Hop Project #41 bottled 3rd week December

For this beauty, we used a lot of Warrior, Columbus, and Galena, with all Warrior for dryhopping. Bottled 3rd week Dec.

My take on it? Whoa baby, this is nice! The Warrior hops really shine in this one. I'm picking up some nice candied mint notes from the hops, which are soft up front but have a great lingering flavor and bitterness to them. Where will this beer be distributed? Well, our Nashville distributor will be getting half the batch, and we're sending the rest up to Knoxville towards the end of this week. #42 will be brewed on Friday, so no worries on keeping up!

Cheers,

Linus

New "Sue" pint glasses are in! Up on our website tonight!

Firing up the old pilot system

We're brewing up a test batch today of a "new" beer that we will be launching in January or early February. I can't tell you more about it for now, except to say we are super excited to bring it to Nashville!

The new Yazoo coozies are here!

Check them out! Makes a great Christmas gift!

Pre-game tailgate party at the Country Music Hall of Fame this Thursday!

Join us for the ultimate tailgate party before the Titans vs. Colts home game. Enjoy festive food and beverages (i.e. Yazoo beer!), plus pre-game and half time performances by award-winning songwriter Shawn Camp. At game time, head to L.P. Field or stay with us to enjoy the game in the comfort of our Ford Theater on a 16 ft HD screen!

Door prizes will be given away at half time.

Members: FREE. General Admission: $15.00. Limited Seats Available.

Get your tickets soon to the "Science of Beer" at the Adventure Science Center Dec 22nd!

http://www.adventuresci.com/default.aspx?section=contact&title=science+of+beer&page=228

It's back! The second annual "Science of Beer" event is happening this Dec 22nd, from 6:30-10 PM at Nashville's Adventure Science Center. The entire center will be open only to the big kids, with cool exhibits on the science behind your favorite brews, which coincidentally will be served up for your pleasure. These events are a lot of fun - you can wander the center with a beer in your hand, and not have to chase any little ones around. It sold out last year, so get your tickets early!

Thanksgiving Weekend Hours

Greetings Yazooligans! If you are not a facebook friend of Yazoo yet, you should be! http://www.facebook.com/yazoobrewing

If you are, then perhaps you already know this, but here are our hours for this weekend:

TODAY Tues 11/23 12-2 PM for growler fills
Wednesday 11/24 4-6 PM for growler fills
Thursday 11/25 Closed (dude it's Thanksgiving)
Friday 11/26 OPEN 4-8 PM for regular taproom hours (brewery will be closed)
Saturday 11/27 OPEN 2-8 PM, plus regular tours @2:30, 3:30, 4:30, 5:30, and 6:30

The tours on Saturday will be busy, so please come by! Just come a little early to reserve a spot. You can hang out and enjoy a pint or two while waiting for the tour. We will have the following on tap this weekend:

Pale Ale
Dos Perros
Hefeweizen
Sly Rye Porter
Onward Stout
Nitro Onward Stout
Fall Ale
Summer Ale

That's basically eight different ways to enjoy a Yazoo beer.

Introducing Hop Project #39, bottled 1st week November

For this Hop Project, we used Warrior as the first wort hops, then Amarillo, Cascade, and Nugget as bittering hops at 75 min; Columbus, Warrior, and Nugget at 30 min; Warrior, Columbus, and Citra at 5 min; and then dry-hopped with Citra, Columbus, and Centennial after four days in the fermenter.

It should be hitting the shelves in Nashville and Mississippi next week! Don't worry, there is a big 80 bbl batch coming right behind it of Hop Project #40.

Problems with batch of SUE bottled 3rd week August

We have pulled back the remainder of the batch of SUE bottled the third week of August due to a slow-developing sourness that has appeared in the past few weeks. It is completely fine to drink - I had another taste this morning, and if you like sour ales you might actually like it - but the beer doesn't taste now as we intended it.

If you have any SUE bottled on that date, we will gladly replace your beer with a fresh batch packaged this week. Please email me at linus@yazoobrew.com and we'll figure out how to make it right for you.

Linus Hall
Yazoo Brewing

Hurry if you want to rent the taproom for the holidays!

Available dates for our taproom are quickly being booked for holiday parties. Hey, what could be cooler than having your next party or meeting at a BREWERY? But you had better get going - call 615-891-4649 or email Brandi at brandi@yazoobrew.com to reserve your date!

Corsair Barrel-aged SUE at the Nashville Flying Saucer Wed Nov 3rd

If you have been by the brewery the past few months, you may have seen some small 5 gallon wooden casks by the taproom window. They came from our friends at Corsair Artisan Distillery, at our old address of 1200 Clinton. The casks held an experimental bourbon, but we filled them with Sue from the fermenter back in August. Now, distillers use five gallon barrels for experimenting in, because the spirit ages faster in the smaller barrels, and you can see what it's going to taste like in a shorter time. Well, the same goes for beer in smaller barrels - this beer is full of vanilla and oaky bourbon flavors after just three months, but nicely balanced with a sticky sweet and roasted beer.

We will be doing more - but, if you would like to try one of the very few kegs we got out of this experiment, come down to the Nashville Flying Saucer this Wednesday night for a pint night featuring our barrel-aged Sue!

UPDATE: We'll get started about 7 PM. Sorry, didn't have that nailed down when I posted earlier.

BAs and Ratebeerians...

I love going to the beer rating sites. www.beeradvocate.com and www.ratebeer.com. There is usually a lot of constructive feedback on our beers, from people who have tried beers from all over the world. And sometimes not so constructive. Rather than get irritated about some of these comments, I'm going to take "Randyweizen"'s advice:

To quote:

"But I say unto you, That ye resist not bad reviews: but whosoever shall trash a really old bottle of your local brewery's pale ale, give him an ancient bottle of their wheat beer also. And whosoever shall ask for a one-ounce sample to review from, give him half an ounce. Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love good beer reviewers and hate bad ones. But I say unto you, Love the ticker, bless them that write one-line reviews, do good to them that undermine a healthy beer culture, and pray for them which persecute the very concept of thoughtful beer reviews."

--

How to tell what batch of Hop Project you have:

Skip over this if you already know, but we have some people new to our beer on our blog:

First, if there is a case display, check the case box. It's labeled on the top with what batch it is.
If no case box is around, check the label on the bottle, and see what month and week of that month it was bottled. Then go to our blog www.yazoobrew.blogspot.com, scan down the dated blog entries until you find the blog about the Hop Project that was bottled on that date. We'll tell you what hop varieties we used. Simple!

We wanted to have a spot on the label where we could indicate what batch it was, similar to having a vintage on a wine bottle. But the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms told us we would have to submit a separate label for them to approve for EVERY batch if we did that. Since we are now brewing one about every two weeks, that would get to be a huge headache. So using the bottled date and our blog seemed the best solution.

MS locations so far...

We've had a lot of emails and tweets asking where our beer is being sold in middle Mississippi so far. Here's a list as of this morning:

McDades - Sunflower
McDades - #2
Hops and Habanas
Fresh Market on Highland Colony (see picture)
Cappy's BP - Old Canton Rd
P&A Food Mart - Hwy 61 N

(those last two are new to me, I have no idea where they are)

And restaurants, on tap or in bottle:

Hal and Mals
Soulshine Pizza - Ridgeland
Wing Stop #3 - on North State Street
Parlor Market - W. Capital St
Burgers and Blues - E. Countyline Rd

RENT THE TAPROOM!

