327: GABF Gold! Rob Malad of Metazoa Doubles Down on Decocted Scottish-Style Ale

In this GABF Gold! edition of the podcast, the last of our 2023 focus on GABF gold medal winners, Jamie is joined by Rob Malad, director of brewing operations for Metazoa in Indianapolis, Indiana. Metazoa recently won gold for William Walrus, a Scottish-style ale and product of necessity, that employed brewing techniques to overcome ingredient challenges while staying true to the spirit of the style.

In this episode, he touches on:

• brewing beers meant to be consumed more than once
• using double decoction to build malt character in lieu of a broad range of speciality malt
• building a recipe with pale malt, Munich malt, and small amounts of low-Lovibond speciality malts but no English malts
• using English ale yeast typically employed in their hazy IPA
• brewing with minimal hops but balancing with carbonation
• their medal-winning approach to saison
• the mouthfeel impression of high Saaz loads
• elements that set beers apart in competition

And more.

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