Hops & Hogs BBQ 02/19/24 - "Goodnight, Dave..."

Nordo, Ken & Aaron are posted up at Heavy Rotation Brewing in Brooklyn Park. Bad beer etiquette, the seltzer option, local BBQ love, putting beer in your rib wrap and more!

Episode Transcript

(00:04):
Welcome to Hobson Hawks, where thelocal beer community and the local barbecue community
blend into one conversation. I'mnordo fromKFA and Radio with Ken Smith of Heavy
Rotation Brewing in Brooklyn Park and Aaronbor Dodge of Northern Fire Grilling and Barbecue
Supply in Minnetaka. Here we wereon location at Heavy Rotation, post it
up and pot it up on aSaturday night. What do we drink it?

(00:27):
Well, gentlemen, what we havefor you today? That's the podcast
voice. Is our lean into itHazy I pa. It's our house sitting.
It's our leaning into it Hazy ipa. It's a house citra I p
a. It looks like orange juice. It looks it's very citrusy. It's
gonna be pretty smooth. You know. The Hazy IPAs are a lot smoother

(00:48):
than your say, West Coast orjust your classic just I p a.
Yeah, it's one of the beersthat it's pretty much always on tap here,
and when it's not, some peoplewill get a little upset. But
yeah, it's it's our flagship fora reason. Day one, it's number
one seller crushes. This beer isawesome. Who are the bartenders working tonight.
We got Ron and Tyler, Ronand Tyler the d squad, I

(01:10):
call him. Why is that?I'm just kidding. They're good dude.
Yeah, Ron, Ron's a goodlooking guy. And Tyler. Yeah,
Ron season he's the wily veteran ofthe group. She is, He's got
stories, he's got wisdom to share. It feels like he get on his
bad side, things get loud ina hurry. Oh yeah, he's too

(01:30):
big for me to take on.So I think I'm gonna mind my p's
and q's around Ron. So Igot I got Ken Smith here, I
got Aaron Bardadge, owner of NorthernFire Grillion Barbecue Supply. I'm Minnetaka,
I'm Nordo from from KFA and thebetter half could not be here tonight,
Nope. So we're gonna have towork on that. We need Missy,

(01:51):
your partner in business, your partnerin crime, your partner in life.
We're gonna need her on the podcastat some point. She doesn't know what
she's missing out on, actually,or she does. She did listen to
the first episode. Maybe she knewexactly that she's missing. That might actually
be a good point. Let melet me start here before we get maybe
into the hog side of thing things. Uh, the Seltzer option, so

(02:15):
from from craft breweries, the boomof it. Everyone's got different flavors,
and it's such a cool thing reallywhen you think about in some ways replacing
what you know otherwise could just belike a cool neighborhood bar and restaurant,
right, the ability in small capacityto to be original, to be creative,
to make different beers. The craftbeer community in Minnesota among really through

(02:38):
if you if you're looking even throughoutthe country, it seems like we have
a very very flourishing, plentiful ifnot in some ways you could speak to
it more than me. It's almostlike it's over. It's it's saturated,
like there's craft breweries in every corner. But and and you know where I'm
going with the with the Seltzer optionis you know, I, you know,
Johnny beer drinker, I'm going toroll into a beer, roll into

(03:00):
a brewery and I need to Ineed to get the flight, you know,
I need to. I need totaste the bitters. Oh yeah,
I need I need to taste thesmooth. They got the hazy in front
of me right now, and I'mdefinitely leaning into this and and I bring
I bring Molly, my wife withme. Now, now Molly, she's
a beer drinker too, but gotto watch those carbs. And then the

(03:21):
seltzer option has blown up to thepoint out where if you don't have a
non beer option, you're you're theodd man out. And it's also too
it's a lot of a gluten freepeople, right that drink the seltzer as
well. I'd be Missy yep,and we do. And fun fact,
before we talk about the seltzer,all of our beers are gluten reduced really,
so it's not something that we reallypromote just because a lot of people

(03:43):
will think like if it's gluten reduceor whatever, it's not gonna taste good
at whatever. But yeah, sojust if you're listening and you come in
and you're like, oh, Ihave a gluten allergy or whatever sensitive to
it, Yeah, anything on ourmenu. I would maybe stay away from
the wheat beers just because as theyare reduced but not nearly as much as
the other beers. But having aseltzer on, yeah, I mean you
almost have to know, right,Like for those non beer drinkers, for
the gluten sensitive people. And I'mnot a huge seltzer drinker, but I

(04:11):
can't get past the bidder of aseltzer. Yeah there, I keep trying,
but it's just, yeah, yougot the big boys out there.
You know, there's no laws whenyou're drinking claws. That's what I've correct
except yeah, that explains a lotof the things I see at my home
bar. And don't get me wrong, I've I've had many, many,
many, many, many, manymany many seltzers today. But but it's

(04:33):
just the but it's it was almostlike an overnight thing, and it was
it was weird where you know,kind of it's it's almost on its own
unique path. Where with craft beer, we're chasing flavor, right, We're
chasing, you know, something thatcatches us, something that is you know,
robust is a good word, Like, we're looking for flavors the seltzers

(04:57):
unless you're adding maybe a sugary Xtracked to it or something like that.
That's the antithesis of flavor for themost part. Right, Yeah, And
then you had all that stuff inthere, and I know there's a lot
of places that there's some of thebig boys locally, there's a company I'm
forgetting the name right now, soI apologize. But they they will take
product that is going to be outdatedessentially, and they'll turn it into a

(05:19):
Selter base for you, and thenyou can flavor it however you want to
flavor it. We make ours inhouse, and we flavored it. We
we call it. Yeah, wehave that, which is funny to me
because it's almost like, yeah,we have that right because it's selter,
not beer. But we know thatwe want to we want options for everybody.
Yeah, absolutely absolutely, I remember. And that's how you and I

(05:41):
met was via Udapils, right,you know, prominent brewery in town,
and I was kind of shocked toget And you learn through the customers.
You learn through these things, andI gosh, I just I love pouring
beer and talking to people and enjoyingit. But it was every you know,
i'd say, third or four customer. You guys got a guys got
a cider, got a you gota sour, the sighters, the sours,

(06:09):
and then the seltzers. Yep,the three esses. They don't all
start with definitely does two of them? Yeah, No, two of them
don't. Yeah, we don't havea cider where we set an education from
one of them, doesn't instead ofMankato cider spelled with an S. I
get it. Yeah, Makato isa tough town. It's a tough town

(06:30):
not known for its literacy. Ormaybe it is. I'm not sure.
I don't know, but yeah,but that that always interests me because it's
It's interested me because it came andI don't want to say it came out
of nowhere, but really at thenational level with the big brands, and
how quickly that filtered down into aneighborhood brewery. And and again I've I've
had very few seltzers that I reallyenjoy, but I know people that swear

(06:53):
by them. That's all they'll drink. And whether that's at home or you
come here, you get you gotan option for it. Yeah, And
like, you know, it's funnythat you said a cider and a selter
and all that. We have allthat. We have a sour. We
have a raspberry sour, an applepie sour, okay, which kind of
hits that cider aspect that will begone probably by the time you guys listen

(07:15):
to this, But yeah, wehave something for everybody. Go on our
website every rotation dot com in BrooklynPark. You can check out what we
have on tap anytime you go onthe website. It's updated. So can
I have some really stupid questions aboutthis industry that I don't really know Other
than me drinking beer, I don'tknow shit about any of this. So
you've got breweries and distilleries and nowyou're kind of dancing this line where you've

(07:38):
got you know, ciders and soursand seltzers in somewhere transitions from that to
distillery. Can you could you inthe same building do distilled stuff that you're
doing. No, but it's awhole nother license even with cider, right,
So we can't make a cider inhouse. We can't make booze in

(07:58):
house, right, It can onlydo beer. Different license, different equipment,
and vice versa. They correct,correct, So there's nowhere in town
that is like both the brewery anddistillery. Uh there, Well, I
guess there is one in Roseville.I want to say, but I think
I think I've never been there.It doesn't yeah, yeah, but I
think they're like, I don't know, I've never been, so I can't

