Monday, February 16, 2009

Beautiful Barrels at The Bruery

(Click Images to Make 'Em Big)



Right, so I spent the better part of today down at The Bruery helping them bottle up some beer. When you're unemployed the world is indeed your oyster. Bottling beer isn't very much fun. But checking out all the fancy oak barrels that Patrick, Tyler and Co have laying around is loads of fun. Er, barrels full, in fact.

 

As of right now they have... a lot of barrels. I'd guess about 200, give or take. Patrick is apparently planning on having over 500 barrels full of beer by the end of the year. Which is... you know... hella ambitious. 


Luckily the Bruery is overflowing with barrels. Kinda literally -- they're everywhere. What sort of barrels? Last time I was at The Bruery (11 months ago!) they "just" had bourbon barrels [EDIT: Brandy barrels, too] -- including Elijah Craig! But now...



Yup. Wine barrels. I know little about wine but "Bourgogne" is a red wine. And what's in them? As it turns out, all kinds of stuff.




Like lambic. That's right, lambic. Brewed and funked right here in California. Smelled pretty good, too. And while the sharp sourness was missing from the nose, it's only been a few weeks.



Oooh. An Imperial Stout. But of course, made with The Bruery's house strain. So, Belgian Impy Stout. And that barrel has been all emptied out! I also saw a Wheat Wine, an Imperial Wit, a Flanders Red and some less exotic stuff plus their anniversary beer (I was there last March when they brewed it) hiding amongst all the barrels. I like what I saw. And now, some parting shots -- enjoy!




1 comment:

Slovak Brewer said...

After reading several articles about Patrick Rue and then hearing him on the session podcast.. I am going to need to swap some beer from a west coast affiliate... impressive.