Author Archives: Victoria S

Brooklyn Brewery

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A few weeks ago I visited the Brooklyn Brewery. It was a Sunday afternoon and I was on the first tour of the day. Upon entering the brewery, the security guys gave my boyfriend and I free tour tickets and told us that we can go have a drink while we wait. We purchase these cute little Brooklyn Brewery tokens that we then exchanged for some beer.

The tokens, beer and tour tickets

The guys who were serving the beers in the tasting room were very knowledgeable due to the fact that they help making the beer on days that the tours are not in session. They told me that they get their hops and barley mainly from Washington and Oregon, depending on where its best at season. They also asked my boyfriend and I what beers we typically drink so that they can recommend the best tasting beer for us which was very helpful. I tried the Brooklyn Lager and my boyfriend had the Winter Lager. Something that caught my eye was that their cups were made from plants (it said so on the cup) which made them environmentally friendly.

The label stating that the cup is made out of plants.

They also had a food cart inside that apparently they change out every week to allow people to try new types of foods while visiting the tasting room. When our tour started, we were allowed to take our beers with us to enjoy while the tour guide told us about their process of making beer. The tour guide started off by asking if anyone knew what the four main ingredients of beer were and I was given a free beer token for answering the question. The four main ingredients are malt/barley, water, yeast and hops. A fun fact that she mention was that hops are a 1st cousin of the marijuana plant. The barley is guided up and mixed in with hot water, it soaks together and creates what is called a mash. That mash is then sent to a lauter tun in which the mash separates into hot and sweet liquid and the grain. That hot sweet liquid is called the wort which is unfermented beer. The wort is then sent to the brew kettle, after the liquid boils, the hops are added for flavor, aroma and also for the beer to preserve better. When that process is over, the liquid is sent to the fermentation tanks and fermented in different ways depending on what type of beer they want to make; a lager or an ale.

The fermenting tanks

After the beer is made it is then either legged or bottled. However all their canned beer and Lager is made in upstate, Utica, NY because those are 60% of their sales and the brewery doesn’t have the space capacity or equipment in the brewery itself to make that much beer. The brewery in Brooklyn actually makes about 1/3 of their beer like their seasonal and special flavors and the factory in upstate makes the other 2/3.

The beer menu in the tasting room

A fun fact is that when Brooklyn Brewery first started off it didn’t even have a name and it was just beer being made out of a house by Steve Hindy. Steve then partnered up with Tom Potter and they decided to make a brewing company. When they were coming up with a logo they wanted so many different things on it but didn’t have any money. They asked Milton Glaser, the creator of the I<3NY logo. It took them a while to even get an appointment with him, but after hassling his assistant for weeks she finally gave them and appointment to see him. He offered them a very simple design (the design that we know now) and asked for a percentage of the company in return and as well as free beer for the rest of his life. He still gets free beer to this day. That is how Brooklyn Brewery began as a company.

More tanks with the Brooklyn Brewery Logo

Pinnacle Wine and Liquor Warehouse

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So for my wine retail store project I chose to go to Pinnacle Wine and Liquor ware house located at 114 Ditmas Ave. Previously known as Dynasty Wine and Liquor warehouse, this place is located conveniently right of the F train line at the Ditmas Ave stop, very easy to get to on my way home from school. Upon walking into the store I automatically saw how big it was and how much of a variety they had when it came to wine. The store is divided into isles by red wines from different countries for the most part.

Some of their white wines and how they keep them.

To see their white wine selection, you can walk over to the refrigerated isle or you can also find some on the shelves as well. I noticed that even though all the wines are facing label in the front and the price tag on the shelf, that there are no “shelf talkers” no descriptions on any of the regions or wines that they have.

The Italian wine isle. Top shelves are more expensive and bottle shelves are cheaper.

They had wines varying from France, Italy, Germany, Israel and even Chile.

I spoke to the girl that works there about the various wines they have and how they keep most of them and she said that all of their wine is either kept on the shelves, the fridges or in the basement for extra storage. In my opinion, having the overstock in the basement isn’t a very smart idea because not all wines keep well for long and having too much of those wines and not selling them fast enough can cause them to lose inventory. I also asked her what the most expensive wine that they cary is and she said it is a $210 bottle of a 2014 Cabernet Sauvignon from the Padis Vineyard in Oak Knoll District of Napa Valley.

Most expensive bottle of wine they have.: $210 2014 Cabernet Sauvignon.

 

 

To be honest, I wasn’t too impressed. I thought that with the amount of wine that they sell from various countries that they would have a an older vintage bottle from France or Italy, but the best they had was from California. Something that I did find pretty cool was that they had wines that were made out of other fruit like passionfruit from Israel and I’ve tried these before and they were delicious. 

Their selection of the Rose, not too large.

They also have a bunch of Rose on display towards the front but a small variety. Overall this place had a good amount of wine some that I even recognized from class and Was so excited to actually know some of them and be able to have a conversation about wine which up until this class I was completely clueless about. This experience was pretty cool, having some of the knowledge that I have now.Â