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Beer Travels: Ale Asylum, Madison, WI

By David on October 19, 2012in beer travels, breweries, Features

If you want to see what a destination brewery might look like, head down I-94 a few hours and see for yourself one brewery’s take on the concept.

What could be considered – by volume only, let’s make no qualitative comparisons – a Surly proxy in Wisconsin, Ale Asylum in Madison is now settling into their brand new brewery and tasting room. Occupying 45,000 square feet on a once-vacant corner near the west entrance/exit of the Dane County Regional Airport, their new facility sits like a welcome sign to weary travelers and a statement of regional identity. They opened their tasting room in late September but haven’t fully started production in the new brewhouse. Regardless, the beer is flowing and people are pouring in.

For anyone familiar with Ale Asylum’s previous location, you won’t notice a change in the beer offerings, and they do still serve food. The new place is simply much, much bigger – five times, in fact – and thoroughly impressive. It was two thirty on a rainy, miserable day when I visited and the place was full. Patrons enter the airy bar where they can immediately catch the current tap list and decide where to sit, which turns out to be no small task: there’s the bar, the seated dining room or the patio, and the latter two have two levels each.

The facility is huge and could easily handle large crowds. However, when it comes to serving beer and food they are careful to state in principle that the new facility will happily remain a tasting room, albeit a large one. Ale Asylum beers are served across Madison and the folks at the brewery are wisely leaving the restaurant work to the restaurants. The food menu at the tasting room is one page front and back consisting of appetizers, salads, sandwiches and pizzas. The choices are limited but familiar and local suppliers keep it from feeling run-of-the-mill.

At the time, the staff was obviously still growing into the new facility. Not all regular beers were available on draft and were substituted by bottles; flights were not available because they’re getting new flight trays and glassware. Expect their four year-round offerings – Hopalicious (their flagship), Madtown Nutbrown, Ambergeddon and Contorter Porter – to be available in the tasting room on tap or in a bottle. Seasonal brews are available on a schedule and a select few will be exclusive to the tasting room; bring a growler and take your pick. Yes, they’ll fill anyone’s growlers so long as it’s clean, sealable and had has the Surgeon General’s statement on it. Isn’t that convenient?

If you are at the brewery and do not prefer beer you’re in luck because wine and liquor are served; I don’t think they’ll fill a growler with booze though. Then again, it is Wisconsin. . .

Drive time from Twin Cities: 4.5 hours, approximately 250 miles.

Food: Try the beet salad, Chad in the kitchen is proud of that one.

Also see: The Green Owl Cafe has pretty good food. It just so happens that their good food is also vegetarian. If you’re downtown, stop into Amy’s Cafe & Bar just off State Street for an unapologetic, welcoming ambiance. If it’s Sunday night, try karaoke at the Come Back In. If nothing else, bring your bike and cruise around the many bike paths around the lakes.

Beer Travels: Toppling Goliath Brewing Co., Decorah, IA

By David on October 17, 2012in beer travels, Features

[Though we champion Minnesota beer first and foremost, we also know that our dear readers like to travel a bit from time to time in search of tasty beers. Below you’ll find David’s account from a visit to our neighbors to the south. -Ryan]

Northeast Iowa doesn’t look like “Iowa”. It’s rolling and quite scenic so the typical hog & corn jokes aren’t going to stick nearly as well as they would elsewhere. Perhaps that’s why the folks at the Toppling Goliath Brewing Company in Decorah so proudly boast that their region should be a destination for beer lovers. Toppling Goliath’s (TG’s) taproom is perched on a small hill, halfway between the Luther College campus and downtown Decorah. I showed up on a Sunday if for no other reason than to take advantage of Sunday sales.

The Beers:

Dorothy’s New World Lager has evolved to be TG’s bridge to the craft beer world for the uninitiated. In it, they took California Common and dialed-back the hop bitterness just slightly. You can’t argue with the results, it is their top selling beer.

TG’s calling card, though, has got to be their wizardry with Pale Ales. While you’d think there would be limited things you could do with the style, TG creates a number of beers that are able to stand apart from one another. Of their regular offerings, the Golden Nugget IPA is the house favorite for hop-heads, followed closely by pseudoSue Pale Ale – named for “Sue” the largest T-Rex fossil ever found. Without knowing why they chose to name it after the famous dinosaur, I’ll assume it was a move intended to ensnare paleo-nerds like me. It worked; I left with a growler of it.

