The Man, The Myth, The Legend…

We usher in the first full week of Fall 2024 with the return of the coveted Jack Browne, our Southern English Brown Ale.

Jack Browne is known for its rich, malty flavor profile, balanced with gentle notes of caramel, toffee, and a hint of nuttiness. It is the perfect choice as evening temps dip towards the 50s and the days become a touch more crisp! This artfully crafted ale returns both in cans and on draft beginning Friday…

In addition to our returning favorite, we are pleased to unveil our food truck schedule for the week. Join us in the Tasting Room as we enjoy a selection from some of Tallahassee’s finest mobile kitchens…

• Thursday 10/3: Wok N Roll Tacos dropping some Asian Fusion on us!

• Friday 10/4: Seriously Thai rocking the dock!

• Saturday 10/5: Taste of Heaven BBQ saucin’ it up!

• Sunday 10/6: Murillo’s Kitchen Filipino holding it down!

Pick a day and grab a few friends, Join us as we dive on in!

---

Giving Tanks

The last few days of long drives and "mildly" overeating at every meal have provided a bit of time to reflect and appreciate how far DEEP Brewing Company has come over the past year and enforce the revelation of how much we truly have to be thankful for.

 ~Begin Flashback~

This time a year ago we had just taken delivery of our brewing equipment and we're working feverishly to get our plans submitted to the City of Tallahassee before everyone downtown began taking time off for the holidays... 

After 3 months of permitting woes, 4 months of construction... with all requisite delays and cost overruns... and a bit of brewing on my trusty 10 gallon steed (homebrew system), we held a "below the radar" opening to a fervent crowd of over 200 people during what felt like the hottest day of 2016... Thankfully the 80 gallons we had on hand was just barely enough beer to get through the day and keep everyone "hydrated!"

A few more "soft" Saturday's over the course of the summer and finally getting our main BrewHouse up and running, we officially opened the doors to the tasting room on the last weekend in August not knowing that the following weekend would have us scrambling to save our precious golden suds from the ravages of Hurricane Hermine and the subsequent loss of power.

During the past two months we've been joined by our fans while we explored and experimented with a number of new recipes, expanded the tasting room by adding a dock and some outdoor seating, and most importantly... invited two awesome and talented people to join this small family-run venture!

The bulk of our thanks for this year go to our loyal fans, customers new and old, and DBC's beer-vangelists that help drive a constant flow of new faces into the brewery every weekend. Also, due to the help, support, and sacrifices made by our family over the past year... DEEP carries no debt and answers to no investor... For that we are forever grateful and can truthfully say we answer only to those who walk through our front door and order a beer.

Thank you for coming along for the journey thus far, and helping to sow the seeds for what is to come!

Brewing Greater Depths,

Facilitator of Fermentation and Scrubber of Floors

Ryan S LaPete

In the Wake of the Storm...

Just one week ago we began prepping for the storm that shall not be named.

For us this meant securing a generator, obtaining at least 24 hrs worth of gas, doing a bit of electrical planning for installation of the generator, and downloading an app to our IPad based POS that would send alerts when the power went out (yes apparently there is and app for that).

With the knowledge that our fermenters and cold room could maintain temperature for about 6 hours with no power, the family and I hunkered down at my parents' place outside of Havana so we'd all be in the same place, so we could keep an eye on the #havanhopyard and pecan grove, and because the superstructure of their house was designed for 200 mph winds!

We received notification that power had gone out at the brewery at 0220 AM on Friday. We rolled out of bed around 0600, heated bottled water on the gas stove, and poured it through a filter full of loose coffee grounds for a bit of pick-me-up before we headed into town.

Sporting a chainsaw, timber chains, gas cans, and extension cords... I wasn't planning to let a downed tree get between us and saving the beer. We found the path to the brewery to be somewhat well traveled and it looked as though people were out far earlier than us trying to get to wherever they were going.

Upon arrival to the brewery and unloading the generator we realized that our best laid plans had been foiled by the 4 millimeter difference in diameter between a 20 amp and a 30 amp 240v generator adapter!

Some creative rewiring by Beerslinger Blair got generator #1 up and running. A bit of rough math told us that the Honda 8750 was woefully undersized to run the whole place, so we concentrated on getting the walk-in up and running so beer would be cold-ish for any whom ventured away from their storm ravaged homes in search of respite.

