I don’t have a very long update this time around. Seems like we are on the verge of moving into construction…that whole silence before the storm scenario…however we are still waiting for permitting but I feel that we are in view of the sunrise.

The majority of things that I have been up to have been managing pilot batches. I had to stop by Southern Brewing Supply the other day and pick up a second hand chest freezer to have another temperature zone for my pilots. The main thing is making sure that the beers finish out but the gravity ranges and different yeast varietals make it complicated to manage with a draft cooler that is now full of pilot batches. It has been a matter of taking some of the higher gravity beers into the office, moving others into the new small chest freezer to cold condition for a few days prior to packaging and managing others in the only ale fermentation temperature chest freezer that I have.

I am happy that we are going to be sharing our beer next week with all of you that decide to attend! I feel like all of you will not only get a chance to experience our pilots but will also have an opportunity to tell us what you think about our ideas. We have been fortunate enough to have several people give us feedback already but we would like for each one of you to tell us what your top 3 favorite beers are out of the pilots as this might sway our ideas for our core beers. We are letting the beer enthusiast/consumer pick the core beers they would like to see us put on the shelves…all we need is your feedback. Just to let you know, I have already stickered about  180 half barrels(with Sebastian’s help…thanks) so that leaves 150 sixth barrels which will only receive one sticker each and about 80 half barrels(two stickers). Depending on how many people show up for this, the actual time frame that I am envisioning should not be more than about 1 to 2 hours tops. Should be a beneficial and fun event and I hope that as many of you attend as possible.

Sebastian also helped me to package the Puppy’s Breath Porter on Wednesday. It should be carbonated by Friday so you will get an opportunity to try this one at the party. It is between 6-6.5 ABV. Dark in color with a ruby hue…dark chocolate aroma with notes of English hop varietals…big dark chocolate malt flavor with moderate notes of dark caramel to lighter toffee with a light hint of espresso in the finish…the hop varietals are all English but the levels at which they are at in the flavor profile escalates this to what you might refer to as American Porter levels. The label will most likely have the picture of a mastiff puppy on the front (Joe’s dog Mongo).

I will be packaging The Little Belgian That Could tomorrow(Friday). It is from the second runnings off the Barley Wine that we brewed. It was brewed with sweet orange peel and smells phenomenal in the fermenter. This one should also be available for you to try this Wednesday. I have high hopes for it. It was actively fermented at 4 different temperature ranges to get the yeast to produce a multitude of by products. There also might be some added surprises there too (if this isn’t enough) but I can’t make any promises.

Premier Stainless called and emailed and I was able to get the appropriate info to the engineer in the nick of time. They are still saying that our tanks should be here by the end of the second week of July. The tanks came off the boat from China sometime last week and we are eagerly awaiting their arrival.

The marketing team that we are working with (Sensory 5) has received more detailed information on some of our brands and we are awaiting their proofs for some of our labels. This will be important to finalize early as label approval takes 30-60 days. If it starts too late then we might find ourselves stockpiling beer that we can’t sell until we receive label approval. I am confident that they will do a great job for us. Meanwhile, the Patio Pils label is currently under work by an out of state artist and will hopefully be made available to our marketing team in a timely fashion.

On a final note, I was pleased to see photos of our beers in glassware. Joe took it upon himself to take pictures of all the beers and I believe will be posting these pictures soon to the blog site. They came out great in my opinion.

Looking forward to seeing all of you soon,
Wayne Wambles
Head Brewer
Cigar City Brewing
wayne@cigarcitybrewing.com

p.s. Joey here. We got the final approval for our wet zoning today. We limited ourselves by design to show the community we'll be a neighbor they can be proud of. But, we'll have up to 4 beer dinners a calendar month. We'll also have a gift shop where you can buy some of the more limited release Cigar City Brewing beers. I'll also have tons of pics posted this weekend so check back for those.