By Jill Nagy<\/p>\n
At Ferdle Turtle Brewing Company, owner\/brewer Alexander Fredell brews his beer one barrel at a time.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n He refers to his operation as a nano-brewery, smaller even than micro. Still, he keeps four beers on tap: dark lager, lager, India pale ale, and a \u201crotational\u201d selection.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n A tasting room takes up about half the space.<\/p>\n In late September, Octoberfest, a malty, slightly sweet brew, was \u201cflying out the door\u201d and a pumpkin ale was almost ready to replace it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a nice problem to run out of beer,\u201d Fredell said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The brewery is located at 161 Broad Street (Route 29) in Schuylerville. It is tucked in under Sweet Lou\u2019s Bistro and \u201cwe try to play off each other,\u201d Frerdell said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Ferdle Turtle doesn\u2019t serve food, except for some chips and salsa, but people can bring their beer upstairs to Sweet Lou\u2019s or bring their food down to the brewery. Fredell is starting to serve a 12-inch pizza.<\/p>\n Fredell started as a home brewer. During the Covid pandemic, he said, \u201cI switched my career path,\u201d and been working at a brewery, a somewhat larger operation than his present one: about 50 barrels at a time.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cNow, I am down to one barrel at a time,\u201d he noted.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/span><\/b><\/span><\/span>Family members invested in the new business, and his wife and a cousin\u2019s husband are involved in the business.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n It takes six to eight hours to brew a barrel of beer. Then it is allowed to cool down. Yeast is added and the mix ferments for about a week. After that, he explained, the beer goes into kegs and \u201cwe blast it with CO2.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Eventually, Fredell said, he would like to expand into a bigger production facility, but he is concerned that the product may lose its personality if his operation gets too big.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI like having my hands on,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/span>He is licensed as a farm brewery, which allows up to five locations but requires using New York sourced grains and hops. New York state, once a center for hops production, is getting back into growing hops, he noted. The yeast does not have to be local.<\/p>\n In the future, he said, he would like to try using local fruit in some sour beers. He has blueberries in the freezer to start with. For now, though, \u201cI just want to be comfortable.\u201d He is pleased that \u201cpeople really love our product.\u201d<\/p>\n Fredell grew up in Saratoga. \u201cFerdle\u201d was a high school nickname. He added \u201cturtle\u201d because \u201cI am kind of a slow person\u201d he explained.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Ferdle Turtle Brewing Co. is open from 3:00 p.m to 9:00 p.m. Thursday; 2:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. Friday; and from 10:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. Saturday.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n For more information go to ferdleturtle.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Jill Nagy At Ferdle Turtle Brewing Company, owner\/brewer Alexander Fredell brews his beer one barrel at a time.\u00a0 He refers to his operation as a nano-brewery, smaller even than micro. Still, he keeps four beers on tap: dark lager, lager, India pale ale, and a \u201crotational\u201d selection.\u00a0 A tasting room takes up about half […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":89,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business-news"],"yoast_head":"\r\n