Brugge Beer

Bottles. Yes, Bottles!

It seems like 4 months – oh, wait, it has been 4 months – since we last talked. And the burning question now, as it was then, is “Where are the bottles?”

Well, guess what?

They’re here!

No, seriously.

They’re here!

Don’t believe me?

Bottled Belgian goodness for you to enjoy anywhere and anytime you’re looking for some serious pleasure.

Black, White, and yes, Tripel de Ripple, all available in .750 litre bottles, a convenient 6 pack, and an even more convenient Variety Pack, with 2 bottles of each for those who can’t decide.

The first bottles arrived at our distributor, World Class Beverage, on Tuesday, so your local retailer, throughout Indiana, should have beer in stock soon. But,in the short term, quantities will be limited as we ramp up production.

In fact, you can help us help you.

We want to know where you shop in Indiana for fine beers so we can make sure Brugge is available where you want it.

Either post a comment here or email me at:

charlie@brugge-beer.com

As we begin to roll out our beers, stay in touch with the BeerFinder on World Class Beverage’s thorough website.

http://www.worldclassbeverages.com/search.asp

Thanks for all your patience and support.

Remember, Brugge Beer is "best enjoyed often."

 

Brugge On the Road - April 8 Update

We're thrilled to add the following establishments to our growing list of places you can enjoy Brugge throughout Indiana.

Brugge Black:

Farm Bloomington

108 & 110 Kirkwood

Bloomington, IN 47401

812-340-3593

http://www.farm-bloomington.com/

Ramada Plaza Hotel

2519 E. Center St.

Warsaw, IN 46580

574-268-1733

http://www.ramada.com/Ramada/control/Booking/property_info?propertyId=10010&brandInfo=RA

And last, but certainly not least, our famous Tripel de Ripple makes it's debut this week at BadaBoomz in downtown Indy.

Enjoy, and we'll keep you updated with any additions.

Spring Cleaning

This weekend's heat wave is brutal. 68 degrees today! When will it end?

It was great to see a bunch of people enjoying the sunshine - and frites and beer - on the patio Saturday and Sunday.

A couple of things...

There's this guy named Ted Miller and he's sort of the head PooBah of all that is Brugge. You may have heard of him. He actually posted here once. And I've begged him to be more active here.

Well, it seems he'd rather talk to some other guys instead of us. The issue in the blog, linked below, is important, and I'll address it in another post, but by the end of the thread, they're all singing the Brugge version of Kumbaya!

http://dig-b.blogspot.com/2008/03/beer-wabash-valley-arrives.html

Last Thursday...

Brugge Brasserie was thrilled to host 2 groups last Thursday, both from a website I'd never heard of 3 days before.

The Indianapolis Beer Meetup Group

http://beer.meetup.com/189/

The Indianapolis French Meetup Group

http://french.meetup.com/754/

Both groups were filled with fun people and they're both obviously smart as well, since they made the decision to eat and drink at our place.

Thanks to Chris and Jean-Luc for getting everyone together. The place was rocking till way past my bedtime. We hope to see both groups again soon.

The Website...

As hard as it may be to believe, our website should be up within the next 2 weeks. We wish it had been sooner, but we're big believers in keeping our mouths shut until we actually have something to say. This blog will be moved to become a page of the new site. We'll keep you posted.

Cardiff and Portsmouth

A new law firm? A British shoemaker?

No, it's the unlikely matchup for this year's FA Cup final to be played at Wembley on Saturday, May 17 at 10:00AM.

A special Steak, Egg, and Frites breakfast will be available as Brugge Brasserie will open at 09:30. Reservations recommended.

Brugge Beer at the Indy 500

Yes, we're just getting our legs underneath us.

And, yes, we still don't have bottles anywhere.

But...

We are honored to be an Official Partner of the Rubicon Race Team for the upcoming 2008 Indy 500.

http://www.rubiconraceteam.com/sponsors.html

Jim Freudenberg and Jason Priestley have put together a terrific group, including driver Max Papis, to chase this year's Borg-Warner Trophy.

Brugge is thrilled to be providing liquid refreshment for all the on-track activities leading up to this year's race.

In fact, Ted has created a one - off batch of a special beer to commemorate the event, named appropriately, Rubicon Red.

We'll keep you posted on how things develop.

Brewery Plans

You may remember - about 100 years ago - we announced plans to produce and bottle 5 varieties of Brugge Beer as we launch.

We have already made our Black, White, and Tripel de Ripple in the new Terre Haute brewery. And from the comments of many of our customers at both Brugge Brasserie, as well as our new bar and restaurant partners, it's the best beer we've made yet.

