Mark's Passion..Article from Knox News October 2007

Home beer brewer blends a pinch of vocation and a dash of passion
MIKE BLACKERBYnews@knews.comFriday, October 12, 2007

Amy Smotherman Burgess
Home brewer Mark Moynihan explains his process for creating beer in his garage on Thursday in West Knoxville. Moynihan will be a volunteer at the East Tennessee Brewers' Jam on Saturday.



"Home Beer Brewer Blends a Pinch of Vocation and a Dash of Passion"

Much like one of his batches of brew, Mark Moynihan is an amalgam of the classic, the stereotypical and the modern home brewer.
The Knoxville resident said the home-brewing process isn’t just a mad rush to guzzle the end product; rather, it’s all about the journey.
Basic beer-making isn’t real complicated. It’s just a concoction of water, hops, malted barley and yeast.
Therein lies the mad scientist aspect of home brewing — vary those four ingredients and the cooking methodology to get the flavor you want. That’s when it gets complicated.
While he doesn’t brew in the catacombs of his basement, Moynihan said his hobby “forces me to have to park in the driveway instead of the garage.”
The 38-year-old Moynihan — a self-avowed “hop head” (connoisseur of pale ales) — will join several thousand beer lovers 1-7 p.m. Saturday at World’s Fair Park for the 11th annual Knoxville Brewers’ Jam.
The event benefits Community Shares of Tennessee and is regarded as one of the South’s premier craft beer and musical festivals.
Attendees can enjoy unlimited samples of more than 100 hand-crafted beers from 30-plus breweries. Tickets are $25 in advance and $30 on Saturday.
Kris Lutz, Brewers’ Jam coordinator, said the event is a huge fundraiser for Community Shares, which raises money for 53 non-profit agencies across the state of Tennessee.
“We raised $70,000 during the Brewers’ Jam last year for our local Community Shares operation,” said Lutz, who expects about 5,000 attendees Saturday.
Moynihan, along with his brewing brethren at the Tennessee Valley Brewers Association, will be among them. An engineering student at the University of Tennessee, Moynihan has melded his avocation — welding — with his passion for home brewing, starting about a decade ago.
“I was doing a lot of stainless steel welding and was doing a project for a microbrewery in Tempe, Ariz.,” he said. “Through that I discovered how brewers make beer. I started making beer on the stovetop and said, ‘You know, I have the ability to make some really nice brew.’”
From those humble hops beginnings, Moynihan has gone high tech. His Heat Exchanged Recirculation Mash System is hardly your father’s home-brewing setup of years gone by.
“There’s a lot of engineering involved in it,” he said. “It’s 99.9-percent stainless steel, with three 18-inch tanks, a heat-exchanger I made myself and 20 to 30 feet of tubing. I picked a lot of brains when I was making this.”
Moynihan said his system is probably worth “around $5,000 to $6,000.”
By contrast, a basic home-brewing kit can be purchased for less than $100.
Moynihan said it typically takes about six hours to complete the actual brewing process. Then it’s another two weeks (ales) to six weeks (lagers) before the final product is ready to be tapped for consumption.
“A big misconception is some people want to try the beer the day you make it. When steam is rolling out of my garage, people in my neighborhood know they can come by in a couple of weeks and get a sample.”