POUGHKEEPSIE – Zeus Brewing of Poughkeepsie is preparing to release a new, limited edition “Left-Handed Pilsner” on Saturday. The Main Street brewery has a brewmaster that is left-handed and he convinced General Manager Jeremy Phillips to allow the beer to be produced in limited supply.
“He came to me with an interesting idea and some fascinating statistics about the left-handed community,” Phillips said. “In the constant ‘one-upmanship’ in craft brewing, I gave the green light to do something completely different and unique.” In researching the validity of his brewmaster’s idea, Phillips learned that five of the last nine US Presidents – Obama, Clinton, George H.W. Bush, Reagan, and Ford were all left-handed and the left-handed community accounts for 12 percent of the world’s population.
Saturday’s release, Phillips noted, will give left-handed people, who represent 13.1 percent of the country’s population, a beer of their own. The Netherlands has the highest number of lefties with 13.2 percent of their population while Belgium and America each have 13.1 percent of the southpaws.
Brewmaster Justin Sturges convinced his bosses to allow him to re-tool the brewing equipment to allow the swirling action of the mixture to mimic the action it would have if done south of the Equator, due to the Coriolis effect. “Left-handed people like myself are often considered backward, despite 20 percent of the members of MENSA being lefties, so I wanted to put this unique spin on the new pilsner.”
Phillips told Mid-Hudson News that Zeus Brewing will open its doors at the Main Street brewpub at noon on Saturday to accommodate the expected rush of people looking to try the unique beverage. More information about the brewery can be found here.