(08:20):
speak to it. But they holda barbecue contest so there's some there's some
way they get around. I don'tknow if they sell it in different spots,
like in different locations are different.I wonder if it's a county by
county kind of ordin. It's definitely, it's definitely in state law for sure.
But yeah, can sell marijuana here. We the th drinks we could.
Yeah, what did we get awaywith at this point? Drinks one

(08:43):
that you can sell, edibles,you can sell anything. Do we know
a guy that sells that? Weknow a guy. We had it.
We had it here for a littlewhile. So you can you can buy
a THC drink in here, andthen if you're looking for marijuana, you
just go find a guy in theparking lot, correct and he handles that.
They'll take care of you. Okay, well that's perfect. What were
you doing in Nashville? Eron alot of wandering around? You know,

(09:07):
we're well what we did and whatwe intended. Yeah, it was a
trade show. We went out tothe Hearth Patio Barbecue Expo, which is
I'd never been to before. Itwas always something I wanted to do.
They do it every year. Soit's kind of a weird combination of things
because hearth. Right, so it'sall like fireplaces and you know, gas

(09:28):
and electric and all this like inside. So you or a hearth guy.
I guess I'm a hearth guy.I keep saying hearth. I'm just is
it. I have no idea.This is the new Mexico education in me.
I'm not even sure I'm the guythat said the three s's right,
And I started it as a jokeand then I confused myself. Yeah,
so I'm the idiot of the groupas it is. I think i'm the
second. But I'll agree with allthose things, Jeff, So tell me

(09:52):
it wasn't an excuse for Barbieah,definitely for you to go to Nashville and
leave Brad Maddon's store by himself,Well, Brad needed some alone time.
He asked for it. You know, we tried to cater to our employees
when we can. But yeah,the idea was a couple of things.
We wanted to go last year andit was in Louisville. Couldn't make that

(10:13):
happen. And then this year wesaw it was in Nashville, and Missy
and I were like, well,we've never been to Nashville. And then
you know, John chimed in,well, I've never been to Nashville,
and you know, and then soall of a sudden, all you know,
me and Missy and John Sherry allmade a trip to Nashville. Kind
of the hope. You know,you want to be on the and I'm
sure Ken's the same way you wantto be. You don't want to be

(10:33):
behind, you want to be ahead. Do you want to see what's coming?
You don't want to find out,you know, from somebody else's social
media channel, which just happened tome. It's like, oh, look
at this new thing that came outand I'm like, what that? Where
did that come from? Right?So kind of the idea was to go
out there and see what was newand coming up. And it wasn't exactly
what I hoped for. It was, uh not the biggest it was.

(10:56):
It was a big show, though, I think, but I guess we
you know, it's all and alot of a lot of what we're doing
too is building relationships and talking topeople on the phone and talking through email
is one thing, but meeting peopleface to face and actually, you know,
having a beer with somebody. Andgod, there was one vendor out
there he's got a really cool machinethat that actually it's a you So you

(11:18):
got your outdoor fridge and then I'msure you've seen it restaurants, but he
made one for home use that yougot all your bottles under in your in
your fridge, and then he's gota tap with like seven buttons and like
you know, whiskey, vodka,mixed drinks, wine, whatever. Yeah,
so it's just really cool. Butfor your house, for your house,
yeah, yeah, yeah, thatwas pretty cool. You know,

(11:41):
there's some little install tricks we gotto figure out, but so that was
one thing. And you know,of course the guy saw John n.
Kevin and was like, you know, hey, you guys want some bourbon?
No, no, but but itactually turned into a really good conversation
with this guy from New Jersey that'sdoing some really cool stuff. But yeah,
I don't really trust myself with theability to pour bourbon with a button

(12:05):
pulse from You know. What's interestingis that one of the things which kind
of I had to giggle about.You got to clean those lines too,
I would assume. So at unit's a lot of straight grain alcohol.
Throom do you really need? It'snot like you sound like beer. I
don't. Do you really need to? I don't know. I think it's
a question. You want to cleanthem if you change brands, for sure,
Yeah, you're overthinking it. Wellno, like no, I'm obsessed

(12:30):
with and it all goes back.I go to yard host yardhouse a lot
in Saint Louis Parks to the radiostation, and it's uh like,'ro
out of least resistance. It's rightthere. Yeah, correct, they have
what do they say, one hundredand forty beers on tap or whatnot.
But there will be and I'm notsaying this as a slight, but it's
the crowd. It's the heavy rotationin the world. You put two three,

(12:52):
you give them, you know,two three six kegs or whatnot,
and maybe two months later they're there'sanother brewery on there. Then two three
months later there's another brewery on there. And if I'm you, I would
be asking those sorts of questions,like are you cleaning the line, because
I'm you know, I'm producing alagger for you. Yep, this is

(13:13):
crisp, this is clean. Ican't taste I don't want to taste some
porter. Yep that was on thatline a week ago. I don't that
that can't happen and for me tryingto sell this beer, and so I'm
just and and there's you know,there's like Pilsner Erkel that's probably been on
tap for six months. There,you mean hearth Lear Erkel. That's it's

(13:39):
all the same. But but Iwould be worried about that. I would
think about that. You'd want themto clean the lines for sure. I
mean we clean our lines weekly.So yeah, I've definitely had that happen
where I would go and have abeer at whatever kind of beer was.
I think it was a half ofice in somewhere and it was very like
peppery. Right. I'm like,this isn't the no way, this is

(14:00):
right, and they just simply justquick change the keg had ajlapeno cream ale
or something on that line, andthen just put the new beer on.
And so you're drinking and you're like, it can't just be at I p
a. It's gotta be some halopeniocream. I'm into it. Oh man,

(14:22):
I'm into all of it. I'mjust saying that the transition in the
spectrum of taste, it had tobe something so glaring and obvious. Well,
that's like if we have that wemade like like I tweeted out,
we made that bacon beer the onekeg deal. So every Friday we do
a one off keg and then Fridayfunked up Friday. It's called X by
the way, Sorry, I'll callit Twitter tweeter tweeter, you know,

(14:46):
speaking to Mancato. I still getit when when we talk on the radio
show, I will always say MankatoState. That's never going to change.
It was Mankato State when I grewup in Mankato. I get people when
I talk about MAVs hockey down there. I will get people that aggressively attack
me on our text line in thestate. It's Minnesota State, Main Cato.

(15:07):
I think you're grand. I knowwhat the hell it is. Yeah,
you're grand. Okay. I wasborn at Emmanuel Saint Joe's. I
slum to the Hoover Elementary Garfield theDakota Meadows through West Okay. I've walked
that Veteran's Bridge home after too manybeers from the circle many times. I'm
very, very familiar with the withthe area. But but you keep chewing

(15:28):
from Elementary from the circle on theHoover day that was the Pride to Colony
Court, Colony Court and Upper northMan Kiddo, sounds fancy. Yeah,
I would clean your lines and ifyou and if you do buy one of
those things from the home show orwhatever that you were at in Nashville.
Yeah, I'd still clean the lines, right, It's better safe than sorry.
Yeah, sure, No, Iwas kind of half joking about that,

(15:50):
but well I completely clamped on thewhole thing. It just it just
popped in my head. Just yourdirty lines can ruin a beer, but
definitely so. But but that whenyou were talking about this guy that made
this, That's what I was curiousabout, Like can a rube like me
go and learn about cool stuff?Because I think innovation I think is super

(16:10):
interesting in the barbecue industry. Andit feels like, you know, there's
a lot of subtlety in that regard, you know, whether it's you think
about like the Traggers kind of redoingthe electronic interface of their products and things
you just think about kind of thosebaby steps while still offering some of the
same basics and building off of thatfoundation, Like how innovative can you get

(16:33):
within the industry? You know what'sinteresting these The other thing we saw out
there is like we went out therelooking for innovation and that we learned something
else. What the other thing wesaw is saturation, okay, like where
things are getting so like everybody afterCOVID, I think everybody was like,
oh my god, I gotta havethis, that and the other thing.
And this year was obvious. Themost obvious thing was the europiece ovens.