We offer our taproom for rent for corporate parties, meetings, networking events, etc. (We just hosted a VIP lunch for Next Big Nashville). It's available on Tuesdays and Wednesdays when the taproom is not normally open (i.e. Thursday-Friday 4-8 PM and Saturdays 2-8 PM). Our holiday calendar is starting to fill up, so if you would like to host a meeting, get-together, or holiday party at the brewery, please contact our taproom manager, Brandi Soda, at 615-891-4649, or better yet, by email at brandi@yazoobrew.com. There's a small deposit to hold the date, and then it's just a bar tab for the beer. We can work with neighborhood restaurants to cater the food (Urban Flats, Cantina Laredo, Jimmy Carl's, Roosters, etc), or you are welcome to bring in your own food.

email at brandi@yazoobrew.com!

Sneak peek at our new Fall Ale label

It can be tough to "call" the Fall season in Mississippi. Sure, it's a sure sign that Fall is upon you when you hear "hoddy toddy gosh awmaty who the hell are we" over and over again. But the surest sign I ever had was the first cool night that got the leaves on the huge Ginko tree on my street to start changing. They would gradually change to a vivid yellow over the next month, until suddenly, like they all knew it was time, they would all drop within a day, coating the street and our yard with an inch-deep blanket of soft, golden leaves.

Fall Ale is made with all German malts - Munich, Vienna, Cara malt, and a little bit of Rye. It's generously hopped with Hallertauer and Tettnang hops from Germany. It's an ale, not a lager, but it's loosely based on a typical Octoberfest beer, with our own twist with the Rye malt. It will be available as the next beer in our Brewmaster's Reserve 4-pack, beginning around the third week of October - you know, about the time that all the "Octoberfest" beers that came out in July are starting to show their age!

Give me a woman who loves beer, and I will conquer the world - Kaiser Wilhelm

Congrats to the lucky bride and groom! Now we have had one couple who proposed at Yazoo, and another who dropped by the brewery on the way to their reception!

http://www.photojoeblog.com/bride-and-groom-and-yazoo-brew

Get REDdy! Here comes the Grizzlies Red Dress Run again!

Save the date - October 23rd, the infamous Nashville Grizzlies Rugby team is once again putting on the Grizzlies Red Dress Run. It's a combination 5k run/ pub crawl through the Belmont and Hillsboro Village neighborhodds, with registered runners getting a free Yazoo beer at the five pubs along the route. It's great fun and the proceeds will benefit the Belmont Theatre, Nashville’s most unique operating community theater for film and entertainment, and the Nashville Grizzlies Rugby Football Club.

Watering Holes on the 2010 route include:

• The Belcourt Theatre (Starting Line) - 2102 Belcourt Ave, Nashville, TN 37212
• PM - 2017 Belmont Blvd, Nashville, TN 37212
• 12 South Tap Room - 2318 12th Ave, Nashville, TN 37204
• Cha Cha - 2013 Belmont Blvd, Nashville, TN 37212
• Cabana - 1910 Belcourt Ave, Nashville, TN 37212

The race is all about having fun, so here are the awards given out:

2010 Awards Categories:

• Best Coiffure
• Best Male in Touch with His Feminine Side
• Best Female as a Female
• Hairiest Legs
• Best Use of a Yazoo Logo
• Most Creative
• Biggest Diva
• Biggest Mess
• Most Bejeweled
• Most Outstanding Group
• Paris Hilton Hoochie Mama Award
• Best Pair

1st Mississippi kick-off event Monday Oct 18th

Here's the details on the first event we have to kick off our debut in Mississippi, a beer dinner at Sal and Mookies on Monday Oct 18th:

http://www.salandmookies.com/

Make sure to get your reservations in early!

Yazoo beer in Mississippi!

Finally! We just loaded up a big truck full of Pale Ale, Dos Perros, Hefeweizen, and two different batches of Hop Project (#36 and #37), destination Jackson, MS! And to kick off the launch of Yazoo Brew into Mississippi, we'll have loads of events scheduled on Oct. 18, 19, and 20th. Check back here in the next few days for details...

Yazoo and Octoberfest, together at last!

We're one of the beer sponsors this year at the Germantown Octoberfest, this Saturday October 9th in historic Germantown, just north of the Bicentennial Mall in downtown Nashville. PLUS we'll be tapping the first kegs of our great new beer, the Fall Ale, at the festival. Come on down for the Bier 5K Run at 8 AM, and stay all day for great beer, food, and music! If you have never been, it's a great party, and we're happy to be a part of it this year.

http://www.historicgermantown.org

Hop Project #37, Return of the Fresh Hop!

It's back! Our annual Hop Project made with fresh wet hops, straight off the vine and shipped by Fed Ex from Yakima, WA, to our brewery door. This year we featured a rare variety, a Japanese-origin hop called Sorachi Ace. To our knowledge, we are the only brewery to ever use this hop in a fresh hop beer. I'm not going to spoil anyone's experience by telling you what I think - you'll have to try it for yourself! I do think it turned out pretty amazing.

Bottled the 4th week of September.

Hop Project #36, bottled 4th week September

For this batch, put together by Colin, we used:

First wort hopped with Magnum and Amarillo, then Amarillo, Cascade, and Nugget at 45 min and then at 30 min, then Amarillo, Cascade, and Citra at 15 min, 10 min, and 5 min, and finally dry hopped with Cascade and Citra after four days in the fermenter.

This twist on this Hop Project was more additions throughout the boil, instead of our standard three boil additions. I suspect that Colin really enjoyed watching Ken and Quinn having to walk back and forth all day measuring out hops, while he was running the bottling line.

It's notched as being bottled on the 3rd week of September.

Say goodbye to Summer with a special deal

All this weekend, we'll be having a special on our Summer ale - buy a pint of Summer Ale and a Summer Ale t-shirt for just $10. Fall is coming, no matter what the thermometer says! We brewed our Fall Ale yesterday, which coincidentally was the first day of Fall on the calendar. It will be ready in time for the Germantown Octoberfest on Saturday, Oct 9th, where Yazoo will be a beer sponsor for the first time ever.

So come on down, and help us blow out the longest, wettest, driest, and hottest Summer ever! A pint of Summer and a cool Summer Ale t-shirt, all for only $10.

SUE wins Sliver at the GABF!

"SUE" took home a Silver medal this weekend at the Great American Beer Festival, coming in second only to the venerable Alaskan Smoked Porter. Great company to be included in, and thanks to everyone who called and emailed to congratulate us!

Congrats to all the other Southern breweries who took home medals - Blackstone, Back Forty, Foothills, Terrapin, Cigar City, Saint Arnolds, and many more. That's proof that a true craft beer culture has taken hold down South - sure, craft beer drinkers here getting more options from breweries around the country, but the brewery just down the street from you is making some kick-ass beers too!

http://www.nashvillescene.com/bites/archives/2010/09/28/who-knew-we-nashvillians-were-so-badass-when-it-comes-to-liquids

Get yer cold Yazoo beer rat 'cheer

You might think that it's not all that unusual to get a Yazoo beer at the Titans stadium. Not so. This is the first real shot we have gotten at selling our beer at Titans games. We did have two (2) taps on the club level several years ago, that did pretty well, but for the past few years the only local beer you could get was our beer, in bottles, at one place on the concourse.

