HOLIDAY TAPROOM HOURS

First of all, thanks for all the great comments about the new beer we have on tap, the Wassail! We blew through a bunch of it this weekend in the taproom, but we should have it on tap through the New Years weekend.

We will be open the following days for the Holidays:

Mon Dec 22 Brewery open, Taproom closed
Tues Dec 23 Brewery open, Taproom closed
Wed Dec 24 Brewery closed, Taproom closed
Thur Dec 25 Brewery closed, Taproom closed

Friday Dec 26 Brewey open, TAPROOM OPEN 4-8 PM
Saturday Dec 27 Brewery closed, TAPROOM OPEN 2-8 PM with tours at 2:30, 3:30, 4:30, and 5:30 PM

Mon Dec 29 Brewery open, Taproom closed
Tues Dec 30 Brewery open, Taproom closed
Wed Dec 31 Brewery closed, Taproom closed
Thur Jan 1 Brewery closed, Taproom closed

Friday Jan 2 Brewey open, TAPROOM OPEN 4-8 PM
Saturday Jan 3 Brewery closed, TAPROOM OPEN 2-8 PM with tours at 2:30, 3:30, 4:30, and 5:30 PM

So what the heck does it mean when I say, "Brewery open"? Well, when we are brewing, the back doors by our loading dock are open and you can swing by and pick up whatever you need - t-shirts, hats, growlers, kegs, etc. The same goes for returning kegs - even when the taproom is not open, you can come to the back doors. We may be in the middle of something, and it might take a few minutes, but we'll always be glad to take care of you!

"WASSAIL" ON TAP THIS WEEKEND!

Just in time for the holidays, we brewed a dark, mysterious ale that will warm the cockles of your weary heart. A traditional Wassail brew was a dark ale or mead spiced with ginger, nutmeg, and cinnamon. Our hoppy American brown has a rich caramel and chocolate body, a hoppy bouquet of citrus and pine, and a subtle aroma of Christmas cookie spice. See if you can guess what we spiced it with! It will be on tap for this weekend starting Thursday Dec 18, and if I know all you thirsty Yazooligans, it won't last long. Come down and get a growler or two - I guarantee it will make the present wrapping this weekend more fun!

"The Wassail Song", English traditional, 17th century

Here we come a wassailing

Among the leaves so green,

Here we come a wandering

So fair to be seen.

Our wassail cup is made
Of the rosemary tree,
And so is your beer
Of the best barley.

Love and joy come to you,

And to you your wassail too,

And God bless you and send you a happy New Year.

And God send you a happy New Year.

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HOPPY NEW YEAR!

BEST GIFT IDEA EVER!

Get the beer lover in your life something they will really appreciate! I mean, socks and underwear are good and all, but you can't drink your underwear (and savor it). Our gift packs come with four of our Yazoo logo pint glasses, and a growler. You can have the growler filled at the time you buy the gift, or we'll give you a gift card for a refill later. They are only $29.95, and the best part about shopping at Yazoo? You can have a beer while you're shopping! Try that at the mall!

Branching out into Knoxville soon...

We will soon be distributing our beers in Knoxville, through our new friends at Eagle Distributing. We're looking at a throwing some launch parties in early January, so stay tuned!

THANKSGIVING TAPROOM HOURS

Hi gang,

We'll be closed this coming Thursday, Nov. 28 to celebrate Thanksgiving with our families. The taproom will be open normal hours the rest of the week - Friday 4-8 PM and Saturday 2-8 PM. So when you wake from your turkey-induced coma and realize you're out of beer, head down to the taproom and fill up that growler!

Cheers,

Linus

THANK YOU!

Thank you to all who turned out on a chilly November night for our 5th anniversary party! It was a blast, and we got much more of a crowd than even we expected. I hope you enjoyed yourselves - we sure did! (P.S. you know it was a good party when there are still bicycles chained up outside on Monday morning... too much Fresh Hop?)

We drained all of our Organic Ale and Rye Saison kegs. The Organic will probably be back in the spring, maybe as one of our regular offerings. The Saison will be out in bottles, very soon, as soon as we get label approval from the ATF. We still have few Fresh Hop kegs left, and will have it on tap in the taproom for the next few weeks. So if you forgot to get a growler Saturday night, or couldn't because the lines were too long, come on in this weekend and we'll hook you up.

Yazoo's Organic brew at Americana Folk Festival

Two days to go...

Nov.1 out at Montgomery Bell state park, the Americana Folk Festival will be on. Finally! It's been way too long between this one and the last, back in Oct 2006. For one of the best listening, enjoying, chilling out festivals in Tennessee, you can't beat this one.

And once again, our friend Dara has blessed us as the exclusive beer sponsor of the event. I'll be on site pouring our beers, including our first ever Organic beer. It's a light end-of-summer kind of beer, made with 100% organic floor-malted English malt. The kind of beer that makes you appreciate the changing leaves, the warm sunshine and the slight chill when it goes behind a cloud. The kind of beer that will go great with the wonderful music of the Americana Folk Fest!