Once we knew the beer was cooling, we took a gamble and found that all of the generators at United Rentals had been taken, but they happened to have a diesel driven light tower sporting a 6 KW generator. Better than a poke in the eye!

I towed this little guy up to the brewery, shifted the walk-in to it all by its lonesome, and wired the Honda to the main panel making sure to isolate the brewery from the city grid via our comically huge disconnect switch on the rear of the building.

From there it felt like that scene on Apollo 13 where Gary Sinise worked to figure our which power loads were essential and in what order they had to boot up to keep from overloading the circuit. Mission accomplished! Not only did we get the fermentation chiller back up and running (albeit a bit later than planned) but we were able run a couple of fans and lights inside the tasting room making it possible to open up for most of our planned 3pm-10pm Friday hours!

Though the beer in the walk-in survived, it took a while for the fermenters to get back down to temperature. Once the dust settled and we got through the holiday weekend cleaning up yards and a few downed trees, it was time to do a damage assessment. We found that our 4 bbl batches of Nyctophile and Surface Dweller, which were in active fermentation at the time of the power outage, may be considered casualties of the storm. Along with those major hits, a minor oversight on my part while trying to get the air conditioners online left two pilot batches (Bottom Dweller DIPA and Short Timer Export Stout) without temperature control for almost 48 hours may also result in their demise as well.

All is well though! The exciting news is that 4 new pilot batches and 2 new Fall seasonals are just below the horizon. Fall is coming, I can feel it!

Now that my long winded post-weather recap is coming to a close, we're extending our hours slightly starting this week to include Friday night from 3:00 to 10:00 pm and Saturday from Noon to 8:00 pm. Bring those growlers to get prepped for gameday! 


Prost,

Ryan S. LaPete
Ameture Electrician @
DEEP Brewing Co.

Something Liquid this way comes...

Grinding and stirring and starting the mash,

Starch into wort as time starts to pass.

This liquids quite sweet, for that we shall do

Add one pound of hops. Better yet, make it two!

Boil and toil, the smell of hop oil

Grown men to their knees, like aluminum foil.

Chill this thrill, put up the malt mill

This liquid will test the strength of one's will.

Though the labor of man may make wort a plenty,

the true work is done by the small and the many.

American, French, Belgian, German, or English,

For there's nothing to drink until their work is finished.

@ellebellepix

Seven syllables, five syllables, three syllables, one. Just naming these beers is my kind of fun.

One week, two weeks, three weeks, or four?

When, you might ask, will you open the doors

The doors, you might add, to this tasting room, fine? So we can partake of this liquid divine!

Soon, I would say, by the end of the month...

But rushing the yeast is not something we want!

 @ellebellepix

Our AC's been beefed up, yes we've turned up the power, so sit down with a pint or walk out with a growler!

Ale, porter, stout, lager, or shandy?

What Day of the week? That'd come in quite handy!

Though our target date was way back in May,

We'll just have to settle for this Saturday!

@ellebellepix 

Come Join us on Saturday from 12:00-18:00 or hop on the Tallahassee Brew Bus Craft Crawl and drop by on Friday night!

Beer about Blogs Cont. (Repost)

Sorry to leave you on the edge of your seat in the previous piece. I sat down to write this thinking it would be about 300 words about beer and blogs filled with lots of SEO tag words about Tallahassee, breweries, bars, and craft beer.... Like how I did that? Yes, at long last we have arrived at the final installment of this nearly-about beer series. We left off in the middle of our conversation about shifting from professional diving to brewer...
 

You might ask "How does one jump to a completely different career?" The answer is "Slowly. And with great support from family and friends." I decided to stop working as a diver full time in order to be more present for my (at the time) 18 month old son and to begin planning the brewery. I didn't know anything about making beer, so I bought and studied several books on both home and professional beer brewing, purchased a boat load of homebrewing equipment, and began experimenting with brewing beer on the balcony of our 17th floor condo in downtown Miami, Florida.

