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Well New Years Eve is getting close. I recommend that you skip the Cheap Champagne and bring a bottle of fancy belgian beer to you New Years Eve party. It comes in the same size bottle, with the same type of cork, and a good Belgian Triple can not be beat, in my book. I find that many people are excited to seeing something other than the typical Champagne on New Years Eve.

Here at the brewery we are busy planning for the new year. No major announcements yet, though I can say there is quite a bit of talk about putting up an expansion next to the existing building. *nudge nudge*

Sales are pretty brisk right now at the brewery… A real surprise for this time of year. People are buying beer by the case and plenty of 1 liter bottles.. for their New Years parties, I assume. I hope this will translate into some good winter sales, that would help us more than anything.

A little birdy told me we might be getting a tap at the Deadwood in Iowa City soon. I would suggest you go there and ask for it if you are a regular customer.

Have I recommended The New Old Capitol pub and brewery in Iowa City yet? Their Straight Pipe Milk Stout is on tap now and it is wonderful. I sort of ‘helped’ (or hindered?) Paul brew it, and I got to peak at his secret recipe. It was shockingly simple. Just british 2row, a bit of wheat, 55lbs of roasted barley, and 25lbs of Lactose. And some hops, I can’t remember what.. I should have wrote that down!

Thats all for now.. I’m on my way down to St. Louis to drink some Schlafly beer… See you all next year!

It’s time to wish everyone a merry Christmas. Yes, the season of shopper-rage, madly overspending, and becoming uncharacteristically spiritual to atone for another year of sleeping in on Sundays is here again.

I have been quite busy both here and at home. I’ve been trying to incorporate some sense of technology into this place and now we have three computerized temperature controllers, two of which actually work. One is installed on the mash tun, fortunately it works. The others are in the cellar on the larger fomenters. They were purchased by the previous owners of this place and are a little fancier than needed. But, they’ll do the job.

I also managed to get the refrigeration people to finally rebuild one of our compressors that had a ‘fatal exception error’ in dramatic fashion back in March. I haven’t seen the bill for that yet.

I also hosted the brewery’s Christmas party at my house this year. I managed to finish remodeling my kitchen and dining room in time for that. One of those projects I started in February that never would’ve got done without a deadline. The party was a success and lots of fun. Now I need to finish spending ungodly amounts of money and get caught up on gifts and their wrapping.

Millie has been an endless source of entertainment and a nice distraction during this season. She likes to bound about the upstairs, chew at everyone’s shoes, and pounce on people as they come into the office. Working on the computer has become especially challenging unless someone else is in the office to distract her. She is a nice addition to the Millstream family.

Tom is keeping busy trying to make some order out of my piles of spare parts, outdated marketing material and other as sundry items heaped in dusty stacks upstairs. It should be noted, this job will rank up there with the pyramids of Egypt and the Great Wall of China if actually accomplished. Unfortunately, I’ll probably never be able to find anything up here again. Oh-well.

We’re brewing stout today, so I better get back to catching a few zzz’s while it’s running off. Merry Christmas!

I was supposed to do a product demo at the Coralville Hi-vee on Saturday.. but I didn’t have too. My distributor dropped off six cases of product the day before. When I got there, there was hardly anything left.. it had all pretty much sold its self. Infact, there was no Schild Brau left in the store at all! I take this as a good sign!

Brennan’s Country Market now has website. They are a small chain of stores in Wisconsin, and the only place you can get our beer out of the state of Iowa. We normally do not sell our beer out of state, but these people are so good to us, that it is impossible to say no to them. They come down and get the beer from us every three months! If you ever get up to there, stop by, they have an amazing selection of cheese, beer and wine.

Well the radio show was pretty fun. I was nervous at first, but once I got talking, I calmed down. I didn’t get to say much with so many other people, but I was happy to say what I did.

I hope that soon we can do an all beer themed show.

Here all the questions, I only got to ask two to the audience.

Questions:

1) Where did bock beer get its name?
a)Bock literally means “goat” in German, and drinking too much of it will make you feel like you’ve been “butting heads” all night.
b)Its a corruption of the name of the 14th century German town “Einbeck” where the style originated.
c)The beer has astrological significance since it presumably could only have been made during the cold months ruled by Capricorn “the goat” Zodiac sign.
d)Its a term for beer that is “from the bottom of the barrel”.

2) What are the necessary ingredients needed to make beer?
a)Malt, Hops, Water, and Barley.
b)Corn, Rice, and Water.
c)Malt, Hops, Water and Yeast.
d)Potatoes, Onions, and Celery.

3) What first time event will happening at the Millstream brewery next year?
a)We will be releasing several seasonal beers.
b)We will have an Oktoberfest celebration at the brewery.
c)We will be celebrating our 20th Anniversary.
d)We are going to release a new low carb beer called “Millstream Ultra Extreme”.

4) Which of the following countries has the largest number of breweries:
a) USA
b) Germany
c) Belgium
d) Budweiser

5) What is it that makes Craft Beer different from Imported beer?
a) Craft brewers use only the highest quality ingredients.
b) Craft beer has more interesting and exotic flavors.
c) Craft beer is made locally and is therefore fresher.
d) Imported beer tastes better because it comes in fancy green bottles.

I’ll post the answers later.. lets see if you guys know any of these trivia questions.

Today we bottled the last pallet of Cream Soda. So now is the time to come out to the brewery and get some if you want to stock up. I don’t have an ETA on the new soda’s yet. We’ll see what the new year brings.

Of course the Cream Soda has been selling fairly well lately. Kind of strange.. maybe we should discontinue everything we make, it garner us a nice sales boost!

On Friday, the 17th, I have been invited to be on Live From The Java House with Ben Kieffer, on NPR (AM 910, also broadcasted in Des Moines on AM 640). The show starts at 10am, and I will be in a group along with Wally Plahutnik (Wine Expert), Kurt Friese (Devotay Chef), and Robert Morey (Coop Cheese Guru). The topic is going to be holiday tips for festive food and drink. I’m not sure that i’m an expert at this subject, but i’ll try my best!