So long 2012! Here's to ya, 2013!

What a great year for craft beer lovers in Nashville and the rest of the Southeast!  It was a whirlwind year for us here at Yazoo.  Some of the highlights:

The beginning of 2012 saw us roll out Yazoo brew along the coast of Mississippi with FEB Distributing.  It's been a blast to get to know the folks down there and to share some great southern brew with people in Ocean Springs, Gulfport, and Biloxi.  Back in Nashville, we had the first ever big bottle release of Yazoo Fortuitous, which quickly turned into an epic bottle share upstairs in the brewery while everyone was waiting for the bottles to be raffled off.  I've never seen so much great beer from around the country, and so many generous drinkers in one spot in my life.

In March, we installed two new 120 bbl fermenters, the biggest yet.  And just in time, too - we began bottling Gerst too.  The ground began thawing in late March, and we spent the morning before the East Nashville Beer Fest planting 20' tall poles and stringing cables out at Sulphur Creek Farms for the new hop vines.

We kicked off the 2012 Hot Chicken Festival on July 4th with a great brand new twist - the first ever Hot Chicken Parade!  Former Mayor Bill Purcell and his red antique fire truck led a battalion of other old fire trucks down Woodland St, with the Hot Chicken Queens flinging beads into the crowd.  I haven't had that much fun in a long time.

In August, we finally were able to source pry-off bottles from our supplier and made the switch from twist-offs.  I am happy to say that I don't think many people even noticed, except for homebrewers, who can now reuse our bottles.

In September, we harvested the hops from Sulphur Creek and packaged up a special batch called Bells Bend Preservation Ale.  We were pretty excited by the flavor from these locally grown hops, and can't wait until harvest in 2013 to do an even bigger batch.

October brought home some great news - our Hefeweizen won another medal at the Great American Beer Festival - this time a Bronze.  We saw the writing on the wall as far as brewing capacity went, and decided to bite the bullet and order more fermenters, this time two 200 bbl tanks, the biggest we could fit inside the building.

In November, I traveled up to Sparta, TN, to do a collaboration brew with the guys from Calfkiller Brewing, dubbed "The Beacon - a TN High Tax Ale".  We debuted this beer at the 12S Winter Warmer on Dec 1.  We will be brewing the second batch here at Yazoo and bottling it in 750s for distribution across the state, as we try in 2013 to get some of TN's crazy high beer taxes reformed in the legislature.

We announced a new series of special sour ales called the Yazoo "Embrace the Funk" series, with our friend and great local brewer, Brandon Jones.  The first beer of the series was "Wild Child", our Sue aged in white wine barrels with sour cherries and Brett Lambicus, which we debuted at the 12S Winter Warmer as well.  Our sour ales will take a while to develop, but we hope to have bottles available later in 2013.

Finally, in late December, we had one of the most nerve-wracking tank installations yet.  Our new 200 bbl fermenters arrived, and we lifted them up and down though a large hole in the roof and into place.  For all my worrying, the installation went so smoothly that everything was in place and the roof replaced by about 3 PM the same day.

All in all, a great year!   Here's to more of the same in 2013!

Who makes "Craft Beer"?

If you follow the beer industry, you have probably read about controversy regarding the Brewers Association's statement regarding "real craft" versus "faux crafty" beers and their attempt to define what is a craft beer and what is not.  http://www.craftbeer.com/news/craft-vs-crafty-a-statement-from-the-brewers-association

The Brewers Association is a not-for-profit trade group made up of small, independent, and traditional American craft brewers across the U.S.  To define its membership, the Brewers Association came up with the following definition of its members: "small" means less than 6 million barrels of beer produced annually; "independent" means that no more than 25% of the brewer can be owned by another brewery who itself is not a BA member; "traditional" means a brewer who has either an all malt flagship (the beer which represents the greatest volume among that brewers brands) or has at least 50% of its volume in either all malt beers or in beers which use adjuncts to enhance rather than lighten flavor.

First, a little history:  this definition of a "craft" brewer has not always been so convoluted.  In fact, when Yazoo Brewing started in 2003, I don't think there was anything more to the definition than "small" meant under 2 million barrels a year of production.  However, a few years ago, Boston Beer, the brewer of Sam Adams lager and the biggest member of the BA, approached 2 million barrels of beer sold.  At the same time, brewers such as Redhook and Widmer began selling equity in their businesses to the bigger brewers like Anheuser-Busch.  So the BA changed their definition - expanding the limit to 6 million barrels, and adding the "independent" and "traditional" definitions as well.

I personally think that the general public deserves to make up their own mind on what beer and brands they want to support with their hard-earned money.  Most "craft" beer drinkers are choosing to buy their beers based on flavor and taste, but also because they like to support small businesses, often ones based in their own community.  My main problem with the brands that the Brewers Association called out as "faux crafty", brands like MillerCoors' Blue Moon or A-B's Shock Top, is that the consumer is often confused as to who the true brewer of the brand is.  But the same can be said of a lot of the "craft" beers on the shelf in your local Kroger, that are solely contract-brewed at big facilities like City Brewery's plants in Wisconsin and now in Memphis.

My advice is, go with what tastes great to you.  If you are a person who cares about where a beer is made and who made it (like me for instance), do a little research while you're sipping on that beer.  If you find that a big brewer owns the brand, and that knowledge ends up making the beer taste not quite as good to you, that's fine.  The good news is, there are more and more small, independent brewers out there every day who you can support.