Cheers,

Linus

Fresh Hop Tour 2008

Here's the tour dates for our Fresh Hop ale. We will be tapping one keg of this special ale at the following locations:

Nashville

Beyond the Edge Oct 22nd
3 Crow Bar Oct 28th
Tin Roof- Cool Springs Nov 6th
Riverfront Tavern Nov 11th
12th South Taproom Nov 13th
Liquid Smoke in Murfreesboro Nov 14th

We are still working on a date for the Nashville Flying Saucer and the two Memphis Flying Saucers.

Huntsville

The Nook - Oct 27th

Birmingham

J. Clyde - Oct 28th

Hope to see all of you there! This has been a fun project and a delicious beer to boot. And of course, if you can't make it to one of these events, be sure to come down to the brewery for our 5th Anniversary party Nov 8th!

UPDATE: Fesh Hop Ale kegged out...

WOW! I hope we brewers can keep from drinking all 36 kegs we got off this brew. We kegged it out today, unfiltered (natchrally!). To tease up our Fifth anniversary party, we're going to be doing a series of one-keg events around town at some of the pubs that have really supported us over the years. The first is going to be this Wednesday Oct 22nd at Beyond the Edge in east Nashville, starting around 7 PM. We'll throw it up on the tap wall and see how long it takes to drain the keg. We've got a series of these one-keg events scheduled here in Nashville, in Huntsville (at the Nook), in Birmingham (at the J. Clyde), and in Memphis (at the Flying Saucer) over the next few weeks. Check back here for the final details. The remaining kegs will be tapped at our Fifth anniversary party Nov 8th, along with yet another special brew!

Yep, this is the fun part of being in the brewing business!

New sexy pub-style glasses in stock now

We finally found the perfect pint for your Yazoo brew. These English pub-style glasses just feel great in your hand (sexy, even!), and the curved lip holds in the wonderful hop and malt aromas. They are for sale now down at our taproom for only $5, and stay tuned to this blog for details of "pint nights" at your favorite local pubs, where we will be giving them away with the purchase of a Yazoo pint!

New Pie in the Sky opening soon in Midtown

As if some of the best pizza in town isn't enough reason to try the new location of Pie in the Sky Pizza, in the old Longhorn Steakhouse building in Midtown, how's this?

Two for One Yazoo Draft all day, every day!

The new location should be opening next week. Come by and check out the great pizza, cold fresh Yazoo beer, and the very cool bar.

Can you tell it's hop harvest time?

We have our newest batch of Hop Project on tap starting this weekend. It's Hop Project #7 (in case you lost track) and it was brewed by our newest rookie brewer, Ivan Chester. He used a blend of Millenium, Columbus, Simcoe, and Cascade for this one. The Hop Project series has become one of those beers people seek out - #6 was all the rave at the Magic City Brewfest this summer. Come on by before it's all gone! It will only be available at the brewery for now!

Cheers,

Linus

Wet Hop 2008 pics

Well, we brewed our Wet Hop ale yesterday! The wonderful smell of fresh-off-the-vine Amarillo hops is still wafting around corners of the brewery when I walked in this morning. The opportunity to brew this beer was a pleasant surprise. I'm friends with the grower who has the patent on Amarillo hops - they are only grown on his farm in Washington state. We had been told by the hop broker that buys his hops and sells them to us craftbrewers, that we would probably not be able to get all the Amarillo hops we need for next year. So I was floored when my friend called me up, said "don't worry, the harvest has been great, and I even have a treat for you. I'm going to send you about 100 lbs of hops fresh off the vine for a harvest beer!"

Now, we normally get our hops in pelletized form, and I have never used whole leaf hops in our brew system. But there was no way I was going to turn him down. So we devised a method to use our mash tun, which has a set of screens in the bottom, as a sort of "hop back" to hold back the hops. We brewed up a strong IPA in the kettle, and then poured in all the fresh Amarillo hop cones into our mash tun. We pumped the hot wort from the kettle into the mash tun and let the fresh hops steep in it for about 15 minutes. We then pumped the wort through our heat exchanger into a waiting fermenter, leaving the hop cones behind in the mash tun.

But wait, we weren't finished. We mashed another batch of IPA in right on top of the fresh hops, and finished topping off the fermenter with this beer. So our Wet Hop Ale of 2008 will be a blend of one batch where we added the fresh hops right at the end of the boil, and one batch where we used those hops in the mash. I think this is a unique process - I've certainly never heard of anyone else doing it that way.

Anyway, the proof will be in the puddin'. I can't wait to try it! Here's some pics of the process:

Justin from Davis on Draft podcast came to bear witness to the hops (back left talking to Neil)

YAZOO TURNS FIVE!

HEY YOU!!

THIS IS BIG!!

We're turning five years old next month, and we're planning a big bash at the brewery. It's going to be held Nov. 8th, Saturday, from 2 PM until late. Here's the lineup:

THE BANDS

THE DELTA SAINTS

starting around 8 PM

SPACE CAPONE

starting around 10 PM

THE BEERS

Not only will we have the regulars you've come to love over the past five years, but for the occasion we brewed TWO new beers!

RYE SAISON - a delicious Belgian farm ale brewed with a portion of Rye grain and a classic Beglian saison yeast. Yes, I've been talking about brewing this for years, and finally have it ready.

