Brewing Up A Good Story

Tom Poland    
September 27, 2013

Growing up in the church and being warned of the evils of alcohol I think twice about writing anything to do with drinking. My Mom would for sure disapprove. Still, for most people a cool adult beverage comes down to a simple reward: It’s a way to forget about work and thing stressing you out. A drink or two can definitely shoo your worries out the window after a worrisome day.

Not everyone who sips wine, squeezes a wedge of lime into a gin-and-tonic, savors Scotch, or lifts a beer is Otis Campbell of Andy Griffith Show fame. After a tough week dipping glue in the furniture factory Old Otis would go on a binge and lock himself up in Andy’s jail.

Otis for all his imbibing I suspect didn’t know the finer points of brewing beer but he’s not alone. Most people don’t understand how adult beverages come to be. They should. Brewing has been around since the 6th millennium BC. Outside of aficionados I daresay most people don’t think about the meticulous processes that yield their beverages. It’s an art really. Hmmm, I thought, there ought to be a good story here. I decided a trip to a microbrewery might brew up a good story and it turns out I was right. First some background.

In the summer of 2000 I spent two weeks in Bavaria. German beer is a feast, a meal unto itself. A wheat beer glass sporting a head of cream shot through with golden light is a thing of beauty. The fluffy foam traps the beer’s fragrance and enriches the flavor. The last taste is as good as the first. When I returned to the States beer paled in comparison to the creamy, palate-pleasing brews of Bavaria. Even so-called German beers here disappointed. Well I wasn’t alone. It turns out that Mark Johnsen up in Spartanburg, South Carolina, had an experience similar to mine and he decided to do something about it. Start a brewery. Robert Clark and I drove upstate to gather first-hand material for a book, features, and, it so happens, this column.

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It’s a sunny day in Sparkle City. You can feel that first hint of fall in the air. Sunlight’s taken on a new attitude. It’s relaxed and lustrous. The humidity is low. Everything’s clear. A deep blue sky, a cobalt dome actually, arches over the city but summer still holds title to the winds and a breeze stirs. Sweet incenses ride this warm zephyr, the honeyed fragrance of simmering hops and barley. As I walk up RJ Rockers Brewing Company’s loading ramp, Stout, a black Lab comes out to greet me. A sulphur butterfly flutters by, intensely yellow against that royal blue sky.

Glancing up I see ten solar panels soaking up sunlight on the roof. Solar-powered in part, RJ Rockers Brewing Company became Spartanburg’s first brewery in 1997 thanks to Mark Johnsen. Following his service in the 1991 Gulf War, Johnsen, an Army Ranger, was stationed in Germany and it was there he fell in love with beer. There he tasted beers crafted by experts. There he learned as much as possible about brewing. Returning to Idaho, Johnsen couldn’t find beer that pleased him as Germany’s did. He did, however, find a small brewery and volunteered to work in it. A deal was struck and he began to learn all he could about brewing, his passion. For years Mark had loved brewing beer for friends and family. When he came to Spartanburg Johnsen set out on a mission to provide the South Carolina Upstate the best microbrewed beer people ever tasted. Their motto reflects just that. Handcrafted. Every Beer, Every Drop, Every Time.

Johnsen, along with Henry Depew, John E. Bauknight IV, and Nick Wildrick own the brewery. They and the other good folks at RJ Rockers believe their beer makes the world a better place. Nothing wrong with that. Henry Depew, co-owner and president, is our host. Henry’s a pleasant fellow from Ohio who looks as if he could have played for the Buckeyes. Henry gives me a briefing on brewing.

 

Brewing is a precise process, he says. Lots of variables in brewing, he adds, but as basics go there are four: hops, water, yeast, and barley. Variables include the balance of ingredients and time and temperature. It comes as no surprise that these are closely monitored. 

Water is heated to 154 to 156 where it comes together with the grain during ‘mash in,’ says Henry. That happens in a vessel called a ‘mashtun.’ We then go from that vessel to kettle where we boil it and add hops at different times during the boil.

That step, I learned, lets them control bitterness and aroma. The earlier the hops go in the bitterer a beer becomes. It’s all about timing and balance. I learned too that those solar panels give RJ Rockers an eco-friendly way to brew beer.

Our solar heaters allow us to get a larger quantity of water up into the 140 range, said Henry. We then use boilers to raise it. So solar does heavy lifting from ground water, call it 57 degrees, to 140-ish.

