May 1997, Volume 20, Issue 5

April 26th Pub Crawl

Bob Jones organized a splendid walking tour to four of Walnut Creek’s best beer sites. We met at the BART station for a short walk to the Black Diamond Brewery on Main Street. We were greeted by Joe who gave us a tour of the front-window brewery, starting with the unique grain delivery. The City of Walnut Creek will not allow a grain silo for the site, so the grain is milled off-site. This has the benefit of keeping down the dust, but getting the grain into the mash tun is an operational challenge. Black Diamond solves this by driving a van full of grain to the back door, and bucket-loading auger-driven shoots from the street level.

A single temperature mash is done in the 152-158 ° F range, using a combination mash tun/hot liquor tank. Cascades are a favorite hop used by Shawn, the Brewer at Black Diamond. Black Diamond uses a proprietary yeast strain, repitching the yeast 8-16 times. This yeast strain has been changed recently to eliminate previously undesirable diacetyl flavors.

Tank temperatures are maintained to ± 0.5 ° F using electronic controls to jacketed tanks. Each tank is individually controlled, so Ales or Lagers can be handled in any of the standing tanks. The Maibock, available in a couple of weeks, is lagered at 34.4 ° F. Black Diamond brews two lagers per year; the other being an Oktoberfest.

The separate tank serving room is chilled to 42 ° F, and beers are pressurized at 15 or 30 psi, depending on style.

Plate chillers with diatomaceous earth are used to filter all beers (except the Hefe Weizen) to 5 microns.

So, how was the beer? Very good. On tap were Stout, Porter, Hefe Weizen, Golden Ale, and Pale Ale. The brewery is housed in what used to be a classic car show room. The unusually long, snaking bar fit the modern decor, and worked well for our large group, which had grown to ten club members. There were plenty of ordinary tables throughout the room too. Appetizers were up-scale, the music wasn’t too loud, the architecture was spacious - a very nice place.

From there we took a longer walk, through the Art On The Main festival on the city streets, to Brew City Personal Brewery on Locust Street. Lunch was individual choice. I went next door to World Wrapp to order a pesto chicken burrito, and then brought it back to Brew City to enjoy with a beer on tap. The patrons in this area were distinctively younger than at Black Diamond. On tap were mediocre beers, covering Reds, Barleywines, Weizenbock, Milds, Stout, IPA, Apricot Wheat, Light Lagers, Wit, Honey Lager, Darks, and Cream Ale. Brew City is a place you’d come to make beer, not drink beer.

Richard gave us a tour of this Brew On Prem facility. All beers start with a common 2-row pale light wort, into which specialty grains are added, using a perforated mash basket. Barleywines are the exception in that they are built up with malt extract. A single step mash is made at 155 ° F for 30 minutes, then the basket with the steeping specialty grains is lifted out. The wort then goes to a steam-jacketed boil kettle (which has a nifty steam vent manifold.) 3-4 hop additions are made, with 75% of the beers being dry-hopped. The brew then goes through a hop strainer / heat exchanger which brings it down to pitching temperature in ONE MINUTE ! Either of two yeasts are used: California Common or Nottingham dry ale.

Plastic fermenters with food-grade disposable liners are used in the fermentation room. The liners are a huge sanitation and operational cost savings. The beer spends 1 week in the fermentation room and 1 week in the cold room. And when I say cold room, I mean c-c-c-c-cold room. 32 ° F.

The beer is filtered to 0.4 micron and then undergoes a passive carbonation period of 25 hours at 55 psi at 32 ° F.

The tanks are connected from the cold room to the bottling line back out in the main work room. A counter pressure system to die for fills the bottles. The customer caps and labels his own bottles.

So, beginning to end is 2 weeks. Brewing takes about 2 hours and you don’t have to clean up. Bottling and labeling takes about an hour and a half. You end up with 14 gallons of beer. The cost is about $120 plus bottles ($35) and includes labels (using any graphics with Mac Illustrator).

If you’re into thrasher art, you’ll love the collage of customer labels on the walls and in the bathrooms. But this isn’t just a college-age hangout. I saw loads of games and toys for children, which makes it a place for families to participate. The music was loud but fit the working environment.

The companion Brew City is located in San Francisco. The Brew City web site is at:

http://www.brewcity.com

To keep on schedule, we headed two blocks away to Stadium Pub, billed as Walnut Creek’s Oldest Sports Pub. The patrons were distinctively ... quieter. Are you sure we’re in a sports pub? Let’s see, lots of sports photos and pennants on the wall, and TWELVE, count ‘em, TWELVE TVs on the walls, each TV with a different sport. Yep, this is the place all right, but I guess since it’s such a fine day, the roudy teams aren’t here yet.

On tap was Guinness, MacTartan’s, Razzberry Wheat, Foster’s Lager, Bacchus Ale, Hübsch Maibock, Bass Ale, Coors Light, Hübsch Hefeweizen, Sudwerk’s Dunkels, Oregon Honey Beer, and Red Hook ESB.

Of minor interest was the cigar case which appeared to have a great selection. But, since food was being served, cigars couldn’t be smoked. As it should be. Lots of nice clean air in this sports pub.

By the time we left, all the seats had been taken. Everyone was still pretty quiet, maybe because of the golf game on one TV. The chalk board with the available beers on tap kept getting more and more lines erased, so sales must be good.

We walked back two blocks to Faultline Brewing Company at Locust and Cypress Streets. The patrons here are distinctively ... wealthier. The post-modern architecture hid the brewery and focused on dining. I’ve eaten at Faultline before and the food is very good, with a price to match. They have a superb wine selection at Faultline too. Trendy? Maybe. Every time I go to Faultline, there’s never anyone there, so it can’t be too trendy. We did see a wine tasting in progress though.

On tap were Golden Ale, Pilsner, Hefe Weizen, Best Bitter, Pale Ale, Spring Bock, IPA, and Stout.

Our tour started with the trademark grain silo outside, similar to Faultline in Sunnyvale. Faultline must be zoned differently than Black Diamond for grain silos.

The silo was filled with 2-row, and there were sacks of Hugh Baird grain in the store room. The mill has a weight-sensitive shutoff, so that a prescribed amount of grain can be milled without attendance. Augers move the grain to the mash tun, and the kettle is steam heated. The local Head Brewer, Jason Valley, brews 5 days a week, because they supply Stout to Sunnyvale. Greg Friday is the Brewmaster.

There weren’t a lot of specifics from our tour guide / waiter. We know that Faultline uses 4 different yeasts. The hops they use are all from the UK: Challenger, Northdown, and Brambling. And, the serving tank is known as a "Tax Determination Vessel."

Oh, the beer? I thought the Spring Bock was slightly over-hopped but the IPA was excellent.

Thanks again to Bob Jones for organizing the tours. It was a pleasant day at a variety of beer places, all within walking distance.