Marika Josephson of Scratch Brewing brews beers using foraged ingredients from around her rural property, including beers brewed with tree bark, roots, leaves, and nuts. In this episode of Bean to Barstool Bite Sized, Marika shares what she loves most about working with tree ingredients in brewing.

Maple is intimately tied to life in eastern North America, and in today’s episode, you’ll hear from Canadian and American bean to bar chocolate makers and American craft brewers who use maple sap, sugar, and syrup local to their areas in thoughtful, nuanced chocolates and beers. All of them had memories that tied the flavor of maple into the stories of their lives, and in this episode you’ll hear how evocative the smells and flavors of maple can be.

So many evocative flavors and aromas come from trees without us really thinking about them that way. Cinnamon is a tree bark. Maple syrup comes from tree sap. In the adult beverage world, the quinine that gives bitterness to tonic water and the angostura that flavors the eponymous bitters are both from trees. And of course there are endless variations in smoke aromas, including in beer and chocolate. In this episode we explore the flavor of wood and other tree ingredients in bean to bar chocolate and craft beer.