For the more adventurous, the Hop Patrol series of limited-release, well-hopped IPAs showcases what just one hop variety or a creative blend can do. On tap were 1492 (Columbus hops) and ZeeLander (Nelson Sauvin hops from New Zealand) and both were impressive in depth and complexity, especially given their single-hop origins. In the spirit of Halloween there is new addition to the series featuring Riwaka hops: the Riwakan Dead (hah, get it?). Mercifully, this one doesn’t taste like candy corn, pumpkin or brains; purely hops.

Expanding:

Construction is underway on a new 10,000 square-foot brewhouse complete with a 30 barrel brew system and bottling line. It is scheduled for completion in early 2013. The taproom serves virtually all their beers and will remain at its current location with regular hours. Their brews can also be found at other Iowa and Wisconsin locations. If you’re in Iowa City or La Crosse you might get lucky. Check their website for an up-to-date list of locations serving their beer. There are no accounts in Minnesota…yet.

Drive time from Twin Cities: approx. 150 miles from the Twin Cities, 2.5 to 3 hours.

Food: No full menu at the taproom. Pretzels, though.

Also see: Dunning’s Spring, around the corner from the brewery, boasts some spectacular scenery and for mountain bikers, Decorah Human Powered Trails maintains 20 miles of singletrack in the Decorah Park system.

Building the Brewery: Surly Brewing Co.

By Nicole on October 3, 2012in breweries, Features, MN

And Now for Something Completely Different
In terms of craft beer in Minnesota, Surly & MNBeer sort of “grew up” together, launching around the same time and watching the beer scene grow steadily. I’m sure some of you remember tasting their beers for the first time at Winterfest in 2006 (bonus: remember Omar with long hair?). Instead of detailing their very interesting past (which is much better heard at the brewery while enjoying a Furious anyways), I will be sharing the insights of Surly’s president, Omar Ansari, about the plans for Surly’s new destination brewery. I should say here that I first talked to Omar about his ideas for the new brewery while at an event to celebrate Surly selecting HGA Architects (my employer) to design it. While I may be biased about their choice of architect, this feature isn’t going to be about the design, but about the concept, and of course, the beer.

A New Brewery the Surly Way
In May of 2011 the “Surly bill” was signed into law, allowing breweries producing under 250,000 barrels a year to sell their own beers on site. This law change cleared the way for Surly to begin planning their $20 million destination brewery, which will include a brewhaus, beer hall, restaurant, event center and an outdoor beer garden. The planning is still in the very early stages. Omar compared it to actually starting the brewery, “It’s a slow process. This in many ways is much harder than building the brewery the first time around. The only people I had to convince then were my family and Todd, and then get the building ready. Now there are so many moving pieces. We have to work with the city, the county, architects, lawyers, bankers, land sellers and neighborhood groups. It’s a much bigger undertaking. From idea to brewery the first time around it took 2 years. We started thinking about this in 2010 and we’re shooting for opening the new location in 2014.”

The big missing piece is the site location. So much of what the new brewery will be like is dependent on what site they have to work with. Though a Prospect Park location has received some serious attention as of late, nothing has been finalized on this front yet. Omar simply joked, “People always have lots of thoughts on where the brewery should be. Usually it’s within stumbling distance of their house.” While it can’t be in everyone’s neighborhood, it’s important to be located in a place that is densely populated and has easy access via public transit and on bike. Offers from many suburbs are attractive, but just don’t fit with what they’re trying to achieve.

He and Todd have always felt that this project would be urban. He talked about breweries around the country that have gone into depressed industrial areas and helped to revitalize their neighborhoods. They’re having trouble finding a spot like that here. He explained the difficulty they’re facing, “We need a certain size site and there just aren’t that many spots available in Minneapolis, which is a good thing. The Twin Cities doesn’t have these old vacant areas. Things are so developed.”

Although the exact location isn’t yet determined (which means we can all keep dreaming about it being in our neighborhoods for the time being), Omar shared some of the details about the new brewery that I’m sure MNBeer readers will find equally important. By this, I mean he told me about the plans for the beer.

