The circular tales of brewers†™ spent grain
The "Drêche-what” ??
Let’s start from scratch. During the beer brewing process, the brewer uses malted cereals to create two products: beer, out of the sugars, and spent grain (drêche, in French), which contains the fibres-and-proteins part of the malted cereals. Traditionally, spent grain is not a problem, quite the contrary: it is supplied to animal feed industries, offered to local breeders, composted on-site, etc.
However, down in city centres, no cows nor pigs! Space is expensive and constrained, logistics are a complex puzzle. Therefore finding what to do with that spent becomes a real headache for urban brewers. Quite a pity, as spent grain turns out to be a great food product: super-local production, rich in fibres and a good source of proteins – a nutritious product for humans too!!
In a nutshell, in a brewery, people brew, in a bakery, people bake, and in a Drêcherie, people drêche: we make tasty stuff out of spent grain. As simple as that !
Behind the Drêcherie, there is us
Us, it’s Elsa from Brewsticks, and Pierre-Elie from L’origine du pain (The Origin of bread). We met in 2018 when Elsa was looking for a place to make her products. We share a small workshop in the 19th arrondissement of Paris, on the Butte Bergeyre. Pierre-Elie makes bread, and Elsa, Brewsticks!
Healthy and tasty products, on the road to zero waste!
Pierre-Élie works exclusively with wheat from biodynamic farming, carefully stone-ground (Astrié mill). This process guarantees a high-quality flour, that preserves all the taste and nutritional properties of the cereals. The flours are directly sourced from a purchased directly from a farmer-miller located near Verdun. Pierre-Elie bakes several types of bread, including spent grain bread. Most of his production is sold through Community Supported Agriculture (CSA).
Elsa discovered spent grain, its incredibly gourmand smell, and its interesting properties during a brewing workshop. She started developing prototypes in the shape of crispy savoury sticks: and after 9 months of research and development, the Brewsticks were born!
Made from craft beer spent grain and from other ingredients that are as local and as little processed as possible – that’s “brut” in French, Brewsticks are free from synthetic food additives, low in salt, high in dietary fibre and a source of protein. They come in 4 regular flavours and are so far sold in 7 Parisian craft beer places.
In total, we are able to craft 15 kilos of Brewsticks a month, all of which are sold before they are even produced. At the same time, we have received about 30 distribution requests. Therefore we must speed up!
However the current workshop configuration does not allow us to meet the increasing demand, and we cannot increase our production capacity with the current production process, which is fully manual. There’s only one solution to tackle that: find a new workshop, increase the baking area, and automate!
In 2019, a collaborative workshop at the Brasserie de l’Être
We currently share a production workshop located in the 2nd basement of a residential building. This forces us to move down tons of flour and dozens of pounds of spent grain every year… and move them back up for delivery in the shape of finished products!
You may have heard that the Brasserie de l’Être, located in the 19th arrondissement in Paris, is undertaking some serious modernization works. The brewers are changing the bottling process, which will allow them to get rid of the refermentation room and gain some extra space. They offered us to sub-let us parts of this space so that we set up our workshop there, on the ground floor, and at the very source of the spent grain.
To make this a reality, we have decided to launch a crowdfunding campaign, crucial to fund what we cannot finance via leasing or other "traditional" funding tools.
The concept: a shared workshop
Our new workshop will allow us to close the spent grain loop, as well as to explore, in the mid-term, the closing of other material loops related to beer-brewing products, such as malt flour, yeast, etc.
In the field of industrial and territorial ecology, this is called a micro-industrial symbiosis: by introducing unused materials into new production processes, we reduce waste by avoiding material flows to reach that stage, and we create value locally !
A relocation planned in spring 2019
The renovation works at our future workshop will begin during this spring. The first equipment (new ovens, larger kneader, biscuit machine ...) will arrive at the beginning of the summer, hopefully on time to test the bread oven and make some spent grain pizzas for the Paris Beer Week in June! The bakery will then be able to start operating. On the Brewsticks’ side, the machine will arrive between June and July. During summer we will test and adjust the machine, targeting an official launch of the Brewsticks in September 2019.
What will the money be used for?
