{"id":18542,"date":"2014-11-10T16:51:42","date_gmt":"2014-11-10T21:51:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/?p=18542"},"modified":"2015-11-10T14:47:53","modified_gmt":"2015-11-10T19:47:53","slug":"the-growler-oxford-beer-haven-on-the-square","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/the-growler-oxford-beer-haven-on-the-square\/","title":{"rendered":"The Growler Oxford: Beer Haven on the Square"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"GrowlerInside\"<\/a>Did you know Oxford has a new craft beer bar? <\/span>
\nThe Growler<\/strong>, one of Oxford\u2019s newest establishments, is nestled in the walkway beside High Point Coffee, in the former Pink & Proper location. The Growler had their \u201csoft opening\u201d on September 5th, and what a transformation the space has undergone since the Pepto-pink days! Since I first walked into The Growler, I\u2019ve described it as a \u201ccoffeehouse\u201d atmosphere for brews.<\/span><\/p>\n

Boasting 30 taps of craft beer, the crew feels a commitment to fill as many as possible with local products. Visit their Facebook page (facebook.com\/oxfordgrowler<\/span>) and click \u201cTap List\u201d on the left-hand side to see at a glance what beers are currently being served (via DigitalPour<\/strong>), along with info about the beer. Both their Facebook and Twitter feeds update to let patrons know when they\u2019re switching kegs (for example, \u201cDiamond Bear Rocktoberfest is on, replacing SweetWater Blue\u201d). <\/span><\/p>\n

The Growler\u2019s crew wants to know what you think and what you\u2019d like to see on tap, if they can make it happen. The Magnolia State\u2019s beer culture has grown since July 2012, when the state loosened the restrictions on ABV (percent alcohol by volume). Several breweries have opened throughout Mississippi, and people are learning more about their beer and its origins. It\u2019s a ripe time for a place like The Growler to open up in a town where so many people love beer.<\/span>
\nThe Growler has a new menu that includes a \u201cseasonal salad\u201d and a vegetarian sandwich, which changes every Friday. The menu features fresh ingredients from The Farmers\u2019 Market<\/strong> and bread from Honeybee Bakery<\/strong>. The hours have also changed slightly: The Growler will now open at 2 pm Monday through Thursday, 11 am Friday and Saturday, and noon on Sunday.<\/span><\/p>\n

I met up with The Growler\u2019s busy General Manager Krisi Allen<\/strong> the night before the official ribbon cutting, which took place Friday, October 17th. Allen started college at Ole Miss in 1994 and left after one semester to finish at Mississippi College in Jackson. She earned a degree in public relations, and worked in program coordination for a year. She ended up taking the LSAT, earning herself a full ride to Ole Miss Law School. After that she went to private practice in Jackson for about five years and then returned to Oxford to work for the Civil Division of the U.S. Attorney\u2019s office for the following five years. Before becoming involved with The Growler, she was a bartender and manager at Buffalo Wild Wings.<\/span>
\nAllen is excited about The Growler\u2019s future, hoping to see live music soon\u2014probably acoustic sets. There\u2019s talk of a Cards Against Humanity night in the future, too\u2014for now, you can borrow their decks and play at your own table. Read on to see what else is in store for one of Oxford\u2019s favorite new watering holes.<\/span><\/p>\n

Does proprietor Anthony Bond own the Memphis location of The Growler, too?<\/span><\/strong>
\nHe is a 50\/50 owner. He started in Chattanooga. He plays music on the side, just for fun, and met some people that were really into craft beer. He jumped on the idea and I\u2019ve heard him say this a million times: \u201cReal estate in Nashville is too damn expensive.\u201d So he went to Chattanooga and opened his first trial run\u2014really small, like a third of the size here. Then he went into a partnership with a friend of his in Memphis. Chattanooga opened August of last year, Memphis was in December, and so this is the third one in about a year.<\/span><\/p>\n

Is the DigitalPour app something that was brought in from the other two stores?<\/span><\/strong>
\nEarly in the process when we were talking about design concepts with our architect, I didn\u2019t know DigitalPour existed. We knew the beers were going to be changing on a daily basis. So [Cory and] I suggested the idea of having a big computer screen, so when we updated the website, it would update on this board. We couldn\u2019t make it work with the look we were going for at the time. <\/span><\/p>\n

We came up with another plan; we were going to do flat, rectangle chalk boards, and they [would] each be hanging on their own hooks \u2013 thirty of them\u2014so you could take it down and erase it without having to get up there and erase a chalkboard over the bar.<\/span><\/p>\n

About 72 hours before we opened, I got a text message [about DigitalPour]. I was like, I love it, but there\u2019s no way we can do that in 72 hours. I just didn\u2019t think it could happen. They have the chalkboard kind of concept; the screen is a black, smoky, chalkboard-like screen, not just a pure black. I thought, this may work. We went and bought TVs, called the contractor to come drill the holes and wire it up for us, and 1 o\u2019clock in the morning the before we opened, my owner was standing on a makeshift shelf, inputting beers. We had a few spelling errors our first few days, but that was a last-minute concept that has been one of the biggest features, really, of The Growler since we opened.<\/span>
\n\"GrowlerBoardTaps\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

