Past meets present at Ancient Future Beer Dinner, July 15

Image courtesy of Priory.

Priory Beer Dinners & Collab Brews has announced plans for its next beer dinner, with the group set to team up this time around with Celestial Beerworks of Dallas.

As always, the Priory team collaborated with the brewery beforehand to create a recipe using a unique culinary ingredient not typically seen in modern-day beer. In this case, the ancient grain fonio adds to the foundation for a hazy IPA, meaning there is an old school meets new school kind of coupling at the core of this partnership. 

Fonio is a type of heritage millet grain grown in West Africa and has been cultivated for over 5,000 years, making it Africa’s oldest cultivated cereal crop. It has a small grain structure similar to quinoa or couscous, but much smaller.

What’s truly unique about this grain is that it needs very little water to grow and can be harvested multiple times per year. This makes fonio very versatile and sustainable, especially in arid climates. Fonio is more well known in culinary circles, having only been used in the beer world in the last few years, primarily thanks to the efforts head brewer Garrett Oliver, from Brooklyn Brewery of New York.

According to a press release, fonio was added directly into the mash, which was hopped with Rakau hops from New Zealand to create a fonio hazy IPA. The hops will predominantly lend a fruity character with notes of apricot, peach and mango to the beer, while fonio will add a passionfruit-like flavor once fully fermented. These flavors combined will create a fruit-forward aroma bursting with notes of tropical fruit, and a punchy bite with notes on stone fruit on the tongue.

As for the beer's name, 'Ancient Future' relays back to the ancient roots of fonio while looking forward to its sustainability in a world where natural resources are becoming increasingly more valuable.

For the Ancient Future Beer Dinner, coming up on July 15th at Celestial Beerworks - The Satellite, Chef Ben Walter of Priory has designed a four-course menu for the evening, including fonio directly into some of the dishes themselves. Tickets for the event are $85pp and may be purchased at https://www.priorybeer.com/events/ancient-future-celestial-beer-dinner.

An intro to Priory, a craft beer, culinary and community-driven concept

Image credit: Priory.

For some, the idea of a ghost or gypsy brewer is one aspect of the brewing industry that might be unfamiliar. Practically, the two terms are the same in that they describe a brewer who does not have a physical facility.

That said, ghost brewing is not to be confused with an alternating proprietorship arrangement, where two (or more) licensed entities share a physical space. Ghost brewers are not licensed, with the gypsy descriptor being fitting if the brewer travels to and collaborates with a variety of different breweries.

Locally, BlackMan Brewing is perhaps the most well-known ghost brewer to operate in North Texas, while Smittox Brewing has been taking this approach more recently as the company works to open a brick-and-mortar location in Dallas.

Smittox, incidentally, highlights a typical goal of the ghost brewer, that being to build brand recognition before committing to a larger investment in the pursuit of opening their own brewery. And with regard to their overall approach, creativity and experimentation are the hallmarks of these nomadic wort wranglers.

This brings us to the newest entry into the category for North Texas, a group that goes by the name of Priory (@priorybeer on IG). A partnership between Collin Zreet (Advanced Cicerone, former co-owner of Funky Picnic Brewery & Cafe of Fort Worth), Ben Walter (creative and culinary director at Southside Cellar of Fort Worth) and John McCurdy, Priory identifies as part ghost brewery, part dinner series.

A priory, of course, brings to mind a monastery, and indeed the principles behind Priory are rooted in the characteristic behaviors of monks and their well-known devotion to community.

---

"The guiding ethos - to know the unknown guest - shapes every aspect of hospitality. The table is central: a place where strangers become friends, where slowness and presence are valued, and where the wild, unseen work of yeast and time become metaphors for renewal.

Priory’s identity draws from ancient monastic rhythms, punk aesthetics and culinary innovation. The tone is contemplative yet gritty, reverent yet grounded. Each beer and dinner tells a story - of patience, transformation and belonging."

---

Established in 2024, Priory debuted its first collaboration beer earlier this year at Turning Point Beer of Bedford. Punk Monk was a farmhouse ale/hazy IPA hybrid brewed with flaked oats and fermented with a strain of Brettanomyces yeast. The formulation was also emblematic of the types of beers consumers can expect to see from Priory going forward. 

"All of our creations will blur the lines between beer styles, including non-traditional ingredients with a focus on culinary compatibility," says Zreet.

Punk Monk was released before beer dinners were added to the concept, but look for the pairing portion of the program to be introduced with the next Priory creation. That recipe, a Japanese-inspired saison is being aged in a foeder at Vector Brewing of Dallas, with the associated beer dinner set to occur on December 15.

As for whether or not Priory has further aspirations beyond its current incarnation?

"Right now, it's just something fun," says Zreet. "We'll see if it turns into anything."