Sugar Maple Brewery Series: Black Husky Brewing

This past Sunday, I went to Sugar Maple, one of my favorite Milwaukee watering holes, for their Brewery Series featuring Black Husky Brewing from Pembine, WI. I've been to several of these events over the last couple of years and each one has been fantastic. For fifteen dollars, you get to sample at least five beers from the brewery and you get to listen to and talk to a representative from the brewery. Sometimes it's a distributor, while other times we are lucky enough to get the owner, like we did this time. It was truly an amazing night and I wanted to share it.

Black Husky Brewing is a nano-brewery owned by Tim Eichinger and his wife, Toni, located up in the far northern reaches of Wisconsin. Last year he brewed between 150 and 200 barrels. This year he hopes to reach 300 barrels. Tim is the only one that brews the beer, though his son helps out as well. They have a team of retired sled dogs, which is where the name of the brewery comes from, as well as the names of the beer. Each beer label also features the dog for which it is named. The beer is fantastic too. I sampled their Milk Stout, Harold the Red Imperial Red, Headbutter (an interesting take on an American barley wine), Pale Ale, and Sproose Joose.

Tim truly embodies the spirit of craft beer. Black Husky is 100% wholesale, with no on-site sales and no tours. All of Black Husky's beer are big beers with rich flavors and higher than average alcohol content. Tim said that he won't bother making beer if it isn't any good. He brews for himself and, if he likes it, then it's good beer. He talked a bit about how there are a lot of breweries who are focusing more on commercialization and marketing, or trying to hit a certain demographic, rather than working on perfecting the beer. Why brew beer if you don't like what you make? That's exactly why brewers, like Tim, become successful. He loves beer, loves to brew, and has a passion for craft beer. He's very particular about the ingredients he uses and only uses what he likes. One of Black Husky's more popular beers is called Sproose Joose, a double IPA. Tim uses fresh spruce pines in the recipe, which he walks out back of his house and harvests straight from the tree.  Now that's fresh.

I think one of the cooler things I learned about Tim and Black Husky Brewing, is that he doesn't have any deals with distributors. He bottles and kegs his beer and personally delivers his beer to bars and liquor stores that he basically hand picks. He has a spread sheet, makes calls to tell people what he's got, and then delivers the beer personally. He said he hand picks places that he feels are going to treat his beer right. By the way, Pembine is about a six hour drive from Milwaukee. That is some service.

The dedication to his craft and the quality of the beer that he brews makes Black Husky a new favorite Wisconsin brewery for me. With all of the effort Tim takes in creating his beers and delivering them to us beer lovers, you know you are getting a really great, fresh product. In fact, if you see Black Husky beer on the shelf at your favorite bottle shop, know that it was most likely brewed in the last six to eight weeks. I'll go out on a limb here and say this...while Black Husky Brewing certainly isn't as big as New Glarus (about 120,000 barrels), the quality and craftsmanship in the beer is on par with them. Maybe Tim will find his flagship beer (Pale Ale?, Sproose Joose?) and he'll grow to become just as big one day.  Until then, I'll continue to enjoy Black Husky beer. Cheers!