“It gave us a lot of ideas.”

The employees at Tire Shack Brewing in Moncton decided to have a little fun with their newest beer.

They brewed beer with the help of artificial intelligence (AI) and are now open to the public.

Brewery co-owner Alan Norman uses ChatGPT (AI to answer questions in a human-like way) to come up with recipes for what future beer trends might look like. language processing tool).

“It gave us a lot of ideas,” said Norman.

Norman and his brewmaster Henry Soares wanted to make something more local and asked for examples of New Brunswick beers made with alternative ferments and herbs.

“So, it said honey. New Brunswick has a lot of honey, but it said lavender. New Brunswick has a lot of lavender fields, so they said we should make a honey lavender saison.” That’s basically what they told us,” Norman said.

The next step was to ask how it was made, and the brewery staff answered quickly.

“If you talk for two seconds, the recipe will spit out,” Norman said.

Surprised, Norman asked for the name of the new beer, and again got an immediate answer.

“Garden party, that’s perfect. Bees, lavender, it kind of made sense,” he said.

Then I used another AI program to create the labels. It took about 30 seconds.

The whole process was a shock to the team, but Soares said the beer’s recipe was flawed.

“The ingredient list was very interesting, but we had to tweak the beer-friendly numbers. It was like a 2 percent beer, too. Nobody wants to drink that,” Soares said. laughed. “It still needed some humanity, but the suggestions were great. The beer was great.”

Norman said the original recipe was watery and lacked honey, so Soares had to tweak it a bit.

“He was kind of proud of it,” said Norman. “He said, ‘Hey, I know more than machines, I’m a professional here.’

While everyone is happy with the finished product, Norman and Soares don’t envision a dystopian future where beer is designed and produced by AI without humans.

“No, I don’t think so. It’s all about art,” Soares said. “People want to feel human in it, so they always keep that aspect.”

Norman knows that humans are irreplaceable in the brewing world.

“Anyone can write a recipe, but it takes years of knowledge and hands-on experience to actually design it, troubleshoot it, and when something goes wrong, put it into practice and fix it on the fly. practice and training,” said Norman.

Norman said AI is currently on the ground level, but will likely become a factor in people’s lives in the near future, for better or worse.

“The AI ​​is kind of taking hold. We just wanted to jump in and go and see if it was fun at low stakes,” he added.

Expansion

While Norman is thrilled with his new beer, he’s also in the final stages of a major renovation project.

The Tire Shack is expanding into a second 5,600-square-foot building right next to the taproom, doubling its beer production capacity.

It will also serve as an event space venue for weddings, corporate events, live music, and more, with a glass-enclosed atrium on the second floor and a seasonal rooftop patio.

“In the summer it feels like you’re in an outdoor space, but it’s covered and protected by glass, but in the winter it feels almost like a snow globe,” Norman said.

The new building is scheduled to open this summer.