Monday Night Brewing

New Hefeweizen: Monday Night Rucksack

Monday Night Rucksack, a new hefeweizen by the Atlanta brewery, debuts in cans for the first time.

The traditional German-style wheat beer is brewed with Mandarina Bavaria hops in the boil, and then steeped in orange peel post-fermentation.

Hazy and unfiltered, Rucksack’s Continue Reading →

A frigid night in a Georgia coolship

Peter Kiley will always remember the day that co-founder and COO of Monday Night Joel Iverson asked him two life-changing questions. The first was fairly simple. The second one is downright daunting. How sure are you about this sour program Continue Reading →

Posted in Monday Night Brewing, New Releases

New Hefeweizen: Monday Night Rucksack

Monday Night Rucksack, a new hefeweizen by the Atlanta brewery, debuts in cans for the first time.

The traditional German-style wheat beer is brewed with Mandarina Bavaria hops in the boil, and then steeped in orange peel post-fermentation.

Hazy and unfiltered, Rucksack’s wheat malt delivers a bready character that screams citrus fruit when combined with Mandarina Bavaria hops. Steeping this beer with orange peel post-fermentation only accentuates this fruitiness.

Monday Night Ruck Sack is available in 12-ounce cans and draft as an early summer seasonal.

Style: Hefeweizen (w/ Orange Peels)
Hops: Mandarina Bavaria

Availability: 12oz Cans, Draft.
Debut: Early May 2018

4.9% ABV

Posted in Monday Night Brewing, New Releases

Magically inspired Monday Night Mischief Managed debuts

Those magically inspired, beer-loving individuals are sure to love this artwork. Monday Night Mischief Managed will emerge from their barrels soon.

Mischief Managed is a no-boil Berliner Weisse that has been barrel-soured in white wine barrels. Fresh raspberries have recently been added to the barrels, then allowed to ferment a second time. The result should be a beer that would make Moody, Wormtail, Padfoot & Prongs proud.

Monday Night Mischief Managed will be a 500-milliliter bottle release. The brewery has not yet announced a release date.

Style: Berliner Weisse (w/ Raspberries. Barrel-Aged.)
Availability: 500ml Bottles
Debut: 3/18/18

4.5% ABV

PIC: Beer Street Journal

Posted in Monday Night Brewing, New Releases

Double barrel-aged Monday Night Excolatur hits shelves

Monday Night Excolatur debuts on February 10th. 

The base beer for Monday Night Excolatur, a dark sour, has been aging in a blend of bourbon and rum barrels for more than two years. For the last four months, Excolatur has been aging on Montmorency cherries.

“Excolatur is Latin for ‘Development.’ This beer started out in fresh bourbon barrels before a transfer to rum barrels. We then inoculated it with locally sourced Pediococcus and Lactobacillus strains and aged it for another year before refermenting it on Mont cherries.

Monday Night Excolatur is now available in 500-milliliter bottles at the brewery’s “Garage” location as of February 10th, with limited distribution across the brewery’s footprint.

Style: American Wild Ale (w/ Cherries. Barrel Aged. Bourbon. Rum.)
Availability: 500ml Bottles.
Debut: 2/10/18

9.5% ABV

Posted in Monday Night Brewing, Headlines

A frigid night in a Georgia coolship

Peter Kiley will always remember the day that co-founder and COO of Monday Night Joel Iverson asked him two life-changing questions. The first was fairly simple. The second one is downright daunting. How sure are you about this sour program you’ve been developing? Are you “millions of dollars” sure?

Kiley divulges that he knew the answer to both was “very sure.” However, when someone throws the words “millions” and “dollars” in a sentence, even the slightest pause is warranted. It was those two affirmative answers that solidified the build of Monday Night’s second facility, a barrel aged & wild facility Atlanta now knows as “The Garage.”

Just a few weeks ago, on a rare frigid Georgia night where the temperature was dipping into the mid-teens, Peter Kiley and his brewing team were about to make Atlanta beer history. The city’s first coolship spontaneous fermentation was about to happen.

This iconic piece of brewing equipment dates back centuries thanks to Belgian brewing. Belgian lambics are still made this way, and if you want to make lambic or gueuze, a coolship is imperative. Kiley and Monday Night’s coolship (aka “The Crunkship”) was the first thing added to the plans. “This had to happen,” says Kiley.

Wild yeast is naturally all around you. Even a bustling metro city like Atlanta. Those yeasts, borne of the trees, plants and fruits create a unique living cocktail; a fermentation snapshot of a particular time and place. Allowing that yeast to “spontaneously ferment” cooling wort, is something incredibly unique biologically, meteorologically, and geographically. And that is less beholden to the brewer and more to mother nature herself.

Earlier that day, Kiley and brew team spent many labor-intensive hours brewing the base beer at Monday Night’s original facility. The turbid mash was rested at five different temperatures then boiled for nearly four hours (losing 20% of the initial volume). After nightfall, the boiling hot wort was loaded into stainless steel totes and trucked to The Garage.