WET HOP HARVEST ALE - we were lucky enough to score about 100 lbs of fresh, wet Amarillo hops, straight from the fields at harvest in Yakima valley. The IPA we brewed with it will blow you away. That's all I have to say to all you hopheads out there.

THE FOOD

We're getting South Street restaurant to set up onsite and fry up loads of fresh catfish. What, a catfish fry in November? That's right! We'll also have some pulled pork barbeque for those who don't do fried. Weirdos.

So that's the gig. Check this space for more details as we get close, and leave the whole weekend open - Saturday for the party, and Sunday for the recovery!

Asheville Brewgrass Festival 2008

A good time was had by all. We don't sell our beer in Asheville, N.C. yet, but I've always heard it was a great festival. So Neil and I made the drive up to the mountains with our Pale Ale, Dos Perros, and Hefeweizen. The Dos Perros was a big hit - somewhat to my surprise, I thought Asheville was supposed to be a hop-head haven - and the festival was great. We look forward to coming up again next year!

Yazoo article in today's Nashville City Paper

Here's the link:

http://nashvillecitypaper.com/news.php?viewStory=62703

Thanks William! Great article.

Grimey's Fall Fling this weekend! Sept 13th!

FROM THEIR WEBSITE:

Grimey's & The Basement's Next Big Outdoor In-Store - Sept. 13, 10am-8pmWe've got an initial lineup for our big shindig on Saturday, September 13th. Confirmed as of press time are:The Dexateens, Meemaw, Caitlin Rose, Korean Is Asian, The Sleep Study, Stone Jack Jones, This Modern Station, The Pragmatic, and Tiger! Tiger! Local DJs (Brother Dylan, D-Funk, The Curse of the Drinking Class, DJ B, Left Can Dance) will spin. More acts to be announced next week.It's an all-day free music festival and store-wide sale. See ya there!

The Yazoo beer van will be there pouring all day, and this time they plan to open up the Basement too. So it will be double your trouble!

Art on Tap at the Dixon in Memphis

We've been to this event twice now, and it's a good time. You can taste just about every beer available in Memphis, all under the stars in the gardens at the Dixon art museum. This year the tiickets went way up to $50, but it still drew a pretty good sized crowd. The band was surprisingly good, playing every song from my senior prom back in 1989. Hard to beat a cover band that can play REO Speedwagon followed by Tone Loc.

See Phil and Jody, I told you I'd put your pics up on our website!

Is Yazoo moving?

You might have read the story in the City Paper today, speculating that we were getting ready to buy a building on West End or the Gulch and moving out of Marathon. Let me set the record straight:

We have run out of space here at Marathon. Our options now are to continue to build out the back side of the part of the building we are in, or to look for more space. When you consider how much it would cost to renovate the back side of our building, looking for another building to move some of our production to seems like the best option.

So we looked at a lot of buildings in and around downtown. We narrowed it down to a couple, and started negotiating with the current owners. While talking with Metro Codes, we found to our suprise that brewing beer was no longer an approved use in anywhere except an industrial zoning!

The old version of the zoning code had an exemption that let small breweries operate in the commercial districts. That's how all four of Nashville's breweries, us included, were approved. But in the newest version of the zoning code, that exemption was left out. Why? No one at Planning had any idea. But it meant that in order for us to either expand here at Marathon, or to move some operations to another location, we had to get the zoning text amended to allow for microbreweries to operate again in commercial zoning.

So that's all the current zoning bill 2008-282 is about, getting us compliant with zoning again and giving us the option to look for more space. We have no plans to leave Marathon anytime soon. But we're seriously feeling the walls, and need more space. And we have to get the zoning code changed to do it.

p.s. Update - the zoning text amendment passed with no problems.

Job opening - tour guide on Saturdays!

We give guided brewery tours every Saturday, at 2:30, 3:30, 4:30, 5:30, and 6:30 PM. Each person gets a souvenir pint glass and samples of three beers as they walk through the brewery, learning about each stage of the process and the ingredients that go into each beer. In the past, our brewers have been the tour guides, trading off each weekend. But now our production has gotten to the point where I have to keep them brewing!

So we have an opening for a Saturday tour guide. I'm looking for an energetic person who likes talking about beer! Someone with some homebrewing experience would be ideal, but we'll train you so you can answer just about any question that might come up in the tour. The hours will be from 2 to 8 PM on Saturday, at $10 an hour plus any tips you get from the tours. You'll never run out of beer at home again either! The job is open immediately. If you think it would be fun to talk about beer while getting paid for it, email me at linus@yazoobrew.com, or drop off a resume at our taproom.

Chattanooga Southern Brewers Jam pics

This is a crazy long festival, starting at 2 PM and going until midnight. We went through fourteen kegs of beer before it was all over. Not surprisingly, our Hefeweizen was the big hit, given how hot and sunny it was all day. The tattoos were pretty popular too! And we want to give a big thanks to the volunteers who helped pour, yall were great!

Yazoo Fresh Wet Hop Pale Ale on tap today, this Thursday August 21st!

