Cosmic Brewery Enters Soft Open Phase

The long awaited opening of Torrance’s newest production brewery, Cosmic Brewery, home of Cosmic Ales, is now a reality as they opened their tasting room to the public this past weekend. I only had a short window of opportunity to visit on Saturday evening but for making a last minute announcement on Friday that they would be open Saturday, the place was packed.

As you can see by my photos, as I watched the build-out of the brewery I never got any photos of the future tasting room. Owner Christopher Briles always kept that close to the vest and he did not want anyone to see it until it was ready. When it was revealed Saturday one had to admit, the cosmic theme is pretty cool.

The tap system is different than any tasting room I have visited in that you pour your own beer and are charged according to how much you pour. If you recall my article about zpizza a couple months ago, it is the same concept. You purchase a card that you insert on the tap, and you pour your beer. I did not play with it Saturday, but I will probably check it out this weekend. Continue reading

LMU Beer Festival 2016 Photos

These photos were taken Saturday at the LMU Beer Fest 2016, which was held on Hannon Field on the Loyola Marymount University campus. The event featured beer from 24 craft breweries, live music by Phoenix Rising, access to six food trucks and a few games of skill. As one person mentioned to me, it was one of the best inaugural events in recent memory.

The beer festival was hosted by the LMU Alumni Association and was a fundraiser to support student athletes through the Lions Athletic Fund. As it turns out there are a lot of brewery owners in the LA area that are LMU alumni, like Allison Kolb of Scholb Premium Ales and Tom Dunbabin of King Harbor Brewing; Steve Farguson of Absolution Brewing has a son that currently attends LMU.

Being the inaugural event, ticket sales were limited; I am going to guess that there were a lot of alumni that purchased tickets to the event with no real intention of attending. This is just a guess, but the VIP session had sold out and there were not very many people for that session. By the end of the day, I would guess that they had a few hundred attendees. Continue reading

Business & Beer Celebrates Four Years

These photos are from the Business & Beer gathering that was held Thursday evening at the Smog City Brewing Company tasting room in Torrance. This marked the 4th anniversary of the networking group’s existence, which probably accounted for the better than average turnout. There was a mix of old and new in attendance with at least a couple first time attendees, and at least seven people that had attended the first Business & Beer at Select Beer Store back in 2012.

To help mark the occasion, Business & Beer co-founder Tanya Martin baked up a bunch of calzones which were readily consumed. Instead of having their monthly beer drawing, all attendees received a coupon for a free beer at an upcoming Business & Beer gathering.

The next Business & Beer will be held at El Segundo’s newest production brewery, Rob Rubens Distilling & Brewing on August 11. You can find more details about the event on the Business & Beer website. Cheers! Continue reading

Jimmy’s Bar & Grill Beer Dinner Featuring Scholb Premium Ales

I guess the word has gotten out to the craft beer fans and foodies in the South Bay area; Jimmy’s Bar & Grill in Redondo Beach is the place to be on the second Wednesday of the month for their outstanding beer dinners. These photos were taken at Jimmy’s July beer dinner last night featuring the latest production brewery to open in Torrance, Scholb Premium Ales.

When we first started attending Jimmy’s Beer Dinner Series back in September the attendance was probably about 30 people. In the months following the numbers fluctuated a little, but I don’t recall there being more than maybe 50 people at any of them. Yesterday afternoon, Jimmy’s announced on their Facebook page that they had sold out at 60 attendees. I guess not everyone got the message because by the time all was said and done they had over 75 attendees at the dinner. It really was a sight to see. Continue reading

Photos from the Beachwood BBQ & Brewing 5 Year Celebration

All day Saturday, Beachwood BBQ & Brewing, the world’s best large brewpub, celebrated five years with hundreds of their fans by providing at least 30 of their beers on tap, four casks, and hourly releases of such favorites as 8 Buffalo, Sadie and Jean-Quad Van Damme along with a special food menu, wandering magicians, balloon artists, and other side show acts turning their Long Beach location into a carnival fit for any adult that enjoys craft beer.

We arrived around 1:00 PM and while there was no line to get in, there was a two hour wait to get a table. We did like many and just opted to stand in the bar until a community table opened up. Getting a beer or ordering food at the bar was quick and easy; and it appeared to me that people were getting seated quicker than two hours. Continue reading

Bruery Terreux Now Open

These photos were taken Thursday afternoon at a preview of the new Bruery Terreux tasting room that is opening to the public at noon Friday. From this point forward they are open daily from 12:00-10:00 PM.

