I’ve been trying to get over to Lexington to pay a visit to Blue Stallion Brewing, the latest entry in the growing craft beer scene over there. It’s a matter of bad timing and being busy. SO, Xavier, one of the owners, gave me permission to reprint this blog post from their website. You should go see the rest of the photos. They’re getting close! Now, here’s Xavier with an update on Blue Stallion Brewing:
It seems like we got even more done in February than we did in January, and that was a lot! If you missed it in the last progress update, be sure to check out this cool time-lapse video of raising the brewing vessels.
The work done in the last month has completely transformed the brewery. It no longer looks at all like a warehouse space with some tanks on pallets. You really get a sense of what the finished build out is going to look like.
In the Tap Room
The large fire wall separating the brewery from the tap room has all its sheet rock up, which really changes the dynamic of the space. The dry wall for all the other rooms was also hung. This includes the cooler, barrel room, women’s bathroom, lab, office and mill room. In addition to sheet rock, the cooler is almost finished and the frame for the bar is complete.
We got large wall openings cut between the lounge area and bar that really open up both spaces. A nice steel staircase was also installed in the lounge area granting access to the mezzanine (yeah, we have a mezzanine).
Up next in the tap room: finishing the window holes we cut, installing the bar top, installing beer taps, building cabinetry, painting walls, and ordering tables and chairs.
In The Brewery
Most importantly, we’ve made serious progress toward brewing our first batch of beer. The glycol lines for the uni-tanks were filled, which keeps the tanks at a constant temperature during the fermentation process. The pumps on the chiller were tested and pressure gauges on the glycol lines confirmed.
As far as the brewhouse goes, the difficult job of re-wiring the controller to all the pumps, switches and solenoids was completed. We also got the burner on the boil kettle running and tested the pumps on the mash tun, kettle and water system. We even got the exhaust stack for the boil kettle installed through the roof!
Up next in the brewery: receiving our TTB and ABC licenses, running the new flex auger from the mill room to the motor at the top of the mash tun, testing the chiller’s capacity to cool the uni-tanks and brite beer tanks, and getting the rake motor working on the mash tun.
In the News
If you didn’t catch it, Blue Stallion Brewing was covered in the Lexington Herald-Leader in February 8th’s Weekender section. The article covered the craft beer movement in Lexington and we got a cool picture printed of the partners standing under the mash tun. The online article even has a video of our own Kore Donnelly talking about his favorite (non-Blue Stallion) beer.
Grand Opening
Now that we’re so close to brewing our first batch of beer, we can finally get more firm on our grand opening date. If you’ve seen the signs on the front of the building, you’ll notice we printed “Spring 2013″. Leaving the opening date vague was intentional because there are so many outside variables that come in to play when you open a brewery. Once we start brewing beer, we can announce our grand opening with much more certainty. Look for an announcement soon!
