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But we are proud to say that Brent Manning contributed 314 entries already.
Wow! Hard to believe we’ve been malting for over a year at this point. Over the past 12 months we’ve encountered all of the typical “start up” problems, cost overruns, permitting headaches, inefficient supply chain issues, etc. all of which contributed to a roller coaster ride. Aaah, but now we’ve hit the sweet spot.
Now, you are probably asking yourself, what is the “sweet spot” for a malt house? Well, it has a lot to do with climate control.
Catawba Valley Brewing! Todd and his staff took our malt in a new direction last week by developing a German Gose recipe with 100% Riverbend products. This style dates back to the 1700’s and is a classic summer sipper for Germans. While somewhat similar to a Berliner Weisse this style commonly incorporates salt and coriander in the boil for an interesting finish.
Brewing this style takes patience….it begins with a sour mash that allows naturally occurring bacteria on the grain to rapidly multiple over a 24 hour period.
In order to handle the recent influx of orders, we’ve recently hired Craig Weitzel as assistant maltster. Some of you may already know this gentlemen as a member of the Bruisin Ales team here in Asheville. His interview and subsequent job offer stem from a casual conversation at the shop and within a few short days he was helping us rake the malt!
Craig hails from the west coast beer mecca of San Diego and has a fairly exhaustive knowledge of America’s craft beers and a true passion for the industry.
So this is pretty special…a few weeks before AVL Beer Week we got an email from Matt at New Belgium requesting a tour of our humble establishment during their stay. Naturally, we obliged. On paper, our two businesses are a great fit…both committed to sustainability and maintaining a high quality of life for their employees. We just weren’t expecting our meet and greet to occur so soon after their big announcement.
It worked out beautifully.
Over the past few weeks we’ve been hard at work making some much needed improvements at the malt house. The main focus (as always) has been the kiln. This little room has caused many a sleepless night for us, as there is no “textbook” method of designing, building, and operating these things at our scale. Our first design/build worked well, but didn’t give us the capacity we need to meet demand (or turn a profit!).
As any musician will tell you, there is a sweet spot where you are “in the pocket” and things just start to click……I think we are getting there! We’ve been actively producing malt just about everyday this year and the orders are starting to pile up. We’ve also got several great beers heading out to the market with our malt in them. Check it out…
Pisgah Brewing Company (Black Mountain) – Riverbend Brown available in growlers,
Last week we gave a tour to a group of students from Warren Wilson College. The students were part of an ethnobotany class taught by Jay Bost. This was a new audience for us, but it gave us a great opportunity to focus on some of the sustainability aspects of our work that are often omitted during a typical tour. We started with a brief overview of the commodity markets that control the price of grain and transitioned into the “day in the life” of a maltster routine that Brian and I have been perfecting over the past several months.
As with most things in life, everyday brings a new set of challenges in the malt house. One of the major issues we’ve been dealing with is grain raking. Specifically, how to accomplish this task without breaking our backs. As the batch sizes got bigger over the first few months, we quickly realized that our first malt rake had a tendency to float to the top of the bed after just a few feet of travel leaving the germinating barley relatively undisturbed.
A few weeks ago, I headed down to the Organic Commodity Conference held in Rocky Mount, NC, that was arranged by our friends at the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association (CFSA). This event offers a chance for farmers, scientists, policy makers, and end users to get to know one another. It also provides a great opportunity for someone with little to no farming background (like myself) to really get a feel for the market pitfalls,
» Read more about: ROAD TRIP: ORGANIC COMMODITY CONFERENCE »
Check out this great article by Anne-Fitten Glenn. Craftbeer.com asked her to expand her article about Riverbend from the Mt. Express to include other micro-maltsters across the country. We are a small group, but each of us has the same goal….to produce an artisan product that supports our local farmers.
Read all about it here.
Talk to our expert maltsters about the best malt for your project or work with us to create a custom malt.