Doing What’s Best for the Beer

The new location will open with Surly’s current line up, but he hopes to have 15 to 20 of their beers on tap in time. As production moves to the new facility, the Brooklyn Center location will be devoted to what he calls “wild” beers (he mentioned a barrel aged Darkness and it set my heart aflutter). It’s no secret that Surly can’t make enough beer right now. He explained, “The constant struggle is that everyone wants more Furious, but they also want more of the anniversary and specialty beers.”

It’s been inferred before that Omar has prevented Todd from being as creative as he could be. The reality is that in their Brooklyn Center location, there just isn’t enough space to do all of the barrel aging and other creative brewing that they’d like to do. This will change when the new facility gets up and running. Having a 25,000 square foot facility for barrel aging and sour beers is a luxury that not many other breweries have. This is another indication that the Surly way of doing things isn’t going to fall by the wayside with their new increased production capabilities.

In the past, Surly has tried to go into other markets and had to pull out because they were having a hard time meeting demand. With an increase in brewing capacity of 100,000 barrels a year they could try to reestablish themselves in those abandoned markets, but that isn’t necessarily what is best for the beer. He emphasized the importance of meeting local demand, “We’re brewing all the beer we can brew. We’re going to have to make enough to meet Minnesota demand first and it’s hard to know what exactly that is at this point. So if this doesn’t get us back into those markets, I guess we never will. There’s only so much you can do to grow.”

First public tour. Not the short goatee!

One of Omar’s chief concerns about the increase in production was whether they’d be able to get enough raw materials. He assured me that they were able to secure contracts for their ingredients, “Getting those particular hops contracted was important. And if we didn’t, we’re building this big facility and what would we brew? We were able to lock that down, so we’ll be able to grow with the brands that folks know and love and maybe even make some of the smaller ones bigger.”

Speaking of ingredients, Surly’s fresh-hop beer, Wet, recently hit the market. This is Omar’s favorite Surly beer and he explained why, “it’s a delicious beer and a lot of work goes into it. We had two tanks fabricated just to make it. It’s an unbelievably laborious process. We don’t sprinkle a little bit of hops on it; all the hops are wet hops. It doesn’t necessarily make a lot of sense in many fashions, but it embodies the way we do things.” Whenever Omar and Todd are confronted with a decision, they always bring it back to what is going to make the best beer.

Going from the new kids in the Minnesota beer scene to veteran brewers making some of the best loved local beers in just six short years shows that doing what’s best for the beer is much appreciated by consumers. Omar is a little bit in awe of the success they’ve experienced, “What’s happened to us is nothing that me or Todd or anyone else would have ever thought would happen. We always thought we would brew beers that literally didn’t belong in every bar and liquor store.” Fortunately for and thanks to Minnesota beer drinkers, that is not the case.

Carmody Irish Pub & Brewery, Duluth

By Danika on September 24, 2012in brewpubs, Features, MN

Nestled between North Shore brewing giant Fitger’s Brewhouse, and their offshoot, Tycoons Alehouse, sits a comparatively smaller and less renowned pub. Carmody Irish Pub sits just three blocks from Fitger’s, and is definitely worth a visit if you find yourself heading north.

Carmody is a very small brewing operation, with a brewing setup that only yields 2 1/2 barrels per batch. With such small batches, it’s no surprise that when I asked what was on tap during my visit, the bartender had to check the beer menu for the day to remind himself which beers and how many different beers were available on the day of my visit. They have four permanent beers in their lineup: Tipplers Golden, Agnes Irish Red, Scanlon IPA, and Famine 47 Irish Stout. The rest of their beer lineup changes on regular basis.

Carmody doesn’t open until 3pm, but they stay open until 2am with live music six nights a week. Their menu is simple, with a couple of sandwich options, a handful of wrap choices, and soup. In addition to their own beers, they also serve a variety of imported European beers and Irish whiskeys, as well as a collection of regional and micro brews. Owner Eddie Gleeson says that they plan to shuffle their guest beer taps to all Minnesota taps in the near future.