If you will recall, it was June 2014 that The Bruery announced that they were going to open Terreux (pronounced terr – ooh) as the location where they would concentrate on their wild ales and sours without risking the quality of the other fine brews The Bruery was turning out in Placentia. Because those pesky Brettanomyces really fly, they took no chances and opened the second facility three miles away in Anaheim; that and the City of Anaheim seemed really anxious to have them.

Bruery Terreux hoped to open their tasting room last summer, but I think we have all watched enough tasting rooms open around here to guess that wasn’t going to happen; permits, permits, permits. Anyway, it only took two years, which is not bad and it was worth the wait. Continue reading

A Visit to the Palmdale Breweries

Since I was going to the Bravery Brewing 4th Anniversary celebration in Lancaster anyway, and Palmdale’s two new breweries are less than five miles from Bravery, I decided to stop in to visit Transplants Brewing Company and their neighbor across the way, Lucky Luke Brewing Company.

The last time I visited Palmdale was for the Transplants Brewing ribbon cutting back in January. If you look at the photos from that event you will probably notice that there was a large mural in progress, and you may have noticed that they were offering 10 beers for their opening day. When we arrived Sunday it was obvious that a lot more work has been done on the mural; I get the feeling it may never truly be completed, but it is very interesting to gaze upon. Continue reading

Bravery Brewing 4th Year Anniversary Photos

These photos are from Bravery Brewing’s 4th Year Anniversary party which was held Sunday at the Lancaster production brewery’s tasting room. In addition to the 30 brews available, there was live music by Blaktop, hamburgers and hot dogs from Hi Desert Mobile Catering, hourly raffles, cornhole, board games and surprisingly nice weather. Of course, co-founder and star of the big and small screen, R. Lee Ermey was there to chat with attendees.

Since I was there, I let Brian Avery take me on a tour of their new brewhouse, a three vessel, 15 bbl system that will allow them to brew a ton more beer than they were doing with the 3 bbl system they have been using.

Congratulations to Bart and Brian Avery and the entire Bravery Brewing team; I look forward to seeing what the next year brings you. Bravery Brewing is located at 42705 8th Street West in Lancaster. Cheers! Continue reading

Photos from Laughs By Volume 4

These photos are from PINT Magazine’s Laughs By Volume 4, a comedy and craft beer event that was held Saturday evening at the Buena Park Community Center. The Laughs By Volume event featured unlimited craft beer tastings from about 30 different production breweries and laughs from four hilarious comedians.

Laughs By Volume 4 provided brews from such breweries as The Dudes’ Brewing, Stone Brewing, Absolution Brewing, Four Sons, Mission Brewery, Great Beer Co, Timeless Pints, Anaheim Brewery, Telegraph Brewing, Pizza Port Brewing, Julian Hard Cider, Tahoe Mountain Brewing, 21st Amendment, Victory Brewing, Oskar Blues, Alesmith, Brewery Ommegang, Boulevard Brewing, Maui Brewing, Double Mountain, and Sixpoint Brewery. The laughs were provided by comedians Cisco, Atsuko Okatsuka, Sammy Obeid, and Tommy Lucero and emceed by Chris JOnesy Jones. Continue reading

Brewers Panel at Rock & Brews

Thursday evening, for LA Beer Week (LABW8), Rock & Brews in El Segundo hosted “So You Want to Open a Brewery in LA?” brewers panel, which was moderated by Celebrator Beer News writer Tomm Carroll and featured brewers and brewery owners from all ends of the Los Angeles area craft beer scene.

The breweries included a well established brewery like Firestone Walker, to contract brewers and breweries that have recently opened; to operations that are just getting started. In addition to David Walker of Firestone Walker, we heard from Bill Reider of Reel Brewery, Patrick Schulz of Scholb Premium Ales, Todd Tisdell of Pocock Brewing, Kristofor Barnes of Los Angeles Ale Works, Matthew Garcia of Homage Brewing, Kevin Osbourne of Cellador Ales, Mike Hancock of Rob Rubens Distilling & Brewing, and Andy Black of Yorkshire Square Brewing Company. Continue reading

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