So, for the next few months, we've decided to only package these 3 beers. This will help us to produce larger quantities of each, which will be even more important when the bottling line is operational.

Bottling 3 varieties also allows to be a bit more "friendly" with our packaging and marketing. We will be putting 6 - .75 litre bottles in an easy to handle 6 pack. And, yes, the 6 pack will be available in a "Sampler" pack, consisting of 2 Black, 2 White, and 2 Tripel.

So where are they?

In Terre Haute, we needed to make several adjustments to the existing bottling line in order to handle our .75 litre bottles. In fact, we ended up making an adjustment to the bottle itself to make it a bit easier to properly package the beer.

This has put us back just a bit further in our schedule. But bottles will be available soon.

Really.

Seriously.

I promise!

Once the bottling line is completely operational, we will be running another bus ride to Terre Haute for anyone who wants to see the operation. We might even drink a beer or 2. I vaguely remember how much fun the last trip was.

All 3 beers will also be on the menu at the restaurant, while Ted continues to play Mr. Science with the brewery at the restaurant. In fact, he has something very interesting cooking right now which should be ready this week.

Stay tuned.

Brugge Beer - On the Road

As we continue to ramp up production at our facility in Terre Haute, we're proud to tell you these fine establishments are now serving Brugge Black and Brugge White.

Brugge Black:

Bada Boomz 
15 E. Maryland
Indianapolis, IN 46204
317 916-9464

www.badaboomz.biz

Spencers Stadium Tavern
802 S West St
Indianapolis, IN 46225
317 916-8888

www.spencerstavern.com

Deanos Vino Rest And Wine   
1112 S Shelby St
Indianapolis, IN 46203
317 423-3154

http://www.deanosvino.com/

Shallos 
8811 S Hardigan Rm#b1 B2
Indianapolis, IN 46227
317 882-7997

http://shallos.net/

Columbus Bar
322 4th St
Columbus, IN 47201
812 375-8800

www.powerhousebrewingco.com

Bone Dry Bar & Grill
3805 W Ridge Rd
Highland, IN 46322
219 838-2442

Come Back Inn
415 Spring Street
Jeffersonville, IN 47130
812 285-1777

http://www.comebackinn.net/

The Black Sparrow   
223 Main St
Lafayette, IN 47901
765 429-0405

http://www.blacksparrowpub.com/

The Heorot 
219 S Walnut Street
Muncie, IN 47305
765 287-0173

The Fickle Peach 
117 East Charles Street
Muncie, IN 47305
765 760-4755

Three Floyds Brewing Pub 
9750 Indiana Pkwy Ste #2
Munster, IN 46321
219 922-3565

http://www.threefloydspub.com/

Beef O Bradys   
1860 45th Street
Munster, IN 46321
219 508-2551

http://www.beefobradys.com/

Rich O's Public House
3312 Plaza Dr
New Albany, IN 47150
812 944-2577

www.richos.com

Fiddler's Hearth Pub 
127 N. Main Street
South Bend, IN 46601
574 232-2853

http://www.fiddlershearth.com/

Mogger's Brewery 
908 Poplar St
Terre Haute, IN 47807
812 234-9202

http://www.moggers-restaurant.com/

Stables Steakhouse 
939 Poplar St
Terre Haute, IN 47807
812 232-6677

http://www.stablessteakhouse.com/main.html

Sonka Irish Pub
1366 Wabash
Terre Haute, IN 47807
812 234-8802

Brugge White:

The Meridian 
5694 N. Meridian Street
Indianapolis, IN 46208
317 466-1111

http://www.meridianonmeridian.com

The bars below are serving our White in addition to the Black

BadaBoomz

Columbus Bar

Come Back Inn

Mogger's Brewery

In addition, you can order a 1/6 or 1/2 barrel keg at:

Kahn's Fine Wines  www.kahnsfinewines.com
5341 N Keystone
Indianapolis, IN 46220
317 251-9463

Thanks to all these fine establishments for serving our products.

Thanks to all our customers for your patience, encouragement, and support.

And thanks to our distribution partner, World Class Beverages, for their confidence in the quality of our beers.

Ale Fest 2008

After spending a few months in sunny, tropical Bangkok, I returned to Indy last week just in time to spend most of the week scraping ice off my car. What a treat.

Fortunately, I also returned just in time to be part of Ale Fest 2008, at The Egyptian Room in the Murat Centre.

There has been a bit of controversy -unfounded and unnecessary, if you ask me - about the "motives" of the organizers and sponsors.

I read and heard allegations the event was nothing more than a marketing ploy to promote World Class Beverage's stable of products.

In the interest of full disclosure, WCB distributes our beer.

These allegations are false if you ask me, but if you were going to have a beer festival, wouldn't you want to partner with a company that sells more craft beer than anyone else in town?

