeasts and bacteria would inoculate the beer along with the brewers yeast, resulting in soured, funky character.

Each beer was as unique as the farm it was brewed on. After World War II, however, breweries started producing stronger beers under the “saison” label with a focus on quality over rusticity. Modern saisons have a pronounced yeast character, interesting grain qualities, a crisp, dry finish, and often notable spiciness from actual spices and/or hops.

With Plum Saison, Lawrence considered the addition of spices before settling on hops.

“I really wanted to use another component from the herb or botanical space. Lavender, dandelion, etc., but I was struggling on what or how much and what was the application technique,” he said. “My buddy Ian with (Stillwater Artisanal Ales) said, ‘Tony stop overthinking it and use hops!’ So that’s what we did. Dry hopped it at about (one pound per barrel) with Loral and a little Chinook for an herbal sub layer of flavor.”

They added 405 pounds of plum puree from Oregon Fruit Products to the 20 barrel batch (approximately two thirds of a pound of fruit per gallon).

The fruit is immediately apparent in the color, a hazy salmon pink muddled with gold. As befitting the style, the yeast character is prominent in the aroma, with some phenolics reminiscent of bubblegum and a hint of medicinal herb, followed up by an earthy hop spiciness and plum juice.

The flavor has a rustic character, bracing with earthy plum skins, a light touch of musty funk and an herbal hop flavor and bitterness as you’d expect for a Boneyard brew. The plum is subtle and light but it’s there, a not-quite-ripe fleshiness that’s a nice balance to the hops. It finishes dry with a spicy-peppery hop bitterness lingering lightly.

Plum Saison is a moderate strength 6.6% alcohol by volume, available on draft at both Boneyard’s Pub and its original taproom location on Lake Place.

If you’re looking to further explore the saison style, several other breweries have their own versions currently available. GoodLife Brewing Company’s Reserve Saison, released each spring, is inoculated with wild yeasts and aged in French Pinot Noir barrels for 12 months.

Sunriver Brewing Company recently tapped PrÉvaloir, a lower strength petit or “table” saison with 4.8% ABV. And Deschutes Brewery is offering Blue Butterfly at its tasting room location on Simpson Avenue, a dry hopped, barrel aged saison that is 5.2% ABV.

Saison is a terrific style to enjoy in the spring, and Boneyard’s Plum Saison is a nice introduction and a change of pace from the normally hop accented brewery.