(16:56):
Everybody like all these gas girls madeanything. I don't care, like you
know now Brio that we sell They'vegot a fire pit accessory. Yep,
that's a pizza oven and it's justpizza ovens are absolutely exploding. And then
then you start to wonder, youknow, you know and that when that
hits a peak? Yeah? Yeah, And and is that good for the

(17:18):
market? Is it? You know? I always say competition is good,
but then when you see that muchsaturation of one thing, then I start
to wonder, Well, now,you know, I'll say this like and
and you know me because I'm I'min your spot way too often and you
can kick me out anytime. Bythe way, you haven't kicked me out
yet. You just know you justpush that button at a jet button and

(17:41):
I'm gone. But Rondo is stillhere. Can you are you working a
heavy rotation? Can you swing overto the northern fire? And he looks
like a guy that knows more thanone joke. Hold, So I'm yeah,
I'm out on I'm out on dealingwith Ron. But but what what
I'm getting at though, is likeI love I love Yoder Smokers. You

(18:03):
know, I'm obsessed with that sixforty and I need to have that in
my life and I hopefully sooner thanlater, will It's it's a beautiful it's
it's a piece of art. Yeah. So with the Yoda though, you
know, they they've had to respondto a lot of that. You get
the pizza of you can get thepizza of an attachment now with a lot
of these things. And that's I'mkind of with you though, where you

(18:26):
know, at some point, howmany pizza is you gonna make? Are
you making one once a month?Are you making one once a week?
Like that sort of thing. Soyeah, and then and then speaking,
you know, using the word innovation, you know, several times over the
last couple of minutes, like howhow space age does that get? How
different? I love you guys?Have one there? That's you know,

(18:47):
it's it's gas propelled, so youcan you can hook gas up to it,
I believe others. Yeah, theGosny, Yeah, and you can
with the Alpha Italian made pizza ovenstoo, but yeah, those look beautiful,
by the way, Like if anything you're buying that you'll make some
pizzas and you need seven people.Don't think you're gonna move it anytime soon.

(19:07):
But once you get it in place, yeah, that's a beautiful thing.
I had a customer to tell meshe you know, apparently she was
not at all in a bad neighborhood, but she was like, you know,
I don't know if I can leavethat outside, somebody might take it.
And I'm like, nobody is takenthat thing. You know, it's
fur hunderd pounds, you know,it's it's it's a big deal. But
but yeah, it's a it.Well, you guys had that incident recently

(19:30):
recently, and you know, thatwas kind of that was kind of my
thought, just to be clear thatone of our neighbors had a little,
uh somebody helped to themselves to acouple of castorers and five in the morning,
you know, in front of basicallygodd and everybody. And yeah,
it's but I just sucks, butit absolutely sucks, and it's it's yeah,

(19:55):
there's we can go a different directionwith that anytime. But in some
ways, some amost like you gotto tip your cap. If you can
watch on the security camera someone tryand figure out how to steal a nine
hundred Yeah, yeah, if theyfigure out how to do that, then
you know, in some ways,it's almost like they've earned it, you
know, I've it's funny because weyou know, miss you know, I

(20:17):
have an outlaw that you know,oh good for me, but uh well
it's on twenties with spinners. It'sa little decadent, it's a little ostentatious.
Yeah, a little, but youknow, we've we've left that out
overnight. Missy's like, what ifhe takes to them? Like, man,
if they take it, they earnedit. They earned it. I
mean if you can get out ofmy neighborhood with a six hundred pound grill,

(20:38):
thus you know it's on wheels,but yeah, camera with the toast
trap and you know my two I'vegot two hundred and thirty pound dogs that
might you know notice, so goodluck, but security detail they're watching over
it. Yeah for sure, that'swhy I just have an old classic Weber

(20:59):
at my at my place, oldkettle. It's just that they call it.
I don't know. It's just anold black Weber, like classic grill.
I don't know. You know whoEber made like fifteen different colors,
right, I'm sure they did.Yeah, I don't know. I went
to the black one. Yeah,that's classic coral blue. It's beautiful.
That was. That was I'm tellingme. In the seventies, I made

(21:21):
some really cool shit. I'm olderthan you guys, that's true. Yeah,
like two three years. But everyone'sowned a black Weber grill at some
point in their life. It's fantasticand it works and it's easy. Yeah,
And I don't know how to cook. I'm not a grill guy.
Maybe I'll learn more as we goon through this podcast. But I can
make pork chops on that bad boy, that's for sure. All right.

(21:44):
Let me ask you this. Letme ask you this because while you were
in Nashville learning about Gosh, Iwant to I want to go. I
want to I want to go toa trade show like that sometimes. But
hey, I was texting one inLas Vegas. Next week I'm out on
Vegas two weeks. I'm out,two weeks, I'm out on Vegas.
Went there for the Vikings game.Five days is too long to be in

(22:07):
Las Vegas, and it completely spoiledit for me during the football season having
the Raiders there combined with there wasa rodeo in town. So I'm bumping
into ten gallons, stets and everyeverywhere. But those you and I talked
about those those gals dressed to thenines. Those those those cowgirls. We
tip, we tip our had tothe cow gals. There's there's no doubt
about saying, you know, andthe and the and then you're ft do

(22:30):
it? I mean those those cowboys, I will say, like, it's
not like you and I like,you know, you you wore button up
shirt today, you were you werekind of you were dressed. You are
like fancy today. Yeah, itis what you know, those kinds they
don't mess around. Man. Theygot the belts, the belt buckets.
We were getting on the plane,all these guys had their their hat boxes.

(22:52):
All the dudes with hat boxes.Of course, like you know,
I feel bad taking my baseball hatand jamming it into my suitcase. I'm
like, these guys are they're they'refor real man. Oh so when you
travel, you do bring extra hats, don't you? I do that because
I do. Yeah, you know, you don't know if it's gonna be
a hardcore carnivore kind of hat kindof day exactly Northern fire of course,

(23:12):
but you know, some meat churchhere and there. But no, I
just don't know. If I'm gonefor any longer than three days. I
have at least three to four hatsin my carry on, all baseball caps
right, all talked and you know, shammed into. Yep, the move
I think the move is to take. If it's a snapback, you hook

(23:33):
it to your backpack, right,just all you can put two or three
on your one backpack on the handleloop. There, it's a move.
I do that all the time.Then it's it's it's an aspect of public
Now I'm exposing, don't be notonly the fact that that I am.
I mean there, There's isn't anessence of laziness that I'm that I'm showing,
is it? You know? Themale pattern baldness factor isn't working out

(23:56):
well for me, looking for lookingfor have a pattern. But I'm all
out on to think about a hairsponsor by the way, I think.
But people with people with fashion,people that understand like they're they're going for
an image and they nail it.Yeah, the three the three hats on
the back back bring maybe maybe there'sa special a special type of hat,

(24:18):
you know when it like the kangarooof caps, or you know something the
cavy hat type of vibe, Sothey'll bring a fedora that sort of thing.
I'm just bringing three to four freehats that I got from various people.
I do it. You might havea color scheme that works with one
of the eight free T shirts thatI'm wearing. Over the course there's a

(24:38):
three or four day trip. There'sno reason to be ashamed of rocking the
hats, all right. I Ihave a beautiful head of hair. I'll
say that. I'm I'm spoiled.You do actually for a forty year old
man, terrific hair. Oh youshould see it's freaking it's taking hat off.
Look at that Look at it isluscious locks. Here are you?

(25:00):
You're just hiding that from the marriedman? Is my wife? My wife?
My wife to the catwalk. Lookat that hair. She's always pissed
when I wear hats all the time. But I like that you're keeping the
gray though, why don't you letthat go? I'm this is pretty long
for me right now. I'm lazy, so I'm a hand. See here's

(25:21):
if if I could grow here,and I've got the brim hat though I
can't do the head hair, thecurve it. I've got the facial hair.
But yeah, your beard is Igot a patchy beard. Do you
have an awesome Thank God? BecauseI mean, if I could reverse it,
i'd be you know, Sebastian BachAnd if you've seen him, he
would look like me with long hair. Right. See that's where see so

(25:41):
you have a terrific beard. Youhave a terrific head of hair. Thanks.
I have nothing. No, Igot I got patches, I got
issues, Molly, And in lifeyou're talking about like personalel assets. No,
in life, I'm fantastic. Butyou have great button up shirt style.

