In the grand scheme of things, I really haven’t been a beer geek for very long, but I remember back when I first got geeky about beer, the places people dreamed of going to visit on beer holidays were exclusively in Europe.
Jamil Zainasheff
Jamil Zainasheff
This year, Jamil is going pro. This spring he is launching Heretic Brewing Company, a 30-barrel brewery in the East Bay region of California’s San Francisco Bay area. Follow along with his blog as he transitions from homebrewer to brewmaster.
BYO “Style Profile” columnist, Jamil Zainasheff is an award-winning homebrewer, author, and host of “The Jamil Show” and “Brew Strong” shows on The Brewing Network. A “stylish” guy, Jamil has brewed every style of beer described in the Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP) Style Guidelines and co-authored Brewing Classic Styles (Brewer’s Publications, 2007) with fellow homebrewer and “Brew Strong” co-host John Palmer.
I don’t hide the fact that I am not a fan of pouring beer at public beer festivals.
I’m not sure exactly what I was thinking, but somehow I had this idea in my head that I’d take all my risk up front in getting Heretic off the ground and once it was past a certain point, there would be a lot less risk. Ah, poor, simple fool.
“A barrel full of certainties won’t roll very far.” – Gerd de Ley
From the beginning, I was certain that we would make barrel-aged beers at Heretic. We are close to Napa so it is easy to obtain used wine barrels and I really like the interesting character that develops from aging beer in a barrel.
A reader asked me, “At what point does someone have enough knowledge to become a [professional] brewer?
