March 1, 2023 • 20 mins
Learn the fundamentals about brewing and fermentation with coursework in production, operations, safety and sanitation, advanced brewing, brewery software, and associated process technologies. Students will learn about brewing and fermentation in a 3-BBL brew lab on our North Metro campus. Students must be at least 21 years of age to enroll in this program.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
S1 (00:03):
This is a need that exist in our community and
nobody's meeting it. You can't go out into any of
our communities, which is fortunate without seeing a local craft
brewery where the communities are now coming together.
S2 (00:15):
I think especially in Georgia and in the craft beer
industry in general, you know, practical experience is very important
for folks who are interested in brewing. They would often
go work at a brewery, work their way up through
the ranks, learn on site. But what was missing was that,
you know, technical education.
S3 (00:30):
Aspect, I think you're going to learn a lot and
it'll set you up. If you want to be a
brewer in the brewing industry, then it's certainly the way
to go.
S1 (00:36):
And the brew industry is just sprawling everywhere you go.
S4 (00:39):
I'd say to flip the switch.
S1 (00:41):
I'm at a place in my life where I can
change careers and I'm changing.
S3 (00:45):
From.
S1 (00:46):
Selling food on a national level to working in a
brewery and going to.
S3 (00:50):
School for brewing fermentation.
S4 (00:52):
It's really designed for anybody that wants to get into
the brewing industry or start their own themselves. And I'll
teach you everything you need to know from operating all
the equipment, writing and designing recipes, brewing those recipes and
doing all the testing involved to make sure that beer
is of utmost quality.
S5 (01:10):
98 seven chat tech or 98.7% of our students earn
a career. In today's episode, we're going to take a
look at the Brewing and fermentation production technology program at
Chattahoochee Technical College. Yeah, that's right. The entire reason I
signed up for this job, we're talking about creating that
amazing beverage that soothes the soul and lowers inhibitions. Delicious
cold beer. We'll talk with one of the first students
(01:35):
enrolled in the only program of its kind in the
state of Georgia. We'll learn about the goals of the
program from the associate dean of the program. And lead instructor.
Or the high of hops. We'll also talk industry insight
from a local brewery owner and the head of the
Georgia Craft Brewers Guild. So keep up with your tasting glass.
And let's start with our very own Willy Wonka. Francis Carlson,
the associate dean of Business and Technical Studies program. Tell
(01:58):
us about the program.
S1 (01:59):
Our Brewing and fermentation production technology program, which is brand new,
is not only brand new to Chattahoochee Tech, but brand
new to the state of Georgia. It will be the
first postsecondary college program of its kind, which makes it
quite unique. It will allow students who join it to
become brewers. When they graduate from the program. They will
(02:19):
have brewed beer for almost a year. They'll know how
to brew it. They'll know how to ferment it. They'll
know how to test it for quality control. They'll know
how to get or can it and distribute it. They'll
also be introduced to some brewery maintenance that's important in
craft breweries to be able to troubleshoot what happened to
your chiller or troubleshoot what happened to your Brite Tank
(02:40):
or understand why your watch was not working or why
you're canner throwing hands off the assembly line so that
you can immediately solve that problem, get right back to work.
We anticipate that that's what our graduates will be able
to do. There's also an internship at the end which
will give students at that point an opportunity to mimic
more of a full time capacity in a local craft
(03:04):
brewery with the hopes that they will have such skill
that they'll be employed, which we hope for all of
our internship students. This is a need that exist in
our community and nobody's meeting it. You can't go out
into any of our communities, which is fortunate without seeing
a local craft brewery where the communities are now coming together,
coming to eat, to host baby showers, wedding receptions, retirement parties,
(03:27):
birthday parties. And it's been a great community builder. It's
a burgeoning opportunity for economic development in Georgia. So we
saw it as an opportunity. What we do is prepare
people to work in our communities and support all of
that economic development. And we're so happy. By the end
of December 2023, we'll have 24 brand new brewers ready
(03:48):
to go to work.
S5 (03:49):
Is this a program for the beer hobbyists of the
states who are messing around in their basement? Or is
this a thriving career opportunity in the state following recent
Georgia legislation like the law allowing 3000 barrels a year
for sale at the breweries?
S1 (04:01):
Our program is primarily designed for students who perhaps already
have a career in the brewing industry. But they want
to be promoted, they seek advancement, or perhaps their own brewery,
and they know that having our associate degree would enable
them to do that because it's a cohort program, which
means all the students start together in August and then
(04:22):
move as one group through the whole program. It is
designed for people who want to be professional brewers primarily.
What we think will happen, though, as the program grows
and expands, is that we will have people who currently
homebrew or maybe they dabble a little bit in beer
and they want to learn about the brewing science part
(04:43):
or they want to learn about safety and sanitation and
some of the quality control that they will be able
at a later date to come and take some courses
as opposed to completing the whole longer program. We also
hope to offer continuing education through our economic development. Non-credit.
