Titillate Your Taste & Brew Your Mind
We visited one of our favourite microbreweries in Hungary, based in Szekszárd: Brew Your Mind, and were impressed…
Founded several years ago by Olivér and Ákos, they began their careers as builders and architects, but neither of them found their calling in their profession. What ensued was perhaps a natural progression – after all who dislikes beer, however, turning a hobby into a quality business, started from scratch is another story where many trip up and lose their way.
Not so with Brew Your Mind.
After a few years of brewing for fun, they reached the point where they could start brewing for specific clients on a contract basis. The brew was one of the new wave of IPAs called “Brew Your Mind Kafé”, an interesting pale ale which combined a mouth-watering array of flavours, dominant among which were coffee and fruit flavours.
This led them to look for their own premises and not work from home and up until 2019 there were located in Szentes, at Zentus Brewery. The quality of their product spoke for itself, small batches, hand-crafted ales and beers and a growing market led them to take the bold step of opening their own place in Szekszárd.
A business loan later and the brewery was functioning within a converted commercial garage, with their expertise in brewing and polished steel brewery on show, next to their small sales and service outlet.
Ingredients play a crucial role in their brewing, sourcing the best hops, malt, and water from the nearby artesian wells of Szekszárd, and a lot of love.
The key ingredient, hops, are sourced from the US, Australia, and New Zealand (among their favourite hops), while their malt comes from one of the UK’s oldest suppliers, Simpsons, who opened their doors in 1862 and account for around 95% of the malt used in Brew Your Mind’s craft beers.
Their credo is precision, to learn from their mistakes and perhaps most importantly, to take particular care to ensure that their beers remain at their best quality after the canning process – something which is often overlooked and affects the taste of craft beers dramatically.
They achieve this by paying close attention to the cold chain, which means that the temperature of the beers does not rise by more than 5% during transport. It is also important to point out that they take great care in the selection of their retailers, as the product should be maintained at its optimum quality for the customer.
What this means is that their exports are also limited as delivery times and the supply chain process has to be controlled strictly to ensure quality especially during those long delivery routes where expectations are doubly high. Primary export markets are to Paris, Slovakia, and even occasionally, Singapore.
Their brewery in Szekszárd is also doubles as a "tasting plant". Anyone who passes by is encouraged to stop in, as there are few things more exhilarating than a freshly tapped beer that hasn't even left the brewery, as we experienced during our visit.
Around 6,000 litres of beer are brewed each month, which is a very small quantity by Hungarian standards, but one can say that quality and quantity are not directly proportional, especially in this case.
They are young brewers with a spirit of experimentation, who are not afraid to try new things, but who have an artistic sense of the limits of good taste.
The COVID situation has affected them like everyone else, but fortunately their beers are in high demand from individuals and not just caterers. Nevertheless, it is a great loss for them that their sales have been more online than to face-to-face contacts.
We, at Urban Umami love their beers, whether their pale ales or their fruity beers, and even their stout. Here, we have paired their offering with our Fish and Chips… and we are now planning on more winter recipes with their beers.
Brew Your Mind goes perfectly with our fish and chips
For recipe click here
If you have the time and are in Szekszárd, we recommend checking their brewery out at:
Brew Your Mind Sörfőzde, 7100 Szekszárd, Tartsay u. 8. – and do, while you’re there, pick up one of their tees… they’re specially designed for Brew Your Mind and are funky as hell!