Bittersweet Farm Brewery is putting the microbrewery concept in motion.
The brewery, the hop yard of which is in Franklin, is housed in a retrofitted school bus.
Dustin Wood, with co-owners Josh and Sheri Youngs and Josh’s sister, Jessica, launched the business in late 2022.
“I was a partner at (an area brewery) and I had met them, because they’d started a hop yard,” Wood, of Franklin, said. “This was probably seven or eight years ago, and we had a hop yard, and … we would help each other quite a bit with harvesting hops and farm tasks. When I left (that brewery), I contacted them and they’d still been growing hops, but they were in the same boat we were five years ago, saying, ‘This is great, but what’s the next step?’ So, I went to them with interest in starting another brewery. That was the end of 2022.”
Bittersweet product, Wood said, is produced in the Franklin, with plans for expansion.
“Right now, there’s no tap room; right now, it’s the bus,” he said. “We have a canning machine coming shortly, so we’ll be canning beer to sell to stores, and we’ve been selling kegs to bars, but our main gig will be the bus going to events. It’s an old school bus that was gutted out and repainted and had some things added.
“We hope we grow enough to build an actual brick-and-mortar tap room,” Wood continued. “Where we’re located has been in the family for a few generations — it was a dairy farm — and we want to keep the character of it. I think people, especially families, really enjoy that setting. Probably, coming in spring, when the beer bus is out at an event, we’ll be serving out of our brewery and there will be an outdoor tap room.”
Wood said Bittersweet’s focus is on quality.
“We’ve brewed three times so far, so I don’t know what our brewing identity is yet, but … as part of being a farm brewery in New York, you have to use 100% New York ingredients, so we’re going with that theme,” he said. “And, my personal quirk is, I’m a plant nerd, so we try to use other plants and herbs and things that can create a unique character for the beer.
“We’ve brewed a pale ale, an IPA and a dark lager,” Wood continued. “I don’t know if the trend everywhere has come back around to light beer, but it seems like a lot of people are preferring light beer, and that’s what we’re going to try to do and just keep it simple in terms of what the customer wants.”
Though still feeling out the company’s vendor-style setup, Wood said, early responses to Bittersweet have been good.
“It’s only been twice that we’ve served, so we’ve had limited feedback, but people really seem to enjoy our lightest beer, which is a traditionally hoppy, pale ale,” he said. “Both (events) were in Sidney, one at Gavin’s and one at Awestruck for an event.”
Wood said Bittersweet Farm Brewery is booking events and “actively pursuing a Halloween event.”
He said the bus is available for a variety of events, with a targeted local clientele.
“We’re going to try to hit western Delaware County,” he said. “So, Franklin, Walton, Delhi, Deposit, Hancock, anywhere from there. Our hope is that the beer bus draws interest year-round. We’d love to be at a ski resort if they need a beer vendor; we’d love to do weddings and private parties; and the canning thing is going to be important to our business, because we want to stir local interest in our product so they recognize our name.”
Beyond good beer, Wood said, he and his partners hope to deepen their connection to people and the process.
“We love growing hops and we also just love to experiment with things,” he said. “Brewing beer is an experiment every time; even though you want to do stuff consistently, it’s science right in front of you, which is pretty cool. And we just love brewing beer.
“The other thing is, doing this before, I like the social interaction,” Wood continued. “You meet a lot of different people and you uncover things you didn’t know about (the area). I grew up around here, but there’s always things you didn’t know were around, and that is always fun.”
For more information or to schedule the brewery bus at an event, find “Bittersweet Farm Brewery” on Facebook or follow @bittersweetfarmbrewery on Instagram.