Arm of the college for people who possibly are currently
(05:06):
working in a brewery, but they need to improve their
sensory evaluation skills or they need to improve their body control,
or maybe they're interested in more sustainable packaging and want
to come for a day long seminar just to kind
of hone in on a specific skill related to a brewery.
And we've already gotten a lot of inquiry about whether
or not we will offer that. And I will say, yes,
(05:27):
we absolutely will. It's the win that we really need
this program to get started and then get it going
and then we can see what expansion looks like.
S5 (05:36):
I'm a fan of visiting the breweries. I'm also a
little envious of the genius who came up with this idea.
How did it start?
S1 (05:43):
When we began researching in 2018, the viability of our
brewing program, we reached out to a lot of the
craft brewers who were in our service area and from
that point on worked closely with red hair brewing schoolhouse reformation,
dry county and burnt hickory through those brewer owners who
(06:06):
gave us tremendous insight into what this industry looks like
and just continued to kind of reiterate to us what
our graduates need to know and know how to do.
Really enabled us to build the program that we had
built and have it approved by the state. Nick Downes particularly,
he's one of the co-founders of Reformation. He worked probably
the most closely with us over the past four years.
(06:28):
He advised us tremendously on equipment, on horse delivery, really
hone in on specific skills that it's important for students
to know, Well.
S5 (06:37):
Don't you worry, I'll be making my way to the
Reformation sampling tent soon. I mean, representative, to give me knowledge,
not that I'm drinking on the job or anything, but
what were the biggest points the advisory committee brought to
the table?
S1 (06:49):
The safety and sanitation part, which we knew would come
up over and over again, has of course, this is
a food product, so people don't necessarily think of beer
as a food product with all the safety and sanitation
required in that equipment. But it is. They also talked
about the importance of being able to recognize that the
beer is good or bad and why, if it's an
(07:09):
all flavor, what's off about it? The variation of flavor
that you get from different types of hops or flavors
that you may add. They really drove home the part
about needing to be kind of a jack of all
trades because once brewing production is started, if something tears
that goes out, you can't really shut it down for
two days while you're waiting for somebody outside to come
(07:31):
in and fix it. Very, very important that somebody in
your brewery know how to fix that equipment on the spot.
It's a very physical job. That's something stressed to us
that we have also stressed in our orientation sessions with
our new students. This is very labor intensive in a
pretty hot, humid environment. So if you think Georgia is
hot and humid now, welcome to the brewery. But it's
(07:53):
hot and humid all the time.
S5 (07:55):
Thank you, Francis. Speaking of lead instructor, here's the high
king of hops himself. You take the mike. I'm just
going to refill my water glass here.
S4 (08:04):
All right. So my name's Steve Anderson, the lead instructor
for the Brewing and Fermentation Production Technology Program, a challenge teacher.
And I've been in the brewing industry for over ten years.
S5 (08:16):
So, Steve, tell me what students will learn in the program.
S4 (08:20):
Well, we start off the first semester learning a lot
about the four main elements of the year, which are
all water maps. They're not only the science about them,
all the different chemical interactions. And we also learn how
to taste and analyze and then later on incorporate them
into recipes to make the beer. And that's really what
I saw all of the colors, flavors and promos of
(08:43):
the first beer. They all have an impact.
S5 (08:46):
Okay, I'll ask it. That means a ton of sampling, right?
S4 (08:49):
Yeah. It's some of the suffering required in the program.
Just like being a culinary program you can't analyze. You've
got to have a tasting. So we're not sitting around
drinking beer all day and enjoying plants together. We are
certainly sampling individual samples of world class beers to learn
about the styles and sampling of the beers that we
make in the program as well to analyze them and
(09:09):
see how good they are, if they fit the accomplishments
of what the recipe designer wanted to set out to do.
And the check for any kind of off label is
made during production.
S5 (09:19):
Becoming the lead instructor for the only program like this
in the state. And I tell you, it seems like
a dream come true. Tell us about how you got here. Well,
I get some more water.
S4 (09:28):
I started off homebrewing as a hobby, but it was
pretty fun. Made my first beer and then wanted to
match it and drink it. And it worked. It was
pretty fun to do, so I kind of kept it down.
Eventually turned a hobby into a job, working at a
home run store, answering questions. We were selling all over
the country online, so I would get emails from everywhere
(09:48):
and everybody asking all sorts of questions. I didn't learn
a lot. It was just something that always intrigued me.
So I just kept reading and learning and eventually got
a job at a local craft brewery here in Atlanta.
I stayed there for about five years, then turned it
on to the record Dry County and kind of saw
very well. I was the brewmaster from 2017 to 2022,
and then this position opened up. So pretty neat to
(10:09):
be able to change some some brewing. And this is
a very hands on technical program. I love a side
of the industry I really enjoy. So applied for this job.
Got it. And I haven't looked back since.
S5 (10:19):
Earlier we heard that students will be brewing beer for
a full year by the time they graduate. How many
different styles of beer is that? Like one a week
once you're in the lab?
