10 Questions for a Sweet Brewer

It's been a few weeks since the last post, largely due to a busy work schedule. It's not like I stopped drinking beer, don't worry. I haven't had time in the last month to brew anything, but I've got some ideas kicking around. A few weeks back I had sent out some questions to Nick Funnell, the head brewer at Sweetwater Tavern. He was nice enough to get back to me. In case you haven't been there Sweetwater Tavern operates three locations in Northern Virginia: Merrifield, Centreville, and Sterling. It's one of the best restuarants near me in the Merrifield area, with a great food selection ranging from steak and fish to more casual offerings like sandwiches and salads (think Outback Steakhouse, but with good food and service). Also, the beer is made in-house and pretty darn good to boot. Nick has amassed some hardware from the Great American Brewfest over the years and it shows. Here goes:

Holz: First, can you give my readers an idea of how you got started in brewing? Were you originally a homebrewer?

Nick: I got started in brewing after getting a degree in Chemistry and finding an apprenticeship in a brewery. I have only ever homebrewed once, without distinction.

Holz: Did you attend any school to study brewing or did you start right out working at a brewery?

Nick: I studied brewing as part of my apprenticeship.

Holz: Sweetwater Tavern always has a nice selection of year round and seasonal offerings, how do you approach the creative process of crafting a new brew?

Nick: When we create a new beer we look for a gap in our portfolio that needs filling.

Holz: I believe Great American Restuarants (owner of Sweetwater Tavern) won two medals this year at the Great American Beer Fest, congratulations. Which beers won?

Nick: We won a Bronze medal in the Belgian Wit bier category for Wits’ End and a Gold in the Rye beer category for Crazy Jackass Ale.

Holz: Were you able to make it out to Denver this year for the festival?

Nick: I was lucky enough to be in Denver for the festival.

Holz: Occassionally, I see Great American beers available at the store, do you guys bottle your beers? Any plans to ramp up bottling production?

Nick: We do not bottle any beer for stores. We concentrate our efforts on getting people to come to us where we are able to fully guarantee the flavor and freshness of our beer. We do sell growlers of beer to go and they are filled on a counter pressure machine that ensures quality.

Holz: Which breweries and/or brewpubs inspire you?

Nick: Almost all breweries and brewpubs inspire me as there is something to be learned from each one.

Holz: Besides drinking the final product, what do you enjoy most about brewing?

Nick: The satisfaction of producing a great product that has developed a passionate following.

Holz: Which beer style do you enjoy brewing/drinking the most? The least?

Nick: All beers are equally satisfying to make as the process is essentially similar. As a brewer it is important to not favor one style over another when it comes to making the beer, or some will be better made than others. That wouldn’t be fair to the drinkers.

Holz: Is there any Sweetwater Tavern news (major or minor) that you want to share with my readers? New beers, locations, etc.?

Nick: Keep checking the website to see what we are up to.

Eat and Drink at Sweetwater. It is so ordered.

-HolzBrew

Interview with a Brewer: Bill Madden

For today's post I arranged an interview with a really great guy, local brew legend Bill Madden. The interview was prompted by my interest in the Mad Fox brewpub that I have been hearing about around town for the last year or so that is supposed to be opening right in my backyard, Falls Church. Without further ado:

Holz: I heard about the possible future opening of Mad Fox Brewing last fall from some friends, how long has Mad Fox been in the works?

Bill: Mad Fox Brewing Company has been in the works for some time and has always been my dream. I think it got serious about three years ago when a great friend of mine and current business partner, Rick Garvin, started to mentor me on how to go about developing a business. We would talk and then I would be given a task list to go out and work on and then I would get busy with a beer festival or some other distraction. The business took longer and longer to develop. Then Rick got the idea to work with me and develop Mad Fox together for a stake in the business, he put up startup capital and he has been instrumental in helping me to deal with the startup business issues while I can concentrate on the restaurant and brewing concepts. Rick has started numerous businesses over the years and I have helped in the opening or restarting of 7 brewpubs in the area so our skill sets work well together.

Holz: According to the website, Mad Fox is slated to open November 2009, is that scheduled opening date still a reality?

Bill: Well, let’s say November 2009 is probably too soon but we had to pick a target date and last fall that seemed reasonable. I would say now that the end of 2009 or the beginning of 2010 would be more like it.

Holz: A lot of my readers aren’t familiar with Bill Madden, would you mind giving us a run down of your brewing career to date?