(26:02):
So that's good. Well I don't. The only reason I don't button
it up is it gets tight.Well, I just think it's great.
Like drink in the wash. Ihonestly I asked the shirt shrank. Yes,
I tell everybody, I'm trying tothink, like the last time I've
seen you not wearing a hoodie.This is impressive. Thanks for dressing up
for the occasion here at hoodie season, hanging out here at heavy rotation,

(26:22):
you dress up for us. Ilike warmon here to be out here we
go. It's a little freezing still, so don't worry about man. Yeah
what yeah? So what were youdoing today? So he was in Nashville
doing barbecue stuff. I was busyjust living life, doing Radio nine and
doing on the fan. What thehell were you doing today? I was
at a beer event out in Buffaloat Hayes Public House. Cool little spot

(26:42):
if you haven't checked it out.But there was like thirteen buries there,
twenty five ish different beers, allone off stuff that was only available today.
But it was outside and it's cold, so so outside for about four
hours sampling beer to people. I'mstill kind of trying to warm up.
But I wonder how this this winterhas is there? Was? Is it

(27:07):
on? Is it? Wa?Zetta? Might be Lake Minnetaka. They
do like a chili open canceled chilicontent. Well no, but that's the
thing is all this stuff that usuallyis happening out on the lakes are either
canceled or moved certainly impacted some waynegatively, yep, while we all celebrated
not having to shovel the driveway.Yeah, no, it was a fun

(27:29):
event though. We made. Wehave an English Dark Mile coming out pretty
soon. English Dark Miles a veryvery nice beer. We'll go over that
more when it comes out. Butwe mix it with a little bit of
cold press, some salted caramel andcoconut and it was a hit. People
loved it. We ran out ofthe beer. So that sounds like something
you could put in a rib wrap. And that's what I was getting to,

(27:51):
because let's do some beer and ribs. No. So he's down in
Nashville, Kent, and they're doingtheir thing, totally get it and just
exchanging text messages and what's going on. They're sending me pictures from this from
uh, you know, their versionof the strip on Broadway there in Nashville.
Kid, And I'm making ribs onMonday and this whole, this whole
thing popped in my head. Iknow how to make ribs, you know

(28:15):
how to drink beer. I knowhow to drink beer, and it just
popped in my head. It's like, Okay, what if I tossed a
little bit of this bells too heartedin the rib rap, And he couldn't
have been more. He was sooffended, angered by it that he's using
He's using all caps, and Iwas just saying to myself, somebody,

(28:36):
somebody has used beer in a ribrap and it's had to have tasted fantastic.
I'm not talking about like grabbing asix or a Dad's schlitz. I'm
not talking about that. I meanI've seen people like do the spray bottles
on pork butts and ribs and allthat with like apple juice or whatever.
Why couldn't I use apple cider vinegar? Mostly, why couldn't you do beer

(28:57):
to keep it moist? And could? Yeah, you know, keep in
mind, I'm a competition dip ship. So we we go into everything and
you're back a lot from a fewdays ago. He told me, I'm
an idiot. Well, I meanthat is not truated actually say that.
No, But I loved your Iloved your quote. You're like, I

(29:18):
don't prefer my ribs boiled. Yeah, well, you know Minnesota, that
might be a popular item, butuh it, it might work. I
don't know. They want way tofind out. Let me let me back
up a few years there was aoh god, Dustin Reese hogline I believe
was using not squirt. What wasthe other one like soda you're talking about?

(29:42):
Yah? Yeah, yeah it wasFresco? No, god, dang
it anyway, was Dusty was dumpinggreat? Yeah? Into a rip rap?
So I don't know, maybe maybeit's going to be my year.
It's going to be you know,I say, I say, I say,
into it rap. I bet itwould say it like. I don't
know if I would soak it likeyou're saying to like the boil aspect or

(30:03):
whatever. But I think if yousprayed it on there, like just replace,
you're out. And again I don'tI'm not a grill guy. I'm
not a smoke guy, all right. So we got a challenge. I
think this is our first. Uh. I gotta find the right beer.
You gotta make it, yeah,probably want with a lot of fly.
I think like heavier you do,like a probably a really maulty one Minty's.

(30:27):
Yeah. So it's funny because likeMissy and I own a barbecue sauce
companies too lucky nineteen that that we'vegot four sauces, and oh good for
us, but in those sauces,in every one of those sauces, the
it's beer. So there's beer inevery single one of them. Pablo Honey

(30:47):
has so here we go, nosecond mber in it. So it's not
like it doesn't work with barbecue we'vegot. There's there's beer in every one
of my sauces. And Missy who'sgluten free, is like, oh great,
because there's beer in all of oursauces. But yeah, it could
work. I'm not gonna say it'snot gonna work. Here's what we do.
We set up some smokers out here. You bring some ribs. You
guys pick a beer. Each ofyou pick a different beer. See which

(31:10):
one would work? All right?And then yeah, just Ken, you
got to pick up his six hundredpounds smoker. You got to bring bring
them Danchor, Michigan's got to makea trip. Let's just throw them on
the webers. Old school, oldschool, let's see how good you guys
really are. Oh man, thatthat hurts my feelings because I would suck.
I am such a big baby.I'm so spoiled. Yeah, it's

(31:33):
like they're like, you guys gottago all by Field. And we talked
about trying to run a contest likethat with just a bunch of old school
equipment, you know, and thenreally throw down on who can cook.
That would be fun. Actually,yep, yeah, stay tuned. We
that's a really good idea. Yeah, well I think you could do it.
It doesn't even have to be oldschool. We could do a local,
local ribs bit of some sort.That that part's easy. Why do

(31:59):
we Why do we have to challengeourselves? I don't know, Like,
oh I had a question, Iget it. I get in my comfort
zone with you know, whether it'sI got that tragger and then I got
the anchor, like those are mythose are my babies, those are my
kids. We keep going back tothose carnitas that I did a couple of
weeks ago, and it's like Igrew up in New Mexico and that,

(32:19):
like cooking outdoors is just kind ofthe way we lived, and I missed
that because now I'm in this competitionvein where we're constantly doing kind of the
same thing all the time, andI miss I miss having variety. So
we need to get that. No, I think I do think, though
you challenge, you should challenge yourselfwith when's the last time. I know

(32:40):
A last podcast asked you, guys, what's the worst thing you've ever made
on a trigger or whatever? Keepthinking, So I'm gonna I'm gonna say,
like, challenge yourself and make somethingon make something on the weber.
Let's go old school, you know, like I said, I can.
Would you do the charcoal ring whereyou keep it all to the outside the
snake don't give don't give away secrets, so it's not a secret. I've

(33:02):
never heard of that in my life. That's a common I'm sure there's only
live. Yeah, you just wantto you want to keep it away from
the direct heat and kind of slowit down a little bit. I said,
I'll make the pork chops. That'sabout it. I could throw some
dogs on the on the old weatherthere too, burgers. I can do
that kind of stuff. You reallykilled my spirit because I was going to

(33:25):
try it. See when I texted, you should try it and tell us
it was awesome, because I wasI was looking. I was looking for
affirmation. If you're looking for approvalfrom us, this is ridiculous. Yeah,
why do you need approval like you'rethe expert. You're the expert.
No, I was thinking I wouldhave run it. You should have run
it, and and you, Imean this year, I could have been

(33:49):
cooking with what was it little MillerLite? What no to? You said,
Bell's too hearted? Yeah, bellstoo hard? My jam all season.
We got better stuff for you.No, I think. Whatever you
need for beer and you want todo something, let me know, we'll
take care of you. We're gonnacook some ribs and spill some beer on
him and see how it goes.So what I did I did, I'll
tell you this. I grabbed lightField Barbecue. I think they're local,

(34:15):
right, yeah, yeah, yeah, what are the Farmington? Farmington?
Farmington, are Lakeville one or theother? And I use them on one
of the racks. Dude, theirsauce is pretty damn guy. So that's
another beer barbecue sauce. Guy,he's he's really into beer and he's got
some uh uh. He's a trendhere in twenty four carrot or twenty four

(34:35):
k I think they call it.It looks like a mustard sauce, but
it doesn't taste like it. Thatstuff is. He's got something going on.
I said, we've tried a lotof stuff, and he brought his
stuff in and we were like,yeah, well, you know, we'll
try and get back to you.And we were all like, holy crap,
Like you know, so I've triedthere. I've tried there. They
just have this small batch BBQ.That's I think that's just I think that's

(35:00):
all they do is small batch.But but it's now but we blow them
up. So I have their Ihave their regular barbecue sauce, and then
I have their mustard barbecue sauce.Yeah, the mustard though it's not really
mustard. The mustard kicks ass,but they're but they're regular barbecue sauce is
super good and there's this little pepperyvibe to it, but it's not overwhelming.