Eddie’s wife, Liz Gleeson, spends her days in the Carmody basement brewing beer, while her husband Eddie heads up the business end of their pub. It’s obvious when first meeting Liz that she loves her job. She glows when she talks about her involvement in a business dominated by men, and proudly displays her pink boots from the Pink Boots Society, whose mission is to encourage women in brewing – whether it be professionally or as a hobby.

Her enthusiasm for brewing is clear, even as she highlights the perils of being a smaller brewery. She points out that three of their fermenters are temperature controlled, while two are not. She says that they got such a great deal on the other two that they had to buy them anyway and figure out a temperature control system later. Gleeson now has these two fermenters hidden within a box of sheet insulation. An air conditioner pumps cooled air directly into this insulated box – creating a makeshift cold room. Solutions like this are a regular part of being a small brewpub.

Even with only brewing small batches, Carmody is on the cusp of expansion. They are planning on opening a second location in Two Harbors on October 1. Gleeson says that they aren’t just building a bar, but that Two Harbors will have all of the aspects of Carmody that people have come to expect.

“Our goal is to bring craft beer and a new music scene to the North Shore,” said Gleeson.

Bemidji Brewing Company

By David on September 8, 2012in breweries, Features, MN

Paul Bunyan & Babe are just blocks away

Do yourself a favor and spend some time in Bemidji; you won’t be disappointed. It’s a pleasantly bustling, yet relaxed town with plenty of nature around to admire and get lost in. In fact, if you stop by on a weekend you can sample the Mexican-Scandinavian fusion food truck, the Local 303. The novelty of a lefse fish taco made with walleye should alone be reason enough to bring you in, but I’ll give you more: it will soon be the only place to find the beers offered by the Bemidji Brewing Company.

Foundations

The seeds of the Bemidji Brewing Company were sown while Tom Hill, Tina Hanke and Justin (call him Bud) Kaney were in college. There, they experimented with homebrewing and developed a passion for good beer and always harbored an inkling they would someday make a living out of it. Their careers took them, collectively, across the country from Alaska to Rhode Island, Texas to Montana and gave them some great experiences with craft beer. In those years, Tom became a Certified Cicerone and worked at Northern Brewer while Tina and Bud had become well-practiced in community organizing, programming and marketing. Feeling need for a change to the daily grind, the three chose to come back to their Northern Minnesota roots (Tom and Bud are BSU grads) and make their passion for beer into a full-time endeavor. The first step, though, would be getting back to Bemidji. When they decided to launch the business, Tina and Bud were in Missoula while Tom was in Saint Paul. These geographic limitations meant Skype meetings and document sharing were the norm while the three of them hashed out their plan for the brewery. They launched (and successfully funded) a Kickstarter project [see the MNbeer.com profile of the Kickstarter trend here] and their nano-brewery was off and running.

Running in place, that is. With a plan, but without a facility, the three were entertaining the thought of working from a shared-space when, by pure serendipity, Harmony Co-Op in Bemidji opened the doors to their Community Kitchen.

One of the co-op’s visions for the kitchen is to be the extra push needed for a food producer to get a professional business off the ground and Bemidji Brewing’s plan presented a great opportunity for both the brewery and the co-op.

Making it work

This fortune came with a unique twist when it came time to obtain federal approval. The TTB informed them they were the first brewery in the country to operate out of a shared space and as such, required more detailed assurances than normal. Harmony Co-Op proved to be a steadfast supporter and was willing to assist with making necessary adjustments to obtain the federal approval. Working within a shared space means, among other things, Bemidji Brewing needs to clear out at the end of a brew day, so their equipment needed to be nimble, compact and for the most part, portable. They found this in a custom-built steel brewing stand that is equipped with two burners and can hold three 30-gallon kettles. Perhaps most importantly, the entire stand can be loaded in and out as needed. To utilize the available fridge space in the co-op they use 26-gallon keg-style fermenters and a caged area in the existing walk-in cooler will house the finished product.

Finally, the three founders of the Bemidji Brewing Company are back, settled in, and finished with Skype meetings and long trips away from home. The facility is set and the equipment is at the ready. Federal approval came in August 2012 and now with state approval pending, Bemidji Brewing is only waiting to start selling beer and become a success story for the Co-Op’s Community Kitchen.

Expect to see Bemidji Brewing beers on tap this fall at select Bemidji locations. Keep up with the latest on their website and on Facebook.