OK, this is a rare treat! We're taken some freshly picked hops from our brewer Quinn's hop trellis and infused them in a keg of our Pale Ale. No matter how careful the hop growers are with their picking and preserving their hops, some of the essential oils are lost in the drying and packaging of the new hop harvest. This is your chance to see how fresh a Pale Ale can really be. It's tough to grow hops here in Tennessee, so we only did one small keg, and we'll be serving it on the Pleasure Chest until it runs out. Come on down early if you want one!

Barry Walker update

A lot of our regulars to the taproom probably know Barry Walker, the owner of Marathon Village. If you haven't heard the news, Barry was seriously injured in a motorcycle accident a month ago. He was coming down Monteagle Mountain to Chattanooga when he hit a car head on. He was air-lifted to Chattanooga, where he has been in Erlanger hospital for a month in intensive care.

We're hoping and praying for a full recovery, but right now he is still in critical shape. You can send him email and check his progress at http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/barrywalker.

Without Barry's vision, drive, and just plain hard-headedness, Marathon Motorworks would probably not have been saved from the wrecking ball. Barry has a long road to recovery ahead of him. If you're out tonight, drink a Dos Perros in his honor, and wish him luck and strength.

New Brewmaster's Special on Tap at the Taproom

We're glad to have the latest of our Brewmaster's Specials on tap at the Yazoo Taproom. We're taking a break from the Hop Project IPA series, until we can score some more hops (probably after the harvest in September). There's a shortage of hops, and barley prices are through the roof, but there's still one ingredient that is still relatively easy to experiment with. That's yeast!

We're calling this one "Brother Ken". It's based loosely on a Belgian style, but like most Belgians, it's got its own personality. It's the brainchild of Ken Price, one of our brewers. Brewed with some Belgian aromatic malts and a bit of rye and crystal 60 malt, and fermented with blend of Belgian yeasts, the beer is big, with a beautiful red hue and a wonderful malty, slightly funky aroma. Maybe if you corner Ken at the brewery, he'll tell you what secret blend of spices he used. We don't know, he waited until our backs we turned to throw them in the kettle.

Yazoo and Bluegrass Brewing event at 3 Crow Bar

Yazoo and BBC are hosting a Beer, Chocolate, and Cheese tasting event at the 3 Crow Bar in east Nashville. It's August 26th, at 6:30 PM, and tickets are $10.00 at the bar. The gastronomical experts are both breweries will be putting their best up against a wide selection of great beers and cheeses.

Yazoo voted "Best Locally Brewed Beer" by the Tennessean's Toast of Music City awards

Thanks to all of you who voted! The paper said that over 44,000 votes were cast in the Food and Drink category. I'm not sure how representative the results were of all the great restaurants in town ( some of whom were inexplicably absent). But "Best Locally Brewed Beer" - we'll take it!

NITRO STOUT

We're looking for a dragracer to sponsor? No, it's just a new twist on an old friend. We have a batch of our Onward Stout on tap at the Yazoo Taproom, and at a few other good beer bars in town. What makes it different? We're dispensing it with a blend of nitrogen and carbon dioxide, in the style made famous by Guinness and other beers like Boddingtons, etc.

Carbon dioxide is the usual gas for dispensing beer. Most people don't realize that it creates a flavor in your mouth. When carbon dioxide meets water, it forms carbonic acid, which has a slightly tart taste. Nitrogen is a pretty inert gas, and doesn't add much to the flavor of the beer. But since air is made up of about 80% nitrogen, bubbles formed in the beer by nitrogen last much longer than bubbles formed in the beer by carbon dioxide, which is only about 0.03% of air. So by pushing a beer with a blend, you get a beer with a nice, long-lasting creamy head, and a beer that tastes much more malty because of the lower levels of carbon dioxide. Whew, techincal stuff done!

It's amazing the way the flavor of this beer changes when it is on nitro. You'll have to come by the taproom and try it out for yourself!

Bottling line position opening

Thans to all who applied for the bottling line position. It's been filled. We'll hang on to all the resumes we got in case another opening comes up.

Cheers!

City House event pics

Thanks to Tandy and everyone at City House for putting on this event! It was a lot of fun, and we'll definitely do it again.

5th Birthday Bash for Panty Raid

We know a lot of the ladies in Panty Raid - heck, we even sometimes trust them with our children! So it's with great pleasure that we are proud to sponsor them for their 5th Birthday Bash at the Cannery Ballroom this Saturday. It's a great time, and fun for all. And there will be special guests, we hear!

TELL ALL OF YOUR FRIENDS! TICKETS ON SALE NOW!

Panty Raid!'s Fifth Annual Tease-a-Thon and Birthday Bash!
Saturday, July 12th, 2008 Cannery Ballroom 9pm sharp
Join us for PANTY RAID!'s Fifth Annual Tease-a-Thon and Birthday Bash on Saturday, July 12th, 2008. That's right, PANTY RAID! is turning five this year and will be celebrating downstairs in the Ballroom with a Three-Hour Burlesque Extravaganza!

In addition to getting to see PANTY RAID! members past and present [Ramona Rouge, Ruby van GoGo, Lula Licious, Ring Girl RoxXxy, Hot Lava Lizzie, Bianca 13, Monique Honeybush, DJ Lonesome and Mister Bananapants], you'll also get to see some of our favorite Nashville friends too [Bodhicitta Bellydance, Kicky LaRue, Gypsyville, SideShow Bennie and our Guest Host for the evening, Tommy Keenum]!