(35:21):
Yeah, which which for me,I'm always I'm one of those people
that's always looking to step up theheat, like I want like a couple
of beads of sweat on my brow. But if I'm cooking for my eight
year olds, you're gonna lose theirdamn mis have you, guys, I
don't need to deal with that.But the but the light Field, he
does a really good job. It'sawesome stuff. I'm not sure if you
guys have ever heard of this barbecuesauce and this is kind of a shout

(35:43):
out to one of our mutual friends. It's fantastic Sweet Baby Rays. I
ever heard of it? Oh,they're new, they're up and coming.
It's one of my fans. Theydo a reduced I think they do a
reduced calorie one. Yeah, thereshould be a movie about sweety Sweet Baby
Rays. Let me how many beershave I had too? Yeah? What's
the what's the ABV on these things? You're doing? Final Finals? I

(36:06):
can't I can't even say Sweet BabyRay that lean into it, definitely leaned
into it. That's probably the Seltzer. That Seltzer hit the Sweet Baby Rays.
So his son is a guy namedDuke who for a I don't think
he's doing anymore, but he usedto cook competition. Is a really nice
guy. But so he got boughtout by I want to say it's craft.

(36:27):
I'm probably wrong, but one ofthose one of the uh half a
ton of money, I'm sure itis. It was. I mean,
he was just so far ahead ofhis time, like forget about like Famous
Davis does our own thing and they'rethey have good stuff too, But he
he absolutely knocked it out of thepark for like taking a brand and selling

(36:49):
it for a profit was just likethe numbers were insane. I mean,
that's got to be one of thenumber one selling barbecue sauces we have in
a country, right, we haveit in our house, And I mean
I'm always curious about that game froma retail perspective. Now on your end
owning the store, you have,you have the combination. I mean,
you haven't gotten to the stage yetwhere I don't know, let's let's just

(37:14):
say it like meet Church, isn'tyou know, greasing you on the side
to get X y z amount ofspace. So that's the thing is is
the combination of sales combined in thegrocery store world, which I as an
outsider, but you can notice howobvious it is when you'll find smaller companies

(37:40):
or certain companies that might be threefour five wide, and then some of
these larger ones. It's not justbecause they sell a bunch, but there's
also that relationship there that works thatthey have an end cap they have,
you know, so that so playingthat game, it's it's super interesting to
me. It seems to me likewhen you look out in the landscape,
if you look at a product thatyou make some assumptions about it being a

(38:05):
small or local or mom and pop. If you look behind the curtains,
a lot of times you find outthat they got bought out by like Craft
or something. It's like, youknow, and there are a lot of
things like the sauce business, sauceand rubs, a lot like pizza ovens.
It's it's getting really saturated. There'sa lot of people that are really
trying to get into it. Andthe only the one thing I would tell

(38:25):
everybody out there that's thinking about creatinga barbecue sauce brand or or or you
know, pork rub, you know, it's super saturated and very hard,
very hard to pend on. YeahI did. Yeah, so you and
I we were the seasoning. Wedid. We did lunch and then a
couple of beers at Northern Tap andPlymouth. Yep, this is my place.

(38:47):
I'm a fan of Northern Tap.Oh they're great, and Northern Northern
jam Ken and I were having beersand I was just just popped in my
head like how cool it would bebecause we we had, you know,
specifically with KFN. For instance,there was a beer with with our name
on it and that had its dayand then it ran its course and and

(39:10):
it was an awesome relationship that wehad with the brewery. But the idea
of doing a rub, I wasso excited and he he gassed up.
I mean, I was just Iwas on fire about this. This is
the most brilliant thing ever. I'mnot saying it and be done. And
whether it was a sauce, itwas a rub. You know. I'm
I'm I'm suddenly becoming a chemist withthis. I'm going to go home talk

(39:34):
about I got all the spices outand and I'm going to you know,
I'm in the lab. I haveeverything but a lab code. I'll put
the goggles on and I'm going toput together the greatest rub ever. I
love it. You know, meetChurch my ass you know, and they're
and they're great, but but youknow what I'm saying. So so I'm
going to be the deck beat Church. And I thought that for about forty

(39:54):
five minutes, which was about halfthe drive. Half of it was the
drive I'm down to your store,and then the other half was waiting to
tell you about my idea. Sofor about forty five minutes, I thought
I was brilliant and it's like,are you stupid? Remember that you really
want to get in to them.Think it was that bad. It's just
a really really tough game. Youstarted hitting me with with some cost related

(40:19):
bits and then you know again,and we were talking about there's some marketing
related bits to it as well,very father like, and yeah, it
was yeah, and you just ruinedmy Christmas well because I told I was
like, I came up. Iwas like, oh, you guys should
collab on it. And I thinkyou're like, I like a spicy rubb
or whatever, and I said thename should be Nordic fire right, and
I like it. I like it. I didn't know about that. That

(40:39):
never got thrown my way. Soit's the tires were pumped, Aaron,
My tires were pomped. I wasso excited about this, and it just
you came crashy down with a paletteof bricks on my head and said,
it's not not impossible. It's justyou know, from running our sauce company

(41:00):
kind of like you know, whenwe started it, I had my full
time gig at three m and threekids, and you know it's hard to
do both and you've got young kids, and yeah, now I've got two
businesses that I'm trying to run simultaneously. It's it's really hard. It's a
and I'm not saying, you know, there are a lot of guys out
there, you know, like lightField, they're probably gonna they'll probably do

(41:22):
great. You know, it reallydepends on how much you can focus,
Like like Ken, if you weretrying to you know, if you're working
a fifty hour week job somewhere elsetrying to do this too. Yeah,
Yeah, it's a tough deal.Like like Ken, what would you so
for the audience out there as somebodythat's like, you know, I've been

(41:43):
making the best you know, semicoupers light in my garage for five years.
I'm going to open a brewery.What would you tell them about that?
Probably the same thing you're telling Ericabout. Like it, the idea
is awesome. You might might bethe best homebre you've ever had or whatever.
Yeah, it's a lot more workthan you think it is, and
it's a lot more expensive than itis than you think it is. Yeah,

(42:06):
I mean, I don't know something, and I don't know anything about
the seasoning world or whatever. Idon't know how much it would how much
you'd have to make, Like,do you have to buy like ten thousand
shakers of seasoning? Well, youprobably want a volume. I mean you
probably want all you mean, yeah, the more volume, the cheaper prices
your unit costs. It's not terrible, but it's not it's not nothing either.

(42:28):
So you know, So two hundredand fifty pounds, how much is
in the average because you can tellin the in the business, So it's
the twelve ounce is really the commonyou can even tell. I'm sure a
lot of these places, whether it'sco packers, et cetera, they have
the same companies. We're gonna goback to our education anymore. Two hundred
and fifty pounds, how many ouncebottles? How many containers? Is that?

(42:49):
How many entires? Who can doit? First? Wow? Let's
see here, Okay, we're scramblingto fifty times sixteen twelve? Well they're
doing that dot check it out.That's three hundred and thirty three and a
third units, is what it is. And fifty pounds that's really not that
many. No, it's I likeI said, but keep in mind,
at that rate, you're gonna paya premium because you're low volume. Sure,

(43:13):
so the co packer's not gonna makea lot so in order for them
to justify their time, unless you'regonna make it in your basement, which
and then you get into Minnesota foodlaw and all that's right, it gets
more complicated. So let's say itcosts you four bucks a jar, right,
three hundred and thirty three. Youthink the state would have any problem,
Like you're making your your seasoning.Then there's there's just like a the

(43:34):
state's awesome, like a bag oflays, and then like a PlayStation four
sitting next to it, kids allrunning around, just sitting on the coffee
table. No, Minnesota doesn't havea lot of long own it's not illegal,
it's not an illegal powder. Butsomething's up. Something's happening on that
coffee table. I mean, Isuppose you could rent out, like there's
a lot of food trucks that useyeah, like rental kitchens or whatever you

