Kutuma

This page was last updated January 6th 2021. No further updates and maintenance will be performed on it.

DSC_0028Location: Cluj-Napoca
Open since: November 2017
Contract brewing since: April 2022
Output in 2018: 252 hectolitres
Output in 2019: 589 hectolitres

GENERAL INFORMATION:

Just when you thought things were getting quiet on the western front, the city of Cluj-Napoca decided it was time to step up its game a bit, with the opening of its fourth independent brewery.

While Kutuma only started brewing its beers on a commercial level in November 2017, Norbert, the head brewer, has a wealth of experience in both brewing, as well as becoming thoroughly involved in the emerging brewing initiative among Romanian beer lovers. His interest in brewing sparked up back in the olden days of working in construction in Africa. After noticing that beer was quite a scarce commodity, he began to contemplate making his own. With that in mind, he took a slight detour via the Czech Republic, where he picked up his brewing craft, before returning home to partake in a budding industry.

His most notable pre-Kutuma endeavor came to fruition with the beer meeting of October 2015, in Cluj-Napoca. The event itself was quite ahead of its time in terms of what it sought to achieve, and we’re not talking just beer tasting nights. As the first homebrewing competition in the country, it brought together both well established breweries, as well as back then home-brewers who would later become a staple on the Romanian scene, such as Hop Hooligans, Bereta, and even Oriel.

With a background as impressive as that, it was only a matter of time before the brewery itself came to fruition, so at the beginning of 2017, Norbert and his two associates decided to tackle the Romanian authorities in order to get the ball rolling. Kutuma made its debut towards the end of the year, and as the name implies (‘cutumă’ is an old Romanian word for common law or well established practices) it came out as the embodiment of a lengthy passion for brewing, aiming to change beer drinkers’ expectations of the finished product.

One thing that makes the head brewer stand out compared to other fellows in the industry is his predilection for using yeast. While most brewers are serious hopheads, or at least showcase a bit of a sweet tooth with their love for malts, the head brewer at Kutuma prefers to contemplate the subtleties of yeast strains, and the unique (sometimes even unpredictable) ways in which they bring a beer to life.

Keeping true to their involvement in the industry and given the fact that they have a more than generous output (they are among the few craft breweries in the country to use 2000 liter fermenting vessels), Kutuma launched a gypsy program in the spring of 2018, to give local aspiring brewers a hand in coming out on the market. So far, they hosted Neuron Mash and it’s first concoction, a double dry-hopped double IPA that slowly, but surely, came out in the month of June. Several months later, they also helped launch the city’s second gypsy Player One Brewery.

Currently available in 500ml glass bottles and 330ml for their Imperial Stout, as well as draft, the Kutuma beers are slowly working their way outside the range of Cluj-Napoca and into the country. You can find their list of locations here, or you can buy them online from Berero Store.

Check out how it’s made: Transa batch 2 (fresh hops edition)

Products:

  • Zăbava – Lager – 5.5% ABV
  • Zarva – American Wheat Beer – 6.2% ABV
  • Jargon – Amber Ale – 5.2% ABV
  • Dambla – IPA – 7% ABV
  • Ortu’ Popii – Imperial Stout – 11% ABV
  • Kurva – Session Pale Ale – 3.8% ABV
  • Transa – Kölsch – 4.8% ABV
    – Fresh hops edition – 4.7% ABV

Seasonal/limited edition beers:

  • Nord IPA – IPA (brewed for the band Luna Amară) – 7% ABV
  • Zarva – East Coast Wheat – American Wheat Beer with NE yeast – 6.2% ABV
  • Cânepăbere – Hemp Lager – 4.5% ABV
  • Ortu’ Popii – Imperial Stout – Zetea Barrel Aged – coming soon

Collaborations:

Contract brewing:

  • American Wheat Beer with cáscara (brewed for Meron) – 6.2% ABV
  • No Indie Rock – IPA (brewed for Bers Nova) – 6.3% ABV
  • Samsara – Session Pale Ale with cardamon and turmeric (brewed for Samsara Foodhouse) – 3.8% ABV

For reviews check out RateBeer and Untappd. 

CONTACT DETAILS: