Episode 14: Orpheus + Somerville

There’s more than one way to make beer chocolate or chocolate beer.

The use of chocolate in beer and vice versa goes beyond adding cacao nibs to a Porter or Stout or infusing a dark chocolate with the same styles. Orpheus Brewing in Atlanta aged a sour beer on cacao fruit pulp and seeds, then turned those seeds into chocolate. Somerville Chocolate in Massachusetts steeped their nibs in fermenting beer and then dried them out to make bars. There are a host of creative crossover opportunities between brewing and chocolate making. In this episode we talk with the founders of both companies to talk about their processes and what other possibilities exist between these worlds.

Beers discussed in this episode include Orpheus Brewing A Dark Everlasting, Artifice of Eternity, Artifice of Eternity Inversion, and The Doughnut Revolution, and Aeronaut Cocosutra.

Chocolate bars mentioned in this episode include Somerville Hops Dark Milk and Beer Dark Chocolate, Ratza Hopped Citrus, and Orpheus’s homemade bar.

The music for this episode was sampled from an instrumental version of the song “Come Home” written and performed by indie folk musician Anna ps from her 2016 album Umbrella. Anna p.s. conveys a sense of weariness throughout her simple yet resonant songs, but it’s a weariness that keeps a blanket of hope tucked up under its chin, even as the rain keeps falling outside the windows. You can find out more about Anna at her website.

Guests:

Jason Pellett is the founder and brewmaster at Orpheus Brewing Company in Atlanta, Georgia. Prior to brewing, he was a music educator, teaching private lessons on the trumpet. In 2020, he launched the Leadership Diversity Program at Orpheus to increase access and opportunities for persons of color interested in entering the brewing industry.

Eric Parkes stumbled upon the world of chocolate making in 2010 during a trip to Costa Rica. A practicing architect, he formed the Somerville Chocolate CSA in 2012 , which uses a multi-bar harvest process to expose members to the subtleties and geekery of chocolate making. The CSA continues to this day, along with an expanding collection of bars available for retail purchase, operating out of a tiny chocolate factory within a brewery in Somerville, Massachusetts.