(43:57):
like. But but blending dry rubsis not necessarily a commercial kitchen jam.
It's different equipment. Sure, veryfew people do it. And it goes
back into the you got a fulltime job, you got the kids,
you got the wife. You're notgonna find yourself in a little kitchen.
Wait, wait, wait, wait, waite, see you guys, Actually
I do not I do not havea full time. That's true. That's

(44:19):
right, you're on the radio.I forgot about that nine and noon.
It's not I've been hearing that forout of there at twelve oven forget.
I get told that a story timethe old Cafe in a little bit.
So we were lucky enough to spenda little time with Door to Kfan and
and we do our bit. We'releaving and Common is walking in and literally

(44:43):
his intro music is playing, Ohyeah, and Common is walking down the
hall like and you know, AndI always joked about the fact that he's
like, does no preparation. Hewas smooth rolling in like he probably was
on air three seconds after I passedthem in the hall. It's like I
should have done radio, man.Oh man. It's it's a fun and

(45:07):
unique thing that I get to do. So when you say, yeah,
you're working forty to fifty hours,I'm thinking to myself in a month,
maybe, yeah, I don't likethat sounds miserable. Now, you know,
I'm watching you know the wild,Yeah, you all that stuff.
I'm watching you know A good jobtonight, Well in four in a row.
But how the hell they blow thatin the last two minutes? Poohm,

(45:29):
I kid and I don't. Idon't. I don't have any grueling
existence. Like I said earlier,what is it you say you do around
here? Yeah, it's it's it'snot a lot. I manage mood swings.
I do a fair amount of babysitting, I find, you know,
we try to. We try tokeep up with the host as well.
I do, and I like it. And it's forty five segments a week.

(45:51):
And you know, at least asof now that the paychecks, the
paychecks continue to cash. So butI was thinking, I was so excited
about this, and you completely absolutely. I think I think you guys should
collab. What we needed an investory. If you're looking to invest in anything,
reach out to Heavy Rotation Brewing.Can you can email me personally.

(46:12):
I can at heavy Rotation Brewing dotcom. I'll make sure these guys get
any info they need. We're takinginvestors in Nordic Fire. Nordic Fire like
trademarked it already, it's not soyou gotta call it Nordic fire and not
make it super spicy because it's youknow, it's still got a little heat
to it, but it's very Oh, let's do the opposite where it's like

(46:32):
mild, because it's I don't know, what the hell do I know?
Nordic fire would be like black pepper. Sure, because I even talked about,
like how do you tie in somelike is there like a purple seasoning
that you can put in there?Like? Yeah, so there's like a
Viking stick you guys, well theygot they got those big mugs there.
What are you gonna do? Whatare you gonna do? I was tempted,

(46:55):
Yeah, and I was so excitedwithout places like the can Like,
if we didn't have places like this, so many dreams would die on the
kitchen table. Well, how manygreat ideas have been proposed, have been
brought up? Uh, you knowthe brainchild of of innovation as we were

(47:15):
talking about earlier, over a coupleof lean into its. Yeah, I
mean that's the dreams, the perfectenvironment. Yeah, you gotta you gotta
wash away, not tensions, yougotta wash away the apprehension. You gotta
wash away maybe a fair amount ofthe common sense and then come up with
the ideas. That's when the lightturns on and you never know until you
try no, I agree. That'sa lot of us. A lot of

(47:38):
us were created in the same fashion. So right, yeah, exactly over
a couple of years. I haveit on sense go out the window.
I have it on good authority thatI was conceived on a Tuesday lunch break.
So there wasn't even alcohol involved.This was actually on purpose, which

(47:58):
is kind of weird. Hey,I okay, on purpose on too,
because look at a lunch I don'tknow. That's my dad. My dad
was on a mission. Your dadthe accountant, right, yeah, call
him up, get him on theshow. Ye who you got to hear
about this? Let's let's cold callhim right now. It's been kind of
weird, Like, you know,my dad straight, straight laced? Is

(48:22):
Eric career? Guys? Eric Norwegianfor lunch break? You know, in
some conversations spend Norwegian for mistake.I can tell you that I could spend
Norwegian for regret. Man. Somereligions of you know, the malignant one
I think is is how it's beenframed up almost depending upon depending upon who

(48:45):
you're talking to. Uh, letme hit you with this ken. Yeah.
So in the brewery business, youknow, we're talking about seasonings and
stuff. And people. There willbe trends and you know, flavor chasing
and all of that, and guyslike me again, you know, trying
to up that level of heat withthat, you know, finding that sweet

(49:07):
spot of of that in the barbecuebusiness. But on the brewery side,
what are breweries have to chase fromtime to time? I mean earlier talking
to you know, kind of theidea of it's not it's not necessarily a
bad thing, but but in alot of ways you do in the effort
of accommodating customers, you're going tohave to offer the Seltzer option. You're
going to offer a reduced country roadshow about ron You're talking but but the

(49:34):
but the idea of, you know, you have to chase things when somebody,
you know, somebody will come upwith one thing that becomes super popular
and then it's just the locusts youall have to swarm you and and I
do say you have to because ina lot of ways, it'll become the
most popular thing and something everyone's kindof looking for. Yeah, I mean,
and it's definitely anything right now currentlyit's it's the Hayes craze, right,

(49:59):
So anything haz Ronny, anything,hazy, people love write anything hoppy
all that stuff. So yeah,and there's trends right like, so for
for a while there, I don'tknow if you guys have ever heard of
like a smash I p A rightwhere it was single malt, single hop.
So that was kind of like thatwas the craze for a little while.

(50:19):
Nitros thing Brute I pas were athing for a hot minute, Like
Brute cologne. Well it was justlike a super trus Yeah, it's like
super dry, like bone dry Ip A yep, exactly right, So
they were kind of chasing that andthen it you know that. I mean,
big brands were doing like huge volumesof it and it would just didn't

(50:40):
It lasted for maybe three months.But you kind of go with what people
ask for, right, I Mean, we're in the business of giving people
what they want. You try,Like, Josh was a killer job of
doing a bunch of old school stylesthat are just not going to go away.
That would like he wants to makesure that people realize like, hey,
there's trendy uf, but there's alsojust beer that tastes like Josh here

(51:02):
too. Yeah, he was ata show tonight at First Ab after that
event we were at. Otherwise hewould have been here. But no,
it's you're always chasing what what thecustomer says back to you're probably doing the
same thing. We're doing innovation.You're trying to see what's coming. Well,
it's cool too, you're probably moreon the leading edge. You're hoping
to innovate, you're hoping to bethe first one out the gate. In

(51:24):
my industry, it's a little harder. Yeah. And the new thing now
we had one couple of days oryesterday, the cold I p as right,
those are a thing. Bacon,smoked bacon. Yeah, that's uh.
You slow played this on on smokebacon beer. And here we are.
You know we were going to behere today. You guys are going
to be here today. Every Friday, we yesterday and I know every Friday

(51:45):
we put a one off beer on. We call it punked Up Friday.
We talked about it whatever, butor planning, Yeah, I thought I
thought it was for us. Wherewere you guys yesterday? You were what
you were done work at noon?I know where he was yesterday. I
was on with my part time jobat eleven fifty four am. Yeah,

(52:05):
okay, with your part time Waita minute, was it yesterday? You
two Yahoo showed up after Hello,Well, hold on, is this thing
on? Was wasn't it? Wasit yesterday or two days ago? It
was yesterday? It was yesterday?Yeah, okay. For those listening,
that was what do you do?What do you do with this? So
I'm gonna use I'm gonna use yesterdayand we're not going to we're not gonna

(52:30):
say the name. So the thingwith craft breweries is you're gonna try all
kinds of things. You're gonna havetonovation. You're absolutely gonna have hits and
misses. Yep. And that that'sa I mean, that's an inevitable thing.
That's and frankly, I think ifI think if you're into drinking beer

(52:52):
and trying different things, that's kindof the experience. That's that's part of
the ticket for the ride. Soyou're gonna have good beers, bad beers,
et cetera. But we also we'veall been to enough breweries where even
the missus like you still get itright, you still understand whether it's a
style. Last week we were drinkingthe Vienna. Well, there are good

(53:14):
Viennas, there are bad Viennas.But you kind of get it right and
you see the direction of it.Well, once in a while you'll go
to a brewery and it's just absoluteit's off. Yeah, it's pure cleaning
solution. And so what's the etiquettewhen it comes to in this particular place

