And then you get to the part that is 110% church-of-beer!
This lovely little room is where all the natural yeast action happens. The windows open. The wood siding, a house-warming gift from another brewery, is rough and captures the wild yeast for release in later sessions.
I highly recommend the tour. Great guide, fantastic beer, awesome facility!
There are factory parts that donât look quite as church-of-beer as the previous pictures. First up is bottling & kegging.
Second is the âfunk roomâ, where beer infected with bret and lactobacillus are stored. Everything in there is marked red to prevent contamination.
And third is a bad angle on the huge lagering room. The horizontal tanks are the largest American-produced components of the setup. Most of the steel is German.
The tour starts with the main brew vessels, conveniently set at ground level and below for easy access. The little one is stuffed with hops when brewing Pliny and its cousins.
The entire tour happens on a beautiful human hab-i-trail to keep us out of the way.
Hey, Noodlerâs Ink, I appreciate that you are trying to give me good value for my money. Maybe donât fill your (quick-drying, permanent) ink bottles all the way to the top, though. Iâm okay trading a few pennies of ink for not having my fingers be blue for a week!
(The other side of my fingers are completely blue and much more impressive, but donât post pictures of your fingerprints on the Internet, kids.)
The appetizer before tomorrowâs feast!
(Although âcan openerâ is probably more aptâŚ)