I love the organic idea of [the chalkboards], and honestly, we had a really hard time selling Chris [Kauerz, bartender] on the idea [of DigitalPour]. He was opposed; he said it wasn\u2019t organic. I think after about a week, he [realized] this is kind of cool, it works, and it makes life a whole lot easier for us. Because when you have this many people in there and you blow a keg, you don\u2019t have time to grab a chalkboard, go look up the ABV, write all the stuff on the chalkboard you need to have; all this is already in the system. A couple of the local companies weren\u2019t in their system, but most of the beers were. So we didn\u2019t have to input color, ABV, IBUs, all that stuff.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is useful to see that info on the screen when you walk in and you\u2019re trying to order a beer. <\/span><\/strong>
\nA lot of people don\u2019t know. People will ask, \u2018Why\u2019s that glass empty?\u2019 And I tell them, \u2018It\u2019s not empty, it\u2019s a black beer\u2014it\u2019s a stout.\u2019 I can tell people, \u2018If you\u2019re looking for something like that, that\u2019s kind of a code to go by.\u2019 It also answers a lot of the questions up front that people ask\u2014\u2018What\u2019s local?\u2019 Well, you can look at the board and see what\u2019s local, what\u2019s from Mississippi.<\/span><\/p>\n

Something we\u2019d love to do\u2014something we are still working on with the state and with regulatory people\u2014is homebrew classes. Nathan, who is one of our bartenders, makes his own beer, and he knows a lot about it, [and] we would love to team up with some folks who are regulars about making beer. It\u2019s still kind of a novelty in Oxford\u2014craft beer, home brewing.<\/span><\/p>\n

How did you get involved in all of this?<\/span><\/strong>
\nAfter [the U.S. Attorney\u2019s office], Buffalo Wild Wings opened, and I decided to just go get a job out there and figure out what I want to do. I started bartending there, and I actually ended up moving into management part-time and bartending part-time. I heard about this guy opening up a craft beer bar, it was actually on Craiglist, and beer\u2019s my thing. I can bartend, but I\u2019d rather pour a beer than mix a drink. I really love beer, and it was just the perfect fit. I had been in management long enough to know what I was doing. It was great, because we started from the beginning, and I was involved with all of the work with the architect and the contractors. I was the on-the-ground person, because [Anthony] wasn\u2019t here on a daily basis. So I just fell into a really good gig.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"GrowlerGrowlersEtc\"<\/a>Tell me about your growlers.<\/span><\/strong>
\nWe have the glass growlers for $6, in clear and amber. And we have stainless steel, which is double-insulated, and it will keep your beer cold for like six hours after you leave\u2014those are $40. They\u2019re all 64 ounces. After that, you just pay the price of the beer. Growler prices are typically between $11 and $15. Every once in a while we\u2019ll have a beer that\u2019s a one-off or something that\u2019s a little more expensive, like $17. But I think we\u2019ve only had two of those since we opened.<\/span><\/p>\n

Any tips on washing the growlers?<\/span><\/strong>
\nMy glass ones, I just wash in mild dish soap. Run a lot of hot water through it. Sometimes the beer will have a real pungent smell, like the blueberry or Triple Haze, which is a raspberry beer. Actually, the instruction card on the metal growler says a vinegar and baking soda combination, to get some of the smell out. So if you go home with a chocolate porter and you want to come back and get an IPA, you don\u2019t want it to taste like chocolate.<\/span><\/p>\n

I want to go home with a chocolate porter! Your crowd loves beer\u2014that\u2019s for sure.<\/span><\/strong>
\nThat\u2019s all we do. I love beer, the owner loves beer. It\u2019s a really ripe time in Oxford for craft beer, because these new companies coming into town, and the heightened ABV, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n

I had a guy come in here and say, \u201cMy wife doesn\u2019t like beer.\u201d And I said, \u201cShe just hasn\u2019t had the right one. There\u2019s something for everyone.\u201d I might try six little sippy cups before I get the right one, but I\u2019m not going to stop until you find something that you like, usually. <\/span>\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

\"TLV-213-oxford_square_ad\"<\/a><\/p>\n

–<\/span>
\nThis article was originally printed in The Local Voice<\/em> #215 (published October 23, 2014),<\/span>
\nTo download the PDF of this issue, click here.<\/a> <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Did you know Oxford has a new craft beer bar? The Growler, one of Oxford\u2019s newest establishments, is<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":238,"featured_media":18544,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[190],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18542","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-business"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/GrowlerFEAT.jpg?fit=620%2C349&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18542","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/238"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18542"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18542\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18544"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}