In addition, WCB "donated" more than half the beer served at the event, with no expectation of any profit, except for the hope of future sales.

The bottom line is attendees had the opportunity to sample and enjoy 4 ounce glasses - real samples - of every style of craft beer available from over 75 different breweries.

Beer enthusiasts turned out in greater numbers than anticipated - the consensus was over 700 people.

As a fledgling brewer, we're glad we were there.

On Tap at Brugge Brasserie - Feb 24

I've been AWOL in Bangkok for a bit, but I'm happy I'll be back in Indy next week.

Why, you ask?

Yes, it's 90 degrees and sunny every day here, and the Land of Smiles is home to some of the greatest food on the planet.

But...

Ted just sent me an email saying the following are all on tap at Brugge right now.

Black

White

Blonde

Old Dog Cru

Tripel de Ripple.

This is the first batch of Tripel from Terre Haute and Ted, that marketing maven, had this to say in his email:

"Tripel is back and is delicious. Like super delicious."

With all 5 of those on tap, it's probably a good thing we will be expanding upstairs soon!

Interesting Reading

Links to a few good places and a few good articles:

1) A terrific article from the Wall Street Journal, and a primer on how to build a business:

http://online.wsj.com/public/article_print/SB118330766419354480.html

2) Beer! Who needs champagne?

http://www.businesswire.com/portal/site/google/index.jsp?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20071226005177&newsLang=en

3) Industry Challenges:

http://www.postcrescent.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080105/APC03/801050520/1888

4) What's "In" for 2008

http://www.projo.com/food/content/fd-gail09_01-09-08_918FD14_v21.107342d.html

5) World Class Beverage- Our distributor's great web site:

http://www.worldclassbeverages.com/MainPage.htm

What Happened and What's Happening

In late 2006, we were introduced to Mike Rowe, the owner of the Terre Haute Brewing Co. and a terrific opportunity was born.

Mike asked Ted if he was interested in buying the building in order for us to start distributing our beer outside of Brugge Brasserie.

We formed a new company, the Vigo Brewing Group, attracted necessary venture capital, and in April, 2007, an agreement was finalized.

At that time, we fully expected to have beer on liquor store shelves, as well as bar and restaurant taps by September.

We should have known better.

Between April and October, we filed papers, documents, revisions, and revisions of revisions in an effort to secure federal and state approval to begin operations. The approvals came in late October.

In November, we began to make our first test batches of Brugge Black, White, and Tripel de Ripple. Tests because the water in Terre Haute is different than the water in Indianapolis, and because Ted, thankfully, is a perfectionist.

When we turned on the equipment ( without a license, we could not even boil water in the building ) to begin testing, we found the bottling line needed to be modified for the Champagne .75 liter bottles we will use.

The bottling line manufacturer is in Italy, its distributor is in Canada, and we are the smallest of small fries to both of them. No surprise, then, when we were told it would take 90 to 120 days for the parts to arrive.

That means no bottles until April at the earliest.

In the meantime, the Black and White coming from Terre Haute are terrific. Ask anyone who has had a Black at the Brasserie lately.

Black is also available at BadaBoomz in downtown Indy, as well as the Power House Brewing Co. in Columbus.

As of this writing, we now have a good quantity of both Black and White in 1/6 and 1/2 barrels in stock at our distribution partner, World Class Beverage. And Tripel de Ripple will be ready in 2 to 3 weeks.

We will keep you updated on where you can find - and enjoy - our beer.

If you have a favorite restaurant or watering hole we should contact, post a reply here, and we'll get right on it.

Again, we thank everyone for all the support, especially those who have emailed us begging for beer.

We're as impatient as you and we're looking forward to a terrific 2008.

Charlie

Happy 2008 ! ! !

We hope everyone had a happy and safe holiday season. And we'd especially like to thank all those who celebrated part of their holidays at Brugge Brasserie.

Ted tells me (I'm in Bangkok for a bit) the restaurant was filled with friends throughout the season.

Makes perfect sense to me. Holidays and cold weather are the the perfect combination for a hearty Flamande and a couple - OK, maybe 3 or 4 - Blacks.

2007 ended on a great note for Brugge Beer as we were invited to participate in Hoosier Beer Geek's New Year's Eve extravaganza at Deano's Vino.

Ted created a special beer for the event, which, I'm relieved to say, is easier to drink than pronounce:

Sint Sylvester Voornavond Ale

Here's what our friends at HBG had to say:

http://hoosierbeergeek.blogspot.com/2008/01/exceeding-all-expectations.html

http://hoosierbeergeek.blogspot.com/2008/01/sint-sylvester-vooranvond-hbg.html

Sounds like I missed a great night.

