John Verive

1 week ago | brewingindustryguide.com | John Verive

“Lautering can feel like handling a rattlesnake,” says Andy Hooper. “You don’t want to make any sudden movements, or you’ll get bit.”Now the director of business development at Barnum Mechanical, based in Loomis, California, Hooper previously was brewmaster at Seismic in Sebastopol, California, for more than six years. He has a keen eye for the details that can make or break a brewing process. In his snakebite analogy, the grain bed is the rattler, and the dreaded stuck mash is the bite.

2 weeks ago | beerandbrewing.com | John Verive

We’ve all seen it so many times that we don’t really see it anymore: the oak barrel, staves silvered with age and sawn in half at the bilge, now used as a planter. Barrels—those marvels at the intersection of nature and contrivance—find new purpose as décor, as common as cornhole boards in tasting rooms, beer gardens, and brewery patios. The bisected barrel is almost the last step on a long journey from acorn to ashes—a testament to the stalwart oak (and the resourcefulness of brewers).

1 month ago | brewingindustryguide.com | John Verive

While pasteurization was once considered little more than a necessary evil in the craft-beer space, attitudes and approaches to it have evolved as the industry has matured. No longer is heat-treatment simply the nuclear option for killing unwanted microbes. A deeper understanding of its impact on beer—and an increased focus on beverages beyond beer—makes pasteurizers a useful tool in the brewery, enabling more operational flexibility alongside peace of mind.

1 month ago | brewingindustryguide.com | John Verive

Beer is elemental—an alchemical medley of water, fire, earth, and air that transforms simple raw materials into a complex brew both flavorful and intoxicating. To carry this metaphor further, the grains and hops represent the earth from which they sprout. The water element is self-evident—not only as a major ingredient, but also as a vital part of the malting process. Fire brings it all together in the kettle, converting disparate elements into a unified solution. That leaves yeast, of course.

2 months ago | brewingindustryguide.com | John Verive

“We’ve called ourselves a ‘data-driven brewery’ for years,” says Teddy Gowan, VP of brewing operations at San Diego’s Societe Brewing. “But now our decisions are actually driven by data that we trust.”Now 13 years old, Societe changed trajectory amid the pandemic lockdowns of 2020. The previous year, all the brewery’s 4,000 barrels of annual production flowed through taps around San Diego and at their tasting room in the Old Town.