TTB, Construction and More

What is new in the land of Payette Brewing Company...lots of stuff, mostly unexciting for you though.  I had my phone interview with the TTB earlier today, meaning I am one step closer to getting my federal license.  The way things are going, there is a distinct possibility that I will be the first brewery in history where it takes longer to get a building permit than the brewers notice.  Although I would like to, I can't totally blame the city for not having a building permit yet, I am sure that if I had certain pieces of information in my plan everything would be further in the process.  Yes, there were construction pictures in a previous post as I did get started on some things, but that is all on hold.  Why? Well that depends on who you talk to.  So here is what happened, the city found out that I started some construction without a permit and told me I had to stop or my fees would be doubled, hence work stopped.  Lesson #58, social media is not a good thing if you are doing something wrong, even if you don't know it is wrong.  That is the my bet on how the city found out I was demolishing stuff, but is no excuse.  Why did I start doing work without a permit you ask?  People with more experience in construction than me, told me that it was okay.  Which leads to lesson #59 of starting a business, listen to the people with actual authority not those who say they know what they are doing.  Maybe the advice I got is okay in some circumstances, but I will be dealing with the city for years to come and whether or not I like it, they have the power and I need to listen to them.

Most of my posts have been about pilot beers, which sucks for you because you read my vague information and don't get to try any.  There isn't much I can do about that right now unfortunately.  What I can tell you, I would say the recipes are 75% ready to go.  The Star Garnett is ready, as one would expect, it isn't perfect after one batch.  Two things I am working on for that are improving the hop profile and trying to figure out how to adapt some of the brewing techniques to a commercial scale.  Didn't help that I had a Hop in the Dark (best CDA on the market) right after trying mine.  While I am going to be double batching the beers I plan to release, it is also time to brew small batches of the Mountain Man, Jackalope and a Pilsner.

If you are wondering about lessons 1-57, you'll have to buy the book I'll never write to get those.

Gotta Hop