“The Crunkship” room is lined with untreated Georgia pine, that’s been exposed to the Atlanta air for weeks, and been allowed to freeze along with city’s dipping temperatures.

12:15 am. The time has come. The pump kicks up, and the first splashes of wort hit the coolship. Steam fills the room. Your nose fills with the aromas of the sweet, grainy mash. Kiley tells us as the room fills with steam and the walls start to sweat, those two questions that Iverson asked came to mind again. From this point, so much is the brewer’s hands.

 

Atlanta isn’t exactly out in a lush, vegetation-rich surrounding, like Allagash, Jester King, or even de Garde Brewing. Some of the city’s most critical beer drinkers have been very vocal about Kiley and Monday Night’s new lambic aspirations. For Peter, discovering this on his own is the only way it was ever going to happen.

“Even if it does fail, we know what the 5th of January in the city that we love tastes like. This requires, patience, education, and time, and always being a student and learning from others around you,” Kiley said.

The next day, the coolship was emptied into red wine barrels – the same that were filled by Kiley himself during his winemaker days. “Talk about full-circle. I have a history with these barrels. I doubt I could ever let them go.”

Barely two days later, those barrels starting bubbling. Fermentation was well underway. What the Atlanta air had to offer after days of freezing temperatures are now captured in oak, where they will rest quietly for years. The plan is to take future spontaneous beers and blend in a traditional fashion, the oldest thread hovering around three years.

Old world brewing is alive in Atlanta. A coolship might be just a vessel, but the process? A romantic artform that, in a way, blends your soul with the beer and puts your faith in the two things you can’t control. Nature and time.

Posted in Monday Night Brewing, Coming Soon

Monday Night Beyond The Clouds debuts January 27th

Monday Night Beyond The Clouds, a new Brettanomyces heavy IPA debuts on January 27th.

Everything you love about tropical hops and the funkiness of Brettanomyces comes together beautifully in Monday Night Beyond the Clouds. Especially if you are a fan of both.

This release has been fermenting for months at brewery’s new location “The Garage”, fermenting with six different strains of Brettanomyces. According to  head brewer Peter Kiley, about half were Monday Night’s strains, and the other half are commercially bought.

The result is a hazy, funky, tropical IPA that leaves you wanting more than one glass. The balance of hops to Brett character can only be described as “perfect”.

Bottles of Monday Night Beyond the Clouds can be reserved now online (mobile only)  for the brewery release on January 27th. Limited market distribution to follow.

Style: American Wild Ale (Brett IPA)
Hops: Citra, Huell Melon, Mosaic, Simcoe
Availability: 500ml Bottles
Debut: 1/27/18

6.5% ABV

Posted in Monday Night Brewing, New Releases

Batdorf & Bronson coffee makes an appearance in Monday Night Whirling Dervish

Monday Night Whirling Dervish is the newest seasonal release by the Atlanta, Georgia based brewery.

A dry Irish stout serves as the canvas for the Batdorf & Bronson coffee roasted especially for this release. Monday Night’s creative brewer Josh Johnson had cold winter nights in mind with designing this recipe. “We packed a lot of roasty and toasty flavor into this beer. It’s an everyday drinker on cold winter nights – or anytime you need a little coffee kick,” he says.

Ren Doughty with Batdorf & Bronson roasted the coffee beans darker in order to bring out notes of chocolate, molasses, toasted almond and orange zest. The resulting stout that will help you forget the almost single digit temperatures so many people are drinking through this winter.

This isn’t the first time the brewery has worked with Batdorf & Bronson. Bed Head (a coffee IPA), as well as award-winning milk stout Tears of My Enemies, make use of the talents of the local roaster.

Monday Night Whirling Dervish will be available in 12-ounce cans and draft starting January 20th.

Style: Irish Stout (w/ Coffee.)
Availability: 12oz Cans, Draft. Seasonal Release.
Debut: 1/20/18

4.9% ABV

Posted in Monday Night Brewing, Coming Soon

Monday Night I’m On A Boat is coming in time for boat season

Monday Night I’m On A Boat, a new golden ale will release in the near future. 

We’d bet 9 out of 10 of you reading this right now has the Saturday Night Live sketch/song in your head, featuring Lonely Island and T-Pain. For the 1% that don’t know, we’ll drop the video at the bottom of the article.

RELATED: Monday Night ‘s new barleywine is insane

It may not seem like it now, but it will indeed be warm outside again. Georgia will get warm, then really freaking hot, and soon you be sipping Monday Night I’m On A Boat, most likely on an actual boat.

This slightly hoppy yet very sessionable golden ale is just shy of 5% alcohol by volume, to be found in  12-ounce cans. Basically, it can and will go everywhere. If our understanding of the brewery’s timetable is correct, you’ll see this in early spring.

Style: Golden Ale
Availability: 12oz Cans, Draft.
Debut: TBA

4.8% ABV