 

The water comes from North Carolina where it enters the South Pacolet River basin. After undergoing precise processes a variety of brews result. There’s Patriot Ale, Bald Eagle Brown, Bell Ringer, and legendary Son of a Peach with its decided peach hints. (They use South Carolina peaches. Gaffney’s legendary Peachoid one-million-gallon water tank is just up I-85 a ways.) Other brews include Fish Paralyzer, Day Drinker IPA (India Pale Ale), and Rockers Red Glare.

 

I take delight in the names of their beers and something pet lovers will appreciate: the brewery’s loyal crew of dogs. Stout, who greeted me, was just doing his job. He works in security and is the brewery’s mascot and greeter. Go to RJ Rocker’s website (http://www.rjrockers.com/) and you’ll see the bios of the folks who work there. You’ll see the dogs’ bios too. Here are some snippets. Stout’s favorite food is pizza crust and his favorite sport is sleeping. His favorite TV show is Dog the Bounty Hunter. He likes Bell Ringer beer.

Ace, another black Lab, works as the company’s ball retriever. His favorite food is steak. He likes to vacation at Edisto Island and his favorite song is Life in the Fast Lane. He sips Bald Eagle Brown.

Willie, who looks much like an English setter, works as the brewer’s assistant. He started off as office manager and worked his way up. His favorite TV show is Dog Whisperer and his hobby is chasing bugs.

Schooner, another setter look-alike, works as the ball holder. Under age he can’t drink. He first worked as a forklift driver.

Finally there’s Khaki, a lhasa apso kind of fellow, who cleans floors. He went to Dogcare High School. His favorite food is socks and sock eating is his favorite sport. Favorite restaurant? The Footlocker and favorite TV show? K9 Cop.

Stout sauntered up to the brewery’s taproom as I photographed the fermenting tanks. (See my shot of him greeting a visitor.) I caught myself staring at all the tanks. You just don’t see stainless steel tanks like this everyday. Mark Johnsen’s first four 60-barrel tanks reminded him of Mount Rushmore. He nicknamed the tanks Rosy, George, TJ, and Abe.

 

I also photographed 50-pound bags of Briess malt stacked on pallets. Briess is in grain country up Chilton, Wisconsin way. The loose malt looks like birdseed and when you chew it a sweet nutty flavor floods the taste buds. Once the grain is used up it goes to a local farm where cattle eat it. Makes for some very happy cows and the steaks are pretty good, said Henry Depew.

I asked Henry just how the brewery’s name came about. (I’m always curious as to how names come to be.) The R, says Henry, came from Mark’s first partner’s name. The J represents Mark’s last name, and Rockers stands for Glen Rock, New Jersey, where Johnsen grew up. Put it together and you get RJ Rockers. Now you better understand the name behind Sparkle City’s handcrafted beer.

Research the brewing of beer and you’ll see that writers don’t refer to brewing as a craft. They refer to it as an art. RJ Rockers Brewing Company takes the art aspect literally. It partners with The Johnson Collection, a splendid private art collection just up the street, to sponsor Art on Tap, an event celebrating palette and palate. It takes place in conjunction with the monthly Spartanburg Art Walk and RJ Rockers’ weekly Tour and Taste. A walk/taste was taking place the day I was there. Life Is But A Dream: Explorations in Surreality.

 

I had my own surreal moment. I ended my tour watching amber bottles advance down a conveyor like a conquering army. They were washed, labeled, filled, and six-packed. Then they were readied for shipment throughout South Carolina as well as to North Carolina, Georgia, and parts of Tennessee and Virginia.

Automation’s a great thing but a lot of meticulous labor takes place here at 226 A West Main Street. The brewery takes great pride in its painstaking approach to handcrafted beer. Its slogan says it all. Handcrafted. Every Beer. Every Drop. Every Time. Before we headed back to Cola Town the fellows at RJ Rockers gave Robert and me six packs of Son of a Peach and Light Rock. Hand-crafted of course. We stored them away, arrived home, and iced them down for another day. We came away too with new friends and vowed to come back one day for the Art Walk and Tour and Taste.

A final note. If you drink, drink responsibly, as if your and others’ lives depend on it. Because they do.

 

Photography by Tom Poland 

 

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Tom Poland is the author of six books and more than 700 magazine features. A Southern writer, his work has appeared in magazines throughout the South. The University of South Carolina Press just released his book on how the blues became the shag, Save The Last Dance For Me. He writes a weekly column for newspapers in Georgia and South Carolina about the South, its people, traditions, lifestyle, and changing culture.