E-mailing Breweries

[johnbarleycorn]

Proper Job is an excellent beer- almost as good as TTL Had a few cracking pints from a very remote pub in Gravesend Kent, overlooking the Thames Estuary. Big Thumbs up to "The Ship" and also the brewery

[WishboneBrewery]

Thats pretty excellent of them

[JabbA]

Coniston Brewery replied with helpful recipe and process related stuff.

That's interesting- I phoned and left a message on the number listed on their website a couple of months ago and they didn't get back to me

I was wanting to know if they use the primary strain of yeast when bottling and whether it was worth culturing-up.

Cheers,
Jamie

[Deebee]

I phoned a brewery regarding a beer i wanted to try and make.

They were brewing but the head brewer told me he would get back to me.

2 days later i got a great mail telling me ingredients and IBU.

He said he would not divulge percentages of the beer concerned but would say that it was near to the recommended max amounts amounts on 2 malts and that i could have fun working it out.

He also told be indirectly when the hops are added and directly which types.

He never mentioned yeast but i have an idea on this one. He asked that i dod not go onto the net and divulge the recipe and that if i was in the neighbourhood i just needed to get in touch and they would arrange a tour.

Well pleased i was.

Some of these guys actually take pride in their work huh.

[Invalid Stout]

Some breweries are just not hip to the internet yet. It is a bit naff to advertise an email address if you're not going to reply to mails though.

[boingy]

Don't be too hard on these guys, especially the smaller breweries. Some of them might not even know thay have an email address! You might find it insane but I've seen a few cases where very small businesses have a website that was created by a friend or a nephew or similar and where there has been no thought as to how any contact via the website will be managed.

Remember they are in the business of making beer. Sure, they need to market the beer too but replying to emails takes up time that they might need to spend selling or brewing. It's very easy to go "oh, brewery X ignored my email so they are rubbish and I will boycott their beer" but maybe the staff at brewery X were overloaded with stuff and had to prioritise their main business operations.

I've no doubt that some of them ARE grumpy sods but brewing and selling beer is still a very old-fashioned process.

[Philipek]

Last weekend, the South Ontario Brewers, had a brewing event: 14 brewers, all brewing all-grain beers, the public coming in, watching, asking questions and helping out. It was very kindly hosted by Amsterdam Brewery in West Toronto, and I think that they even provided the grain, yeast and hops (though I could be wrong, now that I think of it, I think Weyermann provided that grain, but I'm pretty sure that the brewery provided the yeast and hops). At the end, recipe sheets for Amsterdam Nut Brown ale and there's a competition with two prizes: as close to the original as possible and best alternative nut brown beer.

How's that for a positive brewery experience?

[adm]

That sounds great!

To add my emailing experiences....given a bit of inspiration by this thread, I thought i'd have a go. I emailed Mikkeller (one of my favourite breweries) earlier this afternoon, asking if they'd give me any hints on brewing their Stateside IPA which is an absolutely fantastic beer.

5 minutes ago, I got a mail back from Mikkel Borg Bjergsø himself......with a complete recipe. Good work Mikkeller fella!

I won't post the recipe here, but if anyone wants it, feel free to PM me.

[WishboneBrewery]

Another big +1 for St. Austell Brewery, I just got a nice helpful and encouraging reply from the Head brewer

[garwatts]

Another big +1 for St. Austell Brewery, I just got a nice helpful and encouraging reply from the Head brewer

Anything that you can share with us

[WishboneBrewery]

I suppose its vague enough to post up here but helpful enough to have a go at it A brewery to visit should I ever be down that way

Admiral's Ale is brewed with 100% Cornish Gold malt, with no pale. Cornish Gold was developed in conjunction with Tucker's malting, ton replace existing Munich malt with Cornish Grown barley. As part of the development, Cornish Gold is exclusive to St Austell Brewery. As is is made on a l=kiln, not a roasting drum, the enzymes in the malt are stilling tact and it can be mashed on its own without pal malt.

The hope in Admirals are Styrian Golding Type 90 pellets in the copper, and then the brew is cast over a blend on whole leaf Cascade and Styrian Goldings. The BU's are not over powering (approx 30IBU) as there is quite an astringency coming from the roast of the malt.

Have fun if you are going to have a go at this!! I hope it all works out.

Roger

I particularly like this sentence:
"the enzymes in the malt are stilling tact and it can be mashed on its own without pal malt" - it reads right but its a tad wrong

[garwatts]

Can you do a brew with just Munich malt then?

[WishboneBrewery]

I'm not sure, I'm thinking of going with 20% Pale malt just in case, though 100% in BeerEngine seem to show a predicted FG 1011 so I asume with a cooler mash it should be OK anyway.

[haz66]

I`ve only had one reply from a brewery regarding any help with a recipe and that
was Conistone Brewery.
The ones that havn`t even bothered to reply are
Moorhouse`s
Stewarts
Copper Dragon

But i also got some good replies about other brewing matters from Naylors Brewery,
they were very helpful, and also have allowed me to go on brewday with them

[arturobandini]

Stone got back to me despite me calling them c*nts in my opening gambit. Friendly fellas and have actually posted up their recipes already.... http://www.stonebrew.com/news/081201/