S4 (10:28):
Sort of like that. So you learn the basics of
what goes into designing a recipe. All the ingredients work,
and then we work in small teams using some of
our we have six pilot systems to brew on those
on the side of beer recipe for beer. It's a
lot of hurry up and waiting. So a minimum of
14 days through a batch start to finish, sometimes much longer.
You don't get to brew a different beer every week
(10:49):
for sure, but you go through the whole process of
saying the recipe brewing the beer. We work on the
conditioning and packaging of the beer, and then with all
these analytical testing tests for things like color fiber, use,
the density of the final product, things like that.
S5 (11:04):
Now, besides being a fan of drinking beer, what else
does an ideal brewing student need to have.
S4 (11:09):
Somebody that's motivated to want to learn a lot about brewing?
There's a lot to learn, and somebody that's really interested
in the process is going on. But if you have
a more of a scientific take to it, that definitely
helps in understanding how to troubleshoot things because things are
always coming up during the process. And there's there's definitely
a lot of troubleshooting. Sorry to a fault throughout everything
(11:30):
you do of right now. There's a little bit of
math definitely helps too.
S5 (11:33):
And since this program is being run by someone with
as many connections as yourself, I'm going to go out
on a limb and say there are lots of internship opportunities.
S4 (11:41):
Yeah, absolutely. We have a ton of internship opportunities around here,
and every brewery I've talked to is interested in taking
students on. So we're going to focus really on trying
to get people into the right brewery for there and
they're trying to say open up a brewpub. He would
talk to some of the group of them and try
and get them working at a place similar to what
(12:02):
they're trying to start or if they want to work
in a larger production facility. You know, we could talk
to somebody like Sweetwater or New Realm and try and
get them a position there so they can learn the
practices and methods that are happening in those type of
facilities that potentially they go in there and do a
good job, you know, carry that all into an immediate hire.
S5 (12:21):
Lead instructor Steve Anderson, thank you, sir. Let's move to
the Georgia Craft Brewers Guild executive director. If you don't mind, sir,
introduce yourself and tell us about your amazing organization.
S2 (12:32):
My name is Joseph Cortez and I'm the executive director
of the Georgia Craft Brewers Guild, which is the 501c6
trade association for Georgia's licensed craft brewing industry. So our
organization as a trade association serves largely as the main
advocacy organization for the craft brewing industry. We lobby for
better beer laws, better beer regulations. We're very engaged in
(12:56):
the legislative process. Our organization, we like to say, stands
for advocacy, education and awareness. So on top of that
advocacy piece, we also work to educate the public, to
help educate our own industry with different events throughout the year,
including an annual conference and then awareness, also bringing awareness
to the industry, trying to build the brand of Georgia craft. Beer. Beer. Tourism.
(13:17):
Helping promote our members collectively.
S5 (13:20):
What are some of the benefits of this program? Not
just for students, but for the industry in Georgia as
a whole?
S2 (13:25):
You know, practical experience is very important to folks who
are interested in brewing. They would often go work at
a brewery, work their way up through the ranks, learn
on site. But what was missing was that, you know,
technical education aspect, particularly in Georgia, we have not had
an actual academic program of study for any sort of
brewing science fermentation as it exists at Chattahoochee Tech. Had
(13:48):
to go out of state to do that at any level.
What this program is providing is just an opportunity for
students in state to actually get those credentials and that
academic experience that might be missing. Just working your way
up at a brewery and a practical experience, which is
a very important part of it, and I know this
program provides that as well. The practical experience is invaluable.
That's a huge central part of becoming a brewer or becoming,
(14:12):
you know, working in production at a brewery.
S5 (14:15):
Is this program right in line for the growth of
craft beer in Georgia? Are we oversaturated in breweries?
S2 (14:22):
The market is fairly strong in Georgia. I think that
we're still on an upward trajectory. We probably have 30
to 40, if not more, across the state breweries and
planning folks that are planning on opening a brewery and
they're all going to need trained, educated folks working in
production in their facilities. So the craft beer industry, I
(14:42):
should say, does ebb and flow a little bit with
the economy. But we've been on an upward trajectory for,
you know, 30 years. We're still, I believe as of
last year, 46 out of 50 per capita. Newberry licenses.
S5 (14:54):
46. Wow. Opportunities like this can help us climb the ranks.
What's the one thing you'd say to those that are
looking to learn more?
S2 (15:01):
You want to be as best prepared as you can
to be a successful brewer or production staff. I think
the program at Chattahoochee Tech is going to help you
do just that, and it's going to help you have
the experience, the know how, that you need to be
a successful professional in a great industry and a great profession,
(15:22):
which is, you know, brewing a product and working in
a space that people love and that provides community.
S5 (15:28):
Thank you, Joseph. My taste in glass is gone dry,
so it's time to meet our friends at Reformation Brewery.
Hey there. Can you introduce yourself while I go and
get a refill?
S3 (15:38):
My name is Nick Downs, and I'm with Reformation Brewery.
S5 (15:41):
How would you describe the ideal candidate for brewing?
S3 (15:44):
It's an interesting lot. I think there's a lot of pilots.