The overall budget of the project is estimated at 120k€. We will bring 30k€ in equity, take out a 40k€ lease from our bank, and approximately 20k€ in grants. We are seeking to finance the whole of renovation works through this crowdfunding campaign, i.e. about 30k€, split as follows:
- With 8 000 €, we renovate the walls and ceilings are done,
- With 13 000 €,we install the ventilation system,
- With 18 000 €, the tiles are restored,
- With 30 000 €,we buy some of the professional kitchen equipment!
Why Blue Bees?
We chose to bring our project into the Blue Bees community for two key reasons:
- It is one of the few platforms entirely dedicated to the funding of initiatives that contribute to the agricultural, ecological and social transition, which we believe is more necessary than ever.
- We ourselves became BlueBees members on the Brasserie de l’Être’s lending campaign, which enabled us to discover an amazing community of strongly committed citizensand exciting projects, all driven by values †‹†‹with which we feel completely aligned.
About the “rewards”
We’ve worked hard to find rewards that are coherent with (y)our values. Obviously, there’ll be bread and Brewsticks – mostly Brewsticks since they are easier to ship and have a longer shelf-life than bread! For the occasion, we will be making a very limited edition of Brewsticks: with seasonal ingredients, and an unusual yet natural colour: naturally blue.
You will also find two goodies that we are proud to offer in limited edition:
- A keyring bottle opener with a knife,from the Maison Cartailler-Deluc , a cutlery house from Thiers. Special acid-marked edition, it comes with a penknife, a bottle opener, and a corkscrew. 100% made in France, 100% stainless steel.
- A 600 ml gourd, carbon neutral, plastic free, Made in Berlin and partly sourced from Italy, 100% traceable and Fairtrade: the SoulBottle, for the occasion a limited Brewsticks edition. What we fell for? It will be the perfect ally for your summers or evening outings: made of robust and inert glass, it is the ideal material for a last or first beer-to-go, demi or pint sized. Cherry on the pie, for each sold SoulBottle, 1€ is donated to drinking water projects, in those countries where it is not for granted.
For one of the rewards, we got in touch with our superneighbour Nicolas Strohl from Superbières. Nicolas runs a craft beer bottle shop located near the Brasserie de l’Être: great beers, fantastic sandwiches, and great music! Because Niko is also a member of the rock duo Get Out To Die, and a little-more-than-amateur brewer too. A wink to his band, he created Get Out To Rye, a rye IPA that you are surely going to love. To go with it, we offer you a very exclusive edition of Brewsticks, made with Get Out To Rye spent grain, spiced up with chipotle. Because apart from music and many other things, Nicolas and his musician pal Matt share a common passion for this wonderful Mexican spice!
For those who like to get their hands dirty, we’re proposing two workshops, one with a focus on beer, the other with a focus on spent grain: les mains dans la drêche! For the beer workshop, we are particularly happy to count on Outland brewery (94) , where the workshops will take place supervised by Alain: many thanks to them.
For professional partners who would like to be among the first in the World to offer Brewsticks, and for those who have already tried and enjoyer, we’ve designed two tailored rewards for you: Crash test, and In drêche we trust.
You prefer your stuff naked and packaging free? Brewsticks are currently available exclusively in stand-up pouches: so granted, it is zero waste at all and finding a packaging solution that matches our seek for a minimal environmental impact will become a priority as soon as we’ve solved that scale up challenge we currently face. Until then, we are happy to offer a special reward for zero waste shops & bulk lovers.
About us
Pierre-Elie Lamaison
Pierre-Élie was born into a family of bakers, and began doing very different jobs, from computer science to drama play. In 2013, after a baking degree (CAP), he is now also a baker and founded L’origine du pain (The Origin of Bread) in May 2015. The Origin of Bread is a craft bakery that specializes in natural sourdough breads (natural fermentation of flour and water), without any processing aid or food additive. He obtained the mention "Nature & Progrès" in 2018 and 2019.
Elsa Bracadabra
In a parallel dimension, Elsa was a specialized consultant, focusing on the wonderful world of waste management and circular economy. But after a few years working on reports and studies, many of which ended up gathering dust on a shelf, Elsa figured it was time to act and get involved in more useful things. Things that actually contribute to change the dominant system. Starting with Brewsticks.