(53:35):
that I'm talking about, by theway, that's a brewery that gets it.
That's a brewery where this is anabsolute outline character. That's correct because
they have awesome beers and they're consistentlygood beers. And even if, again
you know me personally, I don'tlike a particular beer, it's not because
it's awful. It just didn't hitme the way that it might hit somebody

(53:58):
else. Yes, you finished it, but this beer, this beer was
pure paint thinner. And so howdo you approach somebody what's the etiquette involved
in saying, hey, here's thedeal. You always hit home runs and
even your your bad hits are stilloff the wall extra bases. Something went

(54:20):
wrong here, and I'm not youknow, because these you know, it's
it's just like Josh. I thinkabout Josh, like Josh and my buddy.
I would be honest with him,like this is in my style,
But like, how do you howdo you approach somebody and be like,
something's wrong with this thing here andI'm worried about it, like what happened?
Yeah, and it is like,luckily I know the owners really well

(54:42):
of that place, so I didsend a text like hey, like IM
not sure if you notice or whatever, but this certain beer, it's not
there's something wrong. It wasn't.It's something handled. There's no chance that
he willingly put that out there.Well, you know, and honestly they
may have, which isn't a greatthing to do, but some people,

(55:05):
so it could have been innovation,it could have been something that would it
probably didn't. This was yeah,it probably just it wasn't up to their
standard that they wanted. But theyprobably like unfortunately, we have to sell
it kind of deal, right,which I would never do. And I'm
he didn't that I don't. I'mhoping that's not what they did. I'm
home beer back. I haven't andI'm pretty good buddies with this guy,

(55:27):
so I'm hoping that, uh,that he doesn't think that I was.
I'm hoping he went in today triedit and was like, oh, so
maybe think it so maybe I'll stopin there. And but there there,
there was what they're clothes now soI can say their name, but six
Win two Brewing, right, theymade it everyone knew that their beer wasn't
great. They had a lot ofoff waivers, all this stuff, and

(55:51):
they made it known that we knewthat our product was not up to par,
but we had to pay our bills, so we had to sell it.
And they thought doing that like arace to the bottom. They thought
doing that coming out and saying thatwas gonna be a good thing. So
they're gonna hit you with honesty.Yeah, and it didn't. It didn't

(56:12):
work that way, right because therewere people. Some people didn't know that
the beer wasn't great. So whenthey come on, like, wait a
minute, I always loved that beer. Now you're telling me that you sold
bad product willingly did that? Nota good look, and wow, hen's
why they're out of business, right. But yeah, like if you,
if you so, if I'm gonnahave I'm gonna have a rule. I'm
instituting my own rule rule where ifif I don't mention what I think about

(56:40):
a certain thing on the podcast,yeah, that probably means that I'm not
a huge fan of this particular thing. Oh correct, So the brewery that
we were at yesterday, I likethose guys a lot. Yep, good
guys. That particular beer it waskind of an l yep. So but
I'm not They're gonna be fine.You. I'm still like you muscle it

(57:01):
out. No, That's the thingis when you when you get a flight
of beers or in this case,I bought a pint, you always drink
the whole thing. Drake it.Returning a flight with half a beer in
it, even if you don't likeit, get over yourself. And just
so that's no. But but I'mnever going to bad mouth no somebody on

(57:23):
the podcast. So I'm just goingto not say anything about that other spot.
Sure, no, and that's cool. Like, but I think like
if you if you knew a place, like if you went too a place
and you're like, this isn't justnot my style? Yeah, picture picture
of them just open, I mean, just put a sign on the door.
Then yeah, the beer sucks,but it's here. Can we get

(57:44):
into the the meat of the matterwith the innovation that we talked about the
other day this you know, weara wristband, go in, you get
four ounces, you go to theback of the line. Yep, can
we talk about that, the beerwall thing. You know, I'm not
a fan of it. Beer wallstuff. I literally have never seen it.

(58:07):
I'll never see it. Uh Like, I would rather sit here with
Ron and shoot the ship and bitchabout the wild yep, you know,
and I'll throw you know, tenbucks Ron's way and you know, head
down the road. But there's zerochance I'm going to go up to a
machine and try to push a buttonlike you know when you're a kid mixing
diet coke with and dew. I'mnot doing that. Yeah, it's I

(58:30):
don't I don't know where this camefrom or by the way, that was
actually fun doing the suicide at thewith the drink with the fountain pop I
mean delicious, Okay, Soda madea living off of that. They basically
the guys at Holiday Station probably don'tgive a ship. But you know these
yeah, Ron and Tyler are workinghard. I mean yeah, when the
beer wall thing, it's it's Ireally don't get it. Whose idea was

(58:52):
that? I don't talk to him. I think the only place that it
would kind of be a fun idea. I think maybe I've said this before,
but is at the airport or themall of America right where it's like
you can bring all this stuff there, all these different breweries can come in
and do whatever. But some ofthese spots that are doing it with their
own products, it takes it takesaway from the whole brewery aspect of like

(59:16):
when you come in and you're like, what is it? What is uh?
What did you just order the countryroad Road? Yeah, if you
were to talk to Tyler Iron orany of our bar attenders to say,
hey, what is it like,they'll most likely give you a little sample,
they can talk you through it.They can do all that stuff,
and you have that interaction with anotherhuman. You're building a relationship, correct,
But to like go up to awall and it's like, well,

(59:37):
I don't even know if I likethis style. I don't know if I
like whatever, but I have tonow I'm on my own Okay. Well
that's that's kind of a grander trendthough. You know you mentioned the airport
there, there are several spots whereyou'll sit down. You actually there's somebody
you know standing right there. Yeah, you order off of an iPad all

(59:59):
yeah, why and I just askedhim for a beer? You know,
it's this invisible there. There's noteven there's not even a glass wall there.
There's he's right there. I couldjust say, hey, you know,
hook me up with the mugg StellaArtois please. I cannot say Stellar
toys, toys just to our toyslike time. Bring it back to Nashville.

(01:00:23):
That's the first airport I've been inwhere you can get a beer at
a restaurant and walk around. Ohreally, I didn't know that. So
they give you like I ordered abeer and I'm like, it's in a
plastic cup on the ingo street sidewith with beers in Nashville in the airport,
in the airport. So I was. I was sitting there at one
one of the restaurants or whatever,and I got the beer the guy put

(01:00:43):
in a plastic cup. I waslike, that's kind of chintzy. That's
in a plastic cup when we're atBut he's like, oh, you can
get up and you can you look, you looked messy to be that's true,
fair enough. I think the handit was it was pretty soft.
Though. I have to be ableto walk around the airport with a beer.
No, I do dig that.But but but getting back getting back

(01:01:04):
to the that's the wristband bit,that the pouring your own thing. Well
I get that. You know,Ron's and Tyler's are expensive, and you
know I mean that literally like havingstaff, having people is expensive, but
also having the right people. I'vegot John and Brad and Missy and I've
got I'm lucky. I've got reallygood people. And those people build relationships
with our customers. Correct. Andyou put a machine in front of me

(01:01:27):
and you know, yeah, I'man older guy. You know, I
barely get along with my iPhone.Yeah you're geriatric. But then to god,
that hit home to top it off, to top it off with the
relationship building and all that stuff.First time did the beer wall thing when
it when I went to close mytab and it asked for a tip,

(01:01:52):
right, the machine did, AndI'm like, who the who? My
machine? Right? Like? Who? Yeah? I did all the like
works, yeah, you know buildit's just going, hey, how about
me a little bit for me?And it's already tough enough for people that
do work tip positions. A lotof people are like they get annoyed with
it now because everything that you do, everywhere you go, someone's asking for
you. Talking about the airport againyou're going and you scan the thing,

(01:02:13):
and now there's a there's for atip. There's self checkout checkout for a
tip at the airport. Well andwas that Hudson News is yeah, the
bit oh with the self checkout,come on. I don't think it's happening
in Minnesota. Maybe it is,but now there's uh, people were putting
in as a search charge on yourbill, like an automatic tip. You
don't even get to choose. Yeah, we went to a place, Uh

