The Pabst Brewing Company, which acquired the Ballantine brand in 2005, announced last week that it is bringing back America’s original India Pale Ale following a 30-year hiatus. And they’re not just bringing back the brand: They’re resurrecting the historic ale as it was brewed in its heyday.
Greg Deuhs, Pabst master brewer by day and forensic homebrewer by night, spent more than two years meticulously piecing together historical records, sensory descriptions, and testimonials from those who still remember the original Ballantine IPA, which was brewed in one form or another from 1878 to the middle of the Nixon administration.
Long interested in historic recipes, Deuhs proposed the idea of commercially reviving Ballantine IPA when he moved from Redhook to Pabst in 2012. After gaining approval to proceed, he began brewing batch after batch of homebrew, five gallons at a time, in his kitchen (pictured at top). In all, Deuhs came up with more than twenty different recipes before he and his colleagues at Pabst felt comfortable moving forward.