Once I decided that the beer I was making didn't suck, I decided to enter them into homebrewing competitions. I won a silver medal for the first beer I ever entered, which was a Belgian Dubbel inspired by Rochefort 8. This early success inspired me to brew more and bolder beers, experiment with more styles, win more medals, become a certified beer judge, and then come to the ultimate realization that I still knew nothing about turning this into an actual business. Time to invest in more books! 

I have always been a fan of self education, a concept which has significantly aided in my getting to this point in life without the burdensome load of student debt. For the last year I have been somewhat diligently teaching myself about business concepts like management, finance, supply chains, manufacturing, marketing, and sales all while building out a business plan for the brewery and doing bits of contract diving here and there. I've looked at the whole process as an accelerated MBA with concentration in brewery operations and a minor in malting and fermentation science. The number of resources we have access to outside of the traditional education system is astounding and it takes some effort to weed through the crap to make sure you aren't wasting your valuable time. I'll work on providing links to some of these materials in the future, for progeny.

As we begin to approach the date of implementation for my brewery business plan, I have been consuming more and more information on marketing concepts while at the same time learning about the Tallahassee beer market. After experiencing the rise of craft beer in South Florida, being jealous of the advancement of breweries in Tampa/St. Pete, and following the progress of brewing friends in Gainesville, Jacksonville, and the Florida Keys... I've decided I could offer something more to the culture of good beer in Tallahassee than just opening another great brewery. That's what this blog is about.

In time, we plan to make the DEEP THOUGHTS Blog a public hub (Pub? Ha!) for information about what is going on with great beer in Tallahassee and at DEEP Brewing Company.

As the brewery comes closer to opening, we'll be working to bring together articles on pairing beer with food, beer reviews, technical articles, interviews with "beer celebrities," and information on beer-centric current events. Make sure you follow us on the various social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram) or at the very least, sign up for our mailing list to get the coldest, freshest news delivered directly to your inbox.

Thanks for reading,
Ryan S LaPete
Owner / Head Brewer @ Deep Brewing Co.

A Beer about Blogs (Repost From Tallahassee Beer Blog)

I hope you all will bear with me as I do a bit of reorganizing and optimizing of some of our content. I am currently working on shifting some things over from another beer project that never quite took off. Much of the content is relevant to Deep Brewing Company as well so I figured it would be a good addition and also fill in some of the back story of where the idea for DEEP was originated... If you haven't read it before, ENJOY!

Thanks for understanding!

In case you hadn't figured it out yet, this blog is about great beer and the advancement of craft beer culture in the city of Tallahassee, Florida. In this inaugural post, I'd like to spend a bit of time reflecting on who I am, where I came from, and why we are here today to opine on the subject of BEER.

I've often thought of starting a blog, becoming a writer, or at least posting my thoughts more than superficially on Facebook or more than 140 characters on twitter. The battle has always been two fold... A lack of true passion for many of the topics I've ever thought of writing about, and a lack of interest in people I didn't know being critical of the words I chose to put on paper.

Well, those days are a thing of the past! In the journey through my 31 years of life I've made mistakes, done stupid stuff, and ran into some shitty people... Reflecting on those negative events when combined with the perspective of time reveals the serendipitous nature of life and the gifts it bestows upon those of us who chose to learn from our missteps and continue to push forward.

Along the way I've had one of the coolest jobs anyone could dream of, Done some crazy things, met some of the most interesting people in the world, married the woman of my dreams, and fathered two of the worlds most perfect beings... None of these miraculous things could have happened without the circumstances that precipitated from the poor choices that came with youth and inexperience. Don't worry, we'll get to the beer in a moment!

I've wanted to start my own business for several years and even tried a few times. I've owned a scuba diving charter, a website that sold pool safety equipment, and a few other poorly conceived and half-assed excuses for businesses in which I never put the time to get the ideas off the ground. The only promising endeavor I ever started was shut down by the man when the administration at the middle-school I attended in Tallahassee arbitrarily decided they didn't like the idea of a 12 year old saving for college by selling blue raspberry blow-pops out of a backpack. Huge margins, low overhead, insatiable demand... Dreams squashed by onerous regulation and protectionist mentality! At this point you are probably wondering when we are going to talk about beer... Soon!

About two years ago my wife and I decided that the time had come for a change of career paths. The idea was to find something that met the goals of both reducing my physical risk and gaining some time to spend with the family. Enter beer here!