Well, this year we worked out a deal with the concession company that runs the food and beverages at the stadium. We bought four roll-around concession carts with beer taps on them, and are now pouring our beer at four locations along the ground-level concourse. Look for the big Yazoo stainless carts, or ask someone with a white Yazoo cup where he got the beer. It's ONLY $9 for a 22 oz beer - yeah, a little high, but compare that to $8 for the same amount of Bud or Miller Lite, and it all of sudden looks like a tremendous deal!

As always, we really appreciate your support. If you are getting a beer at the stadium, please seek us out!

Another busy festival weekend!

Wish us luck! Ivan and I are heading out to Denver for the Great American Beer Festival this weekend. This is the big daddy of them all - 450 breweries and 2200 beers, competing for the right to be called the best in the land. The quality of beer at the festival has gotten so good, that I feel kind of sorry for the judges who have to pick the winners in each category. I have a good feeling about our Hefeweizen, Hop Project, and Sue this year - but hey, even if we don't win anything, we will have a great time hanging out with our brewer friends and visiting the dozens of breweries around Denver.

Meanwhile, Neil will be making the trek eastward to Asheville for their Brewgrass Festival. Tickets are sold out again for the millionth year in a row, but for those of you lucky enough to be going, you know you are in for a great time. Unlike some festivals, the Brewgrass Festival is staffed by the brewers themselves, pouring you the beer and telling you all about it. The music is usually amazing too.

bottling in action...

We get a lot of comments during tours about bottling, "I bet that is interesting to watch, why don't you ever give tours when it is running?" Well, here's the next best thing to being there:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBPCAvBidhc&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Chattanooga Beer Fest this Saturday

We're heading down to the 'Noog this weekend for the annual Southern Brewers Fest, held down on the riverfront in front of the Aquarium. If you have never been, it's a little unique as far as beer fests go. You buy a cup and three tokens for beer when you get in, and get a full pour of whichever beer you like for one token. You can purchase more tokens as the day goes on.

It's all for a good cause, and there will be more breweries and beers there than I can ever remember. Come on down!

http://www.southernbrewersfestival.com/

The lowdown on Hop Project #35

Hop Project #35 was bottled the forth week of August (check the left side of the label).
For this one, we used Columbus and Nugget for first wort hops, then Goldings and Nugget at 30 minutes, Goldings and Nugget again at 5 minutes left in the boil, and then Goldings for dry-hopping.

We have ramped up production of the Hop Project, as it gets out into more stores in the six-packs, and as we expand it out into markets outside of Nashville. So if you are checking stores around Nashville, you may be lucky enough (and confused enough) to find three or more different versions of Hop Project available. We're having a lot of fun with this particular beer, and love experimenting with different blends and different techniques.

Knoxville got a delivery of #34 in cases and sixth barrel kegs last week. We'll be sending a limited number of #35 up there in half-barrel kegs this week. Memphis just get a limited number of cases of #35 (and of Sue) this week as well.

Hop Project #34 now out in bottles...

Hop Project #34 was bottled third week of August. For this batch, we decided to feature a hop we have never used before, Sorachi Ace. We used Warrior hops at the beginning of the boil, and then the Sorachi Ace at 45 min, 5 min, and dry hopped in the fermenter.

It's got a unique lemony aroma and a dry lingering bitterness. I like it. And I hope you will too.

Cheers,

Linus

Fun little side project...

Thanks to our friends at Corsair Artisan, we have 12 small 5 gallon barrels that recently held an experimental bourbon, but now have "Sue" aging gracefully. It should be fun to see what flavors the beer picks up in a few months. Check out our twitter feed @yazoobrewmaster in a few months, and we'll let you know when and where we'll be tasting it.

Refresh on our 6-pack recycling program, since you asked...

Hey guys and gals,

We're always trying to figure out ways to lower our impact on our environment at Yazoo. We capture all of our cooling water for hot water for the next batch; our spent grain goes to a local cattle farmer, and to Provence for their Yazoo bread; we recycle our cardboard down at Smurfitt-Stone (even though they quit paying anything for scrap cardboard!); and so on. One of the things that has always bugged me was the fact that after they are purchased, our six-pack carriers go straight into either the trash or recycling, when they could be used again.

So we're starting a 6-pack recycling program at Yazoo. Bring in your Yazoo 6-pack carriers during normal taprooom hours, Thur-Fri 4-8 PM and Sat 2-8 PM.

Ten Yazoo 6-pack carriers will get you a pint on the house. Thirty Yazoo 6-pack carriers will get you a free t-shirt.

The carriers need to be in good shape, and ready to be reused again. That is, no tears, no water damage, no cigarette butts, etc.

Hey, free beer and swag, just for doing something you hopefully do already (drink Yazoo)! And you'll feel so much better knowing that you're helping the environment. Save your 6-pack carriers, bring them down to the taproom during normal taproom hours, and enjoy a pint or a t-shirt on us!

Beer Fest!

We're getting ready for not one, but TWO beer fests on the same weekend coming up. The first, of course, is Nashville's own Music City Brewers Fest, voted one of the best parties of the year. The second night session is completely sold out but you can still get tickets for the earlier session. Personally, I prefer the earlier session, since all of the beers are still available and the level of sobriety is higher. You can still get tickets at www.musiccitybrewersfest.com.

The second is the Top of the Hops Brewers Fest in Jackson, MS. I'm excited about this one! It's going to be the first time we've had our beer out in my home state of Mississippi. We'll be bringing our Pale Ale, Dos Perros, Hefeweizen, and Hop Project down. I don't have a firm date when we will start selling our beer down in MS - but I will be glad when all my relatives can buy it in their local Kroger, instead of me filling up my trunk every trip down.

Meet the newest Tennessee distillery...

It's Yazoo Brewing Company! Yes, we now are the proud and poorer owners of a TN Dept ABC Distillery License! That will allow us to legally produce in Tennessee beers over the 5% by weight cap. Yes, I said legally. And that is all I will say about the past. Anything that happened before today is kind of fuzzy in my memory.

So a batch of a beer named "Sue" is on tap for next Friday. It will tax our new brewing system with double the amount of malt as Hop Project or Pale Ale, but we think it is well warmed up and ready for the challenge. The aromas around the Gulch will be a wonderful mixture of bread baking at Provence, smoke from Jimmy Carl's Lunch Pail, and cherry-wood smoke from our batch of Sue. And all will be right with the world again, for a little while.

Cheers,

Linus

Hop Project #32 bottled today

Hop Project #32, bottled 3rd week of July (notched on left side of label). We went back to one of our favorite hops in the series so far, Nugget. This beer was bittered at the beginning of the boil with Warrior hops. We then added Nugget hops at 30 minutes left in the boil, 5 minutes left, and then dry hopped in the fermenter with Nugget for almost two weeks.

The aroma is mild and pleasant, with some citrus notes. At first sip the beer seems almost too-well-balanced for an IPA, but then the bracing bitterness kicks in with a slightly-chewy melon bitterness that lasts and lasts. God, what a great job I have, tasting beers at 9:30 in the morning!