Bill: My brewing career started with home brewing in San Francisco and a friend of mine liked my beer so much he suggested I look into going to the University of California at Davis, Master brewers Program. I graduated in 1995 from UC Davis and was hired by Capitol City Brewing Company before I graduated to become a part of their expansion team. Cap City was just the one location then at 11th and H in the District of Columbia and I was to be the brewer at Tyson’s Corner, which never happened. I opened the Cap City on Capitol Hill then designed the brewery for Shirlington, Bethesda and Baltimore. At various times I ran all those breweries and found myself the Executive Brewer for all CCBC locations. I based myself out of the Shirlington location which was the best brewery design of all the Cap City locations (if I do say so myself!). I also founded the Cap City Oktoberfest over ten years ago which is still running strong each fall season. I left CCBC after nine years to accept sweat equity in a small brewpub called Founders’ Restaurant and Brewing Company in Alexandria, Virginia. I lasted there for a year and left to pursue other interests. I was tapped by my current owner, Anthony Cavallo to restart the brewery of the former Thoroughbreds Brewing Company in Leesburg, Virginia now known as Vintage 50 Restaurant and Brew Lounge where I currently brew and helped found the NOVAbrewfest that will be happening next weekend at Moraven Park in Leesburg, June 27th and 28th.

Holz: You currently brew for Vintage 50 in Leesburg; once Mad Fox opens do you still plan to brew for Vintage 50?

Bill: I will not be the day to day brewer at Vintage 50 once Mad Fox is in construction phase but V-50 hired Dean Lake who lives in Leesburg and has brewed at many breweries in the area including Old Dominion (RIP, very sad), Thoroughbreds (RIP but now V-50!), Rockbottom Ballston and Sweetwater Tavern Sterling. I will stay on at V-50 as an Executive Brewer and will check in periodically. There are some mutually beneficial business relations that will be maintained between V-50 and Mad Fox Brewing Company.

Holz: My site is dedicated to all things beer, one of which is my home brewing hobby, did you start out as a home brewer or did you jump straight into the big leagues?

Bill: I started as a home brewer and still maintain ties to the homebrew community since I am a member of the local home brew club BURP (Brewers United for Real Potables). My lovely wife, Beth, is the Editor of BURP’s monthly newsletter as well.

Holz: Are there any local brewpubs or beer bars that have inspired your Mad Fox brewpub concept?

Bill: No, really, the concept of Mad Fox Brewing Company is different from what is available in the DC metro area. We will be brewing our own beer and the restaurant will have a European Pub feel to it with a wooden bar and wood accents to soften the feel and atmosphere. The food will be locally sourced within reason and the focus will be pizzas, panini’s, salads and seasonally changing entrée offerings that the chef will have a major focus on to showcase his or her talents. There are great pizza places in this town and there are great beer places but no one to date has put the two together. I have seen this more on the West Coast than around the Mid Atlantic region.

Holz: By all accounts starting up a brewpub is an expensive process. To date, has raising capital been tough?

Bill: Raising capital started amazingly well in the spring of 2008 and then dried up in the fall with all the excitement we had on Wall Street. We put Mad Fox in hibernation until this spring when we were approached by the Landlord of the Spectrum property in Falls Church at 444 West Broad Street. The original tenant of the property had faltered financially and we had looked at this very spot the previous summer but were excluded by that very tenant for a competing menu item, pizza. Well, when the terms of the Letter of Intent were presented to Rick and me we realized that a bad economy presents some very good opportunities. Commercial real estate prices are way down, construction costs are down, stainless steel (brewery parts) are down and most contractors, architects and a host of others are competitive for your business. We presented the economic scenario and having a location changed our perception from an investor’s perspective and we are almost there on the first round of investment to start developing the location for Mad Fox.

Holz: Running a brewpub is about a lot more than just brewing great beer, unfortunately, are you also the brain behind the restaurant aspect of Mad Fox or are you working with a partner(s)?

Bill: I have a number of consultants from investors who are successful local restaurateurs to my current employer at Vintage 50, Anthony Cavallo, who is a consultant and has many years of restaurant experience running the former Blackies’ and Lulus’ restaurants. We will hire a General Manager and Chef which I have already had some very competent folks enquire about. I will oversee all operations but will focus on what I do best for Mad Fox and that is making beer.