There's a lot of engineers. It's people that have decent
attention to detail, but also have some aspect of creativity
because you got to be able to imagine the beer
you want and design it, taste it and adapt it.
So it's somebody like that.
S5 (16:03):
Now tell me more about the common career progression of all.
Go get another flight.
S3 (16:06):
Typically for us would be a keg washer working on
the packaging line and then if you show interest, you'd
move to celery. But typically somebody that has this degree
would go right into celery at the very least. And
Solomon's the guy that takes the beer that's in the fermenter.
Once the brewer gets it in there and takes care
of it, ensures temperatures are right, takes gravity's figures out
(16:27):
when it's done fermenting, cools it down, transfers it maybe
through a filter, maybe through a centrifuge over to the
bright tank carbonates it the Solomon moves the beer all around.
Usually in that process there'll be a day when you
might be a little slow. So you'll go up on
the brewhouse and you'll spend the day with the brewer.
We have three locations. One of them has a pilot
brew system. And so you'll spend time down there and
(16:50):
we'll be able to try out a few your own recipes.
And it's relatively inexpensive to make mistakes of that size.
So we're happy to let people kind of exercise some
creativity there. And it's actually it becomes fun. And then
from there, you would move up to Brewer. The size
of the brewery really drives the compensation. I would imagine
a brewer at Monday nights or at Budweiser or at
(17:12):
Sweetwater makes more than a brewer that's going to be
at a brew pub or just a place that has
a single tasting room. But that's generally the progression. And
then if you want to go on to lab and,
you know, count cells and harvest yeast and do that
kind of stuff, you know, that's another avenue you can do.
There's a lots of things you can do.
S5 (17:29):
You were instrumental in getting this program started, right?
S3 (17:32):
Francis came to us way back when they were looking
at curriculum, and we kind of helped them with designing
a curriculum, what things were important to us and what
we wanted. Once they were ready to set the whole
system up, they actually had me come in and identify
the equipment they needed, lay out the brewery and where
the drains have to go, where the fermenters should go,
you know, size the chiller. And then once they hired
(17:55):
Steve Anderson, who was going to run the show, he
kind of took over from there. So that was my role.
I was early on. I helped figure out what they
needed and how to set it up.
S5 (18:04):
Can you tell us why this program is a better
option than learning online.
S3 (18:07):
Theoretical You see it in a video or something, and
it's not quite the same as what kind of valve
is he talking about? What does it look like when
the pressure gets up to what they're saying it does?
And how does that chiller work again? And when you're there,
you work on the cold room, you work on the fermenters,
you're clean, you change gaskets, you do all that stuff
(18:27):
that you're really watching TV. It's like if you had
to watch a video on how to drive a car,
the first few miles would be pretty sketchy.
S5 (18:35):
Thanks, Nick. Let's talk with one of the first students
on the program before we wrap up here, Craig. Tell
us a little bit about your experience so far. My
name's Craig.
S1 (18:43):
Snyder. I started with Chattahoochee Tech on the green fermentation
degree of.
S3 (18:47):
Science just.
S1 (18:48):
Recently this August. I started when I was 15. COOK
and I was always around food.
S3 (18:53):
And as I grew up and got older in the
food business, I learned more and more about.
S1 (18:57):
Beers and so forth. And I always had an idea
about how beer would be working on the Brewers side.
But back when I was a kid, Virgin make any money.
Now jump forward, you know.
S3 (19:08):
30 years and.
S1 (19:09):
The brew industry is just sprawling everywhere you.
S5 (19:11):
Go. Thanks, Craig. Now, how much liquid courage did it
take to shift gears and join a brand new program
on brewing?
S1 (19:18):
I decided just, I'd say, to flip the switch. How about.
S3 (19:21):
Food service degree in science associate.
S1 (19:24):
Degree, similar to what this degree is. I'm at a
place in my life where I can change careers and
I'm changing.
S3 (19:30):
From selling food on a national level.
S1 (19:33):
To working in a brewery and going.
S3 (19:35):
To school for brewing fermentation.
S1 (19:37):
It's a big life step.
S5 (19:38):
This opens so many doors not only for students, but
I feel like it could give a big boost to
the industry here in the state. What's the rest of
your class like? Describe a day in the life of
a student for us.
S1 (19:48):
We have a.
S3 (19:48):
Mixed bag.
S1 (19:49):
Of individuals in the class. We have different ages, different
walks of life, people like myself that have been in
profession and in the private.
S3 (19:57):
Sector and career for such a long.
S1 (19:59):
Time are trying something new. Everybody is very in tune
to everything that's going on. There's so many applications that
we're learning about.
S3 (20:05):
We're taking four different classes.
S1 (20:06):
They're all fallen right into what we're doing for myself
in the industry. But then also it's amazing how everyone's
going to have a chance to learn as everything comes.
But soon we'll be brewing. It'll be.
S4 (20:16):
Fun.