We have this on tap this weekend at our taproom. Sorry to say but I predict it will not last through the weekend. It will be out in six packs next week or the week after in our mid-TN areas of distribution, and down in Alabama towards the end of next week.

And yes, Mississippi, we'll be bringing a couple of kegs of Hop Project #32 down for the Top of the Hops Brewfest on July 31 in Jackson, along with our Pale Ale, Dos Perros, and Hefeweizen. I'm looking forward to meeting all the Raise Your Pints guys and gals!

Cheers,

Linus

Should Yazoo switch to cans?

(Don't forget to vote ----------- > )

Our next big project is going to be increasing our packaging line speed. Right now, we're running it five days a week, and the slow speed of our old six-head Meheen filler is holding up the rest of our brewing process. It's going to be a pretty hefty investment in new equipment, so now's the time to ask the question: Should we continue in bottles, or make the jump to cans?

Before you say the obvious answer (Do both!), let me say a few things. First, when you get into any kind of packaging, you start off by buying a whole lot of packaging materials at one time. For instance, when we started packaging our beer in bottles (two years after we opened by the way), we had to buy truckloads of glass bottles, cardboard boxes, six-pack carriers, paper labels, label glue, metal crowns for the bottles, etc. The amount of money you have to invest in just packaging materials, upfront, means you have to move a significant amount of beer every month just to make the numbers work.

If we decided to start canning, there would of course be the upfront investment in the new equipment. But on top of that, we'd have to buy 8,500 cans of each brand we canned. That would be a huge hit to our cash flow. So for us to start canning, it would only make sense to make the switch completely. We couldn't afford to both can and bottle our beers.

In a lot of ways, cans are a much better package than glass. They are impervious to light, while even a beer packaged in amber glass will get lightstruck and skunky if left in sunlight for a short time. Cans are more readily recyclable. Almost 45% of all cans are recycled, while only a small percentage of glass bottles are. There is an active market for recycled aluminum, while there is not much demand for recycled glass right now. Cans are much lighter than glass, so the fuel costs of getting the glass to the brewery, and out to the market, is less. Cans are welcomed in places where glass is not - beaches, golf courses, parks, etc.

For us, cans are pretty attractive. Our packaging components would be a can, a lid, a six-pack ring, and a cardboard tray, most of which can easily be recycled. Compare that to bottling, where you have a bottle, cap, label, six-pack carrier, and cardboard case box, with almost none of those items ever being recycled.

But... the big question is, "What do you think about it?" If you saw a big, beautiful pack of Yazoo Pale Ale tall-boys at your local grocery store, would you buy it? Please take the poll over there to the right, and post a comment!

New Yazoo caps are in!

Our new Yazoo ball caps are in, just in time to protect your brain cells from frying in this heat. We'll have plenty in stock at our taproom, and online at www.yazoobrew.com.

New Summer Ale Posters are in!

We did a limited run of only 100 numbered and signed posters of our Summer Ale label artwork. The artwork was designed by local artist Derrick Castle, and he was kind enough to sign all 100 posters. Why did we only make 100? Since we will be donating all of the proceeds of the sale of these posters to the Community Fund of Middle TN for flood relief, we wanted to make them collectors items. They will sell for $25 apiece. You can get one or more at our taproom, or online at our online store at www.yazoobrew.com. Cheers!

Kegs for the 4th of July weekend!

Don't forget to stock up for your fireworks-viewing parties this weekend! We will be stocked up with plenty of Pale Ale, Dos Perros, and Hefeweizen kegs, in both the full size (140 beers) and our popular 5 gallon kegs (50 beers). AND we will be kegging the second batch of our Summer Ale on Thursday, with kegs available for sale starting Thursday afternoon.

Yazoo in Chattanooga!

Thanks to @introvertedone for the picture of our display at his local Publix. Yes, after popping up on draft at great Chattanooga locations like Taco Mac, Mellow Mushroom, and Tremont Tavern, our bottles of Pale Ale, Dos Perros, and Hefeweizen are popping up wherever good beer is sold in Chattanooga.

Experimental Beer tonight - Sly Rye Porter with Dominican cacao shells and spearamint

Another special beer tapping tonight - and if you thought the coffee-infused Hop Project was out there, come try a pint of Sly Rye Porter aged with Dominican cacao shells and spearamint extract. We'll be tapping this beauty about 5 PM, plenty of time to get off work and come down!

Fire and Ice Event cancelled for this weekend

Due to circumstances beyond our control, the Fire and Ice event, a benefit for Galaxy Star Peacemakers, has been canceled. Anyone who purchased tickets for the event at the Yazoo Taproom will be issued a full refund. Please either come by the taproom to have your ticket refunded, or contact us at info@yazoobrew.com or at 615-891-4649.

Just over a month away from the Music City Brewers Fest!

It's just over a month away from the Music City Brewers Fest, in front of the Country Music Hall of Fame on July 31st. And judging by the number of calls we have been getting looking for tickets, the tickets are going fast. WE DID NOT GET ANY TICKETS THIS YEAR TO SELL. They are only available online at www.musiccitybrewersfest.com and it looks like the second night session has already sold out.

Experimetnal Beer Day today

I've always been curious about combining the earthy bitterness of a good coffee with the citrusy bitterness of a good IPA. So we took a firkin of Hop Project #31 and aged it with some Drew's Brews "Lost Weekend". We'll be tapping it at 6 PM today, Thursday June 17, at our taproom (a little later than usual). I sneaked a taste this morning (even I was a little worried how it would turn out). It's tasty, and I can honestly say I have never had anything like it.

Hop Project #30 out now, on draft and in six-packs!

Wow, we are already up to #30! (That's Chris holding up a bottle.)

I expected that when we moved to a larger batch size that we would slow down the progression of new batches, but it seems you guys like your hops! Here is the description to cut and paste into ratebeer.com:

"Bottled on 6/15, indicated by a notch on the side of the label at June and week 2. For #30, we used a blend of Magnum, Columbus, and a new variety, Citra. Citra is a new variety released by the Hop Breeding Company in Yakima, WA. It's supposed to be a cross between Hallertaur Mittlefrueh and U.S. Tettnanger, but somehow bred to yield much higher bitterness. Its alpha acids come in around 12%. Our beer starts with a pleasant mellow and fruity aroma, with a rounded mellow up-front bitterness that fades into a sharp peppery finish."

I can really taste the Tettnanger part of this hop, the peppery finish. It would go great in a Saison. Maybe next year for our spring seasonal Rye Saison?

Look for Hop Project #30 out in six-packs and kegs by this weekend. We also will have a special small keg of this on tap this Thursday June 17, aged with Drew's Brews "Lost Weekend" coffee. Yeah, an unusual combination - but I always wanted to try to match the earthy bitterness of a good coffee bean with a hoppy IPA. If you want to know how that turned out, come down to the taproom this Thursday!

Follow us on twitter @yazoobrewmaster and @yazoobrew to catch details on other special small releases. Hop Project #31 is already in the tanks!

Summer Ale for flood relief

Our newest seasonal release was about ready to bottle when the floods hit in early May. It seemed that the only thing that matched the scale of the damage was the overwhelming generosity of the people of Nashville in the weeks that followed. We had our own fundraiser for the Community Fund of Middle Tennessee the week after, but we wanted to figure out a way to keep that momentum going throughout the summer.

