Part Eight: New Chicago Beer Co.'s Brewing Set-Up

New Chicago Beer Co.'s sign. Photo by Alex Rich.

One of the principle aims of the New Chicago Beer Co. is getting people involved in brewing through demonstrations and classes, a home brew blog, or guided tours

"We want people to see the process," Jesse Evans said.

The brew house will hold the major beer making apparatuses, massive vats that will run 4-5 times a week producing strong ales, protected behind glass, so tours can see the process in real time. An intimacy that will allow viewers to be so close to the brewing they will "be able to see if the brewer has dandruff."

Massive vats will run floor to ceiling holding the beer as it ferments.

A restaurant and nano-brewery will eventually be put here. Photo by Alex Rich

It's industrialization on a small level, which allows the brewers to experiment. In another room, which they plan to turn into a restaurant and tasting room, the company will run a nano-brewery, producing 100 gallons of beer at a time, and allow the brewers to try new recipes on guests.

"The city needs more breweries than we have now," Evans said. "We're the pioneers."

Part Seven: An Introduction to New Chicago Beer Company

Jesse Evans, owner of the New Chicago Beer Co. Photo by Alex Rich.

In 2003, Chicago natives Jesse Edwin Evans and his brother Samuel began their first brewery in Oakland, California. They started small, brewing two recipes and working out of their home, selling to whatever bars or liquor stores would take their product.

"We had a really good opportunity," Jesse said. "We were basically doing a home brewing set-up that was not as nice as this at all. It was like one turkey frier."

A few years later, after selling off their company in California, the brothers are starting on an entirely new undertaking on Chicago's South Side. In an old meat packing plant, a dilapidated old building undergoing major renovations, the brothers hope to be brewing beer by this summer.

But the brewery will be part of a larger ecosystem of businesses, including a restaurant and bakery, that will be housed in the building at 1400 West 46th St. The goal is to have a completely self-sufficient food and drink collective. The Chicago Reader has a good graphic on how this will be achieved, but the basic rundown is this:

1. Beer production produces lots of waste from grains used to make malts and produce different flavors, which are usually discarded. At New Chicago Beer Co., they will be used to produce bio-gas when mixed with thousands of pounds of animal waste from a nearby animal processing plant (the 50/50 mix of carbohydrates and animal fat is best for producing bio gas).
2. The bio-gas, is then put into a massive turbine (which used to be an engine on a decommissioned military bomber) which uses the natural gas to create steam power, which will heat the building, create electricity, and, perhaps most importantly, heat the kettles that will brew cook the beer.

The eco-friendly experiment in brewing will 

Part Six: Homebrew Slideshow

This slideshow is a beginner's guide to home brewing equipment.

Photos by Alex Rich.

Part 4: The Chicago Beer Riots

I'm currently doing research for my beat, and I came across this great story via BeerHistory.com:

Chicago has always been a divided city due to the mosaic of neighborhoods that ebb and flow over the map like a petri dish full of malformed amoebas. But this was even more true back in the 1850's, well before Mayor Cermak famously united the Eastern European neighborhoods with the African American neighborhoods to defeat the Irish-run machine that was controlling the city.

Before the Irish got control, however, the English and the Know-Nothings controlled the city (think Daniel Day-Lewis in Gangs of New York). Mayor Levi Boone, the great nephew of Daniel Boone, didn't like the Germans or the Irish very much, and decided to make those feelings known by enforcing a ban pubs being opened on Sundays and increasing the licensing fee from $50 to $100.

Jokes about the beer-loving Germans and Irish aside, this did not sit well with the ethnic minorities who, after a hard week's work, wanted nothing more than to sit down and have a pint or two on the Lord's Day. So they decided to organize.

via The PBH Network

First, the immigrant community organized legal defense funds in support of tavern owners who refused to comply. A trial was scheduled for April 21st, and when a massive crowd came out to support the accused, the Mayor ordered the police to forcibly disperse them. As part of Boone's "reforms," he refused to hire immigrants as police officers, making the fight not just about some beer on a Sunday, but about the clash between established American families and the second-wave immigrants from Europe.

The ensuing brawl led to over 60 arrests and 1 death, but perhaps more importantly led to the ousting of Boone at the next election.

Additional information was found at The PBH Network and The Encyclopedia of Chicago

Part Three: The Great Homebrew Taste-Off

(Photo by Alex Rich)

In the film 24 Hour Party People, Steve Coogan (playing famed Factory Records chief Tony Wilson) says, "Jazz musicians enjoy themselves more than anyone listening to them does."

The same could also be said for home brewers. They enjoy the craft of making their beer and drinking it often times far more than anyone else does. Which makes sense, because it is a labor of love and often times the product is far inferior to commercially available beer with their access to fresh ingredients and industrial-strength brewing equipment.

But there is also a sense of competition among those who brew, to try and do their best and better other brewers. So there will be many taste-offs and competition to see who really has the upper hand.

Tasting Andrew Canning's (full disclosure: he is the author's roommate) IPA, which he claims to taste the same as a Sierra Nevada was like tasting a beer after someone dumped a handful of lawn clippings into it. The hops were so overpowering, and hit the drinker so violently, making it almost impossible to taste any sweetness at all. Bittering is important in the brewing process, but that amount of hopiness was unforgivable.

Meanwhile, a second beer (brewed by the author) in the American tradition of light beers, was also on had. This beer was a little too sweet, possibly due to adding too much sugar to the brew. It was more enjoyable, but less sugar would have brought out a more hoppy flavor.

This taste test was an exercise in two extremes, and the next round should go much better.

Part Two: Gross Residue

Beer Fermenting with Fermentation Hose (Photo by Alex Rich)

by: Alex Rich

When the fermentation process begins, there will be a gross, sickly looking residue of the hops, or, to use the not-so-technical term: "blow off."

There are three ways to deal with this (although it's not really a huge problem, it could lead to more residue in your bottles and a chalky taste at the end of your swig).

The first option is the one pictured above, using a fermentation hose. Although this will not get rid of all the blow-off, it is a better way to get rid of those hops particles that will eventually turn into sediment in the bottom of your bottle.

The second option is to do a two-stage fermentation. The above picture is of a single-stage fermentation in a glass carboy, and all of those particles in the top will settle at the bottom of your carboy when as fermentation completes. Two-stage fermentation means you would ferment the beer in a bucket for the initial few days, when "blow off" is at it's height, and then transfer the beer to a carboy for the final stage of fermentation, filtering out most of the nasty bits.

The third and final option is to simply do both. When the beer is in the initial stage of fermentation, attach the fermentation hose to get rid of some of the nasty bits, and then transfer into the carboy and remove the hose. Very simple and will lead to a better tasting finished product.

Part One: An Introduction

There has been something of a revolution in food and drink in this country, perhaps spawned by the popularity of cooking shows where a red faced chef yells at some poor kid just out of cooking school that he didn't reduce a tomato based sauce enough. It is an age of the informed eater and drinker, where the consumer's palate is informed and put to the test.

Gourmet has become mainstream, even traditional American stalwarts such as the cheeseburger and beer have been replaced by local farm-raised beef hand-fed by a benevolent farmer topped with truffles and organic lettuce grown upside-down coupled with a micro-brew made from hops grown on the roof and malt extract imported from a former monastery in Bavaria.

This blog will be an exploration of that world, a hands-on expedition into the heart of Chicago's "gourmet casual" dining experience.