Beer company prepares to launch new flavor

In February 2011 three friends from church were sitting on a back porch when they hatched an idea to start their own brewing company.

Almost four years later that idea has become the soon-to-be six beers that pour from Solid Rock Brewing taps.

"We are looking for a little bit older demographic, people who really want to enjoy their beer. It's more about [giving people] something that's classically done that I can go back to every time," co-owner Steve "Beaker" McCarthy said.

McCarthy runs the brewing business with Curt Webber and Steve Jones. Each Tuesday, the trio will start brewing at 5:30 a.m. and do not stop until 6:30 p.m. or 10:30 p.m., depending on the size of the batch. The batch is then bottled or kegged in-house and sent out to one of the approximately 400 locations that sell Solid Rock products.

"We very much look back at pre-Prohibition where you had your local butcher, your local baker and your local beer. You just came here for good beer; you weren't looking to have your taste buds exploded," McCarthy said.

As Solid Rock's team begins to start its expansion phase, McCarthy said it is focused on quality and making sure everyone that walks through the brewery finds at least one beer they like. If that beer is not found, they figure out what could be done better.

"We really believe strongly that if you really want to show your ability as a brewer, you need to demonstrate how to brew really good beer with very, very minimalistic ingredients, and I believe we've successfully done that," McCarthy said.

Being a craft brewing company in the Austin area can prove to be a challenge, McCarthy said. Many people have the impression that craft brews are extremely hoppy stouts, which many do not find appeasing to the palate at first, he said. However, that's not what all craft beer is about, he said.

"Take someone that's learning to drink coffee. The first thing they're going to do is put some sugar and milk in it and learn to develop [their taste] over time and learn to appreciate the coffee's bitterness. It's the same thing with beer—there's flavors in there that you have to develop your palate to because the hops can be very astringent on the tongue," McCarthy said.

That's why, McCarthy said, the first two brews they created were a light cream ale and an Irish red ale to help those wary of craft brews to disband those fears.

Solid Rock currently hosts tap hours on Saturdays during which people can buy a pint glass with a set amount of refills, but the brewery's owners say they are hoping to receive a permit to become a brewpub so they can begin to sell beer in six packs, kegs and more on-site.

"Our intent was to be a village brewer, not to be a big-package brewery. We think it's important to maintain the essence of being a craft brewer by not being too big," McCarthy said.

Solid Rock's Vanilla Milk Stout will be available in November with a seventh beer waiting in the wings for the right launch time, McCarthy said.

Brewing process

• To make its beer Solid Rock Brewing uses thousands of pounds of barley grains and pops them open using a carefully set machine. Once those grains are popped open, they are spun through a long tube to a mash tun, or a large vat.
• The mash tun creates a mix, like a large tea, of grains and heated water that extracts the sugar from the barley with various ingredients mixed in depending on what beer is being brewed.
• Wort, or the result of the tea mix, is then transferred to the boil kettle through the sparging process. A number of chemical reactions take place here, and this is when hops are added.
• The wort is super-cooled while moving to the fermenting vat. The fermenting stage differs in length of time for each beer. This is the stage at which wort becomes beer. Solid Rock does not use a filter on its beer during this stage; instead the beer is naturally cleared.
• The beer is then moved to a brite tank in which the carbonation level reaches its final adjustment and becomes ready for packaging.

Solid Rock beers

The brewery currently offers 5 beers, but will add a sixth beer in November and has plans to launch a seventh in the future.

• Cornerstone (cream ale)
• Roundhead Irish Red Ale (Irish red ale)
• Dauntless (IPA)
• Big Drought Stout (dark stout)
• Cho'Sen (hybrid ale)

Solid Rock Brewing, 2214 Bee Creek Road, Spicewood, 512-571-1740, www.solidrockbrewing.com