As a special treat, we're flying in Pogo-tease Artist ROKY ROULETTE from San Francisco, CA, and have invited our friends GYPSY HANDS TRIBAL BELLYDANCE from Knoxville, TN to round out the show!

But that's not all folks! We've got additional surprises "up our sleeves"… but we can't give it all away, now can we?

Dig out your best birthday attire, put on your party hat and get ready to attend the best Birthday Bash ever!

Advance tickets available on the Westside at Katy K's Ranch Dressing and Grimey's New and Pre-Loved Music, on the Eastside at Platinum Salon and The Groove, and online at http://www.mercylounge.com/! Tickets $15 advance $18 at the door. Showtime 9pm sharp.

###

Cookout with Tandy Wilson of City House at the Yazoo Taproom courtyard

Well, it's the lazy, dog days of summer. The 4th of July is rapidly fading in our memories, if you can remember it at all. There's the Music City brewfest coming up, but that's weeks away. What to do?

Come on down to the Yazoo taproom on July 14th, from 5:30- until the food is all gone. We're hosting Chef Tandy Wilson from the acclaimed City House in Germantown. Since it has opened last year, City House has been on the receiving end of rave reviews, and justly so. Tandy will be setting up a grill in our courtyard, and promises some great surprises for all comers. It's only $15 for three small appetizers and the three beers paired with... come on, you can't even put four gallons of gas in your car for that much! It promises to be a fun, relaxing Monday afternoon, just what the doctor ordered for the dog days of summer. For more info, email linus@yazoobrew.com or call 320-2090, check out http://www.cityhousenashville.com/.

Music City Brewers Fest tickets on sale now

We have tickets for sale to the Music City Brewers Fest, held downtown July 26th in front of the Country Music Hall of Fame. They are $35 in advance, $45 the day of the event (if you can find any!) It sells out every year before the gates open, so get your tickets early!

We will only sell these tickets during our normal taproom hours, Thursday-Friday 4-8 PM and Saturday 2-8 PM.

There will be a maximum of four tickets sold per person, and we are not selling tickets over the phone. Come on down to the taproom in person and get your tickets! And just to let you know in advance, the taproom will be closed that Saturday so that we all can attend the Music City Brewers Fest. See you there!

http://www.musiccitybrewersfest.com/

Remember, the taproom will be closed July 4th

We will be closed this Friday July 4th for the holiday, but will be open our regular hours on Thursday 4-8 PM and Saturday 2-8 PM.

If you miss your Yazoo on Friday, come down to East Park in east Nashville for the Music City Hot Chicken festival from noon-3 PM. This year they will have the Yazoo beergarden with our tricked out van pouring cold Pale Ale and Dos Perros. It should be a great time, see you there!

Team Remax/ Yazoo takes third in Charlotte!

Our biking team took third in Charlotte! As their team slogan says, "We didn't come to win but we might..." They would have taken first, but several water bottles were "mistakenly" filled with Pale Ale instead during the race. Congrats to the team!

Wine Down Main Street Mexican Fiesta and Tequila Tasting today!

This benefit for the Boys and Girls Club will feature Chef Jason McConnell from Sol and Red Pony restaurants providing authentic Mexican food, accompanied by six different tequilas from Milagro, wine, and of course the best Mexican beer out there (Yazoo Dos Perros, what else?)

Tickets are $55 and are available at http://www.winedownmainstreet.com/news/article_2008_05_20_4430.html. Its from 7-10 PM at the Hallmark Volkswagen dealership at 620 Bakers Bridge Ave.

Grand Opening of the new Whole Foods in Franklin

The former Wild Oats, purchased by Whole Foods last year, will be reopening this weekend in Franklin. To celebrate, they're having all kinds of shin-digs this weekend. Our favorite? Friday June 20th will be a free Southern Shrimp Boil from 4-7 PM. All you care to eat until the mudbugs run out, and they will be pouring cold $4 Yazoo drafts. They'll also have live bluegrass from the Howling Brothers. See you there!

Yazoo Taproom Closing...

The taproom will be closed on Friday, July 4th so that we all can go drink too much beer and try to blow our fingers off with M80's. We will be open our regular hours on Thursday 4-8 PM, and Saturday 2-8 PM. Tours will still be given on Saturdays. Come join us at the Hot Chicken Festival in East Park on that Friday! (see post below)

4th of July hours:

Thur- 4-8 PM
Friday CLOSED
Sat 2-8 PM

Yazoo to sponsor the 2nd Annual Hot Chicken Contest!

If you remember last year's first ever Music City Hot Chicken contest in East Park, the only thing missing was something to quench the mouth-watering heat! We're proud to be the beer sponsor this year for the 2nd Annual Hot Chicken contest, held this year again at East Park on July 4th. It's the brainchild of our favorite former Mayor Purcell, who has had a passion for the Nashville institution of hot chicken for years.

Go to http://www.musiccityhotchickenfestival.com/ for more details. East Park will be hopping that Friday, with the Hot Chicken Fest in the afternoon and the fireworks display downtown that night. And if you want to get your Yazoo, it will be a good bet - the taproom will be closed that day anyway!

