It is not often you start writing about a brewery after drinking a single beer of theirs. Nevertheless Avren’s latest creation, Silk Road 7% Oat IPA - a soft, hop bomb laced with coconut flavour from generous amounts of Sabro and grapefruit tang from the Idaho7 hops, just reminds you that there are not enough articles about (talented) breweries being published . With over 30% in flaked and malted oats combined to the malted barley, it left us a happy memory - even though we had to stop after the 4th pint, given the beer’s powerful 7.2% ABV.
We first met with Avren’s founder Georgi Kyuchukov to talk about their new brewery project in Yambol over a year ago and ever since, their beers have become a fixed presence and more on our taps.
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Georgi started his road to producing craft beer as consumer 10 years ago and by 2018 he was home brewing, a year later building his own homebrew rig with his father to achieve the quality of beers he really was satisfied to drink himself. His obsession grew further by 2021 when time came to scale up production and go commercial.
It was when Mr Kyuchukov Sr stumbled across an old horemag* building in the village of Stara Reka a couple of miles outside Yambol that previously housed a hairdressing business, that Avren’s future started to take form. After agreeing to fix the roof (more of a sieve than a roof) and forking out a full stable of hair, the building of the 1.8hL brew-house took form.
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Their first creation was Kvartalna Sreshta a very hoppy Mosaic & Citra Pale ale in 2021 which was quickly followed by Astral Vision IPA with Columbus, Centennial, Simcoe & Amarillo. Their core range was then amplified in 2023 with Rave Potion a session IPA with Mosaic & Sabro and Dark Descend Stout with Cocoa nibs & Costa Rica coffee. This summer we saw the birth of Treat Me Like Your Fantasy a New England Pale Ale and a draft only version of 046 Hazy Pale with Citra, Idaho7 & Bru-1 on tap, that disappeared at warp speed at our craft beer shop on Lyuben Karavelov 53. We hope to see the last one in bottle form soon!
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By chance we met again in Yambol when we decided to visit Avren’s nano brewery in Stara Reka during Easter 2024. It was already clear that the brewery had to start thinking about expanding as their nano set up could not handle demand nor could the local water pressure. It was then that Georgi announced that he had just ordered a 6hL brew-house which will start operating in December 2024 if the local electricity and water board would make good their promise to bump up supply to the brewery! Ah, the endless tales of small entrepreneurs in Bulgaria… Once the new brew-house is installed and working Avren’s next project would be to create an on-site taproom which is perfectly place in the middle of the village next to a peaceful park…
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Whilst we wait for this to happen you can find Avren’s core bottles and special beers on tap at our craft beer shops in Sofia and Bansko.
Avren 8600 Brewery is a pioneer and managed to put the city of Yambol on the craft beer map of Bulgaria with dignity.
*Horemag: HOtel, REstaurant and MAgasin(aka shop) in one, an establishment in villages created during the socialist period.
from PIVOTEKA
