New Glarus Brewing Company, New Glarus, WI brewery website
I've been to the brewery twice (July 2005, August 2006). This page is a compilation of pics from those trips.
The brewery is quaintly located in a small Wisconsin town, at the edge of a field. It really is a great place. Not only do they make great beer, both basic and adventurous, but there is a down-home feeling surrounding the whole company. I saw Deb talking to someone in the gift shop when we walked in, and I later saw Dan doing different things in the brewery.
One of the painted parts of the outer walls.
Spent grain going to a local farmer.
The entrance to the gift shop.
The gift shop and Six Pack Island. (mix your own 6 pk for $6.99)
Just a few bottles of their award-winning, delicious fruit beers. :)
Glasses, shirts, inflatable cows...
They had a great self-guided tour where you would put an audio device to your ear and press the number by whatever it was you wanted to learn about. They told a story of saving these $1,000,000 copper kettles (one shown above) from a German brewery that was being sold. The kettles were going to be sold for scrap, and they ended up buying them for just over scrap value of $24,000.
This was taken on the guided tour. We were allowed to walk in and get a better look at the mash tun/boil kettle, and lauter tun.
From Germany, baby.
The 2nd time I visited we really got lucky. Not only were the doing guided tours (instead of the self-guided, audio ones) but we were allowed to have four 4oz samples, and keep the small etched sample glass.
The bottling room and a video of the room. 720k
Another view of the kegs.
I had never seen this before. They had two monitors on the wall that switched cameras between rooms the public did not have access to. Kind of fun.
The first time I was there we were not allowed to go back by the fermenters. This time, we were. They had quite a few more (you will see) than I expected.
Now, look at the picture above this one. Imagine taking a left into the first row of fermenters. You would see that there are even more behind it. They had 3 or 4 rows of them (you see part of two of those rows here).
This is an important picture. If you have ever had New Glarus Belgian Red, or New Glarus Raspberry Tart, you know that they are out-of-this-world, award-winning beers unlike anything else. Well, these are the two casks where they are made. I found out they use some of the wild yeast in the casks as well as their own controlled yeast.
This nice panoramic shot shows the grounds.
Jerry and Don in front, Aug 2006.
This is what I got from Six Pack Island plus a couple extra ones.