New tank installation pics!

View from up on the roof

the tanks arrive!

Big temporary skylight the night before...

Up and away

Sure it will fit!  I think so at least...

one in, one to go

All in!

Quinn next to our original 10 bbl fermenter,
 with one 20 times as big in the background.  It's
starting to look like a real brewery in here!

If you can't make it to 12S Warmer, we will be tapping this 4 PM Sat Dec 1 @yazootaproom, with Dave and Don Sergio from Calfkiller! Swing by!

Introducing the first ever Yazoo-Calfkiller Brewing collaboration brew - "The Beacon"

We have never done a collaboration brew with another brewery before. But about three weeks ago, I traveled up to Sparta, TN, to brew a seven-barrel batch with the Sergios of Calfkiller Brewing. I had been impressed with Dave and Don and 

their approach to beers and brewing since I met them a few years ago. I think we have a lot in common and I always enjoyed sharing a few beers with them. One thing we definitely have in common is our drive to change Tennessee's beer taxes, which unfairly tax craft brewers at a higher per-gallon rate than beers from the big brewers, and which have risen every year since 1954, to where TN's beer taxes are the highest in the country. So... we decided to put our frustrations into liquid form. Introducing... THE BEACON! Shining a light on a STYLE OF BEER UNIQUE TO TENNESSEE! THE "TENNESSEE HIGH TAX ALE" STYLE! Yes, only Tennessee can lay claim to this unique style of beer, where the taxes are raised to an almost unbelievable level of $37.00 per barrel. Other areas of the country can claim unique styles of beer, but only in TN are beer taxes taken to this level. We should be so proud!

Your first chance to taste this beer will be if you were lucky enough to have gotten one of the 1000 tickets to the 12S Winter Warmer beer festival this Sat, Dec 1. But there's more - we will be tapping kegs of this across Tennessee in the weeks to come. We will be brewing a second batch at Yazoo Brewing soon and plan on bottling it up in big 750 ml bottles, for distribution wherever the light needs to shine in Tennessee.

What is The Beacon, you might ask? Calfkiller and Yazoo brewed this beer with some German oak smoked wheat malt, local TN honey, and some in-house Calfkiller-roasted coffee. It's fermented with Calfkiller's house ale yeast and unfiltered. I am so happy with how it turned out! The nose is fresh, clean and slightly flowery. The smoked wheat shows up in the beginning of the first sip, followed by a herbal, earthy body but finishing dry and only slightly sweet. 

Again, try it this weekend at the 12S Winter Warmer, and then if you missed it there, stay tuned for updates on where we tap the remaining kegs. Later in a few months we will brew another batch at Yazoo for bottling! 

And, if for some reason, you don't feel that Tennessee's unique claim to beer fame should be our highest beer taxes in the United States, stop by our TN Craft Brewers Guild tent at the festival for more information on how you can help change that! We will also have details up soon, on the TN Craft Brewers Guild website http://www.tncraftbrewers.org/. Thanks,

Cheers,

Linus Hall
Yazoo Brewing

Seth modeling our new Yazoo hoodies. He did it to himself, I swear...

Embrace the Funk!

I've long been a fan of the beers of a local brewer and friend, Brandon Jones.  I first brewed with him when he won a chance to brew a recipe of his on our old ten-barrel system.  We were trying to raise money for a brewer who was in a horrible welding accident in east Tennessee, and Brandon stepped up to the plate, brewing his "Brandon's Hop Blaster", with all the proceeds going to help the brewer and his family.  http://yazoobrew.blogspot.com/2009/10/mark-moynihan-fund.html

Since then, Brandon has really branched out into some wild and funky ales, full of sharp, tangy, and wild flavors.  After the happy accident that we turned into Fortuitous last year, he and I got to talking - what if we could partner up to bring some of the beers we both loved to a wider audience in Nashville and beyond?

So...  here's introducing a new series, titled the "Embrace the Funk" series.  Brandon and I will be working on a range of wild, soured ales that we will release in small batches as we go forward.  Your first chance to taste our creations will come at the 12th South Winter Warmer, with a beer we are calling "Wild Child".  Its base beer was our Sue, but it has been aging for a good while in a special barrel inoculated with a brett yeast strain and some dark sour cherries.  If you don't get to taste this beer at the festival, don't worry - we will be releasing some big bottles of it soon afterwards.

Getting the spent grain out - still hard work!

We've also started on a couple of other beers, but until they age we won't know how they are going to turn out.  One challenge has been making a small enough batch of wort to get the limited amounts of these exotic bugs going.  I want to say thanks to the guys at Corsair Artisan, who kindly let Brandon and I in last Saturday to brew up a ten-barrel batch of a special wort for a barrel-fermented project, which hopefully will be ready to bottle in about a year.

Yes, we have the best jobs in the world

Laying down the funk!

Well, I'm really excited about teaming up with Brandon on bringing some of these wild and funky ales to a bigger audience.  Through his website, www.embracethefunk.com, Brandon has been chronicling his journey down the wild path, along with some great interviews with brewers like Jean Van Roy of Cantillon, Tomme Arthur at Lost Abbey, Lauren Salazar at New Belgium, and Chad Yakobson of Crooked Stave.  We will be continuing that spirit with frequent updates of our progress (or failures!).

Stay tuned here and at:  http://embracethefunk.com/2012/11/14/we-want-the-funk-give-up-the-funk/