Strange Brewing

Breweries in the southern hemisphere are wildly underrepresented in this part of the world, a fact we’ve only become increasingly conscious of the further afield we’ve travelled. Over the last 12 months one brewery in particular has transported us to their corner of the world, making local challenges and successes feel like our own — which, in many ways, they are — in spite of being so far away. Strange Brewing started life as a brewpub in Buenos Aires, Argentina, but has recently opened a second retail location with expanded capacity for barrel ageing and a new, more elaborate food concept. 

“Our second venue struggled initially as we were navigating one of the toughest recession periods of this millennium in Argentina,” says co-founder, Torstien Hoset. “A lot of industry players closed during this period, but we have been able to maintain our operations at both locations without any downsizing and without sacrificing quality. Now our second location is in profit and growing month over month as the economy is starting to reactivate, and we are very optimistic about the future. We are excited about being able to draw on a larger stock of barrel-aged beer to do even more blending and expand our barrel-aged product line. The plan is to export more of these products to neighbouring countries, and also to China. We also continue to explore opportunities in Europe, with the hopes of one day finding the right place to build our European home.”

Like every brewery we speak to for this issue, we ask Strange what advice it would give to a younger version of itself, if it could travel back in time and do one thing differently. “We’ve always been concerned with the quality of the ingredients we use,” says Tor, “but what we’ve found makes the biggest difference when it comes to the fruit and hops we use, is that we select everything ourselves now. I wish we had started doing that earlier.”