Changing Brewers Might Not Always Be A Bad Idea

Over the last several months both Goose Island and Rock Bottom in Chicago changed their head brewpub brewers.  One brewery approached the change in a manner designed to keep customers happy.  The other brewery lacked discipline and control and failed to provide a the quality that loyal customers could expect.    

Rock Bottom lost Pete Crowley who wanted to go out on his own, and Goose Island transfered Wil Turner to their production facility.  Rock Bottom replaced a highly regarded brewer with a well regarded and experienced brewer, Chris Rafferty.  Goose Island replaced their brewer with a man who lacked the resume and the experience of the man he replaced.  While new Goose Island head brewer Jared Rouben is a smart man and does know how to make beer; he is not realistically in the same ballpark as his predecessor.

When Rafferty came to Chicago he made what I feel is an unusual move.  He knew a good beer when he saw it and did not tweak every recipe.  For instance, at Flossmoor Brewing Company their signature Pullman Brown Ale has been changed with each brewer.  However, Rafferty is not tweaking the Chicago Gold, Line Drive Light, and a few others.  He is putting his stamp on the place by introducing some of his own recipes.   This does include an excellent Pilsner.

On the other hand, the beers at Goose Island never quite tasted the same.  Maybe the recipes have been tweaked, the lines went bad or something else happened.  No one I know seems to enjoy the beer as much.  To much changed so fast that loyal customers could not come in and drink or eat something familiar.  People who enjoy craft beer enjoy two things: innovation and consistency.  While Goose went with innovation, the consistent beers people drank every year just were not there or not like people remembered them.  I know I take a hard line on Goose Island in many of my posts, but I feel like they have gone down the path of maximizing profits at the expense of stupid customers who do not know the difference.

At Flossmoor Brewing Co., the ownership had an audit done by a previous brewer and his recommendation was to revert back to the old recipes used by several brewers ago for the Great Eight.  I appreciate the  throw back to tradition , but I think it handcuffs the current brewers options as well as an inability to evolve with customer tastes.  A mass produced Budweiser today should taste like a Budweiser from forty years ago.  Craft beer is in large part about evolution.  The quality of ingredients and customer tastes are constantly evolving to the next level.  By sticking with a static recipe the owners of Flossmoor will likely be left in the dust.

From a standpoint of owners managing brewers I find it somewhat odd that Rock Bottom a national operation seems to be doing a better job than locally owned and managed operations.  Brewpubs can be the heart of a community, and being sensitive to the community is what matters.  If you make good beer they will come.  Management in these establishments need to learn a hands-off approach when it comes to beer.

My Bottling Day At Flossmoor

Flossmoor Station Brewing Co. is one of my favorite breweries.  Yesterday, their brewer Bryan Shimkos sent out an SOS that he needed help ASAP on his bottling line.  Like a firefighter running to his truck, I was on my way.  He offered beer and lunch as a reward.  To be honest, I wanted material for the blog and a chance to pick the brain of a young brewer.  Bryan answered every question I asked him from the brewing process to beer trends.  I can honestly say I enjoyed my day.  Here is an in-depth look at bottling the Flossmoor way.

Bright Tank

Before I arrived, Bryan had already pumped the Pullman Brown Ale (Previous Review) over to a bright tank located in a basement cooler.  A bright tank is  where secondary fermentation occurs and can also serve as a serving tank.

Phil Connors

At this point, I should introduce you to Phil Connors.  Phil is a nice guy, but somewhat temperamental and has a slight handicap.  Oh, and by the way, Phil is the bottling machine.  Yes, like all good breweries Flossmoor named their bottling machine.  Phil Connors is the character Bill Murray played in the movie Groundhog Day.  He should be able to fill four bottles at once, but today was only able to handle three.  Before filling the bottles the bottling machine needed to be sterilized.  This is done by flushing it with sterilizer.  A very painless process.  To be honest I was expecting a little more dirt, grime and struggle here.

When Bryan was satisfied that Phil had bathed adequately we went over to Flossmoor's other basement and hauled over a plastic wrapped pallet of boxes and empty bottles.  Flossmoor has their label screen-printed directly on the bottle.  I think this is classy.  The downside to being classy is not mentioning your age therefore no date codes exist on Flossmoor bottles.  Once the plastic is off the pallet we placed adhesive labels and stamped the date code on the boxes.  This date code is the only way to track a batch of beer back to the source.

We then set up the tables for bottling.  One table is for the rinsed bottles and a second is for packaging.  Bryan also set up the bottle rinser.  Now this is a fancy piece of equipment.  The bottle rinser is composed of a large trash can filled with sanitizer and a PVC tube grid laid across the top.  Twelve small pipes stick out of the PVC each with a hole drilled in the end.  Placing the bottles on the pipes and turning the pump on would squirt sanitizer to the bottom of the upside down bottle and rinse the sides on the as it ran down.  Each round of bottles are washed for two minutes.  The bottles are then moved to a rack where they wait upside down.

Hanging Bottles

Hanging the bottles upside down accomplishes two main goals.  First, the sanitizer drains.  Second, nothing can fall into an upside down bottle.  To ensure sanitation only 48 bottles are out at a time.  If sanitation is moving along faster than filing bottles with beer, it is temporarily stopped.

Phil has three available pucks that bottles are placed in.  The puck pulls the bottle back where the dispenser comes down.  Phil creates an airtight seal on the bottle and begins a multi-step process.

1. Double evacuation of oxygen using two bursts of carbon dioxide
2. Pressurization of the bottle 
3. Beer is pumped in through a tube that runs to the bottom of the bottle

Filling the bottles.

As Phil is filling bottles Bryan slid caps into the capper at the front of Phil.  After filled with beer the pucks push forward and the capper drops down to seal the bottle.  This is followed by a quick visual check of the fill level and cap placement and a quick dunk in sanitizer.  The first round of filled bottles are considered less than ideal.  These beers were our "quality control" bottles as we worked.  Yes, quality control in quotation marks means we drank them as we worked.  Additionally, bottle breakage is a danger.  As the bottles pressurize, damaged or defective bottles can explode.  In fact we had two.  One bottle had a quarter size piece blow out the side and another bottle had a full explosion.  In all reality, breakage can be dangerous.  Bryan recounted stories of how flying glass has pierced his shirt.  Finally, a second assitant packs the bottles into cases of 12 and stores in a cooler until picked up or sold to customers at the brewery.  

Finished pallet with my case missing!

Bottling took the whole day.  I showed up about 10:30 and stayed until about 5:00.  A day in a dark cold basement is likely not the glamorous lifestyle we all think brewers have.  However, I did get to take a case home.  While I can not claim to be anymore than a cellarman I took pride in finishing my day with this beer at home.

And what am I doing with my beer?  Well that is another post.