We decided to donate part of the proceeds from our Summer Ale to flood relief programs. One of the local artists who created one of the great posters for sale at www.LiftUpNashville.com, Derrick Castle, agreed to donate his artwork for the label.

We will be donating 20% of the sales of our Summer Ale to the Community Fund, and our distributor RS Lipman has agreed to match that as well. Look for it in our "Brewmaster's Reserve" four-packs in area stores, and also look for special events around town where it is on tap.

Summer Ale is a light clear golden ale, with a crisp hop bitterness. It's
totally refreshing in the summer heat, and wherever you see it this summer,
know that part of your beer money is going directly to help your neighbors
rebuild!

Good use for empty barley sacks...

We have some creative problem-solvers here at the brewery. Quinn, our head brewer, has been trying to come up with a good use for all the empty barley sacks we generate each week. He called up Metro Public Works, and it turns out they were delighted to take them off our hands. They have been using them the past few weeks to bag up debris from flood-ravaged neighborhoods, since the sacks hold up much better than regular garbage bags.

Bonnaroo!

Well, it's finally here! We'll be in the Brooers tent all weekend pouring Dos Perros and Hefeweizen for all you crazies. Come by the tent, cool off, say hi and grab a cold Yazoo.

Busy, Busy Weekend coming up!

There are a load of events happening this weekend, with plenty of Yazoo flowing...

Taste of Music City Saturday June 5th on Deaderick Street

This event keeps getting bigger and better. It got so crowded last year on the bridge that the event organizers moved it to Deaderick Street. Anyone remember Summer Lights? It's going to be a similar setup, with the street closed from the Metro Courthouse park all the way up to War Memorial. There will be a Wine Tasting Experience with Arrington Vineyards at one end, a Jack Daniels Experience, a Robert Mondavi Discover Wine Tour, live music, over 50 restaurants with tasting booths, a Kids Zone, and... three Yazoo beer stations! (we've rented a refrigerated truck so the beer will be nice and cold!)

Admission is free, and you can buy food and beverages with tickets. It's going on from 11 AM until 9 PM. Come by and get a sneak taste of our Summer Ale before it gets released! For more info visit www.TasteofMusicCity.com.

The Annual Otha Turner Birthday Bash Saturday June 5th, 2-9 PM

Our good friend Bill Ramsey throws a birthday party every year, for both himself and his old friend Otha Turner, the famous fife blues legend. Otha passed away a few years ago, but his family still makes the trip up from Mississippi every year. The block party is on Sweetbriar Drive, just off Belmont Blvd. If you have never seen Otha's granddaughter play at Bonnaroo or with the North Mississippi Allstars, here is your chance to see her, Sharde Thomas and the Rising Star Fife and Drum Band. Admission is a $30 donation at the door with proceeds going to the Second Harvest Food Bank. There is always great food and a few kegs of Yazoo hidden (just ask around). For more info visit http://www.othaturner.com/party.html

Magic City Brewfest!!

For all the good beer fans down in Alabama, this is your chance to get out and taste the best beer the South has to offer. It's held at an amazingly cool location, the old Sloss Furnaces just near downtown Birmingham. Ivan and Neil will be down there pouring our contributions to good beer, including a keg of Yazoo Sue. For tickets and more info visit http://www.magiccitybrewfest.com/

Experimental beer tonight - Pale Ale dryhopped with Cascade and Columbus

Come on by the taproom tonight! We're starting a tradition of tapping a cask of an experimental beer every Thursday. Tonight we have a cask of our Pale Ale, aged with more hops in the cask, of the Cascade and Columbus varieties. It makes for a very aromatic and flavorful version of our Pale Ale, without the intense bitterness of the Hop Projects.

Any sound control experts out there?

We are looking at some different options for dampening some of the noise in our taproom. When it gets going, it can get pretty loud. One option we are looking at is installing soundproofing tiles in places between the overhead girders. But I'd be the first to tell you that I don't know what the heck I'm doing. Any soundproofing guys out there, that would want to swap their expertise for some beer?

New Yazoo mural going up...

We are lucky enough to be getting the muralist Michael Cooper to paint a Yazoo logo on our building. That expanse of yellow brick wall has been crying out for some artwork, and after listening to comments from our regulars, we decided to paint our "Ask for Yazoo Beer" oval on the wall. Well, actually we decided to change it to "Drink Yazoo Beer", since that made more sense for the side of a brewery! It should be done in a few days.

Next, we'll be building a trellis over the patio. Got to have some shade, and something for our hop vines to grow on!

Michael has done a lot of the cool murals in and around downtown - the one on the wall in front of the downtown library, the ones by the Arcade, etc. Check out some of his other work at http://www.muralsandmore.com/.

Experimental beer tonight Thursday May 20 at the taproom

We'll be tapping a keg of an experimental brew, our Sly Rye Porter aged in a cask with Olive&Sinclair cocao shells. Come on down this Thursday from 4-8 PM and try a pint!

We have some casks now that we will start doing some interesting experiments with. In the works is one of Sly Rye Porter infused with Drew's Brews Lost Weekend coffee. Stay tuned! Thursdays will be the usual night for tapping these experiments (we get great feedback from all our "regulars" on Thursdays!)

Turnip Truck adding location in the Gulch!

Cool! Welcome addition to our new neighborhood!

http://nashvillecitypaper.com/content/city-news/gulch-grocery-will-help-define-district

More flood relief benefits coming up...

The waters are receding, but the needs are just beginning. Please check out these flood relief benefits coming up:

"Writer's Block Flood Benefit" at the Listening Room at Cummins Station, Sunday May 16th

We'll be a sponsor of this great new event, featuring some of Nashville's best songwriters including Jeffrey Steele, Rivers Rutherford, Kirsti Manna, and many others. It's on the parking lot across from Cummins Station, and runs from noon to 10 PM this Sunday. http://www.musicrow.com/2010/05/writer’s-block-concert-becomes-flood-benefit /

Thank you to everyone who came out!

Thanks to everyone who came out for our fundraiser. It was a crazy night! We just dropped a check off to the Community Foundation for $6,300 for their Flood Relief Fund. And it was such a great feeling to do it! Thanks again.

Flood Fundraiser tomorrow at the Yazoo Taproom!!

We will be holding a fundraiser tomorrow, Thursday May 6th, from 4-8 PM, to benefit the Community Fund of Middle Tennessee (www.cfmt.org). 100% of all sales at our taproom will be donated to their Metro Disaster Fund. Yes, 100% of ALL sales. It's a nice round number.

To conserve water, we'll be selling pints in our Yazoo logo pub glasses, which you can take home with you. Pints will be $5, which includes tax for this night. Growlers will be $12 new/ $9 refills. CASH is very welcome as it will speed up the line.

We also plan to tap two casks of special beers we were holding back for a special occasion. One is a cask of Pale Ale dryhopped with Amarillo, another is a cask of Dos Perros aged with cocao shells from Nashville's own Olive and Sinclair Chocolate Company.

Let's see what we can do! Last time we did this we raised a lot of money for the Red Cross for Katrina relief.

The Flood of 2010

We made it through fine. The brewery is on high ground, and all of our staff made it through with mostly only flooded basements and driveways. Thank you to everyone who has called, some from all around the country, to check on us. We're fine.

