Creative by design
Grain, process, yeast, and hops create nearly endless room to shape flavor—and beer belongs at the celebrations where people come together.
Hunterdon County, New Jersey • Building in public
A little mountain.
A big brewery in the making.
Jugtown Brewing Co. is a start-up craft brewery looking to give cheers to the world—and document every honest step it takes to get there.
Food science◆Mountain ingenuity◆Built in public◆Cheers to the world
01
The name behind the brewery
Small mountain. Mighty spirit.
Jugtown Brewing Co. takes its name from Jugtown Mountain in Hunterdon County—a place tied to local stories of Prohibition-era ingenuity and applejack moving down Old Route 22.
The area’s apple orchards gave mountain makers what they needed: fermentable sugar, water, and a way to keep local taverns supplied when alcohol was federally outlawed.
That resourceful, independent energy is the heart of Jugtown: create joy with what you have, keep moving when the odds say otherwise, and bring something worth celebrating back to the community.
“We are here to bring joy in spite of what is happening around us.”
Founder · Food scientist · Homebrewer
Meet Matt Jiorle.
A food science professional turning the intersection of flavor, operations, and ambition into a brewery built to last.
- 10+
- Years in the food industry
- 2×
- Rutgers graduate
- 1
- Big brewery vision
How the idea took shape
Matt earned his bachelor’s degree in Food Science from Rutgers in 2015, then returned for a master’s in business and science with a food science focus. His career has taken him through flavor R&D at Mars Wrigley and into quality control at Flavor Materials International.
The brewery began as a pipe dream during graduate school. By the end of his capstone, the idea had found its center: combine the creativity of recipe development, the “chaotic ballet” of business operations, and a family connection to Jugtown Mountain’s bootlegging past.
Now he is developing the beer, mapping the operation, building his own brewery software, and sharing the unvarnished process from scratch.
The long view
This is not a glorified bar that makes its own beer.
The goal is a serious production brewery: lean operations, rigorous quality control, room for flavor creativity, and a brand that can grow far beyond its first taproom.
Local by choice
Hunterdon County is home. Jugtown begins in its countryside, its history, and the place that formed its founder.
Built to endure
From custom operating software to disciplined quality systems, the foundation is being designed for scale from day one.
Ten-year vision“I want to be buying my own beer from a vendor at Yankee Stadium.”
04
What’s brewing
The first pour is still ahead.
The lineup is taking shape through recipe development, homebrewing, and testing. No pretend launch list—just the real work, shared as it happens.
In development
NowRecipe development
Building flavor, repeatability, and a point of view.
NextLicensing & equipment
Turning the homebrew operation into a legal brewery.
ThenFirst commercial pour
Bringing Jugtown back to Hunterdon County—and beyond.
The build log
No overnight-success mythology.
Recipes, licensing, equipment, construction, software, setbacks, and wins. The whole business is being documented so the finished brewery has a true story to tell.
See the real-time build @jugtownbrewingMilestone 004
Latest news
“I've really been stewing the last few days about this dream being unrealistic, among other things, but I thoroughly enjoy working on this passion project. I just need more money, baby! This stuff is hard, but fun.
I can't brew and work on this all the time because I need my full-time job to enable this business. I also can't do this alone without another co-founder who is actually willing to put in the work and I can trust them.
So... I'm just going to keep documenting my hobby business semi-idea, keep renewing the LLC so nobody takes my name, and keep on brewing.”
Life's a garden, dig it.Milestone 003
Process improvement
“My boomer dad made a comment about my beer not being clear and I guess there may be some validity to his statement, I COULD do more to clarify the beer. So, I've decided it's time to retire my copper wort immersion chiller and get a counterflow chiller.
Last time, in the summer heat, it took me a solid 5 hours to cool the beer to pitching temp, and THAT in itself is a problem with efficiency. The time spent cooling the beer means more time to potentially expose it to fruit flies that want to contaminate the batch with their wild yeasts and other microorganisms (happened with a batch of mine last year; beer tasted medicinal and band-aid-like).
It also means more proteins will be suspended in solution because the hot wort keeps the proteins dissolved, so if that part is slow, large protein globules will NOT form and I'll have a bunch of smaller proteins just floating along merrily. The faster cooling will help reduce some of the foaming problems I saw in my earlier batch. Less protein means less foam.
I'm also going to start using a hop spider because I have developed a clog in the liquid line of one of my kegs and it is definitely due to hop material stuck in the line. I had some practice on my empty kegs removing the parts and reassembling it, so later I'll do it live on the filled keg.”
Next batch should be clearer, DAD.Milestone 002
The first kegged taste
“Well, I now have a functioning website and I don’t need to pay a monthly fee, just the initial domain registration fee. I love being resourceful.
I also got to taste my kegged beer tonight. I initially put the cobra tap on with the spout open and foamy beer went literally everywhere in my basement. All over the chest freezer, a suitcase, the wall and the floor. Just had to get past a little foam, but the flavor was definitely there.”
A few more brews and I’ll have to try some lagers for winter.Milestone 001
The first website
“I purchased my first website yesterday, which was a lot easier than I expected. However, GoDaddy doesn’t let you do anything constructive for the website after the initial creation, so you need to really maximize your use of about 20 characters to get your message across.”
That part was easy: THE PARTY’S POPPIN’.A few honest answers
Good things take time.
Is Jugtown Brewing Co. open yet?
Not yet. Jugtown is in the start-up and development stage. This site follows the work from recipes and planning through licensing, equipment, construction, and eventually opening day.
Why share the process publicly?
Because the story matters. Matt wants people to see the work behind the outcome—not assume the business simply walked backward into success.
Why build a brewery in Hunterdon County?
It is where Matt was born, raised, and still lives. The countryside, the Jugtown name, and the area’s independent spirit are foundational to the brand.
What kind of brewery will Jugtown be?
A production-minded craft brewery with lean operations, strong quality control, and the ambition to grow without losing the creativity that started it.
Homebrewers. Future customers. People who root for little guys.