S5 (20:17):
You know what? Let's raise a glass and say cheers
To all the current and future students of Chattahoochee Tech's
Brewing and Fermentation Production technology program. To learn more, visit
Chattahoochee Tech Dot edu. Thanks for listening to 98 seven
frantic were 98.7% of our students are a career.
This is a need that exist in our community and
nobody's meeting it. You can't go out into any of
our communities, which is fortunate without seeing a local craft
brewery where the communities are now coming together.
S2 (00:15):
I think especially in Georgia and in the craft beer
industry in general, you know, practical experience is very important
for folks who are interested in brewing. They would often
go work at a brewery, work their way up through
the ranks, learn on site. But what was missing was that,
you know, technical education.
S3 (00:30):
Aspect, I think you're going to learn a lot and
it'll set you up. If you want to be a
brewer in the brewing industry, then it's certainly the way
to go.
S1 (00:36):
And the brew industry is just sprawling everywhere you go.
S4 (00:39):
I'd say to flip the switch.
S1 (00:41):
I'm at a place in my life where I can
change careers and I'm changing.
S3 (00:45):
From.
S1 (00:46):
Selling food on a national level to working in a
brewery and going to.
S3 (00:50):
School for brewing fermentation.
S4 (00:52):
It's really designed for anybody that wants to get into
the brewing industry or start their own themselves. And I'll
teach you everything you need to know from operating all
the equipment, writing and designing recipes, brewing those recipes and
doing all the testing involved to make sure that beer
is of utmost quality.
S5 (01:10):
98 seven chat tech or 98.7% of our students earn
a career. In today's episode, we're going to take a
look at the Brewing and fermentation production technology program at
Chattahoochee Technical College. Yeah, that's right. The entire reason I
signed up for this job, we're talking about creating that
amazing beverage that soothes the soul and lowers inhibitions. Delicious
cold beer. We'll talk with one of the first students
(01:35):
enrolled in the only program of its kind in the
state of Georgia. We'll learn about the goals of the
program from the associate dean of the program. And lead instructor.
Or the high of hops. We'll also talk industry insight
from a local brewery owner and the head of the
Georgia Craft Brewers Guild. So keep up with your tasting glass.
And let's start with our very own Willy Wonka. Francis Carlson,
the associate dean of Business and Technical Studies program. Tell
(01:58):
us about the program.
S1 (01:59):
Our Brewing and fermentation production technology program, which is brand new,
is not only brand new to Chattahoochee Tech, but brand
new to the state of Georgia. It will be the
first postsecondary college program of its kind, which makes it
quite unique. It will allow students who join it to
become brewers. When they graduate from the program. They will
(02:19):
have brewed beer for almost a year. They'll know how
to brew it. They'll know how to ferment it. They'll
know how to test it for quality control. They'll know
how to get or can it and distribute it. They'll
also be introduced to some brewery maintenance that's important in
craft breweries to be able to troubleshoot what happened to
your chiller or troubleshoot what happened to your Brite Tank
(02:40):
or understand why your watch was not working or why
you're canner throwing hands off the assembly line so that
you can immediately solve that problem, get right back to work.
We anticipate that that's what our graduates will be able
to do. There's also an internship at the end which
will give students at that point an opportunity to mimic
more of a full time capacity in a local craft
(03:04):
brewery with the hopes that they will have such skill
that they'll be employed, which we hope for all of
our internship students. This is a need that exist in
our community and nobody's meeting it. You can't go out
into any of our communities, which is fortunate without seeing
a local craft brewery where the communities are now coming together,
coming to eat, to host baby showers, wedding receptions, retirement parties,
(03:27):
birthday parties. And it's been a great community builder. It's
a burgeoning opportunity for economic development in Georgia. So we
saw it as an opportunity. What we do is prepare
people to work in our communities and support all of
that economic development. And we're so happy. By the end
of December 2023, we'll have 24 brand new brewers ready
(03:48):
to go to work.
S5 (03:49):
Is this a program for the beer hobbyists of the
states who are messing around in their basement? Or is
this a thriving career opportunity in the state following recent
Georgia legislation like the law allowing 3000 barrels a year
for sale at the breweries?
S1 (04:01):
Our program is primarily designed for students who perhaps already
have a career in the brewing industry. But they want
to be promoted, they seek advancement, or perhaps their own brewery,
and they know that having our associate degree would enable
them to do that because it's a cohort program, which
means all the students start together in August and then
(04:22):
move as one group through the whole program. It is
designed for people who want to be professional brewers primarily.
What we think will happen, though, as the program grows
and expands, is that we will have people who currently
homebrew or maybe they dabble a little bit in beer
and they want to learn about the brewing science part
(04:43):
or they want to learn about safety and sanitation and
some of the quality control that they will be able
at a later date to come and take some courses
as opposed to completing the whole longer program. We also
hope to offer continuing education through our economic development. Non-credit.
Arm of the college for people who possibly are currently
(05:06):
working in a brewery, but they need to improve their
sensory evaluation skills or they need to improve their body control,
or maybe they're interested in more sustainable packaging and want
to come for a day long seminar just to kind
of hone in on a specific skill related to a brewery.