Nashville Brews Cruise is now running!

There is a great new tour in town, the Nashville Brews Cruise. Hop about their van on Saturdays and for $40 per person, you'll get to tour four of Nashville's breweries, sample their beers, and all while being safely driven around! This idea started in Asheville, NC, and was so popular that they're giving it a shot in Nashville. Check out www.nashvillebrewscruise.com for details!

Taste of Nashville June 21st

Well, it will be hard to top last year's event. The Taste of Nashville, held every June on the new Gateway Bridge, is a great event to sample the best of wine, spirits, BEER, and food that Nashville has to offer. Last year, this event followed the Redbull Flugtag at the riverfront. About 70,000 people showed up to watch teams try to fly their manually powered aircraft the furthest before spashing into the Cumberland. Our brewery sponsored the Team Green Flying Submarine, which held first place before being passed by a team that I personally think cheated!

Limited number of Party Pigs for Bonnaroo

Hi all,

We will have a limited number of Party Pigs available for Bonnaroo this year. What's a party pig? It's a self contained little draft system, that holds a case of beer. All you have to do is keep it cold, and best of all, when you're done, you don't have to return the keg. Just toss it in the recycling!

We'll have both our Pale Ale and Dos Perros in stock. The hogs are $32 each. Call 615-320-0290 to reserve one!

Magic City Brewfest Pics

Wow, what a great time! Neil and I got into town early to give us time to set up, but all of the work had already been done (thanks Supreme Beverage!) The tent looked great, with a fantastic high-res banner, again from our friends at Supreme.

I have to admit, it was a little like staring at the lion about to eat you, having all of the thirsty beer drinkers lined up at the beginning waiting to get going.

Saturday was packed! But the heat never really got too bad. We had lots of new folks trying our beers, and the feedback was really positive.

We managed to sell quite a lot of t-shirts and pint glasses. Always nice to make enough money to pay for gas to get home! This young lady was pretty happy to be wearing her Yazoo shirt - probably because it was the only dry clothes she had on. Sunday was a drencher in the beginning, but it cleared up and dried out enough to have a good time.

All in all, quite a party and one of the best brewfests we've been to. And to all of you who tried the Hop Project IPA on the pleasure chest, be patient! We'd love to have that beer on tap year-round, but we can't get enough hops right now. Maybe in a year or so!

On tap now in Huntsville and Birmingham!

We rolled out into northern Alabama this week! First time out of Tennessee! Look for the Pale Ale and Dos Perros on tap at your favorite pub down there (if they don't have it yet, please ask them to get it!) The Pale Ale, Dos Perros, and Hefeweizen will be available in bottles at most grocery stores where good beer is sold. And look for a "Southern Brewers Cask Ale" night at the J. Clyde leading up to the Magic City Brewers Fest on May 31 and June 1, with our friends at Terrapin Beer and Lazy Magnolia. Stay tuned for more details, coming soon!

Meet our new Sales and Marketing Manager

We're excited to announce we have hired Neil McCormick as our new Sales and Marketing Manager. Neil has been a passionate supporter of craft beer for a long time in his previous position with RS Lipman, our distributor here in middle TN. He is personally responsible for convincing a lot of smaller craft breweries to give Tennessee a shot, and has helped grow and educate the market on how to appreciate good beer. He's always had a great interest in our brewery and we're happy to have him on board!

Carb loading before the County Music Marathon

PROOF THAT BEER IS GOOD FOR YOU

I drink, therefore I run.

That sums up my exercise philosophy right there. A good ten miles on the weekend seems to keep the beer gut in check. I always say I have a six-pack stomach, but it's on the inside where you can't see it.

So my training for this year's half marathon was to run a little on the weekends. Then one month before the half-marathon, I hurt my knee and decided to take some time off. One thing lead to another, and I missed the entire month - no running at all. And then, the night before, my wife calls and says meet her and the kids at our friend's house for some drinks and bbque.

Our friend has come up with what she calls "beer-garitas". Basically a can of frozen limeade, then fill the empty can with tequila, and add three pale ales. They were delicious! I had four, then decided to switch to beer. Well, at ten-thirty we made it home. At four-thirty the next morning, I awoke to a hangover and a steady cold rain on the windows. Man, it was hard to get out of that warm bed and head out to downtown to stand in the cold rain for two hours waiting for the start.

But I made it in under two hours! And felt the best afterwards in five years of running the race. So it just goes to show, beer makes you a better runner!

New batch of Hop Project IPA on tap this weekend

The newest incarnation of our Hop Project IPA, #6, will be on tap this weekend at the taproom only. Why the taproom only? Because, with the price of hops these days, and based on how many we used, I'd have to charge an arm and a leg to sell it anywhere else.

I've got a lot of new readers, who are probably asking, "What the heck is Hop Project"? Well, last year, we began working on developing a kick-ass IPA recipe. We alternated the hops in each batch of IPA we brewed, with the intention of coming up with the best blend we could and then releasing that beer as a year-round Yazoo IPA. And then the hop shortage hit, and we could no longer get enough hops to release the recipe we had come up with. So we kept on brewing an IPA any time we managed to score a couple of boxes here or there of different hops.

