Millstream Makes News!
Wow what a day! I’m just frazzled! Lets see, first, I came in early to transfer two beers for bottling on Tuesday. Its time to bottle the second batch of stout and another batch of White Ale.
Then right when I took over from Chris on brewing, Channel 2 News called up and said they would like to come down and interview us about our GABF Silver Medal. They have been covering the event the whole time, and were even at the GABF when we won the medal!
So they came down during the busiest moment of my day. We brewed Schild Brau today, and I was right in-between the first and second batch. They shot some stock footage of me hosing down the kettle. I was like “I can hose this as long as you would like!”. But a few minutes seemed to be enough. 
Then they interviewed me. I tried to be as truthful as possible, without sounding too haughty about the win or dismissive of the award. I’m actually not sure what I said, in retrospect. I guess we’ll have to wait and see. I remember trying to emphasize just how difficult it is to win a medal, and to win one consistently. Finally, a local homebrewer, Jeff Schaefer, just happened to be in the tasting room dropping off his samples for the THIRSTY CLASSIC. So they interviewed him too! What luck! He was also kind enough to give Farmer Don a ride home after he dropped off his grain truck. Thanks Jeff!
They said they are going to air the Special Feature on Nov 1st and/or 2nd. Someone please record it for me (I’m sure I’ll be here brewing or something).
That threw off my schedule. But I was just about back on track when Scott and his fiancee Dawn dropped by from the Old Capitol Brewery (formerly Fitzpatrick’s in Iowa City). They are opening up on the 31st of THIS MONTH. Wow! He seemed very knowledgeable about both beer and restaurant business. He said that they are going to try to make 6-8 of their own beers, and they will have many other beers from other breweries on tap on the “old” side of the bar. He mentioned a belgium beer, Mackeson’s XXX stout, and our Schild Brau. He said they have been very busy overhauling the place. All the tap lines have been replaced (about time!). They are considering what to do with Gary’s old brewing system. There just is not enough room in the place as it is, and they are going to tear out the old system and replace it either with grain storage, or with serving tanks. Yes that’s right, there are no serving tanks, so there is currently a heck of a lot of kegging involved in getting the beer to the bar. He agreed with me that it was nice equipment, but monstrously oversized. Its a 20bbl system (we only have a 10bbl). A seven bbl system would have been plenty fine and left more room for more tanks and ingredients storage.
Well I was thoroughly impressed by Scott, and I wish him luck in his endeavors. I really can’t wait to try his beers. It will be so great to have friendly brewpub on board in this area, its like having neighbors again, its been QUIET around here lately!
Finally I just noticed that both the THIRSTY and IBU Homebrewing Clubs have great new websites up… fancier than this one! Congrats! I might just have to try to one up them (but I just finished redesigning this site…)