And we've already gotten a lot of inquiry about whether
or not we will offer that. And I will say, yes,
(05:27):
we absolutely will. It's the win that we really need
this program to get started and then get it going
and then we can see what expansion looks like.
S5 (05:36):
I'm a fan of visiting the breweries. I'm also a
little envious of the genius who came up with this idea.
How did it start?
S1 (05:43):
When we began researching in 2018, the viability of our
brewing program, we reached out to a lot of the
craft brewers who were in our service area and from
that point on worked closely with red hair brewing schoolhouse reformation,
dry county and burnt hickory through those brewer owners who
(06:06):
gave us tremendous insight into what this industry looks like
and just continued to kind of reiterate to us what
our graduates need to know and know how to do.
Really enabled us to build the program that we had
built and have it approved by the state. Nick Downes particularly,
he's one of the co-founders of Reformation. He worked probably
the most closely with us over the past four years.
(06:28):
He advised us tremendously on equipment, on horse delivery, really
hone in on specific skills that it's important for students
to know, Well.
S5 (06:37):
Don't you worry, I'll be making my way to the
Reformation sampling tent soon. I mean, representative, to give me knowledge,
not that I'm drinking on the job or anything, but
what were the biggest points the advisory committee brought to
the table?
S1 (06:49):
The safety and sanitation part, which we knew would come
up over and over again, has of course, this is
a food product, so people don't necessarily think of beer
as a food product with all the safety and sanitation
required in that equipment. But it is. They also talked
about the importance of being able to recognize that the
beer is good or bad and why, if it's an
(07:09):
all flavor, what's off about it? The variation of flavor
that you get from different types of hops or flavors
that you may add. They really drove home the part
about needing to be kind of a jack of all
trades because once brewing production is started, if something tears
that goes out, you can't really shut it down for
two days while you're waiting for somebody outside to come
(07:31):
in and fix it. Very, very important that somebody in
your brewery know how to fix that equipment on the spot.
It's a very physical job. That's something stressed to us
that we have also stressed in our orientation sessions with
our new students. This is very labor intensive in a
pretty hot, humid environment. So if you think Georgia is
hot and humid now, welcome to the brewery. But it's
(07:53):
hot and humid all the time.
S5 (07:55):
Thank you, Francis. Speaking of lead instructor, here's the high
king of hops himself. You take the mike. I'm just
going to refill my water glass here.
S4 (08:04):
All right. So my name's Steve Anderson, the lead instructor
for the Brewing and Fermentation Production Technology Program, a challenge teacher.
And I've been in the brewing industry for over ten years.
S5 (08:16):
So, Steve, tell me what students will learn in the program.
S4 (08:20):
Well, we start off the first semester learning a lot
about the four main elements of the year, which are
all water maps. They're not only the science about them,
all the different chemical interactions. And we also learn how
to taste and analyze and then later on incorporate them
into recipes to make the beer. And that's really what
I saw all of the colors, flavors and promos of
(08:43):
the first beer. They all have an impact.
S5 (08:46):
Okay, I'll ask it. That means a ton of sampling, right?
S4 (08:49):
Yeah. It's some of the suffering required in the program.
Just like being a culinary program you can't analyze. You've
got to have a tasting. So we're not sitting around
drinking beer all day and enjoying plants together. We are
certainly sampling individual samples of world class beers to learn
about the styles and sampling of the beers that we
make in the program as well to analyze them and
(09:09):
see how good they are, if they fit the accomplishments
of what the recipe designer wanted to set out to do.
And the check for any kind of off label is
made during production.
S5 (09:19):
Becoming the lead instructor for the only program like this
in the state. And I tell you, it seems like
a dream come true. Tell us about how you got here. Well,
I get some more water.
S4 (09:28):
I started off homebrewing as a hobby, but it was
pretty fun. Made my first beer and then wanted to
match it and drink it. And it worked. It was
pretty fun to do, so I kind of kept it down.
Eventually turned a hobby into a job, working at a
home run store, answering questions. We were selling all over
the country online, so I would get emails from everywhere
(09:48):
and everybody asking all sorts of questions. I didn't learn
a lot. It was just something that always intrigued me.
So I just kept reading and learning and eventually got
a job at a local craft brewery here in Atlanta.
I stayed there for about five years, then turned it
on to the record Dry County and kind of saw
very well. I was the brewmaster from 2017 to 2022,
and then this position opened up. So pretty neat to
(10:09):
be able to change some some brewing. And this is
a very hands on technical program. I love a side
of the industry I really enjoy. So applied for this job.
Got it. And I haven't looked back since.
S5 (10:19):
Earlier we heard that students will be brewing beer for
a full year by the time they graduate. How many
different styles of beer is that? Like one a week
once you're in the lab?
S4 (10:28):
Sort of like that. So you learn the basics of
what goes into designing a recipe. All the ingredients work,
and then we work in small teams using some of
our we have six pilot systems to brew on those
on the side of beer recipe for beer. It's a
lot of hurry up and waiting. So a minimum of
14 days through a batch start to finish, sometimes much longer.
