The Black Abbey Brewing Company – Welcome to Knoxville!

We’ve been very fortunate over the last year or so to have some awesome new brands move into the Knoxville market. Recently, The Black Abbey Brewing Company out of Nashville was introduced to our thirsty little town and I was able to meet some of the guys behind the beer, John and Carl. Subsequently, on a recent – icy/snow ridden adventure in Nashville – I was able to stop by Black Abbey and check it out.

First of all you can find Black Abbey at 2952 Sidco Drive in Nash-vegas. They do operate a tasting room called Fellowship Hall which is currently open Thurs-Saturday evenings. What’s great about Fellowship Hall is that it is open to the remainder of the brewery. It does have a church-like feel to it (more on this in a second) in how it’s laid out. They were also able to use reclaimed wood throughout which is flat out beautiful. I’d show you some pics but there was a private gig in there at the time – I wasn’t feeling all that creepy so I refrained. It also gives you more incentive to go check it out for yourself!

You may be wondering where the name came from and why I mentioned “church-like” above. The name of the brewery comes from Martin Luther who birthed the Protestant Reformation way back in 1517. Luther penned his famous Ninety-Five Theses at a place called The Black Cloister. After he nailed the document to the church doors he was, understandably, on the run for a time. In 1525 he came back, married a refugee nun, Katherine, who had her brewing license – cool, and received The Black Cloister as a wedding gift which became their home. Katherine, of course, brewed beer! John and Carl felt that what was accomplished here was very much a new type of abbey and named this brewery in honor of Martin Luther. (To be fair, the explanation of the name is much better on The Black Abbey website than what I have paraphrased here.)

All that said, let’s talk about the beer. These guys are brewing on a 20bbl setup with 6 fermenting tanks (3 @ 60, 2 @90) and plenty of space, wiring and talent to grow. They currently send that beer outbound in both half and sixth barrels. Bottling will come soon, so we’ll see more package before too long. All this equipment pumps out The Champion (pale ale), The Rose (Belgian-style blonde), The Special (Belgian mild), Chapter House (Belgian-style red) and Potus 44 (porter with a nice coffee flavor). There are several seasonals as well which we should see throughout the year. The winter seasonal, Belsnickel, might very well be my favorite from Black Abbey so far. This beer does spend a bit of its life in a Woodford Reserve barrel so you can understand why I’d like it!

You’ll also note the barrels in the pics below. These guys are barrel aging some of their beer as well as working on some sours. I’m sure we can all get excited about that!

Join me in welcoming The Black Abbey Brewing Company to Knoxville! If you haven’t had one of their beers yet, give ’em a shot – you won’t be disappointed.

Cheers!