A Brewer’s Journey: Josh Davies Is at Home Connecting with the Neighborhood at Happy Valley Brewing Enterprise

On the Friday of Penn State’s graduation weekend, Satisfied Valley Brewing Firm head brewer Josh Davies poured a few pints of his freshly built beer straight from the tap and gave me a tour as we chatted about how he finished up at the brewpub.

Josh is a significant component of HVBC’s historical past he came to the spot from Michigan to be head brewer when the brewpub opened in 2013 in a renovated 200-calendar year-old barn at 137 Elmwood Street. Immediately after a transient hiatus at Otto’s Pub and Brewery throughout city, Josh came back again household to the barn final summer time and doesn’t prepare on leaving once again whenever soon. He’s seeking to keep on to mature the brewery’s existence in the local community.

“I like to be a lifer and make beer for the group, and not jump all-around. … To be truly impactful, I sense like you have to be section of a community for a very long time,” Josh says.

I relished acquiring the prospect to enjoy a craft beer with the individual who manufactured it and understand about how he received right here. Just after all, most just about every beer lover has at one particular place dreamed about becoming a brew learn, mixing the grains into mash and making a beer that people today appreciate. I have created a couple household-brew batches in my day, but they had been almost nothing to brag about.

So, below I was ingesting a Tailgater IPA, listening to Josh explain to his tale about how he is residing that aspiration it set a smile on my confront. Effectively, probably the smile came from the truly tasty beverage that Josh brewed. Yeah, that was definitely aspect of it. It is in those smiles from individuals making the most of his beer that Josh finds drive.

“When you see folks drink your things, and they like it, that feels really awesome,” he states. “When men and women are like, ‘Oh my gosh, I like this beer,’ … I’m blushing, for the reason that I really do not know how to say thank you. … For me, to be the go-to beer for some individuals in this community, exactly where when folks consider about an IPA they think of my beer, that feels fairly good.”

Josh’s journey to head brewer started in Michigan, in 2001. He was working as a paramedic when he satisfied a couple of folks from the now-closed Arcadia Brewing at a brew expo, and they linked around their love of audio and beer.

“They explained, ‘Dude, you should appear assistance us bottle. We bottle every single Monday you are going to consume the freshest beer you ever drank, we’ll deliver you residence with three instances, and we’ll educate you a issue or two about a matter or two,” Josh says. This sounded like a fantastic deal to Josh, who was then 21. “That was Saturday. I went on Monday, and I went each Monday for two-and-a-50 % a long time.”

Quickly immediately after, a fellow EMT hooked Josh up with some property-brewing materials and he started earning his possess beer. He bought hooked, discovering as a lot as he could about method, recipes, and tools.

With that experience, he discovered a career at Michigan Brewing Corporation in 2004, taking care of the property-brew retail store, all the even though finding out and building connections. Just about every opportunity he acquired, he assisted out in the brewing system, right up until one day the operator handed Josh the brew listing for the day, telling him to phone if he had any thoughts.

“I didn’t even know what button to drive … it was all buttons,” says Josh, seeking again with a giggle. It was a demo by hearth, but he aced it, figuring out the accurate buttons to thrust even even though he experienced to get in touch with the owner “probably 10 times that working day. But, no dilemma, almost everything was fantastic. I brewed just about every batch of beer there for the subsequent two-and-a-half decades.”

He continued to make connections, creating friendships and his community, until eventually he got a call from his old good friend from Arcadia Brewing Business.

“He mentioned, ‘Dude, it is time to appear residence. We can’t make enough beer we have high quality manage issues and we require you,” says Josh, who became assistant head brewer at the place in which he applied to volunteer for a few of cases of beer.

Eventually, as a result of buddies in the field, he obtained linked to a team that was hunting to open up a brewery in Happy Valley.

Josh remembers the initially time he arrived to Condition University to consult with about the chance. During that vacation, he sat on the 50-lawn-line of a Michigan-Penn Condition video game on Halloween, and climbed to the leading of Mount Nittany. He begun to consider in the again of his thoughts about how great it would be to increase his young loved ones in the mountains of central Pennsylvania.

“It was like, this is … sweet,” claims Josh.

Ultimately, he experienced a choice to make: Both continue to be in Michigan and aid Arcadia expand to a 2nd place, or, “there are these definitely interesting people who I just achieved who want to open up up a brewery in Condition University, where you can get any where in the woods in like 10 minutes, and they have mountains, and streams you can paddle, and there is no criminal offense. … So, the preference was to go below and raise a spouse and children in an awesome spot.”

Once he settled in, Josh obtained to brewing with this philosophy: “We are not striving to make the finest beer on the earth our legitimate, genuine intention is to make the greatest beer you’ll drink these days.”

Josh brews a vast range of beers, on the lookout to satisfy a range of taste profiles. He likens the lineup to that of a athletics staff.

“For us below, a whole lineup is 12 beers on faucet. … 4 of them require to be hoppy … so we have obtained eight to engage in with. You want a few good, approachable beers, mainly because not most people rides mountain bikes and sucks down 7-p.c IPAs every working day. A large amount of individuals want the closest factor to Miller Lite. You must have a little something that satisfies the taste-choice assortment.”

As we occur out of the pandemic, Josh is prepared to create the brewery’s connections to the neighborhood even stronger. An avid mountain-biker who enjoys stay new music, he sees these as avenues to build all those connections.

“I want to make beer for this local community, I want to be a part of this neighborhood,” he claims. “My things is new music-dependent, outdoor-centered. So, for people today who are undertaking points in those realms, I want to be associated. If there is a mountain-biking function or a trail-running celebration, we want to be concerned. Beer features a great deal of factors for individuals who are seeking to produce, that are coming up with strategies. They are having together, brainstorming, and the surroundings downstairs is good to sit again, seize a few of beers, and shoot the breeze and determine it out.”

Town&Robe staff members writer Vincent Corso enjoys drinking nearby and conference new people today at central Pennsylvania’s numerous intriguing establishments. This tale seems in the June 2021 concern of City&Robe.