When reflecting back on life and searching for the common thread that could tie together the fabric of my personal evolution, I noticed that beer has been present since my coming of age. Beer has been there for the worst of times and good beer has been part of the best of times. I also noticed that the better the beer I chose, the better my life choices. Now you may attribute that to age, experience, and maybe the elevation of income... But this is a blog about good beer! I'm trying to connect the dots!

Taking into account this massive revelation, the obvious business choice was to open a brewery! I know what you're thinking... "Starting your own brewery is quite time consuming, how does that fit into the plan for more family time?" My previous work as a commercial/research diver demanded huge time commitments and entailed high amounts of person risk. Relatively speaking, owning my own brewery would be fairly tame on both accounts.

Man this thing has gotten out of control! We'll have to stop there for now and have a beer! Tune in next time when I might wrap this damn thing up... Might.

If you find this the least bit interesting, like us on Facebook and maybe follow us on Twitter for more updates! If not, do it anyway... I might catch your attention in the next installment!

Out with the old... In with the BREW!!!

When the dust settles... 

A quick look back at 2015...

It's been quite the year. As we begin the next chapter in this saga, I wanted to take a minute and look back on how far we've come.

Over the last 12 months DEEP Brewing Company has grown from the seed of an idea pondered during long walks on the sea floor (literally), to nearing tangible reality...

Beyond the awards and accolades, the research and planning, the networking and drinking of decadently delicious suds... here are a few big revelations...

1.) After nearly a year of failed deals, stalled negotiations, and dealing with greedy landlords... DEEP Brewing Company officially has a place to call home. As of October 26th we have planted that seed to spawn DEEP Brewing's base of operations on the North East side of Tallahassee. Though we're not quite ready to disclose the exact address, we can tell you that it is outside of the Circle, but remains south of I10. I find it hard to keep a secret in person, so if you see me around town just ask.

2.) As part of the previous earth shattering news, we have started the process of meandering our way through the city's permitting process and are on our first round of revisions (they apparently start charging us after two). Everything seems to be going swimmingly, although slower than one might hope (I was a sprinter, not a distance swimmer).

Since I have a knack for biting off more than I can chew, I've decided to act as our architect and purchased a copy of autocad lite for much less than the cost of a professional. Only time will tell if we can keep the number of revisions within reason!

3.) Many who follow the progress of other breweries (both local and otherwise) know the often-told story of equipment delays that plague brewery openings and push back the revelation of golden suds... Well, about five months ago when negotiations were looking good on a previous location, we went ahead and placed the deposit on our equipment to get the ball rolling on a three month lead time.

Now two months after the promised delivery date... The tanks have arrived! Though we are still awaiting the arrival of our control system and a few other accouterments, the bulk of our brew house and cellar have landed inside city limits. Now we just have to keep the dust off of them while we build out the facility!

Into the bowels of the ship... 

Looking ahead to 2016

While we've been a bit coy with information regarding our plans up to this point, we most definitely plan on changing that as we role out the new calendar. Here's a teaser on some of our lofty goals for 2016.

Deep Brewing Co's New Year's Resolutions

1.) Keep you up-to-date on everything that's going on as we bring this dream into reality.

2.) Bring the dream to reality!

3.) Allow glorious suds of all colors, flavors, and styles to cascade down from the brilliantly polished stainless steel taps hand mounted in the tasting room of our own design. Let's call it the "intimate" 35 seat wheelhouse,  from which we'll pilot this brewery through seas we've yet to explore.

4.) Quit dreaming and realize that the thirst for our depth-inspired concoctions is nearly insatiable... Brew more and more beer!

5.) Here's the ambitious one... Become the pride of Tallahassee's budding brewery culture and with the help of others, put Tallahassee firmly on the map as a craft beer destination!

6.) Try not to be so busy that we can't go get a dive or ten in this year!

That's all for now!

Into the darkness... 

Don't forget to "like" our Facebook Page to get the low down on our most recent activities. Also, go ahead and check out our online shop as we start to release DEEP swag for your enjoyment!

Cheers to a New Year in great local beer!
- Ryan S. LaPete
Owner/KegWasher
DEEP Brewing Co. Tallahassee