Shazam

Hope you had a happy Halloween. So far my favorite bumper sticker in the election is:
"Vote Cthulu! Why Choose the Lesser of Two Evils?"

We brewed our first batch last week, gave away samples early today from five gallons I pulled out of the conditioning tank and carbonated ahead of time. Nothing like extremely fresh beer! I liked the taste, it was clean with a dry aftertaste. Comments were extremely positive, except for John Maltz who kept yammering on and on about how Hobgoblin was better. Which, if you like sweet "bitter" with low flavor he's right) It was the Combat Ale, incidentally, I figured that was the most tolerant brew for the first run. Mostly, the equipment ran as it should have. I learned that you can never have too many clamps and gaskets. Or pumps. The gasket on the mash tun was my biggest worry, but it held fast. The horses got the spent grain after.

I'm hoping for label approval Monday on the first three brews, and we got a shipment of 1/6 bbl kegs in. Oddly, the state requires federal approval of keg caps along with labels, so I can't sell anything until the labels pass. I'll post the labels online when the approvals come in, the artwork is pretty neat. The Combat ale has some neat t-shirts that will, of course, be way cooler than anything Liberty Street comes up with, I'll bet!

In fact, the artists that worked on the labels kicked ass. It would be hard to beat their design, but I'll keep trying. I supplied the concept for the second and third labels, but Dan designed the Soviet motif all on his own. Rather apropos for the times, eh comrade?