Indiana Beer News – Aug 6

Figure 8 Brewing has 22oz bombers available in better liquor stores. A recent Kahn’s add lists Where Lizards Dare IPA ($7.99), Solar Collector Pale Wheat ($6.99), Snake Pro Double IPA ($7.99), Ro Shampo Imperial Red ($7.99), Offwidth Double Pale Ale ($7.99), First Ascent Belgo Honey Lager ($5.99).

Oaken Barrel says “We are running out of beer!  Due to the high demands of our customers at the restaurant, Sunday carry out beer sales, and the demand of our beer distributor, we’ve ran out of few beers this summer.  We are in process of expanding our brewery, and plans are in the works to add 3 large fermenters to double our capacity.  Thank you for the understanding.”

Sun King’s Pale Rider will be tapped at the Captains Cove at Victory Field. 6:35pm, August 18th. Dave Colt will throw out the first pitch.

Thr3e Wise Men’s newest seasonals are Long Fang Abbey Ale, 7%; and Centennial Martyr Double IPA, 7.7%.

Fountain Square Brewing is starting construction of the inner walls including the tap room. The “could be open by Labor Day but that’s in a perfect world”.

The Tuxedo Park Brewers homebrew store in Fountain Square, Indy, is starting an in-house homebrew club. MONK – Midwestern Order of Ninkasi" – has about 15 members already.. They also have acquired much of the Wilbur Brewhause consumables including:

• Malt Extract – Organic Pale Malt. $1.50/lb. $85 / 60 pound pail.
• Cases of clean, unused, bottles – $10/case
• Organic Hops – 2009 crop. $1/ounce. Leaf Hallertauer, Fuggle pellets, Nugget pellets.
• A 24-head bottle rinser.

Big Woods Brewing has opened the Big Woods Pizza Co. It’s on Indiana 135, N. Van Buren St, just east of the brewpub, north of Main St. It’s a family place (the brewpub is 21+) and has 2 taps of Big Woods beer – right now Busted Knuckle and Cattail Wheat.

Eric Strader uncovers an effort in Elkhart to start the Iechyd Da Brewing Co. (that’s Welsh)next year. article

Flat 12‘s Axis Hefe is the “featured beer of IndyFringe. On tap at Mass Ave bars and Fringe Festival Outdoor Stage "Club Fringe" and will be served at the Sullivan Hardware Indy Egg Fest – nope, an Egg is a big round BBQ.

Owen Lingley from Wyeast Labs will be joining Great Fermentations for their monthly Friday Night Club meeting and at 5:30pm on August 12th, he will make a short presentation then be available for questions. Attendees are encouraged to bring home brew or wine to share, and we have a special 20 gallon batch of beer split and fermented four different ways to showcase the yeast. Our Friday Night Club always meets on the second Friday of each month from 5-7pm, and is an informal get-together of brewers and winemakers to share information, ideas and beverages.

Triton In Lawrence has signage up now.

St. Peters has some new flavors. Sorgham Beer, Old-Style Porter, Cream Stout, IPA, Fruit Beer-Grapefruit, Organic English Ale.

The Great British Beer Festival has named Mighty Oak Oscar Wilde Mild as the Champion Beer of Britain. 3.7%, Champion Mild of Britain in 2006, CAMRA Beer of the Year, 2002, and not available here (or much of anywhere outside of Essex).

Strained headline of the day: “Coney Island Brewing opens as world’s smallest brewery”. one-gallon. output is bottled.

Morgan/Monroe, Two Counties Strong

Took a road trip to try Bloomington Brewing’s Ole’ Floyd Belgian Ale. Floyd Rosenbaum’s 1000th batch. It’s served attractively in a tulip glass with no head. None. Medium brown. Raisin and fig aroma. A bit of tartness gives a good 3-way balance of bitter, sweet, and tangy. 7.5%.

Also on tap are the regulars, Freestone Blonde, English Mild, Ruby Bloom Amber, Quarrymen Pale, B-Town Brown, and Big Stone Stout. Seasonals include a Double Hopped Pale (42 IBU), and Java Porter (on CO2, Nitro, and Cask Conditioned – the same 3-tap treatment given the Quarrymen Pale right now).

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Across town, Upland is combating the 7.5% with their own perennial Winter Warmer on tap at 8.5% ABV. Bright leather color. A neutral American Barleywine with a classic aroma and little spritzes of clingy head. No flaws or harshness. Seems like it should take a few years to reach this state of maturity.

All the bottled Winter Warmer is gone from Bloomington liquor stores and growlers are $17 at the brewery. You might want to check a 6-pack out of your local library liquor store while it’s still around. Aging for a couple of years is perfectly fine.

The reserved issues of this years Upland Sour Ales have been taken away by patrons and it’s now first-come-first-served on the Blueberry and Strawberry Lambics as well as some bottles of Dantillion that weren’t picked up. $20.

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After a drive north through the abandoned but plowed lane of the Morgan Monroe State Forest, Martinsville beckons. Jeez-O-Pete’s Old Northside Tavern on the north side (of course) of the square serves ice cold bottles of Wilbur Brewing’s Country Mellow with their ham sandwiches and the Biography Channel on TV. The ONT is an old-line tavern but with an odd veneer of modern made to look old.

Country Mellow, at 8% could well be called a British Strong Ale and Wilbur’s flagship brand. Aroma: Did I mention it was served in a bottle? Color: Did I mention it was served in a brown bottle? Taste is a mild brownness, caramel, and slight oxidation. The lingering finish is exactly the same. Now to let it warm while I enjoy the Polish ham and cheese sandwich. . . Warmer, this beer brings out some complex fruits and loses the oxidation.