You don't get to brew a different beer every week
(10:49):
for sure, but you go through the whole process of
saying the recipe brewing the beer. We work on the
conditioning and packaging of the beer, and then with all
these analytical testing tests for things like color fiber, use,
the density of the final product, things like that.
S5 (11:04):
Now, besides being a fan of drinking beer, what else
does an ideal brewing student need to have.
S4 (11:09):
Somebody that's motivated to want to learn a lot about brewing?
There's a lot to learn, and somebody that's really interested
in the process is going on. But if you have
a more of a scientific take to it, that definitely
helps in understanding how to troubleshoot things because things are
always coming up during the process. And there's there's definitely
a lot of troubleshooting. Sorry to a fault throughout everything
(11:30):
you do of right now. There's a little bit of
math definitely helps too.
S5 (11:33):
And since this program is being run by someone with
as many connections as yourself, I'm going to go out
on a limb and say there are lots of internship opportunities.
S4 (11:41):
Yeah, absolutely. We have a ton of internship opportunities around here,
and every brewery I've talked to is interested in taking
students on. So we're going to focus really on trying
to get people into the right brewery for there and
they're trying to say open up a brewpub. He would
talk to some of the group of them and try
and get them working at a place similar to what
(12:02):
they're trying to start or if they want to work
in a larger production facility. You know, we could talk
to somebody like Sweetwater or New Realm and try and
get them a position there so they can learn the
practices and methods that are happening in those type of
facilities that potentially they go in there and do a
good job, you know, carry that all into an immediate hire.
S5 (12:21):
Lead instructor Steve Anderson, thank you, sir. Let's move to
the Georgia Craft Brewers Guild executive director. If you don't mind, sir,
introduce yourself and tell us about your amazing organization.
S2 (12:32):
My name is Joseph Cortez and I'm the executive director
of the Georgia Craft Brewers Guild, which is the 501c6
trade association for Georgia's licensed craft brewing industry. So our
organization as a trade association serves largely as the main
advocacy organization for the craft brewing industry. We lobby for
better beer laws, better beer regulations. We're very engaged in
(12:56):
the legislative process. Our organization, we like to say, stands
for advocacy, education and awareness. So on top of that
advocacy piece, we also work to educate the public, to
help educate our own industry with different events throughout the year,
including an annual conference and then awareness, also bringing awareness
to the industry, trying to build the brand of Georgia craft. Beer. Beer. Tourism.
(13:17):
Helping promote our members collectively.
S5 (13:20):
What are some of the benefits of this program? Not
just for students, but for the industry in Georgia as
a whole?
S2 (13:25):
You know, practical experience is very important to folks who
are interested in brewing. They would often go work at
a brewery, work their way up through the ranks, learn
on site. But what was missing was that, you know,
technical education aspect, particularly in Georgia, we have not had
an actual academic program of study for any sort of
brewing science fermentation as it exists at Chattahoochee Tech. Had
(13:48):
to go out of state to do that at any level.
What this program is providing is just an opportunity for
students in state to actually get those credentials and that
academic experience that might be missing. Just working your way
up at a brewery and a practical experience, which is
a very important part of it, and I know this
program provides that as well. The practical experience is invaluable.
That's a huge central part of becoming a brewer or becoming,
(14:12):
you know, working in production at a brewery.
S5 (14:15):
Is this program right in line for the growth of
craft beer in Georgia? Are we oversaturated in breweries?
S2 (14:22):
The market is fairly strong in Georgia. I think that
we're still on an upward trajectory. We probably have 30
to 40, if not more, across the state breweries and
planning folks that are planning on opening a brewery and
they're all going to need trained, educated folks working in
production in their facilities. So the craft beer industry, I
(14:42):
should say, does ebb and flow a little bit with
the economy. But we've been on an upward trajectory for,
you know, 30 years. We're still, I believe as of
last year, 46 out of 50 per capita. Newberry licenses.
S5 (14:54):
46. Wow. Opportunities like this can help us climb the ranks.
What's the one thing you'd say to those that are
looking to learn more?
S2 (15:01):
You want to be as best prepared as you can
to be a successful brewer or production staff. I think
the program at Chattahoochee Tech is going to help you
do just that, and it's going to help you have
the experience, the know how, that you need to be
a successful professional in a great industry and a great profession,
(15:22):
which is, you know, brewing a product and working in
a space that people love and that provides community.
S5 (15:28):
Thank you, Joseph. My taste in glass is gone dry,
so it's time to meet our friends at Reformation Brewery.
Hey there. Can you introduce yourself while I go and
get a refill?
S3 (15:38):
My name is Nick Downs, and I'm with Reformation Brewery.
S5 (15:41):
How would you describe the ideal candidate for brewing?
S3 (15:44):
It's an interesting lot. I think there's a lot of pilots.
There's a lot of engineers. It's people that have decent
attention to detail, but also have some aspect of creativity
because you got to be able to imagine the beer
you want and design it, taste it and adapt it.
So it's somebody like that.
