Every brewery has an origin story. Norse Brewing Company's is better than most, because it's true and it involves bourbon: a February 2017 neighborhood cookout in Heritage that ran until two in the morning and ended with a plan.
How it started: the cookout
The neighbors were two couples: Chris and Jenni Jorgensen, and Brad and Lynn Wynn. Brad brought six-packs of Chris's favorite bourbon-barrel-aged ale; when the beer ran out, Chris fetched a bottle of Basil Hayden; ribeyes went on the grill; and by 2 a.m. — in the brewery's own telling — they had solved all the world's problems and Brad had suggested they start a brewery together. As Norse puts it: nothing exciting ever starts with a glass of milk and a salad.
The founders
The pedigrees made it more than talk. Brad Wynn is one of the Triangle's craft-beer trailblazers — a veteran of Pennsylvania's Victory Brewing who came south to brew, spent years as head brewer and partner at Raleigh's Big Boss Brewing, and created the brewing program at Wake Tech. Lynn Wynn, a former Whole Foods manager, runs Norse day to day. Chris Jorgensen, originally from Denmark — he met Jenni in California as a sixteen-year-old exchange student in 1989 — brought an engineer's process discipline from a career at Boeing, GE, Siemens, and Thermo Fisher. Jenni's twin sister Jeannie and brewpub director Joe Gosselin round out the ownership. “It truly is family run,” Lynn has said, “and I'm so glad we're all still friends after all this time.”
The Great Hall on Brooks Street
After scouting eleven breweries for sale across the state, the couples instead transformed the former La Foresta Italian café at 203 S. Brooks Street, opening in December 2019 after a top-to-bottom redesign: 5,000 square feet, room for roughly 330, a 40-person bar, a covered deck, brewhouse seating, and a downstairs bourbon, rum, and tequila bar. The kitchen serves the Southern-Scandinavian menu that became the brand — the Viking burger, Nordic mussels, elk sausage, and Frikadeller built on Jorgensen's grandmother's recipe — beside Wynn's beers, ciders, and seltzers.
A second location, the Norse Brewing Longhouse, has since opened in downtown Zebulon — but the Wake Forest original remains the family's Great Hall. Reservations, events, and menus are on their directory listing.