Holz: The Mad Fox website details your intended beer offerings, 7-10 year-round offerings and a rotating selection with 20+ seasonals sounds pretty awesome, what size brewery are you working with and how often do you plan to brew in order to keep up with the aggressive selection of beers?

Bill: My plan for the beer at Mad Fox is to offer a lot of what I am known for and then add some new creations given that we plan for a large brewing system to support some limited off site sales. I will have my usual four core beers, Kolsch, malty middle beer (ESB, Amber etc.), hoppy middle beer ( IPA, APA etc.), dark offering ( Porter, Oatmeal Stout etc.), an ever changing Belgian style seasonal, Weizen year round, then all the rest will be seasonal along with my regulars like Wee Heavy and Stealth Beer like Molotov Hoptail etc. One thing I am excited to get into will be sour beers and other funk brews that I have been adverse to do given the tight quarters I have been in the last two breweries I have had to work in. Maybe some barrel aged fun is in the works as well. The brewing system will be determined by what we can find in the used market but I have a design in mind. I would like a 15 barrel system or one slightly larger with a fermentation capacity of at least 150 barrels to have a potential annual output of over 3000 barrels. The configuration will be similar to my old baby at Cap City in Shirlington.

Holz: Of the beers listed on your site, the Devils Due and Head Knocker look the most intriguing to me, what’s your favorite beer on the list and why?

Bill: The Devils Due is a Belgian style Strong Golden Ale, think Duvel, and it comes crashing in around 9% abv which has done some damage to our V-50 patrons. The Head Knocker was inspired by a trip to the UK and a sampling of Head Cracker from Woodfordes. It is an English style Golden Barley wine and it is divine on cask. My favorite beer on the list is a question I get all the time and it is hard to pick one child over another. I am proud to have an assortment of beers on tap that covers many bases for patrons coming to V-50 or any place I have worked and each beer is designed to please folks on many levels. To pick one I cannot since each beer I brew I put much effort in designing it to please. I can tell you one beer I brew each year that the patrons love but I have a hard time drinking a full pint of and that is Punkinator, my fall spiced pumpkin beer. I actually go through the trouble of picking the pumpkins at a local farm, Homestead Farms, who carry a heirloom varietal pumpkin called Cinderella. I core and roast the pumpkins and add 100 pounds to the mash. All that work and it is not my fave.

Holz: Which beer style do you enjoy brewing/drinking the most? The least?

Bill: I enjoy brewing all beers but some are more a labor of love like the Wee Heavy which is boiled for six hours to concentrate the wort and intensify the flavors. I enjoy most beers but am not a fan of many spiced beers like Punkinator mentioned above.



A big thanks to Bill for setting aside some time to answer my questions. I can't wait for Mad Fox to open. As mentioned by Bill, a reminder, the NOVA brewfest is this coming weekend at Moraven Park in Leesburg.

Stay Mad Like a Fox,

HolzBrew

Interview with a Brewer (To Be)

For today's post I've got a real treat for you guys. If you've looked around this site, you might have noticed that I've linked to other exceptional beer-related blogs. Well, the last couple of months I've been keeping up with the guys over at Monday Night Brewery as they chase their dream of opening up brewery.

Who/What is Monday Night Brewery?

In short, three young ambitious homebrewers in the Atlanta area attempting to start up a brewery by 2010. See their about page on their site for the longer version.

I managed to get in contact with MNB's Jonathan Baker and asked if he'd like to participate in a HolzBrew exclusive interview. He was down with it. Here goes:

Holz: You guys have been hard at work for a number of years trying to commercially start up Monday Night Brewery by 2010, what has been the most unexpected delay in the process thus far?

MNB: You know, it’s funny. From the outset we gave ourselves a 3-year time frame and we’ve actually stuck to it pretty well. We’re still on track to hit our original target date. Who knows what will happen between now and the end of the year, that could change, but thus far we haven’t encountered any huge delays.

Giving ourselves more time than necessary upfront was definitely a wise decision in hindsight. We wouldn’t have had the time to really develop and think through our brand otherwise. It’s also given us time to actually get pretty decent at brewing, which is obviously a critical piece in this whole picture. The real goal for us is to make sure that we have done everything possible to be successful before actually investing any serious capital into the enterprise.

Holz: By all accounts starting up a brewery is an expensive process. To date, has raising capital been tough?