S5 (16:03):
Now tell me more about the common career progression of all.
Go get another flight.
S3 (16:06):
Typically for us would be a keg washer working on
the packaging line and then if you show interest, you'd
move to celery. But typically somebody that has this degree
would go right into celery at the very least. And
Solomon's the guy that takes the beer that's in the fermenter.
Once the brewer gets it in there and takes care
of it, ensures temperatures are right, takes gravity's figures out
(16:27):
when it's done fermenting, cools it down, transfers it maybe
through a filter, maybe through a centrifuge over to the
bright tank carbonates it the Solomon moves the beer all around.
Usually in that process there'll be a day when you
might be a little slow. So you'll go up on
the brewhouse and you'll spend the day with the brewer.
We have three locations. One of them has a pilot
brew system. And so you'll spend time down there and
(16:50):
we'll be able to try out a few your own recipes.
And it's relatively inexpensive to make mistakes of that size.
So we're happy to let people kind of exercise some
creativity there. And it's actually it becomes fun. And then
from there, you would move up to Brewer. The size
of the brewery really drives the compensation. I would imagine
a brewer at Monday nights or at Budweiser or at
(17:12):
Sweetwater makes more than a brewer that's going to be
at a brew pub or just a place that has
a single tasting room. But that's generally the progression. And
then if you want to go on to lab and,
you know, count cells and harvest yeast and do that
kind of stuff, you know, that's another avenue you can do.
There's a lots of things you can do.
S5 (17:29):
You were instrumental in getting this program started, right?
S3 (17:32):
Francis came to us way back when they were looking
at curriculum, and we kind of helped them with designing
a curriculum, what things were important to us and what
we wanted. Once they were ready to set the whole
system up, they actually had me come in and identify
the equipment they needed, lay out the brewery and where
the drains have to go, where the fermenters should go,
you know, size the chiller. And then once they hired
(17:55):
Steve Anderson, who was going to run the show, he
kind of took over from there. So that was my role.
I was early on. I helped figure out what they
needed and how to set it up.
S5 (18:04):
Can you tell us why this program is a better
option than learning online.
S3 (18:07):
Theoretical You see it in a video or something, and
it's not quite the same as what kind of valve
is he talking about? What does it look like when
the pressure gets up to what they're saying it does?
And how does that chiller work again? And when you're there,
you work on the cold room, you work on the fermenters,
you're clean, you change gaskets, you do all that stuff
(18:27):
that you're really watching TV. It's like if you had
to watch a video on how to drive a car,
the first few miles would be pretty sketchy.
S5 (18:35):
Thanks, Nick. Let's talk with one of the first students
on the program before we wrap up here, Craig. Tell
us a little bit about your experience so far. My
name's Craig.
S1 (18:43):
Snyder. I started with Chattahoochee Tech on the green fermentation
degree of.
S3 (18:47):
Science just.
S1 (18:48):
Recently this August. I started when I was 15. COOK
and I was always around food.
S3 (18:53):
And as I grew up and got older in the
food business, I learned more and more about.
S1 (18:57):
Beers and so forth. And I always had an idea
about how beer would be working on the Brewers side.
But back when I was a kid, Virgin make any money.
Now jump forward, you know.
S3 (19:08):
30 years and.
S1 (19:09):
The brew industry is just sprawling everywhere you.
S5 (19:11):
Go. Thanks, Craig. Now, how much liquid courage did it
take to shift gears and join a brand new program
on brewing?
S1 (19:18):
I decided just, I'd say, to flip the switch. How about.
S3 (19:21):
Food service degree in science associate.
S1 (19:24):
Degree, similar to what this degree is. I'm at a
place in my life where I can change careers and
I'm changing.
S3 (19:30):
From selling food on a national level.
S1 (19:33):
To working in a brewery and going.
S3 (19:35):
To school for brewing fermentation.
S1 (19:37):
It's a big life step.
S5 (19:38):
This opens so many doors not only for students, but
I feel like it could give a big boost to
the industry here in the state. What's the rest of
your class like? Describe a day in the life of
a student for us.
S1 (19:48):
We have a.
S3 (19:48):
Mixed bag.
S1 (19:49):
Of individuals in the class. We have different ages, different
walks of life, people like myself that have been in
profession and in the private.
S3 (19:57):
Sector and career for such a long.
S1 (19:59):
Time are trying something new. Everybody is very in tune
to everything that's going on. There's so many applications that
we're learning about.
S3 (20:05):
We're taking four different classes.
S1 (20:06):
They're all fallen right into what we're doing for myself
in the industry. But then also it's amazing how everyone's
going to have a chance to learn as everything comes.
But soon we'll be brewing. It'll be.
S4 (20:16):
Fun.
S5 (20:17):
You know what? Let's raise a glass and say cheers
To all the current and future students of Chattahoochee Tech's
Brewing and Fermentation Production technology program. To learn more, visit
Chattahoochee Tech Dot edu. Thanks for listening to 98 seven
frantic were 98.7% of our students are a career.
Popular Podcasts
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.