Barrel and Flow Fest 2021 is in the books. Our friend Alero from WARCLOUD Brewing wanted to capture the expereince of brewing a collab with famed Miami craft brewery, J. Wakefield Brewing. Read about Alero’s experience collaborating with Wakefield and then serving it up at Barrel and Flow. Please stay tuned in upcoming weeks as The Full Pint tells the story and introduces the people, the brand and the beer known as WARCLOUD. – Cheers, Danny
“No Sh*t there we were” is usually how most cool stories start. But… No sh*t there we were; en route from LAX to MIA. To paint the picture only seen in dreams. The flight in – We caught thunderstorms with lightning dancing around cumulus clouds, illuminating the skies. All of that with no turbulence. It was the calm before the storm we were about to get into! First time in Miami with the Warcloud crew. Ready to brew a beer for the largest African American beer festival in the world, Barrel and Flow Fest 2021!
But let’s rewind a bit. Completely random we had listened to the Full Pint podcast episode: 170 with Jonathan Wakefield. A few days later we conference-called with Day Bracey of the Barrel and Flow Fest. An opportunity to collaborate with JWB was on the table. This is what Warcloud calls an HVT or High Value Target. Someone to learn from and build resources with. Jonathan Wakefield hit us on comms and we talked about the beer recipe, and he said “let’s not just do 1 beer but let’s do 2!” …. “Whoa!? … For real?!” In addition to all that – Ironically we as a team started watching Startup on Netflix which takes place in Miami. That show right there helped us get a lay of the land, and it was dope! Planets started aligning, the universe started providing.
So we landed at 0200 hours in the morning in Miami. Headed straight to the hotel in Biscayne bay, just minutes away from JWB in Wynwood. This hotel lobby alone was taking people out. Drunks rolled in like Zombies n’ sh*t. A few rolled in on wheelchairs, one girl came in slumped and thrown over her boyfriend’s shoulders. One dude came in smoking an imaginary cigarette then he made a b-line to throw up in the planter before hopping into an elevator. We were thinking “damn, this city takes people out.” Afterparties went until 0500 hours in the morning, right there in that hotel lobby. We were camped up with them pulling an all-nighter, just people watching and waiting for check-in at noon.
Moving on, brew day wasn’t until Tuesday. Which left us 24 hours to explore. Figured out all of the exits, points of egress, walked the entire surrounding hotel area, planned all emergency contingencies. Place is already crazy and that’s just how we get down with preparedness. We ended up mapping out a few cigar locations, Haitian…
