Valiant Brewing: The Brewery of the FUTURE!

, Valiant Brewing: The Brewery of the FUTURE!What do you get when you cross a mechanical engineer and craft brewing? a) A robot with beer taps? b) A Dr. Seuss-like beer-making machine called a Brewhoomaloo? c) An introvert with a Mr. Beer kit? Trick question. It’s actually none of the above. What you get is the head brewer and owner of Valiant Brewing Company, Brian Schroepfer. I was able to meet with Brian during Valiant’s recent grand opening in Orange, CA.

When I first stepped into Valiant, my mouth dropped open and all I could say was, “woooow.” I felt like I was in an old 1970s sci-fi show because of all the brand new shiny equipment, platforms, and blinking lights. I was expecting to see a Cylon next to the steam boiler. It makes sense that Valiant’s facility is so pristine, because Brian is a mechanical engineer who formerly worked for an aerospace company.

, Valiant Brewing: The Brewery of the FUTURE!Brian has two major passions in life: brewing beer and building drag racers. When a hill fire burnt down his race shop six years ago, his company, Magnum Motorsports, went down with the blaze. Insurance didn’t pay out the full worth of his losses, so he decided to take the money and focus on his other passion by starting a brewery. Four years later, he completed his impressive brew-fortress. Brian wants to set a new precedent for breweries by having the latest and most advanced brewing technology. It certainly shows because his set-up looks like the Trimaxion Drone Ship from Flight of the Navigator crashed into a warehouse bay and was reconfigured into Brian’s equipment (only without the annoying Pee Wee Herman voiced robot eyeball).

Valiant’s beers take inspiration from Stone Brewery in that Brian wants them to be bigger with more profiles and flavors. Imagine a normal craft beer as a seven-layer bean dip. Brian wants his beer to be a twelve-layer bean dip wrapped in a pizza. His goal is to have his drinkers be satisfied with one beer instead of having several beers, which may leave people with the notorious bloated gurgle gut. Being an engineer, Brian is very methodic with these crafts and makes mathematic formulas for each. Don’t worry about Valiant’s brews being too “left-brained” to be able to capture the art of making a good craft because they contain so much alcohol that your right-brain won’t know the difference.  

That said, Valiant also has a premium line of session beers, including one of its flagship beers, the Mighty Maximus Premium Bitter, which has a bold flavor for a beer with an ABV of 3.6%. It’s incredibly smooth and it’s a beer that I would want to drink for all occasions. , Valiant Brewing: The Brewery of the FUTURE!

It seems like every brewery on the West Coast needs to have an IPA (I’m sure a brewery would get its license pulled if it didn’t), and Valiant’s 31 Kings is one of the better IPAs that I’ve had due to its balance, wheat in the malt bill, and its citrus and pine hops. Their Veranda Biere de Garde French Ale is complex, delicious, refreshing, and easy-drinking even though it has such a high ABV at 8.5%. This beer is not in bottles yet, but I hope the label will have a pencil mustache and a baguette on it when it goes into production.

Brian plans to release his other creations in the coming weeks, such as his Jericho Imperial IPA and a Saison to satisfy his wide spectrum of target consumers. You can find Valiant’s brews at their tasting room, Slater’s 50/50, and Smoqued BBQ, all in the OC. He will also continue to get his inspiration for his beer creations from technology and programming, which is something I can appreciate since I studied automotive design in college. Hopefully, you can appreciate this as well, and when you think of a mechanical engineer and brewing, you’ll think of the Valiant Brewing Company. Or you can think of a mad scientist with an army of beer-shooting robots, which is also pretty awesome. 

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