Lots of things are going on as Brugge looks forward to 2008 and we'll chronicle all the activity on these pages.

But for now, all the best for 2008 and thanks for your continued support of Brugge.

Treat yourself well.

Charlie

New Year's Eve with Hoosier Beer Geek

You probably know all about the great New Year's Eve event our friends at Hoosier Beer Geek will be hosting at Deano's Vino.

Not coincidentally,this event will be held on December 31!

http://hoosierbeergeek.blogspot.com/2007/12/new-years-party-info.html

We humbly asked if Brugge Beer could participate in the event as well and we're thrilled to say they accepted our offer.

http://hoosierbeergeek.blogspot.com/2007/12/our-new-years-party-keeps-getting.html

Sounds like Deano's is the place to be to ring - or wring - out the old.

I would suggest, however, your social secretary not make any plans for you on New Year's Day.

Strong Belgian Blonde on Tap

Ted has unleashed a terrific Strong Belgian Blonde at the Brasserie.

I told him it sounded great, but I had no idea we were hiring additional staff.

I immediately sensed he wanted to hit me in the head, but was saved as we were on the phone at the time.

Then he explained it to me.

Easy drinker with a soft sweet malt character. Yeast character with honey-like alcohol, and fruity esters is evident
Reminiscent of pears / pineapples. Subtle yet complex.

Sounds even better than what I originally imagined!

Enjoy!

EURO 2008

The draw for the 2008 Euro 2008 Finals was held today. The contest will be held June 7 - 29 in Austria and Switzerland.

http://www.uefa.com/Competitions/euro/index.html

Our good friends, the English, were unceremoniously handed their hat in the qualifying stages.

Had Engerlund qualified, we were thinking of running a 3 city trip, beginning in Brugge, followed by excursions to 2 England matches before returning home.

With England exiled, would anyone still be interested in such a trip?

If so, we need to begin planning soon.

Drop a note here or on my email at:

charlie@brugge-beer.com

Slow, but Steady Progress

With the limited amount of beer available from our first batch, we are proud to say our Brugge Black can now be enjoyed in 2 great places other than Brugge Brasserie.

First, it's available from our good friends at BadaBoomz in downtown Indy.

http://www.badaboomz.net/

And just last week it was added to the great range of beers at the Power House Brewing Co.'s Columbus Bar.

http://www.powerhousebrewingco.com/index.html

More beer is on the way as well.

In fact, we will be releasing a large quantity of Black and White in kegs, both 1/2 barrels and 1/6 barrels very, very soon.

Stay tuned here to find where you can go and enjoy.

Turkey Time

The air cools as the stuffed turkey watches over our humble brewery. Yes, we actually do have a stuffed turkey watching over the brewery. Left from some great hunting expedition before our time, I guess? A freshly brewed batch of Black Ale releases pear and other fruity notes in a veil of CO2 filled air. This year, like so many other years and other people, we are Thanks-Giving for good beer. Have a great and safe Thanksgiving holiday everyone out there in blog world. You'll be hearing alot more from us.

Cheers from the Terre Haute Crew

Micah,Cathy and John

England v. Croatia, Wednesday @ 3:00PM

Start Thanksgiving weekend with some real football.

England must win or draw at Wembley versus Croatia in order to qualify for Euro 2008.

See it on the big screen at Brugge.

Wednesday, November 21.

3:00PM

Ted petitions to change corny blog name

In a vulgarity laden tirade - um - I mean - rant - Ted has petitioned the blogmaster to change the name of the blog bearing his name. Considering the pedestrian, albeit informative name of the main blog, he is requesting that he be granted permission to change the currently insufferably corny name of his blog to either:

Prophetic Ripple Ministries

Spirit-filled Charasmatic Anecdotes

Funkbier

Twerpbone and his one-sided viewpoints

Bumblemunch

We're taking a vote. Entirely new names welcome.

November 14, 2007 - New Beer on Tap

There's a new beer on at Brugge Brasserie.

It's called Imperial Amber.

Here's a description from Ted:

Impérial is a Belgian inspired Imperial Amber. Rich with hints of toffee and dark fruit, this beauty drinks every bit of 8%. This would pair very nicely with the Carbonnade Flamande.

Sounds perfect for some of the colder nights ahead.

Enjoy!

Charlie

Explanation of Weblog Name

Our good friends at Hoosier Beer Geek were kind enough to mention our new Weblog, going so far as to commend us for being so "creative" in coming up with a name.

Check their site for an in-depth analysis of all the sweat and blood that went into its development.

http://hoosierbeergeek.blogspot.com/2007/11/hop-crop-news.html

Charlie