Onward and forward! It’s been just thirteen months since we bought and moved into our new home and began working on making this brewery dream a reality (and only 6-months since our last update blog – WAIT, WHAT, WHAT?!) Thirteen months, thousands of dollars, hundreds of work hours, and a ton of paperwork later, we can almost see the light at the end of the tunnel. We are nearly there. Just about ready to announce that Kaiser Brewing is officially open for business!
Since our last build-out update, we’ve primered, painted, and sealed the new walls, installed temperature-regulating devices in the fermentation and cold rooms, insulated the cold room, installed four taps/lines, added decorative finishing touches inside the brewery, got some new kegs, and the best news of all, finalized our OLCC license!
To regulate temperatures in both the fermentation chamber and cold rooms, we installed air conditioning units in each. For the fermentation chamber, we added an automated heating and cooling sensor to regulate the temperatures our ales ferment at. The cold-room required an integrated Cool-Bot unit to bring keg temperatures down to the right serving/conditioning temperatures.
Adding the tap lines was pretty intense. Everything started off smooth; drilling holes through the cold room and tap wall, adding the shanks, taps, making the tap handles, reinsulating the cutout, installing the cO2 regulators, beer lines and keg couplers, and a partridge in a pear tree. But when we installed the beer-line tubing for the lines, the beer had an awful taste, and YES, after performing a proper cleaning. Thinking they are new and just needed a few more passes, we spent hours flushing the tubes, only to find out the bad taste persisted, no matter what!
Long story short, we ultimately deducted that it was bad beer lines because (a) the flavor was only in the beer that sat in the line from the coupler to the handle, not from the kegs once flushed. And (b) doing the sniff/puff test. Yes it is a thing. I compared both the used and unused lines, by sniffing and then puffing on the hose, and that same awful smell/flavor that would not leave not matter what, was still present. I contacted the company, they claimed “wow, this has never happened nor have I ever heard of this before”. Ultimately I went with other beer lines, problem fixed, and I got a refund on my initial purchase.
We wanted to add some Kb personality to our newly painted chalkboard walls, so, using chalk paint pens we added our name, logo, and tagline over the doorways and next to the tap wall.
We have kegs! We picked up 15 used 1/6th bbl kegs and 10 new 50 liter kegs, created some really great, high-end cardboard stencils, and tagged those bad mama jamas! Look for them at your favorite bub/restaurant, purchase them for your next party/event, see them out in the markets, and make sure to come down and get a growler filled from them at our establishment.
Our OLCC license was finalized on Jonathans birthday (6/28) and while we can sell anyone else’s beer, cider or wine, we still cannot sell our own beer without TTB approval. But we are close, my friends. So Friggin Fraking Fraggle Rockin’ close!
Next phase of the build out, includes pouring some cement in the storage area to level it with the rest of the brewery, sealing the entire floors, installing a three bin sink, and finalizing the last of our required licenses and permits with the TTB and ODA. So stay tuned! Did we mention we are so Fraggle Rockin’ close?!
