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Real Ale Brewing Company
Live Oak Brewing Company

The Beers

Imperial Rye IPA

This beer celebrates Real Ale Brewing Company's 20th Anniversary and was inspired by one of the brewery's longest running brews, Full Moon Rye IPA.  The Anniversary Ale is a much bigger beer, though, with a malt bill that is twenty percent rye, a starting gravity of twenty degrees Plato, and an ABV of 9.5%.

For this special occasion, Real Ale invited current and former  employees to participate in the brew day, calling it a "Rye-union."  It made for a crowded brewhouse, with brewers from breweries across the country adding liquid hops to the boil, and a big celebration in the tap room.  

Pilz has been the flagship beer for Live Oak Brewing Co. since it began in 1997.  Brewed exclusively with a classic Moravian heirloom malt and Saaz hops, this Pilsner is clean and crisp, with an aggressive hop character.  Traditional decoction mashing really brings out the malt and gives it a beautiful golden color. 

Bohemian Style Pilsener

After almost two decades brewing with old equipment in a former meat packing plant, Live Oak recently built a brand new, state of the art facility.  The Craft of Craft Beer documents one of the early Pilz batches in the new brewery, but also features brewing footage from the original location on Austin's east side.

Spontaneously Fermented Farmhouse Ale

Most beers are fermented with a specific yeast strain, and brewers go to great pains to keep other organisms from contaminating their beers.  With SPON, Jester King goes completely against the grain by leaving unfermented beer, or "wort", in an open shallow vessel called a "coolship" overnight. The brewers depend entirely on the wild yeasts and bacteria in the night air to inoculate the beer, which ferments in oak barrels for up to three years.

The Craft of Craft Beer illustrates the coolship process, which is based on Belgian Lambic beer making techniques, with beautiful footage of the steamy wort entering the vessel in Jester King's upstairs barrel room.  We also chronicle the bottling and release of their very first spontaneously fermented beer.

Jester King Brewery
Belgian Dubbel

Many traditional Belgian beers were originally brewed at monasteries dating back to Roman times.  While some Belgian classics are still brewed by monks today, secular brewers have embraced monastic brewing, as well.  One of the most popular styles is the dubbel, which is a big, malty, brown brew with a flavor profile that is largely dictated by yeast characteristics.

Dennis Middleton spent eighteen years living in Belgium, so he's learned a thing or two about their brewing techniques. At his small neighborhood pub in Wimberley, TX, you'll find some of the best examples of traditional Belgian beer in America, including Galena, his rendition of the dubbel.  This film follows the brewers at Middleton Brewery as they brew, barrel age, and bottle this special beer.

Middleton Brewing
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