David vs Goliath, Wilbur Brewing

Wilbur brewing likely could not have a more idyllic setting for current brewing operations, a former Girl Scout cabin beside a pond, with little but trees around! Maybe some of that peace transends into the beer! Wilbur is gently moving from a homebrewing operation to micro-brewer. Still it is likely one of the few who could claim "fire brewed" beer! Plus the beer is organic. The last time indianabeer.com caught up with founder Dan Hause, Wilbur Brewhause was in its infancy. Wilbur now has larger fermentation vessels and is brewing in larger quantities.

Throwing beer styles to the country wind, Wilbur's most popular offering is Country Mellow -- and it is smooth but weighs in at 8% alcohol. This beer is closest to a strong scotch ale, but there we go trying to categorize a beer that folks just plain seem to like rather than discuss. It is a deep brown mahogany beer with rich maltiness made with local artesian waters. Wilbur's second most popular is labeled Summer Ale, though the light spiciness in it made it a tasty Fall beer, too. Wilbur bottles other seasonals such as Oktoberfest, Biker Brown, and Midnight Coffee Stout with beans from B-townBeans.

Wilbur, named for the closest little 'village' of Wilbur, Indiana, between Martinsville and Monrovia, will likely move one of these days as Dan plans to expand. That may allow Wilbur to distribute more widely with more offerings. Currently Country Mellow is likely the beer you'll find in Bloomington on tap at Scotty's, Yogis, or maybe Max's and in 6-packs at Bloomingfoods, Sahara Mart, in Martinsville at Brownstone liquor or try a bottle at Olde Northside Bar & Grill, or pick some up at Parti-Pak on the Southside of Indy.

It's great to see expanding variety for Indiana. Little Wilbur Brewing is adding organic options in South Central Indiana. Check out the facebook page for Wilbur Brewing !

Misc News – June 10

Correction: Yesterday's new referred to Southern Wine and Spirits as possibly carrying beer. Our bad. Todd Antz points out that in Indiana beer and liquor distributors are mutually exclusive.

Todd also says "The 5th Annual Keg Liquors Fest of Ale was a great success this year.  Our attendance was up to 750 people, and we were able to raise $5600 for the WHAS Crusade for Children, which is an improvement of $2100 over last year's donation."

Wes Barnes, the sales guy at Wilbur Brewhause reports some great growth. Dan Hause has moved from a 5gal system to a 55gal system, boiling over a wood fire, and can make up to 200 cases per month. Country Mellow, their 8% Certified Organic bottle-conditioned 81-IBU Pale Ale can now be found at the 4 Sahara Mart and Bloomingfoods locations in Bloomington. It's on tap at Max's Place (tapping next Tuesday) and Yogi's (tapping next Wednesday). In Martinsville, stop at the Olde Northside B&G and Brownstone Bottle Shop. Also Red Barrel in Monrovia. Huzzah.

John Holl who is writing the beer-travel-oriented book "Indiana Breweries" for Stackpole Books tells us Doug at Upland mentioned that their tasting room would be getting brewing equipment in about 60 days. I haven't seen that news on your site yet, but thought it would be of interest to your readers."

Speaking of upcoming books. Besides Rita Kohn's True Brew there is Indiana: One Pint at a Time should be out sometime soon. It's Douglas Wissing's "journey through the history of beer from prehistoric times through industrial brewing. the book also details the history of brewing in the Hoosier State, including the Indiana-German brewers who dominated the industry until Prohibition, the 20th-century decline of the industrial breweries and the rise of craft breweries in the 1990's." $24.95 pre-purchase

Dark Horse has bought the neighboring building and is planning a $700,000 expansion in Marshall, MI. This will add 18,000 sq. ft. and increase capacity to 25,000 bbls from their current 6,000. article in Kalamabrew

Brazil has a hot, hot, hot economy. I fact they've run out of beer cans. article that really doesn't have toom much to do with beer

Belgians have an observatory in Chile. Of course it's called TRAPPIST (TRAnsiting Planets and PlanetesImals Small Telescope) or we wouldn't even mention it. That's a new meaning of Beer Goggles. Next up: the Chimay Galaxy.

Wilbur Brewing

Meet Dan Hause, the owner of the Wilbur Brewhause in the middle of the woods between Martinsville and Wilbur, Indiana.

That's Dan on the right. The goats really don't have anything to do with the brewery. They won't even eat spent malt, they are just there to eat the poison ivy – but who could resist such a picture?

Dan seems to jump hip-deep if not head-first into his projects, like timber-frame building (including the goat shed), and brewing. It started 5 years ago when he and his son got a homebrew kit for Christmas. Now he has federal and state licenses and even Certified Organic status for his beers.


Let's talk about the idyllic setting for a minute. Can you spot the brewery in this picture?

The little A-frame is one of three buildings left from when this woodsy enclave of a dozen houses was a Girl Scout Camp.

Now the small kitchen is a homebrew-sized 5 gallon brewery. Just enough room for a half-dozen fermenters, a brew kettle, a manual bottling line, and a pallet of empty bottles in the living room waiting patiently to be used.

Dan is making 2 beers right now,

• Country Mellow – Creamy sweet Pale Ale with Nugget hops. 8%
• Biker Brown – Thick and creamy with big cocoa/coffee type flavors over a light maltness. 9%

Right now, they are available only at the Old Northside Bar & Grill in Martinsville but they'll appear shortly in the World Class Beverages Indiana 12-pack.
All of Wilbur Brewhause's beers are krausened and naturally carbonated to produce a bottle-conditioned product.