PRBC Blog

Two brewers (husband and wife), one big old barn, one river located just down the hill below the barn and an idea for something that may be a little work that leads to a lot more fun.
Hops, Hoptemonium, Hopalicious, Hoppiness, Hops! The Beer

Hops, Hoptemonium, Hopalicious, Hoppiness, Hops!

We signed a contract today.  Not a huge contract, but a contract nonetheless.  It is a contract that is vital to the success of Piney River Brewing Company in 2012.  It's a contract that's vital to the outcome of handcrafted beer from Bucyrus, MO. We signed a contract for our hops. Small, family owned brewery in the Ozarks has signed a contract with a US hop brokerage firm in Washington. Why is it important to contract your hops, you might ask? There are many different types of hops (grown around the world), and the hop farmers contract with breweries prior…
Piney River Brewing Company
September 15, 2011
Even Microbreweries Need Friends in High Places Start up

Even Microbreweries Need Friends in High Places

A craft beer fan told Brian today that if I didn’t blog about the brewery soon, they were going to start a “Piney River Brewery Won’t Blog” blog. I know you don’t want to read excuses, but this writer has been thinking about writing while helping Brian brew; cleaning, sanitizing and filling kegs; cleaning brewing equipment, and helping with general brewery construction and maintenance.  There’s the day job, too, and fall soccer has started for Andy.  But enough about that; I AM blogging tonight. Right now, the owners of Piney River Brewing Company are racing against the clock.  We’ve felt…
Piney River Brewing Company
September 9, 2011
New Microbrewery Stuff Start up

New Microbrewery Stuff

Visitors to Piney River Brewing Company last week got a chance to take a gander at some of our new brewery "stuff". First came more stainless--our new (to us) 7-barrel brew house. Yes, we were planning to build our own system, but Brian found a used system at Big Muddy Brewing in Murphysboro, IL.  Don't worry, we're going to use the parts we were already working on to add some components to this brewing system. It took two trailers and two trucks, but it all arrived safely at the BARn. Now, the fun part...getting it all hooked up.  Rees Oil…
Piney River Brewing Company
August 25, 2011
The Fun of Microbrewery Ownership Start up

The Fun of Microbrewery Ownership

If you read our blog regularly, you know that microbrewery ownership is a lot of planning, risk taking, sweating and late nights.  AKA...work.  And in our case, we already have day jobs and a small farm. This Saturday was another great example of why microbrewery ownership is so much fun even when it's so much work.  We had been closed for three Saturdays--two because we were traveling on vacation and at a wedding and one because we had no beer.  We hated to be closed for three weekends, but we didn't have a choice. We opened little earlier than usual…
Piney River Brewing Company
August 20, 2011
Northern Brewer Saved PRBC The Beer

Northern Brewer Saved PRBC

Once upon a time there was a family in the Ozarks that started a nanobrewery called Piney River Brewing Company.  The family spent time every summer on a fishing trip on Rainy Lake in Northern Minnesota/Canada.  The first year their brewery was in operation, the family found it very difficult to pick “the right time” to leave the brewery for their annual pilgrimage to North Country. However, as the summer of 2011 went along, the family realized that the first week of August would be a good week to make the annual Rainy Lake trip.  They began planning, and as…
Piney River Brewing Company
August 7, 2011
The Happy Nanobrewery Start up

The Happy Nanobrewery

Happiness is a great craft beer. Happiness is starting a nanobrewery. Happiness is starting a nanobrewery that cannot make enough beer. If you're the nanobrewery owners, you're happy when the brewery is crowded on Saturday.  You're happy when you're getting carpel tunnel from pulling the tap.  You're happy when there's empty keg after empty keg.  (Okay, I'll admit, you're a little stressed about the empty keg thing, too.) The aforementioned  publicity came out in The Houston Herald last Thursday.  That brought a few new people out to the brewery this past Saturday.  Then some of our previous customers brought some…
Piney River Brewing Company
July 25, 2011
Nanobrewery Word of Mouth No More Start up

Nanobrewery Word of Mouth No More

It was bound to happen. We started the PRBC Blog last August (almost one year ago, to be precise).  The Piney River Brewing Facebook page began sometime in late fall.  Our Web site, www.pineyriverbrewing.com, was up and running sometime this winter. Piney River Brew on Twitter began in March. We cracked open the door to the BARn the first weekend in March, and we've relied on word of mouth for word to spread from Bucyrus to Houston to Plato to Springfield to Minnesota to Alabama to New York, California and Mexico (just to name a few places where there are…
Piney River Brewing Company
July 20, 2011
Nanobrewery News Beer Events

Nanobrewery News

Some of you that follow the Piney River Brewing Company blog do not follow us on Facebook or Twitter, so I want to share a few things with you that you may have missed from this past week's events at Piney River Brewing Company. We were blogged about by a craft beer lover from Little Rock, AR:  http://focuseddistortion.blogspot.com/2011/07/show-me-your-hops.html The same blogger also did what we believe to be our first beer review:  http://www.beerreviewsonline.com/Beer.php?page=1&id=2135 Thanks to Scott Parton for the blog feature and the review! We had another excellent Saturday in the BARn.  As you know, we cannot keep up with…
Piney River Brewing Company
July 9, 2011
The Harrow and the Harvest, Gillian Welch, David Rawlings & Crafting Great Things The Beer

The Harrow and the Harvest, Gillian Welch, David Rawlings & Crafting Great Things

Music and beer go hand in hand. Since our stovetop homebrewing days tunes have been a very important part of the beer we've made.  We still have the TV we bought when we were married, but we've upgraded our stereo system more than one time.  The BARn is currently outfitted with an iPod player, but we're already thinking about where and how to pipe the tunes all over the BARn when the time comes.  (This will involve more outdoor speakers.  The cows, the turkeys, the deer all love tunes, too.) Several years ago I read this article in The New…
Piney River Brewing Company
July 7, 2011
When to Expand Your Nanobrewery Start up

When to Expand Your Nanobrewery

I'll admit, it felt a little insane at Piney River Brewing Company last Saturday. After moving in the fermentation vessels and bright tank, parts of the brewery looked like an explosion had happened.  We had to relocate tables, kegs and other miscellaneous items.  We needed to sweep the floor and do some rearranging (this will happen several times over the upcoming weeks, I'm sure).  Brian and I ate a hearty breakfast and hit the brewery by 10 a.m., cleaning and moving like mad folks.  We readied our slightly primitive bathroom--electricity, flushing toilet and hand sanitizer.  There was beer to taste…
Piney River Brewing Company
June 27, 2011
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