How Ike & Oak Brewing Uses Yogurt and Tea to Craft Award-Winning Beers

Learn how Ike & Oak brews sours with yogurt, crafts tea-infused ales, and has brewed 220+ beer styles since opening in 2019.

Ike & Oak Owner Ed Ranquist and Head Brewer Nathan Tertell dive into the secrets behind Ike & Oak’s award-winning lineup, from using yogurt cultures to sour fruit beers like Jelly Bean Forest to scaling up Nathan’s homebrew passion project into Broken Carabiner, a green tea ale with complex tropical fruit flavors. They also discuss the pros and cons of brewing on a 10-barrel system, how awards validate their craft, and the opportunities and challenges of their open brewhouse design.

After the beer break, Ed and Nathan showcase Ike & Oak’s core lineup of six beers alongside experimental one-offs, explaining what it takes to keep 12 taps full and why styles from West Coast IPAs to fruited sours keep their regulars coming back. Listener takeaways include: how lactobacillus from yogurt sours beer, why fruit puree adds flavor without excess sugar, the business balance between brewpub beer and food pairings, what makes a Vienna Lager pair perfectly with pizza, and why Nathan sometimes brews from midnight to dawn to balance brewing and family life.

About Ike & Oak Brewing Company: Located in Woodridge, Illinois, Ike & Oak Brewing Co. is an independently owned local craft brewery featuring handmade artisan pizza. Learn more on their website at https://www.ikeandoakbrewing.com/

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You can learn more about Crafty Brewers and get in touch with us on our official website, https://craftybrewerspod.com

Crafty Brewers is a production of Quantum Podcasts, LLC. Is your brewery or business looking to capture a loyal audience to drive business results with the power of podcasting? Then visit https://quantum-podcasts.com/ to learn more.

Our executive producer and editor is award-winning podcaster Cody Gough. He insists that we tell you that in this episode, you’ll learn about: Illinois craft breweries, Chicago suburbs breweries, Jelly Bean Forest sour, raspberry sour ale, yogurt in sour beer, lactobacillus beer, fruit puree beer, Broken Carabiner beer, passion fruit green tea ale, tea beer brewing, Vienna lager craft beer, West Coast IPA vs English pale ale, Forest Series sour beers, Omega yeast lacto blend, kettle souring yogurt, small batch brewing, 10-barrel brewhouse, brewpub Chicago suburbs, beer and pizza pairing, artisan pizza brewpub, craft beer awards Illinois, FOBAB medal winners, hybrid beer styles, fruit beer brewing techniques, scaling homebrew to commercial, beer recipe development, sour beer balance, passion fruit beer flavor, green tea in beer, small brewery flexibility, open brewhouse design, suburban craft beer scene, and brewing with live cultures.