For this batch, we used Pilgrim, Millenium, and Simcoe. It's a unique IPA to say the least. I've never had an IPA with as many different hop flavors, and one whose bitterness sneaks up on you. The first sip, you say, "wow, this is well balanced!" Then the bitterness washes over you like a rising tide, with the enamel of your teeth crying "Mercy!" That's actually a pleasant sensation to a hophead like me.

In addition to the new batch of Hop Project IPA, we will have on tap:


PALE ALE
DOS PERROS
HEFEWEIZEN
SLY RYE PORTER
ESB
HOP PROJECT IPA #6

Best time to hit the Nashville Flying Saucer is this week

Because they just ripped out their old cooler, and replaced it with a new one, and most importantly, all new draft lines. If you ever wanted to catch a night when all of the beers on the wall are poured through completely new lines, stop by when this week after they re-open Wednesday night. Draft line cleaning makes a huge difference, and it doesn't get any cleaner than when they are brand spankin new.

Cheers,

Linus

Back from San Diego Craft Brewers Conference

Just flew in from San Diego, and boy are my arms tired...

Man, tough crowd.

My wife Lila and I flew out Thursday, unfortunately missing the opening reception at Stone the night before. It was great to rub elbows with some of the greats in this biz - Jim Koch sat next to me during one of the hop seminars, and brewing "rock stars" were all over place. What's the coolest part is getting to know some of the hop and barley producers - we usually are purchasing through distributors, and never get a chance to meet the people actually growing the stuff. I had a beer or five with Darren Gamache, of VGF farms, who discovered and patented the Amarillo hop variety, which I personally love. Very interesting discussions on hop forward contracts and how he thinks that will be detrimental to the variety and diversity of hops available.

But, after all of the west coast IPAs (I think I know where all the damn hops went to), it's nice to be sitting here typing and drinking a Yazoo Pale. And it's good to be back home in Nashville.

Nashville becoming a craft beer town?

Well, I heard some interesting news this morning. The fight for beer taps around town is going to get even more competitive, but at least we'll be competing with good beer, instead of the macro-crap. Magic Hat Brewery, out of Vermont, has signed a distribution deal with Ajax-Turner, the area Anheuser-Busch distributor. It's really interesting to see the big A-B house signing up craft breweries - they signed up Yeungling and Atlanta Brewing last year, and now Magic Hat. A-B has relaxed some of their restrictions on their distributors, letting them carry beers with higher margins than Bud and Bud Light. We'll see how well they can sell craft beer.

I also heard that New Belgium Brewing out of Colorado, the brewer that makes "Fat Tire", will be in town again to interview with Ajax-Turner and DET Distributing. So far, New Belgium has not distributed across the Mississippi river - you can get it in West Memphis, but not Memphis. I'll be surprised if they really do decide to come into Tennessee before other states like Georgia and North Carolina, that have more established craft beer markets like Atlanta or Charlotte. Our 17% wholesale tax really hurts the profits of the breweries that sell here, especially compared with other Southern states.

Anyway, it's a sure sign that Nashville is becoming viewed as a good town to sell craft beer. When we started our brewery five years ago, it seemed like Sierra Nevada and Flying Dog were the only craft brands available. Most restaurants would only have four taps. Now most new restaurants have a much larger selection of draft and are more and more devoting the space to craft and imports. As a brewer, I'm not looking forward to more and more of the "big craft brewers" like New Belgium and Magic Hat coming into the market. But as a beer lover too, I'm glad for the diversity we're starting to see.

Bottle it for a sunny day...

Well, it's a cool, rainy day here in Nashville. Surely we have made up for the drought last year by now. Let me tell you, the old Marathon building is not the most fun place to be when it rains. We put a new roof over our space when we built it out in 2002, but the rest of the building... let's just say it's weatherproof-challenged.

But we're bottling our Hefeweizen today! Just watching all those bright yellow labels rolling by makes me think of popping off the cap of one in a couple weeks, when hopefully the weather will have improved to the typical sunny April days we usually have here in Nashville.

It also takes a couple of weeks after bottling for the Hefe to reach its prime. Why? Because we follow a traditional German method of adding the carbonation to the beer. The day before we are going to bottle Hefe, we brew a new batch. Then just before bottling, we dose in a portion of the new, unfermented beer into the bottling tank, and then package it. The new, unfermented beer is full of malt sugars and live, young yeast, and it undergoes a secondary fermentation in the bottle. The carbon dioxide the secondary fermentation creates is trapped in the bottle, boosting the carbonation to the high levels typical of Bavarian hefeweizens, and giving the beer a smooth, creamy texture and mouthfeel. We won a gold medal at the 2004 GABF with this beer in its draft version, but I actually think it's even better in the bottle. For the best flavor, I recommend pouring about half of the bottle into a traditional Hefeweizen glass, swirling the bottle to rouse up the yeast, and then finishing the pour.

And an update on where it can be found - it's been in Kroger grocery stores since January, but Publix just recently added it to their Yazoo selection as well!

