Originally aired on YPR’s Flavors Under the Big Sky
A “meadup” can be made in Columbus at the Bearded Viking Mead Company. Traveling off Highway 90 to skirt the downtown, nicknamed “Sheep Dip,” and over the railroad tracks and across the Yellowstone River is a Quonset hut where the ancient beverage, mead, is made. Here, CEO and founder JT “Viko” Robertson crafts an ancient form of wine made with honey instead of grapes.
He named his business Bearded Viking, which began “as a joke.” After leaving the military, he started wearing dreadlocks and sporting a beard, which earned him the nickname “Bearded Viking” while he lived in Salt Lake City. “So, I made an Instagram handle called Utah Bearded Viking, and it ended up being kind of a big thing over time. So, when I named the company, it was just fitting because it was the beaded Viking’s mead company.”…