(01:02:34):
there's some extra taxes rolling around.Yeah, we went to a place for
charges a couple days ago and itsaid like right on very fine print on
the bottom, was like there's asix point five percent search charge on all
this is not gratuity. Blah blahblah. I'm like, what what's it
for? Tell me what it isn't? But what is it for? So
here here's like a really weird likecan you you can just add these searcharges

(01:02:54):
quote unquote, like you know,for us getting deliveries and stuff, we
get a four dollar delivery search chargefor fuel surcharge. And if fuel prices
go up and down and we stillget the surch arger. So it's a
weird. The only thing for mewith the self service bit that tap walls,
et cetera. Don't put a capon it please, right, okay,
because here's the thing that's four ouncesright well, No, the thing

(01:03:17):
for me is that you go inthere and let's say, you know,
so I this one place, Iwent in a line and they give me
the the wristband bid and then theyou know, keyfob of sorts, right,
and there's other places might use acard and you put it up on
the bit and then as it's asit's racking up the ounces or whatnot,

(01:03:37):
you fill a pint glass and allthe glasses are the same, so that
that helps from an easy member measuringstandpoint, I don't want to get told
halfway into my third pint as itjust shuts off and says that I've hit
my limit, and then I haveto get back in line and say can

(01:03:58):
I mean that I gave you mycredit card and that goes back to right.
Like, so there's a personal responsibilityaspect of it on me, by
the way, like, I'm goingto drink a reasonable amount of beer and
not be a liability to the communityfour hundred ounces of beer on your like
when you walk in on your wristband, like again, the guy ever done
this? The guy? The guytold me because I just went up and
I said, you know, hereI am, here's my card paid for

(01:04:19):
it? He's you you get theI think what was it? It was?
It was a forty ounce limmit.What a weird What a weird number?
When you still pike, you pikeclass And if you're going in,
like say you're on a date orwhatever and you go in or you're buying
around for your buddies, yeah youcan't. You have to like go and
check in every like everybody gets atwo ounce round. Well so, but

(01:04:42):
then I will say once I wentback, then it was all good for
the rest of the time. Sure, but I was just sour about that.
As I was sitting there, I'mlike, as I'm holding no one
listening to the podcast can see this. You see what's in my hand right
now, as I have a pintglass with about a beer in it,
mostly empty. This is what Iwas left with. Yeah, I stoodn't
lie. It wasn't even enough tosatiate me while on the journey through the

(01:05:06):
line to re up my wristband.How is it that you know if this
trend continues, right, We've allseen the Taco bell freakouts where people are
like assaulting employees. When's you know, the beer wall assault. We're going
to see Eric have an absolute freakout of wind these breuies. That's not
the case, the case, Ihope not. No, this is it's

(01:05:30):
just not tons of bark, nobite. You know, we're talking about
the fact that all of this whenyou have a business, you're trying to
build relationships, You're trying to like, I can't tell you how many customers
have become friends, you know,like, you know, uh, tonight's
an exception, but normally we wentto the range and we saw Dan.
Yeah, absolutely, Dan's a guy, a relationship. Yeah, but normally

(01:05:54):
tonight I'd be at my buddy Drew'shouse watching UFC for about three hours.
But you know, or thirty nowwe heard You're You're big time on Dare.
That's funny. You're the You're theIrish goodbye guy. There's no doubt
about that. Yeah. I thinkgoes back to just people. I love

(01:06:15):
having bar tenders. I love thatthey have to interact with us, right
or the general public. And Tylerlistens to the podcast did you know that
he's gonna get a raise? Now? I guess he listened to He just
he said he listen. You listenedto the first episode, didn't you know?
He absolutely? He told the otherguy over there, he's like,

(01:06:36):
I love your show. He's like, I don't want automated tap walls,
dude, but like it's just thatI don't know. Hey, thanks brother.
There's something awesome about the human interactionwhen you go into any establishment,
right, whether whether it's going intoNorthern Fire or going wherever. Right,
like if you if we live ordie, but you have the you know,

(01:06:57):
you have the tap wall, he'sgot the flavor wall exactly. We
need human interaction to guide us throughthat. Yeah, I'm gonna get a
computer to like, you know,you want four ounces of season sweet sweet
heat execution? You know? Justoh that that's kind of a cool.
Like actually think about that, dude. Has anybody ever talk about innovation?
You walk in there and you justget the season's figot. Yeah, like

(01:07:19):
the like when you go to likethe grocery store, you know what three
ounce you know what do you whatdo you think a couple of racks of
ribs, three ounces of honey hoogHot. I could just pour that into
a little plastic bag. It's likethe produce section where you get you go
get the plastic bag. I needthree onions, I need three ounces of

(01:07:40):
honeyhog hot. You start doing thatin three ounces, you're gonna have the
upside down bottle of light fields,you know, three ounces and that,
and then you're gonna come out hereand get three ounces of beer for your
wrap. Ye, I'll sell youthree ounces of beer. But no,
that's what I'm gonna do, bythe way, So I were going to

(01:08:00):
be of the time. That's bad. I'm gonna make it. Do that.
I'm gonna make a couple of wraps, racks of ribs this weekend.
Oh good for you. I'm pouringbeer into it. Do it. So
I'm gonna do it your same way. You didn't do it last weekend.
Well, no, because I feltbad about myself because you've not reach out
to me. You reach out toJohn, your coach, but you were

(01:08:24):
included on it, and you hitme with negativity on the front end,
and I was very sensitive about it, and I was in a big spot.
I was entering the intersection as Itexted that you hit me with that
negativity, and I'm like, allright, fine, apple juice it is.
What's the The ribs were terrific.Okay, yeah, no they were.

(01:08:45):
They were absolutely awesome. You putthe beer in your mouth, you
put the apple juice in the ribs. You know, we're we're running out
of I mean, at some pointwe're just gonna put the kaibosh on this
on this episode of the podcast.But yeah, I'm kind of getting into
I got two rhythms, rub lovethe I can't talk love the love the

(01:09:06):
rat. And that's the process.It's always worked. It's not three two
one. It's based on feel andI'm in a really good rhythm with it,
kind of like an unwrapped what areyour thoughts? Go for it?
Yeah, I mean no. Oneof my favorite things to do. Every
year I do a I'll do abatch of what I call Texas style.

(01:09:26):
I've never lived in Texas. Ihave no idea. I'm probably making it
up, but basically salt and pepperlike a brisket. Yeah, no wrap,
no juice, no sauce. Ilove them. They're amazing. Yeah,
They're very good. Right, Yeah, don't overthink it. For God's
sakes, Nobody at home. Shouldbe doing the crazy bs that I do
it in competition. You know,make the stuff you like. If you

(01:09:49):
want to dump a cours light ora PBR in your ribs, go for
it. I'm all for it.Look once again, you drink the cores,
you drink the PBR. Love PBR, by the way, it's good
stuff. Breakfast beer is what Icall it. But use a maybe a
hoppier of more flavorful, sugar filledbeer for the rap. Also drink that

(01:10:12):
beer though, no drink drink beerbetter for yourself. Don't don't know.
I'm not saying port of the wholebeer. All right, we're gonna try
it. We're gonna all right,that's that's all right. Try some final
finals in there, because you coulddo that. You could that you could
drink and you could put on theribs. Man, what a combo.
I honestly don't think do much becauseI think your final finals too light,

(01:10:34):
which is part of it. That'spart of what it. So I'm not
looking at like a logger, right, this is yeah, So this is
a couls Is that what the styleis? So you're right, I'm not
looking I'm not looking for a coolshI'm looking for something that's heavier, you
know, maybe the vienna that wetalked about last week, or I p

(01:10:55):
a something with the Baconator beer thatyou guys just it's gone. It's gone,
man. It would have been agreat name. By the way,
Baca. Yeah, so Frickin' Davecomes after you from Wendy's, Dave said
burl oh no alr I p restin pre we doing another moment of silence
on him. Two. On thatnote, I think we should just say

(01:11:17):
good night, good night, Dave, good night, good night Dave.
That took a weird turn at theend. It's Hops and Hogs, a
barbecue podcast. Thanks to Ken ofHeavy Rotation, Aaron of Northern Fire,
and you for listening. Make sureto subscribe to the Hops and Hogs podcast
via the free iHeartRadio app or whereveryou get your podcasts, and follow us

(01:11:39):
on Twitter slash x at Hops Hogsbbq. Try some beer in that river
app and see what happens. Talkto you again soon.