Tucked away amongst rows of white stucco offices and storage units on Westtown Way lies West Chester’s youngest brewery, Boxcar Brewing Company. As you enter their facility, your nose is hit with a wave of freshly roasted grain. You turn the corner and are greeted by two smiling brewers standing next to large silver vats that used to belong to dairy farmers and now contain swirling batches of soon-to-be beer. You must watch your step, the brewery floor contains large bags of grains, hoses slithering between buzzing machines and kegs eagerly awaiting contents destined to tickle your taste buds in a fortnight.
Boxcar celebrated its first birthday this month and has come a long way from a tub full of beer at a 2006 Tennessee wedding. That wedding was of Jason and Kristen Kohser. Jason, a former California winemaker, used his homebrewing hobby to supply beer for his reception. While bonding over some brews, Jason talked to his cousin, Kymberly and her then boyfriend (now husband) Jamie Robinson and before long Jason and Jamie realized they had a common passion – beer.
A few months later, Jason proposed another big question, if Jamie would became his business partner. Compliments on their homebrews were coming in left and right, so Jamie and Jason decided to trade paperwork for pints and wort.
Boxcar is family owned, operated and consumed, the husbands brew the beer and their wives take care of marketing and promotions. They moved into their headquarters on Westtown Road in May, but before they knew it the orders were overflowing and they had to expand to the space next door in September.
Boxcar can be found in 90 locations throughout Bucks, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery, Philadelphia and Berks counties. During their first year of production they produced 240 barrels (31 gallons in each barrel) and plan on doubling that this year.
Boxcar’s two brews, Original Ale and Brown Ale, are great beers for anyone who wants to get into craft beer but has always been intimated by crazy flavors or odd names. Their flagship Original Ale is a smooth pilsner with a golden glow that placed first in the 2010 U.S. Open Beer Championship. Their rich Brown Ale has hints of walnuts, cedar, caramel, cocoa and dried cherries.
If you could sum up Boxcar in two words it would be community based. Even though they don’t do official tours, they invite anyone to come in to talk about beer (believe me, these guys know a lot about beer), just be sure to give them a heads up before you come.
They go out of their way to include anyone in the exciting beermaking process, from their grassroots marketing, community bottling days, local farmers using leftover mash for their animals and their Community Supported Beer (check their website in a few weeks for details).
Boxcar is looking for volunteers to help with upcoming beertastic events. Tap into their website for their lineup. If you are interested, shoot them an email at [email protected].
Boxcar Beer has gained quite a loyal following and can be found in several festivals throughout the region. Jamie Robinson loves meeting everyone from brewers to beer lovers.
“When we go to these beer festivals, a lot of times we would get repeat people. You go there and there is 50 beers and you go around and taste them all. A lot of times we will get people who come back three times and by then end they come back and say we really like these beers but yours and two other ones are the best. That’s really cool to hear.”
Celebrate Philly Beer Week in West Chester at Ride The Rails, on Friday, June 10 at 7 p.m. Take a ride through beautiful country scenes on West Chester’s historic rails to the beautiful Glen Mills park. Plenty of beer (it’s a new release), live music and BBQ will be waiting for you for $35.
Jason doesn’t just love brewing beer, he loves everything from the krausen (a beautiful meringue – like substance that collects after a hard day’s brewing) to the emotional connection with beer over the years. “It’s one of the most amazing things, you spend your time getting it ready, setting the stage and after that it’s all up to the yeast. That’s one of the reasons why I think so many monasteries make beer,” Jason enthusiastically expressed.
“Here we are in this day and age, where there are so many things that we know, and you look at archaeologists and they looked at civilizations based on when they started producing alcohol. We may know a little bit more but this is the way we have done for the last several thousand years.”
So begin your archaeological case study by picking up a pint of Boxcar today!
Photographs courtesy of Thomas Barrett
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