Saturday tour pics

See how much fun you could have had this Saturday? We give guided brewery tours every Saturday, starting at 2:30, 3:30, 4:30, 5:30, and 6:30. For not much cash, you get a souvenir pint glass and samples of our beers during the tour.

Someday our name will be in lights!

Nothing beats seeing your logo all lit up in neon. It's been a long strange trip from when my wife jumped out of bed in the middle of night and sketched out our logo on a scrap piece of paper. When she got back to bed, I asked her what was going on, and she mumbled, "I had an idea, we'll look at it in the morning." And there it was when I woke up. Our logo, which I love and think is cool, so keep it to yourself if you don't. And now, after lots of false starts with different neon designers, we found one who could replicate it in neon.

We only had a limited number of these done - heck, they're expensive! If you see one in a bar or restaurant around town, it's a great bet that they have supported us from way back.

We are also selling them at our taproom. It's the ultimate collectors item for anyone who loves Yazoo beer. We only have 25 available, and when they are gone, they're gone. We're selling them for $250 at the taproom, and we will even ship them to you if you can't make it here.

On tap this weekend April 3 - 5th

We will have on tap this weekend:

PALE ALE

DOS PERROS

HEFEWEIZEN

ONWARD STOUT

ESB

SLY RYE PORTER

We're missing the Hop Project IPA series too - if you happen to come across any hops looking for a good home, send them our way! We can't find the hops we need, at any price, right now.

Yazoo drink pretty good, don't it?

If you haven't seen this video yet, of the debate in the Alabama House of Representatives over the bill to allow over 6% abv beer into the state, check it out at http://www.freethehops.org/ or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEFDVc6XCcc. Skip to about the 5:30 minute mark for some of the funniest comments by Rep. Alvin Homes of Birmingham. It's an instant classic! "What's wrong with the beer we got? It drink pretty good, don't it? We got Budweiser... what's the name of some of those other beers? They drink pretty good, don't they?"

To commemorate his immortal words of wisdom, we've come up with this t-shirt design - we're thinking of getting them out in time for the Magic City Brewfest in May.

If you like this t-shirt design, send me an email at linus@yazoobrew.com and we'll get some coming.

UPDATE: Due to the fact that the Gourmet Beer Bill is still hung up in Alabama's Senate, I got some sage advice to nix this idea - don't need anything to antagonize the fine people in Montgomery. Maybe after that passes?

ON TAP THIS WEEKEND MARCH 13-15

I'm going to start posting what we plan to have on tap every weekend, so you can plan your weekend around beer ( who doesn't?)

ON TAP

Pale Ale
Dos Perros
Hefeweizen
Onward Sout
Sly Rye Porter
ESB

Alabama here we come!

We've signed a distribution agreement with Supreme Beverage, who covers northern Alabama. We're pretty close to rolling out our beer into Birmingham and Huntsville, just waiting on approval of our brands by the state ABC board. We'll probably be launching it in April, right when the weather turns nice and people head to their favorite patio for a beer. I'm really excited about Birmingham - it's full of independent restaurants, and seems to have a really developed foodie culture. Plus, we've got good relationships with three restaurants already - Mafiaoza's is opening a Birminham restaurant and are really excited about bringing in our beer as they open; Jackson's Bistro has a Birmingham restaurant as well; and, although they don't sell a whole lot of beer, Jim-n-Nicks has six restaurants there and are really trying to support Southern breweries with their draft selections. Plus, the Free the Hops group has really stoked a lot of interest in craft beers, albeit higher alcohol ones. The interest is bound to spill over into anything new that they couldn't get before, including Yazoo!

Huntsville is suprising to me. It's becoming one of Supreme's biggest markets, and they attribute it to all of the military and NASA folks moving in, after a lot of base closings in Virginia and Maryland.

St. Patty's East Pub Crawl

We're sponsoring this year's St. Patty's Day pubcrawl in east Nashville, and it looks like it is going to be a great night, if the weather cooperates. Three Crow, Red Door East, Beyond the Edge, Alley Cat, and Batter'd and Fried are all a part of it. Most places will be running a Yazoo special all night (2 for 1, $3 pints, etc.) If you make it to all five places and get your card stamped, you can win an autographed guitar, Predators tickets, and more. See http://www.eastnashvillepubcrawls.com/ for all the info.

This pubcrawl and the one we sponsor for Halloween are some of the most fun nights in east Nashville. Come on out and celebrate!

Start your engines, it's 2008!!

2007 ended up being our best year ever! We sold over 6,100 barrels of beer, or the equivalent of 1.5 MILLION pints of beer. Damn, that's a lot of beer to come out of this little 10 bbl brewhouse.

I'm sad to report that Holly, our sales manager for the past three years, is leaving us to work for another brewery that is looking to bring their beer into Tennessee. The brewery is Boulevard Brewing out of Missouri, and I guess Holly thinks it will be a better opportunity. She says they will be able to offer her a lot more money and perks, and according to her the stress level will be less. Boulevard signed a distribution agreement with DET Distributing, where Holly used to work as a salesperson selling Miller and Coors. So I'm sure DET was happy to get her away from us, and working for their side again. I wish her the best, she was a dedicated hardworking person, and a lot of fun to work with.