Microbrewed Adventures - Charles Papazian [12]
Brewery in a Goat Shed
Boulder Brewing Company
FOR THE FEW INDIVIDUALS who were lucky enough to have visited the original Boulder Brewing Company, the brewery will always be remembered as having been started in a farmhouse goat shed in Hygiene, Colorado. Opened in 1980, the Boulder Brewing Company, now called the Boulder Beer Company, is the oldest surviving craft microbrewery in America.
The love of beer and homebrewing provided the inspiration—microbrewing at its essence. Founders Stick Ware, David Hummer and Al Nelson decided that after their 14th single-barrel test batch of bottle-conditioned homebrew they were ready to explore the legal aspects of going professional. It wasn’t easy in those days to start a small brewery. Malt was available only in quantities measured by train car loads, hops were sold in bales weighing hundreds of pounds and fresh yeast cultures could be had only at great expense or through long overseas journeys from German and English brewing institutions. Getting a brewery license was an extreme challenge, as the government agencies in charge of regulating brewing laws were more experienced in dealing with million-barrel-size breweries. The hurdles to opening the Boulder Brewing Company in 1980 were unquestionably daunting but were overcome with microbrewing persistence and the assistance of the only other “local” brewery, the Coors Brewing Company (providing them with pale malt).
That three guys, homebrewing test batches, managed to acquire the necessary equipment, ingredients and permits to go professional is yet another fantastic tribute to the passion for microbrewing and beer. Their passion is, in my opinion, the only reason they succeeded.
Otto Zavatone (with hat) at the “Goat Shed” Brewery with Michael Jackson (right), Fred Eckhardt (center, right) and Al Andrews (left)
English-accented Boulder Pale Ale, Porter and Stout were their initial styles of ale, introduced by original head brewer Otto Zavatone. Otto once jokingly described how he got the job of head brewer at the “goat-shed” brewery: “They told me I could be the brewmaster, except I had to build the brewery first!”
The beer was truly handcrafted in every way, filled with a gravity-fed bottling system and capped using a manual “homebrew” bottle capper. All the beers were refermented in the bottle, establishing natural carbonation. After moving to their current facility in the late 1980s Boulder’s hand-bottling system was abandoned. Today’s Boulder beers are of extraordinary quality, and their range of ales and lagers offer a variety of flavors for the beer impassioned. I’m particularly fond of their hoppy Hazed and Infused, a lupulinhead’s daydream.
But there was something charmed about their goat-shed ales of the mid 1980s. Otto Zavatone and his successor, Tom Burns, managed to extract unique, full-bodied, full-flavored ales from their small 1,200-square-foot brewery.
I have ever since been drawn to very small breweries, with batch sizes of five barrels or less. There is something unique about beers from breweries of this size. Perhaps it’s because of the scientific dynamics involved when brewing in small volumes. I often find myself tasting a new beer not knowing its origins and marveling at characteristics reminiscent of the earliest small microbreweries, only to discover that the beer was brewed in batches of five barrels or less. I’m content to believe that these qualities reflect the original passion of a brewer who started out small, with all the dreams of success dancing in their mind as they tended to every aspect of the beer’s production.
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1981 BOULDER CHRISTMAS STOUT
In 1981 I shared a unique Christmas stout brewed by Guinness of Ireland with future