All About Beer Magazine - Volume 35, Issue 5
January 9, 2015 By John Holl

A Brewery Collaboration 

Steve Hindy held open one of the large glass doors to the breezeway that connected a gleaming new brewery and a taproom and restaurant that serves the beers. Welcoming a visitor inside, he gestured widely toward the brewery before turning right into the tasting room. 

Steve Hindy
Steve Hindy and James Lemoyne. Photo by Julia Dansarie, courtesy of Brooklyn Brewery.

It was the morning after the official launch party of Nya Carnegiebryggeriet, a joint venture of Brooklyn Brewery, which Hindy co-founded, and Carlsberg Brewery, the fourth-largest brewery in the world, with a headquarters in Denmark. The signs of a well-attended party were still evident, especially on the faces of the staff, who had reassembled just hours after the last guest shuffled out. There was still work to be done, however, before the official public opening, so the staff was back cleaning, installing, testing recipes and working with contractors to make sure this closely watched venture—not just in Sweden, but in the United States as well, hit the ground running. 

There were a number of reasons for this collaboration brewery, and both sides involved saw the real potential to stake a claim in a growing beer market before too many others jumped on the bandwagon. 

Situated in the harbor neighborhood of Hammarby, the brewery rests along the waterfront, near a commuter ferry launch, a bike path and rows of housing. The location offers a steady stream of customers, a serene harbor view from both the inside restaurant, which seats 81 people, and the outside patio, which can accommodate 150 more (weather permitting) complete with a grill station. 

Because of preservation society rules, many of the original architectural elements of the building—where lightbulbs were once made—had to stay intact, including the windows that face the water, and certain precautions had to be installed, like scrubbers on vents to prevent the smells associated with brewing from permeating the neighborhood. 

“The nature of craft beer is local, and we wanted to work with our partners and our neighbors to be a local brewery with a local brand,” explained Hindy. 

For those who have visited Brooklyn’s headquarters in New York, it was hard not to see the similarities: a modest-sized brewery in a repurposed building in a neighborhood on the upswing where young professionals were staking their claim. It was not just the infrastructure that was similar, but the brewing staff as well. 

Before he became brewmaster at the Brooklyn Brewery, Garrett Oliver was a homebrewer. So, too, was Anders Wendler, the new head brewer at Nya Carnegiebryggeriet. The staff he assembled also is a mix of established and newish-to-the-industry, but all have that culinary and inventive streak that has become a hallmark of Brooklyn’s beers, something reinforced as the team trained for weeks in New York as Sweden came online. 

All of the beers produced—from the five they started with: Nya Carnegie Kellerbier, Nya Carnegie Amber, J.A.C.K. session IPA, Lumens In Tenebris (a dark saison), and Primus Lux (a winter warmer) are all made with food pairings in mind. This is not only Oliver’s influence, but the ethos of the Swedish staff as well. A small room just off the bar houses private beer dinners where brewers and chefs alike can showcase the harmony of flavors to intimate crowds. 

During a visit in spring, the brewing team was working on a stout with coconut sap sugar, brought back in several suitcases after brewer Josefine Karlsson took a vacation to Indonesia. 

“Coming up with ideas is not the problem,” says Wendler. “It’s finding the time to do it.” With a capacity of 12,000 barrels, Hindy said, the majority of the beer would leave the brewery to be served at bars throughout Sweden and the rest of Scandinavia. Indeed, within several days the first batches of Nya Carnegiebryggeriet beer were being poured throughout Stockholm, to a warm and enthusiast reception. Some of the beers will even make their way to American shores, completing the beer exchange.


John Holl
John is the editor of All About Beer Magazine and the author of three books, including The American Craft Beer Cookbook. Find him on Twitter @John_Holl.