USA, NE: Prairie Pride Brewing hoping to start brewing in late May

Coming this summer, Grand Island residents and visitors alike will get the chance to wet their whistle with a selection of craft beers brewed at the Prairie Pride Brewing Co., Grand Island Independent reported on April 5.

“We hope to start brewing in late May,” brewmaster Alex Briner said as he stood next to a mash tun in the brew house toward the back of the building at 115 E. South Front St.

He and Jay Mack, both home brewers from Aurora, quit their full-time jobs in early March to take on the full-time duties of brewing and bartending.

They are two of five partners who comprise Prairie Pride Brewing Co. The others are Dr. Phil Cahoy and contractors Amos Anson and Brad Shearer, all of Grand Island. Briner worked in construction and Mack was a paramedic.

“We’ll be open by State Fair,” Anson said.

Cahoy said the whole idea of a local brewery stemmed out of his collection of pre-Prohibition brewery signs.

“Every town had its own brewery — Hastings, Columbus, Fremont, Grand Island. There was Metz and Storz in Omaha,” said Cahoy, who grew up in Omaha. “Grand Island had the Grand Island Brewing Co.”

The breweries were so prolific, he said, because kegs could be effectively hauled only about 25 to 30 minutes from the brewery due to lack of refrigeration. That led to lots of local breweries and lots of special recipes.

As craft brewing began to resurge in recent decades, Cahoy thought how great it would be to bring a brewery back to Grand Island.

“Breweries changed neighborhoods — and mostly for the better,” he said.

Cahoy happened to stop at the Lucky Lady Tasting Room in Aurora and sampled one of Mack’s brews. He asked Mack if he ever thought about transitioning to a full-scale brewery.

“It’s every home brewer’s dream,” Mack said.

Over the past two years, Mack pulled in Briner. Contracting friends connected them with Anson and Shearer, and the company was born.

The Prairie Pride Brewing Co. name pays homage to a beer label once produced by Hastings Brewing Co. that used a bison head as a logo, Cahoy said.

That vintage logo was stylized into a modern company logo that will decorate tap handles now and will later serve as the icon on labels when the brewery advances to the bottling stage, Briner and Mack said.

“Jay and Alex make great beer,” Cahoy said. “Their flagship is an amber, Samuel Adams-tasting beer. They’ll have five or six standard beers and then five or six that rotate.”

Briner said he and Mack already have 12 solid recipes, including one that includes toasted coconut.

They’ve been training with existing breweries and attending conferences on how to transition from the home brewing of about five gallons at a time to brewery recipes that make 400 to 500 gallons at a time.

The building, owned by Chicken Coop restaurateur Dean Pegg, is being remodeled by Anson with a modern industrial feel. It formerly served as the Thomasville Gallery showroom for Williamson’s Furniture.

A new entrance into the building is being cut into the brick wall that faces the parking lot next to Wayne Cyclery. Patrons through the new entrance will be able to turn right to access the brewery or left to an area being finished for another future tenant.

The building has exposed brick walls, slab ceilings and thick fluted concrete support pillars. The 8-inch-thick floors support the 900-gallon hot liquor tank; the boil kettle, where the hops are added; and the whirlpool, where hops particles are separated out and sent to a chilling plate to drop the 185-degree whirlpool temperature to 68 degrees.

The brew, known as wort, is then piped to the nearby tank farm, where fermentation and carbonation occur. When the beer is complete, it will be piped into the building’s full basement, where kegs and a large cooler await.

Brewing takes about six to eight hours, and the whole process from brewing to the keg takes several weeks, Briner and Mack said.

“We’re making the dream come true,” Briner said.

“We want to sit back and watch the smiles and watch people enjoy beer,” Mack said.

Cahoy said old buildings and paying homage to history are seen as modern again.

“We want Grand Island to have that urban feel,” Cahoy said. “We think it will be great for Grand Island. Drink local.”

06 April, 2016