EUREKA REDEVELOPMENT AGENCY

You Heard It Here 1st!

Note from Barbara:

We are working on a series of beers that will be a limited release. They will be in 22 oz. bottles, higher strength, with the ability to be aged so people can collect them and store them in their beer cellar. Wine cellars are now passe. Beer is the new wine.

We are also working on bringing our root beer to market in 6 packs.

We are now the 33rd largest craft brewery in America. We did 50,000 barrels last year. With the new brewery we can leave that barrelage in the dust.

LOST COAST BREWERY ~ THE STORY

The Lost Coast Brewery and Café began with a common dream. In 1986 Barbara Groom, a pharmacist, and Wendy Pound, a family counselor, wondered what it would require to start their own brewpub. After years of experimental home brewing, planning and studying, which included visiting scores of pubs in England & Wales, Barbara and Wendy were ready to transform their dream into a reality.

With the 1989 purchase of the Pythian Castle, a 100-year-old building in Eureka, California, the café was ready to open. The building, a restored wood frame structure constructed in 1892, was purchased from the original owners, The Fraternal Order of the Knights of Pythias. After spending the winter and spring engaged in extensive remodeling, the Lost Coast Brewery and Café became a living dream in July of 1990.

The cool maritime climate of the Humboldt Bay region has proved to be very conducive to brewing quality ales. The year round average temperature of 55� Fahrenheit is ideal for top-fermenting ale yeast. While embracing the rich tradition of English-style ales, Master Brewer Barbara Groom has added a distinctive West Coast flavor to her ales by brewing with Western Plains barley and wheat and the exceptionally clean water of Humboldt County.

Since it’s humble beginning in 1990, the brewery has outgrown the original facilities in the Pythian Castle and moved production to a larger site down the street. Again Lost Coast is looking to expand into a new facility.

 “We have been able to reinvest the money we have saved and grow our business and hire more employees faster than other brewers in the area,” says Ms. Groom.

 “What the Enterprise Zone offers us as a Eureka business…”

The Lost Coast Brewery is one of the only female-owned and operated breweries in the United States. The Lost Coast Brewery is famous for its delicious and award-winning beers.

Ms. Groom says she has been able to grow the Lost Coast Brewery in part because of the Enterprise Zone credits the business receives. “We have been able to reinvest the money we have saved and grow our business and hire more employees faster than other brewers in the area,” says Ms. Groom. Operating a 50,000 barrel brewery (compared to 12,000 barrel breweries in the area), Ms. Groom says “The tax savings we receive also allows us to pay our 77 employees higher wages than our competitors.”

The Lost Coast Brewery distributes its beers nationwide and Ms. Groom is looking at building another new brewery. “We want to stay in Eureka because of the Enterprise Zone credits we receive,” she says. “That is what is holding us here – otherwise we would be looking elsewhere.”

LA Times ~

Lost Coast Brewing Tangerine Wheat

BEER OF THE MONTH

April 15, 2009|Charles Perry

This business of flavoring beer with fruit, which started with the Belgian cherry and peach lambics, has the potential to go too far. Sooner or later, some American brewer (face it, it'll be a Californian) is bound to produce a kiwi-mango beer that will embarrass us all.

Citrus, however, has a true affinity for wheat beers, which need to make up for their lack of barley roundness, and a dash of lemon syrup is traditional with Berliner weisse. Taking the clue, Lost Coast Brewing has come up with a tangerine-perfumed wheat beer -- as usual with Lost Coast, not erring on the side of the subtle; it's a whole lot of tangerine on top of a crisp, mildly hopped wheat. This is going to be a charming outdoor sipper as the weather warms, and it has real potential as a food beer, particularly with fried fish. I'd also try it out in sauces where you might use wine, maybe boiling some down with butter and shallots to go with that fish.

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Two women brewing beer in their garage approached the City in 1988 and requested financial assistance to start the Lost Coast Brewery and Cafe. 22 years later, the company is 77 employees strong and they are beginning to look for a larger site to brew beer and expand for the third time.The City invested $255,000 of the total project cost of $785,000.