Hosting a rotating line-up of food trucks to complement the ever-changing menu of craft beverages.
Call or email to plan your event! locustgrovebrewco@gmail.com
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"The building and grounds are artfully and eccentrically decorated with farm implements and Kent family memorabilia; an homage to the community's long agricultural history. The Kents welcome you to stop in and enjoy their excellent selection of beverages and food , with magnificent views of the majestic Hudson River."
- Meet me in Marlborough
It's big. It's yellow. It's eccentric. It's loaded to the rafters with the brilliantly repurposed "detritus" of this farm's generations' past, dragged from long-neglected sheds and outbuildings around the farm's vast acreage - signage, wagon wheels, lanterns, beams from old-growth lumber.
The Locust Grove Brewery Barn came to life first in the fevered minds of Chip & Jim Kent. The fact is, their revenue stream was severed when NYS ordered restaurants to close in March 2020 due to COVID-19. Without restaurant industry customers, the Kents were saddled with a surplus of fruit.
The farmers made a decision to turn what they could into cider - like "When life gives you lemons, make lemonade". Now that New York State legislation makes it possible for farmers to create and sell alcoholic beverages from their own produce - COVID be damned - the Kent brothers forged ahead with plans for the cidery.
photo courtesy of Locust Grove Brewing Company
Some years ago, Chip tried brewing cider as an experiment. It didn't go very well. "It was gross."
Make note! He's since perfected the family recipe.
"We decided to make a batch of cider and thought, 'Hey let's use the quinces!" Jim Kent recounted. Quince, a pear-like fruit the family has been growing for over 100 years, was popular with restaurants. "The quinces the restaurants didn't buy, went into the cider. We're farmers, we roll with it."
How the apples, and other cider fruits, express themselves and the decisions the cider maker makes before, during, and after fermentation can produce a full range of flavors and expressions, from sweet to dry, clean to funky, smooth to prickly and bubbly.
The Kents offer ciders whose sources range from sweet to sour cherries, from peaches to berries. They grow over 100 varieties of apples, and they'll integrate each into their drinks.
photo by Katherine Donlevy