My fiancee and I have spent the past week in Paris and was able to visit Deck and Donohue on Wednesday. I’ve know the Donohue in Deck and Donohue since we were in 2-year old play group back in Philadelphia so it was great to see Michael again. Before opening D&D this past February he was the brewmaster at Flying Fish in Philadelphia and before that worked at 21st Amendment in SF. His business partner, Thomas Deck is French and got to know Michael during his semester abroad at Georgetown University back in 2002.
Anyways, Summer and I swung by their brewery and Michael was working away. While there we got to taste a couple of their beers and tried to catch up!
Michael opened a bottle of their seasonal Clem’s Summer Wheat to start and both Summer and I loved it. Incredibly refreshing, lots of fresh fruits, nice piney notes from the hops, and a clean finish. I think this was our favorite of the tasting!
After that Michael opened up their IPA and then their Monk Brown Ale. We liked both a lot…the Brown Ale was a day or two old and was incredibly fresh and zippy with nice cocoa notes and great acidity. The IPA had a nice malty backbone to it and at 6.5%alc, is a really nice IPA.
On Thursday night, we went out for dinner and drinks with Michael and his wife Tomoko and the restaurant we dined at had his Mission Pale Ale by the bottle. Got one of those (their best seller) and I liked it a lot. Reminded me very much of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. Michael mentioned that a lot of cocktail bars are using the Mission Pale Ale in cocktails…thought that was interesting.
Despite being just a few months old, their beers are finding their way into some of the hippest restaurants in Paris; Septime, & Clamato come immediately to mind. While the cocktail scene is really exploding Paris, they’re rolling the dice that the craft beer scene (which is absolute shit right now) is next to take off.
If anyone here goes to visit Paris, I’d be happy to introduce you to Michael…I’m sure he’d love to have some beer/wine nerds stop by the brewery.