A lot of our neighbors are not. We're planning a fundraiser of our own in the next few days. Please check back here for details. I encourage everyone to come out to Mercy Lounge this Wednesday the 5th for a fundraiser they are having, instead of their Cinco de Mayo party. The show will be free with suggested donations of $20, and there will be a silent auction as well.

The bad news for beer lovers in Nashville is that three of the town's major beer distributors are surrounded by water. We hear that Ajax Turner, which is on the same road by the Cumberland river as the Omohondro Water Treatment plant, took on a lot of water inside its warehouse. DET Distributing and RS Lipman (our distributor) are both in Metrocenter, and are reportedly surrounded by water. No one at Lipman has been able to get to the warehouse, as the police are not letting anyone into the area due to concerns over the integrity of the levee. We are hoping all the beer is safe and our kegs haven't floated away.

So even though we didn't see any damage at the brewery, we can't deliver our beer to our distributor, and they can't get beer out to all the bars, restaurants, and stores in Nashville. I don't know about DET and Ajax Turner but I imagine they are in the same fix.

Answering some FAQs...

Well, we are starting to settle into the new place! We have done about 20 brews now on the new brewhouse, and Ken and Quinn are starting to become experts on all of its quirks. Colin and Chris are cranking out more cases than ever on the same old bottling line, and dreaming of the day, soon, when we will have a faster line...

But we have been getting a lot of questions since the move, and I'd like to answer some:

1. Now that you have more capacity, will you be releasing any new beers?

Yes! Our next beer in our Brewmaster's Reserve seasonal series is going to be the return of our Summer Ale. We plan on having it out in bottles and kegs around the middle of June.

2. Will you be able to brew "Sue" again? How about more high-alc beers?

When we filed for our new permits with the beer board, they had a lot of concerns about the legality of us brewing high-alc beers, even though we felt we had done everything that the ABC and TN Dept of Revenue had asked us to do (they are the ones who have jurisdiction over high-alc beers). We have a plan to get the beer board's approval within about another month. Until then, if you see some "Sue", I suggest you buy it!

3. The outside of the building still looks "unfinished". Any plans for it?

Yes! We will be building a trellis over the patio out front, to provide some much needed shade as summer comes. We'll be planting some hop vines out front to grow over the trellis as well. We'll be paving the parking lot soon, and striping it to help with the parking. We know that parking can be a hassle, but there is lots of street parking once our lot fills up, and we promise, we'll make the beer worth the walk! And Neil has plans for a bocce ball court (what do you think?)

4. It's pretty noisy inside.

Yeah, we didn't realize how loud it could get until we opened and it got crowded. We're planning on installing some "floating" accoustic tiles in the taproom ceiling to cut down on the noise.

5. My wife doesn't like beer, so will you ever add wine to your menu?

We can't. The ABC has ruled that anyone with a restaurant liquor license cannot sell "growlers" of beer to go. That's a big part of our retail business, so we don't ever plan on getting a liquor license.

First case of Pale Ale rolls off the line!

Wow! We spent the last few days taking down our bottling line at Marathon and moving it to 910 Division. It takes a lot to run one - electricity, compressed air, CO2, and water. All the conveyors and tables have to be realigned. But after a lot of hard work, bright red caps were again rolling down the line. I couldn't resist, so I grabbed one of the first bottles. Our Pale Ale has never tasted so good - maybe it was just from the relief and elation of finally tasting a beer made at our new brewery, but I swear it was the best beer I have ever had! Hey, let us know what you think - the first beers from our new brewery will soon be at a store near you, starting with Pale Ale bottled the second week of April!

Beer Board grants us permission to begin brewing at our new location!

Heck yeah! The beer board granted us permission to begin brewing at our new location! That's the good news. Here's the bad: they were uncomfortable with us brewing high-alc beers like "Sue" and felt that they needed more documentation from the state ABC to prove that we had gotten all the appropriate licenses and permits. So brewing "Sue" will be on hold for at least a couple of weeks while we try to prove that the ABC is satisfied with what we are doing. I hope it is not longer than two weeks, but you never know. Might want to run out and buy a case now - god willing, it won't be the last one for a while, but you never know!

Story and pics about the new taproom

Check it out - very cool picture of a Brian filling a growler at our new spot in the Gulch.

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20100405/DAVIDSON/100405036/1974/DAVIDSON/(No%20heading)

And thanks for all the great feedback on the new taproom! We love working there and I hope it shows!

Open for growler fills this Wednesday 4-6 PM

Don't forget, we're open for growler fills from 4-6 PM today, Wednesday, at our new location at 910 Division. On tap, HoP Project #28, Rye Saison, Onward Stout, Hefeweizen, Dos Perros, and Pale Ale. We also got a new run of old-school Yazoo baseball shirts - you know, the ones some of our regulars wear and you always wanted!

And if you are looking for the building, it's the big YELLOW brick-faced building between Frugal Macdoogals and the Gulch, at 910 Division. That's right, we got some painting done this week!

A little bit about the new taproom...

Top Ten things we love about our new taproom:

1. Eighteen taps pouring six different Yazoo beers, so that we can fill a growler, pour a pint, and pour a sampler tray without waiting on each other!
2. Heated and air-conditioned bathrooms with plenty of stalls
3. Lots of great natural light
4. A direct, thru-the-wall draft system so the beer pours without foaming
5. Free WiFi (password is "buybeers")
6. A big dock in the back that will double as a stage for bands when we have block parties in the parking lot
7. The beautiful view of downtown, especially sunset on the new Pinnacle building
8. Sunrise comes right into the brewery when we will be mashing in
9. The trains are close enough to be kind of comforting, without blasting our eardrums at the old crossing on 12th Ave N behind Marathon
10. The sunny patio that we will soon cover with a hop trellis

Brewery Tours

Our popular brewery tours are on hold for a few weeks as we finish up our new back brewery area. But there is a big bay window looking in from the taproom if you are interested in seeing the new space. Check back here at our blog or call the brewery at 615-891-4649 to find out when we will be resuming the tours.

This weekend...

We will have on tap this weekend at the NEW TAPROOM at 910 Division:

Hop Project #28
Rye Saison - our new Spring seasonal, a light, fruity Belgian farmhouse ale
Onward Stout - back and ready for your growlers
Pale Ale
Dos Perros
Hefeweizen

We're open for business, and with eighteen taps and a big open bar, we promise you won't have to wait in line for long!

Beer Board grants our Taproom license!

Whoo hoo! The Metro Beer Board granted our on/off beer license for the taproom, so we will reopen our new taproom at 910 Division this coming Friday, March 26th. The brewery half of the building is still awaiting final inspections to begin brewing, but we will be able to open our new taproom in the meantime. Give us a day to catch our breath and then please join us for a soft opening of the taproom this Friday!

Thanks for the memories, let's make new ones!

It was a great send-off Saturday for the old taproom! Lots of our friends from the very beginning came out for a last pint, and we met a lot of new faces who had such a good time. The weather was perfect, everyone was in a great mood, and no-one wanted to go home. We go before the Beer Board on Wednesday the 24th. If they approve us, we could open the new taproom by next weekend. Keep your fingers crossed!

Beautiful weekend ahead!