MNB: It IS expensive. Which is one of the reasons why we’re going to start by contract brewing. Upfront we will only need a fraction of the capital we would need if we were building a brewery from scratch, which will allow us to own more of the company and build some of the demand we will need to sustain ourselves long term with less risk.

I think the 3-year time frame has actually been very helpful in this regard as well. 3 years has given us ample time to make connections and prove to potential investors that we are very serious. Thus far we haven’t had any trouble raising the money we need. We aren’t there yet, but we don’t foresee any huge hurdles in getting it done. We are also throwing in a good chunk of the money we need ourselves, which helps.

Holz: If you could look 5 years out past the initial start up of the brewery, how do you want to distribute your product? In other words, do you see yourself limiting distribution to just the state of Georgia, or perhaps limiting it to a specific region like the Southeast?

MNB: Great question. From the beginning I think we’ve always seen ourselves as a regional brewery. We want to focus on Atlanta and Georgia for the first couple years at least, but eventually we would like to distribute throughout the Southeast. Craft beer is still a local product, in our minds.

Holz: Determining the proper mix of year round offerings vs. seasonal or even limited releases is a delicate process for a professional brewer. What is your current plan for the number of regular year round selections and season/limited releases?

MNB: We are going to launch with 2 beers, a malty IPA (Eye Patch Ale) and a dark, smokey scotch ale (Drafty Kilt Scotch Ale). Eventually we’d like to have around 5 year-round beers, though that is probably a few years out. I think our homebrewing background has instilled in us a desire to experiment, so we would love to focus on limited edition seasonals to the extent that the market will allow it. It would be great if we could have 1-2 seasonals at any one time. We already want to work in our imperial pumpkin ale (Headless Horseman) and our barleywine (Laissez-Faire) whenever possible.

Holz: Could you guys use a good CPA sometime in the future (because I know one)?

MNB: Hmmm. Depends, does he work for beer?

Holz: Just to be clear, I do work for beer.

Seriously though, currently you three are full time professionals in fields outside of brewing, how do you plan to staff the brewery once it is in operation? Do the three of you intend to work at the brewery full time or will you share oversight responsibilities while still maintaining some professional schedule?

MNB: At the very beginning there will be some combination of 1 or 2 of us working part-time and then everyone working nights/weekends (especially Monday nights). We plan on jumping on full-time as the brewery needs it. Joel and I will be the first to make the leap, and then Jeff as we expand and can sustain the monstrous income that he plans to draw (joking). It could be a several year process, depending on how fast we are able to grow. The ultimate goal is that we will all be working full-time at the brewery.

Holz: You guys have been busy updating your brand image lately, how do you plan to differentiate yourself from all of the other great craft beer offerings in your area?

MNB: Part of the reason we updated our brand image was precisely to differentiate ourselves from some of the great craft beer here in Georgia. I think there is still a need for a slightly sophisticated, white-collar beer here. That’s where we fit in. We want to brew well-balanced, interesting beers that can be consumed on weeknights with or without food, with or without friends. Though we obviously recommend friends. We are shooting for a clean, clever look, and we want that same nuance to permeate our beers.

Holz: Besides drinking the final product, what do you guys enjoy most about brewing?

MNB: You know, I find the actual brewing process very cathartic. It’s hard work, but it’s almost like therapy. That or the people – we meet so many great people and the craft beer industry is unlike any industry I’ve ever been a part of. It’s very close-knit and communal.

Holz: Which current craft brewers and breweries do you most admire and why?

MNB: The impossible question. There are obviously too many to name, since craft beer is all about trying new things. But we do look up to Dogfish Head for their brazenness and willingness to experiment (and great beers) and Terrapin for what they’ve done to elevate craft beer in Georgia.

Holz: Which beer style do you enjoy brewing/drinking the most? The least?

MNB: You’ll get a different answer from all of us. Jeff is a hophead, so he loves the Eye Patch Ale. I love darker beers, so my favorite is the Drafty Kilt Scotch Ale. And Joel has a soft spot in his heart for our Belgian wit. I do think we can agree on our least favorite beer styles. We’ve never been too keen on lagers. That’s not to say we don’t enjoy them, we just don’t enjoy them as much as some of the other styles. So even though we have the equipment to lager beer, we just haven’t pulled the trigger yet.

Big thanks to Jonathan for taking time out of his busy schedule to answer my questions! Head over to the MNB site to keep up with their progress and buy their beer in 2010.

Brew on Mondays,

HolzBrew