Garden City’s Barbarian Brewing honors the past, brings flair to beer
A bartender fills a glass at Barbarian Brewing’s Garden City taproom. | Photo by Kyle Pfannenstiel
This story is the fifth stop in Project FARE’s 2022 Idaho Brewery Tour. We’ll be featuring breweries around the state throughout April for Idaho Craft Beer Month and May for American Craft Beer Week (May 16-22). Sign up for our newsletter and follow us on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter for more stories.
Story and photos by Kyle Pfannenstiel
If you don’t like beer, the owners of Barbarian Brewing think they can change your mind.
While Barbarian specializes in sours, co-owner Bre Hovley assures that everyone can find something to like out of their diverse beer lineup, which has included 300 different varieties over the years. Enthusiasts can even sign up for a brewery membership that includes access to special barrel-aged beers released quarterly, along with a discount in their Boise and Garden City taprooms.
Bre Hovley
Bartenders at Barbarian taprooms offer beer blends to in-person customers, splicing different beers on tap together into the same glass for a unique experience.
“We really do try to think of how we make beer as trying make something for everyone,” Hovley said. “One of our favorite things to do when people come into our taproom that don’t traditionally like beer is to find something on our lineups that they enjoy, and usually we can find at least one.”
Barbarian was born out of curiosity toward the craft of brewing excellent beer.
Hovley remembers buying her husband, James Long, a home brewing kit for his 25th birthday. In 2015, the couple upped their investment—going from bathtub brews to a bonafide operation.
Owning a brewery had long been a dream for the couple, but they made it a reality when James went to brewing school and they moved back to Boise in the early 2010s, amid the “brewing boom,” to set up shop.
The Barbarian owners’ interesting foray into brewing aligns with their distinctive approach to crafting and enjoying beer.
And it seems to be paying off. Barbarian recently relocated its brewery in Garden City to a new spot with more space. The new location, at 114 East 32nd Street, boasts the brewery, an indoor taphouse and an outdoor beer garden.
Now, the couple and brewery owners find themselves paying homage to traditional brewing methods for fruited sour beers—many of which spend extra time maturing in oak barrels previously used for whiskey, wine and more.
The Tiger Sunset sour is aged in oak barrels and finished with Tiger’s Blood Snow Cone Mix, watermelon and coconut puree, while the brewery has several other beer offerings like IPAs, stouts and even a beer meant to taste like s’mores (it does).
The brewery initially started out not planning to can their beers, but the pandemic forced the brewers to quickly adapt. Now, cans and bottles of their regular and barrel aged offerings can be found at both taprooms.
Attached to their Garden City taproom is the brewery, filled with brewing vats, dozens of oak barrels and their coolship metal vat, which is used seasonally to brew when temperatures allow. The coolship is used for beers like the Ragnarok 2021, which uses a spontaneously fermented red sour base aged in barrels and rested with peaches, and the BAM! It’s A Sour, a spontaneous golden sour aged in brandy barrels and finished with apricots and mangos.
“The coolship also allows us to use native wild yeast and bacteria, which makes it our own special sour program that can't be replicated outside of Barbarian,” Hovley said. “It's as local as it gets.”
Brewing equipment at Barbarian’s Garden City brewery. | Photo by Kyle Pfannenstiel