Our taproom will be open for the last weekend at Marathon Village from 4-8 PM Thursday and Friday, and 2-8 PM on Saturday. Tours on Saturday will be given at 2:15, 3:15, 4:15, 5:15, 6:15, AND 7:15. We think that there will be a pretty big crowd on Saturday, but we will be adding another pouring station out in the courtyard to handle it (thanks Yvonne!) Come by and help us wish us a fond farewell to the old taproom! And as soon as we get Beer Board approval, we'll see you at 910 Division!

going to miss the old building

Barry Walker, the owner of Marathon, called me today upset about one of my recent posts (which I have since deleted). After rereading it, I realized that my comments could be read to think that I was slamming Marathon Village.

Nothing could be further from the truth. I am proud of the work that Barry and I put into renovating our corner of the building, and I am proud to have been a part of Barry's long journey to save the old car factory and to turn it into a cool artistic haven for Nashville. I've apologized to Barry for my poor choice in words, and I hope that anyone else I offended will accept an apology too. We're going to miss Marathon Village. It's come a long way, and has a bright future, and we're proud to have gotten our start there.

HOP PROJECT #27 out in bottles...

Hop Project #27 is denoted by notches on the side of the label, bottled on 1st week in March. For this batch, we first wort hopped with Nugget and Simcoe, then Amarillo and Cascade at 30 min, followed by more Nugget and Simcoe at five minutes left in the boil. We dry-hopped with Cascade and Nugget after six days in the fermenter. We were aiming for a pure West-Coast-style shot-o-grapefruit-juice IPA, and I think that is what we got!

This will most likely be the last Hop Project in the Brewmaster's four pack packaging. We're getting an individual six-pack carrier done for the Hop Project series, and we'll be packaging our upcoming Rye Saison in the Brewmaster's four pack.

Boiler approved!

Our boiler passed TWO inspections today (good boiler!) and we are close to firing it up and running some test brews on the new equipment! Once Peidmont Gas (used to be Nashville Gas) comes out and upgrades our meter (they have been waiting on the inspections to set the meter), we can test fire the boiler and start supplying steam to the brewhouse, and do our first batch of Pale Ale.

We also cranked up our new chiller and added the 55 gallon drum of glycol to the reservoir. That will keep the new fermenting beer nice and cool.

We are waiting on a couple of above-40 degree days to pour our dock and some sidewalks. The outside of the brewery still looks rough, lots of painting and paving to do. But we are waiting on good weather.

Delayed at least another two damn weeks...

We have been pushing to get the taproom at our new facility open, and are so close. We have been going through final inspections on the taproom for most of the week, trying to get the approvals in before the beer board meeting last night. Well, the fire marshal inspector asked us to move an exit sign, and add some emergency lights, and provide some documentation on the sprinkler alarm system, and well, to make a long story short, we didn't get our fire inspection approval before the beer board meeting. Our application hearing for opening the new taproom was deferred until we can get all our inspections and documents to the beer board for their next meeting in two weeks, on March 11.

Firing up the boiler has been on hold as we wait for the vent stack parts to come in. When we get the boiler up and running, we can do some test batches in the brewery and then start moving equipment out of Marathon and over to the new place.

Getting closer...

Quinn and I got the two grain augers installed yesterday. One feeds from the grain mill to the grist hopper, which will hold a batch's-worth of ground barley. From the grist hopper, another auger takes the grain up to the mash tun to be mixed with hot water. Once we get these augers wired up, all we will be waiting on to start brewing is our boiler to be fired up (and all our final inspections, of course).

Our friends from Prism Systems and Advanced Engineering are also on site, testing and debugging the automation controls for the new brewhouse. Once done, we'll be able to control valves and motors from a central location, instead of manually opening and closing the valves.

We're shooting for a fire marshal inspection of the taproom today or tomorrow, and to hopefully go before the beer board tomorrow. We'll keep you posted...

Brewing our Spring Seasonal today ... Rye Saison!

Even though it's snowing outside today, and school is out for like the millionth time, we're busy thinking of Spring today. Yes, the time of year when young brewer's thoughts turn to ... fruity, juicy, slightly funky-but-in-a-good-way Belgian yeasts! Yep, that's how you spell L O V E to a brewer. Soon, Fed Ex will deliver an active culture of a Belgian saison yeast, to be pitched into a sweet concoction of pale, vienna, wheat, and rye malts. There, it will ferment at unbelieveably high temperatures (95 F instead of our usual 68 F) until the beer is infused with peppery aromas and a wonderful juicy-fruit tartness.

We'll be bottling this in about a month, just in time for Spring (hopefully it will remember to come this year!)

Stout infused with Olive and Sinclair

It really pays to follow us on Twitter. See that little icon over on the right side of this blog? Click on that icon to follow @yazoobrew on Twitter, and become one of the people who know the inside scoop on all the Yazoo happenings.

For instance, we tapped a keg of our Onward Stout, aged for a month with cocao shells from Nashville's local Willy Wonka factory, Olive and Sinclair! These are the shells from roasted cocao beans, still full of chocolate flavor. We announced on Twitter that we would be tapping a keg of this beer for Valentine's Day at 4 PM last Friday. It was gone in less than an hour! Thanks to all our Twitter followers who showed up en masse to sample it, and if you missed out, sorry - but follow us on Twitter to see when we tap a keg of Sue aged with the shells!

New location update...

We passed our health inspection! Rachael from the Metro Health Dept came by and inspected our new location (and commented on how much nicer, in her opinion, the new location will be!) She asked for us to add a couple of door closers, but other than that, we're good to go as far as Metro Health is concerned!

We'll be trying to get the Metro Fire inspection next, and if they approve, we can go before the beer board on the 24th! If approved, we could open the taproom up while we finish up in the brewery. All that is left there, on the inside, is firing up the boiler and finishing the mill auger hook-ups. That hopefully will coincide with our beer board meeting on the 24th, but then again I've learned not to get my hopes up about how fast construction goes.

Hop Project #26, out in kegs and bottles today! Plus other news...

Hop Project #26 was bottled 2nd week of Feb (look on the left side of the label for the bottled date). For this batch, we first wort hopped with Cascade and Nugget, and then added Amarillo and Centennial at 30 minutes left, Cascade and Nugget at 5 minutes left, and dry hopped after six days with about 1 lb/ barrel of Centennials. It has a wonderful floral nose, followed by rounded grapefuity bitterness, and finishing crisp and dry with a little bit of lingering chewy hop resins.

We took a little break on the Hop Project series, waiting on some varieties from the 2009 harvest to become available. We haven't used much Centennial in this Hop Project series, but I always remembered it fondly from homebrewing days. We like it, and hope you will too!

We're getting six-packs printed for Hop Project, and when they arrive, we will be transitioning the Hop Projects from our "Brewmasters" 4-pack packaging into its own six-pack. #26 will probably be the last Hop Project in the 4-packs.

Once the Hop Project is in its own six-pack, we will be releasing our Spring seasonal in the Brewmaster's 4-pack. We're bringing back the Rye Saison we brewed for our five-year anniversary! If you remember, it was a classic Belgian farmhouse ale, brewed with a spicy, fruity Belgian yeast. The addition of rye malt complements the fruitiness and peppery spiciness that comes from the yeast. Look for it in area stores in March!

bet you didn't know this...

