Northern Ireland-based business Yellow Door Bakery has partnered with craft brewery Pokertree Brewing of Carrickmore to create a new beer from sourdough yeast.

Yellow Door describes Babcha as a light, opaque, pink colour, which is available in 500ml bottles with an RRP of £2.50.

Simon Dougan, managing director of Yellow Door Bakery said that when Darren Nugent, founder of Pokertree Brewing of Carrickmore, suggested he would be interested in producing beer from sourdough, he decided to produce some yeast for him from a starter he had used for many years.

“My sourdough is based on yeast brought to me from Poland by my head baker many years ago. In fact, the original recipe dates back about 50 years,” said Dougan.

“Darren Nugent’s wife is Polish and she suggested the name Babcha, which means grandmother in Polish. We took some of this ‘mother’ that we have been feeding and caring for like a baby for the last 15 years and produced an extra amount for Darren to use in his beer.”

Nugent has been exploring various types of beer since launching the Pokertree craft brewery in 2013 and has been looking at different fermentation and processing techniques that would enable him to produce a unique product.