Meet one of our neighbors at our new location! I was driving by and saw Mackenzie Colt out front of her business, and stopped to say hello. Amazing story, and we're looking forward to being in the neighborhood.

http://www.coltschocolates.com/companyprofile.html

Pretty cool - soon, the Gulch will be home to a bakery, a brewery, a chocolate factory, and once Bongo Java cranks up their operation, a coffee roaster! All your staples in one neighborhood!

Brewhouse powered up!

Thanks to the guys at Advanced Engineering, we now have power to the new brewhouse! We worked late last night testing out all the I/O and checking motor rotations. Hard to believe, but we only found one mistake in the wiring, one that is easy to correct. Next, the guys at Prism Systems down in Mobile, AL, will be up here on Monday to install the Siemens Braumat program that will control the automation on the brewhouse. It's going to be pretty cool, a touch-screen computer contolling air-operated valves, instead of the manual controls we've had the past six years.

We were all set to go before the Metro Beer board for our taproom beer license this week, but have not yet been able to repair our hot water heater that froze during the last snowstorm. When we cut the power off to the building so that NES could make their connections, our tankless hot water heater did not drain properly, and froze up and ruptured during the night. No hot water = can't pass a metro health inspection yet = no beer permit. Bummer. Now we are shooting for getting our beer permits on the next meeting, Feb 24th. And if you ask my opinion on tankless hot water heaters - so far less than impressed.

Yes, we are still open for tours and pints at our 1200 Clinton location

Sorry for any confusion the two news stories in the paper lately seemed to have caused. I thought they were great, well-written stories, but we have been getting a flood of phone calls this week, from people thinking that we had closed our 1200 Clinton St location.

No, we're still here! The taproom is open our normal hours, and we will be giving tours this Saturday.

New brewery update

Wow, sometimes it feels like we are a glacier, moving an inch a day. But hey, global warming should speed us up soon, right? Here's what's happened lately:

1. We got approval from the fire marshal to not have to fire-rate the wall between the taproom and the brewery. Doing so would have cost us dearly in fire-rated doors and windows, as well as a fancy expensive fire alarm system.

2. NES finally hooked up our three-phase power! Thank you, especially for working this past Sunday in the snow! Now we can start testing the new brewhouse out!

3. We took down our Siemens Braumat controller at the old brewery and moved it over to the new, to start integrating it into the control system for the new brewhouse.

4. The boiler installation is almost complete, just waiting on the stack to arrive.

5. We've been doing the final trim work in the taproom, painting, hanging doors, installing baseboards.

6. We're having to wait on a break in the weather to finish our loading dock, it's been roughed in but we can't pour concrete until we get a slight warm spell.

7. Same thing on paving the parking lot, having to plan around all the bad weather.

8. Our grist hopper, which holds the grain after it has been through the mill and then feeds it into the mash mixer, arrived. In lots of little pieces and nuts and bolts! We're starting to assemble it today.

Update on the Yazoo beard contest...

Back around Halloween, all the guys in the brewery (well, all but two) decided to stop shaving until we were in and running at the new location. Here is a little before and after...

Let's hope, for our wives and girlfriends sakes, that we get in the new brewery soon!

(note: Brian got a head start about six years ago)

Great article in today's NashvillePost.com...

http://www.nashvillepost.com/news/2010/2/1/the_food_biz_digs_delayed_yazoo_keeps_chugging


Thanks to Dana Kopp Franklin for all her great articles about local businesses over the years!

Yazoo Taproom hours during the Snow-apocalypse this weekend...

It's really coming down out there at this minute! Much of our staff has called in, stranded by the snow, so we are planning on opening tonight (Friday Jan 29th) from 4-6 PM only, so that we can make it home before the roads freeze. Come by and get a growler!

UPDATE: Saturday, we will be open from 2 until 6 PM, closing early before the roads freeze over again. We will be giving tours at 2:30, 3:30, 4:30, and 5:30. The main roads are looking pretty good (I got here from east Nashville on Gallatin Pike and it was clear)

FINALLY!! Pleasure Chest is on the loose...

We are excited to announce the launch of our "Pleasure Chest" variety pack, featuring three bottles of four different Yazoo beers. The first incarnation of the Pleasure Chest will include the first bottling of our Sly Rye Porter, a sinfully delicious dark ale with hints of chocolate and spicy pepper.

What's the story behind the name "Pleasure Chest"? Well, the original Pleasure Chest is an old cooler we converted to pour draft beer at all of the beer festivals we attend. We usually have something unique pouring from the Pleasure Chest (I'm remembering that bourbon-barrel aged cherry porter, the first few Hop Projects, Velvet Elvis, the Rye Saison, etc). It's getting harder and harder to get more shelf space in grocery stores, even for good locally brewed beers, so we plan on using the Pleasure Chest to get our fans new beers that aren't yet available in six-packs. Thus, the reason for the name, "Pleasure Chest" - throughout the year, you can expect new beers that you may never have tried before!

If you really like the Sly Rye Porter, drop us a line at info@yazoobrew.com, and we'll try to use the feedback to lobby for getting it in its own six-pack. In the meantime, we will have a limited number of cases of Sly Rye Porter for sale at the brewery, for those of you who want to stock up, or who trade bottles with friends across the country (you know who you are). Cheers!

Announcing Growler Hump Night!

During the holidays, we opened up on Wednesdays a couple of times to let people swing by and refill their growlers. People seemed to love the idea of not having to wait until the weekend to get their "fresh-from-the-tap" beer ( and not having to wait in a long line, like when out taproom is normally open). We have been getting a lot of requests for a regular night open for growler fills, so we will begin opening the taproom on Wednesdays from 4-6 PM for growler fills only, starting this Wednesday Jan 27th.

You'll be able to zip in and out without waiting in a big line, and if you wanted to buy a t-shirt or pint glass, you can do that too. We look forward to seeing you there!

NEW GROWLER NIGHTS, WEDNESDAYS from 4-6 PM!

GREAT article!

Thanks to the Nashville Business Journal for this great story on locally produced wines, spirits, and beers! (Click on the story to view it in a bigger window.) And thank you for supporting your local businesses!

910 Division update

A little news on our new location: Things are progressing, but not as quickly as I planned. Our main holdup has been NES. Way back in May '09, our electrician met with one of NES's engineers to map out where we would be getting power for the brewery area (which needs three-phase power). When we turned in the work order to get power, NES told us that there was not enough capacity available in our area, and we would have to pay thousands of dollars for them to get us hooked up. Well, we fought it, and they relented and agreed to do the work, but it has put us several months behind on getting the equipment fired up.

But the taproom is almost ready, just need some trim work done and to get final fire and health inspections. We are going to try to get our beer permit to run the taproom as soon as possible, even if the brewery area is not completely finished. We go before the beer board next week to see what they say about that plan.

UPDATE: NES should be setting our power poles this Friday, with power hopefully following the next week. We got word from Jim Purcell, the Energy Services Manager, and the person we worked closely with during the Green Power Switch promotion at Greer Stadium this summer, that work was about to start. Apparently, there was a miscommunication between an NES engineer and our electrician as to where we would be getting power from. Maybe after two months of waiting, we will get power soon!

On tap this weekend...

We will have on tap this weekend:

Pale Ale
Dos Perros
Hefeweizen
Sly Rye Porter
Wassail
and Silky's Irish Red (a beer we make for Silky Sullivans in Memphis on Beale St)