UPDATE: Uncle Billy's is turning 2 on Thursday, April 30th.  If you're in the Austin area, come out and celebrate with Uncle Billy's and BeerMasters.com!

Twenty years ago, Brian Peters was just an engineer with a home brewing hobby.  At that time he knew everyone who tried his beer and he loved the social interaction that came with sharing his newest batch.  For the first few years Brian was content to keep his home brewing a hobby, but eventually brewing began to take up more and more of his time.  Brian searched out other brewers, professionals and amateurs, for tips, recipe ideas and just to discuss the finer points of the craft.  He experimented with other brewing friends he had met, and he kept brewing and brewing year round.

It turned out that he had a serious passion for beer brewing.  Brian’s passion sparked from the “mystery” of beer brewing.  “It is such a mystery to me…I was obsessed with it… It’s really hard!  We have generation after generation now who know absolutely nothing about beer.” said Brian. And it was his drive to figure out the mystery of beer brewing that lead him away from being an amateur home brewer into the co-founder of Live Oak Brewing Company and the current resident brewer at Uncle Billy’s Brew & Que.

Nowadays Brian is lucky to know five percent of the people who sample his work.  Such is the plight of the professional brewer, says Brian, who has come to terms with the added pressure and less social payoffs of being a professional brewer, as well as having to give up his home brewing hobby to make time for his work and his family.  “The biggest thing that I tell people is that if you’re a happy home brewer, stay a home brewer.  If it’s a job, then make it a job.  But those are two different things.”

The other thing Brian Peters has had to come to terms with brewing a light ale.  He brews a kolsch-style ale, a beer for the “uninitiated” to enjoy.  His transitional beer is meant specifically to draw in people who haven’t ventured further away than a domestic beer.  “Baby steps, right?  They’re going to be exposed to a lot more malt…but to me this is light and easy drinking,” said Brian.

Brian keeps a revolving door of at least 5 or 6 brews going on at a time.  At the moment he’s got a smoked porter (he smokes the malts himself), a fantastic Pale Ale called the Ax Handle, an organic amber ale and an Agave Wit.  My personal favorite was the Ax Handle, although I have been told that the next batch of IPA coming to tap, the Zombie, is even better.  His favorite hops come up from the Northwest, so if you’re a fan of craft brews from that area, there is a good chance you will love the beer at Uncle Billy’s.

I was really pleased when I ran into Uncle Billy’s and spoke with Brian.  Just a few weeks ago I was lamenting at the lack of good pubs here in Austin.  It turns out that we do have a handful of craft brew places out here with the *potential* for being a good social pub.  And with brewers like Brian and his peers who have been out here for the last twenty years, maybe those places already exist.   Maybe it’s only a matter of time?  Brian Peters wants to open up his own pub out here.  “There’s no way I’m going anywhere,” said Brian, “and I’ll make beer out here for the rest of my life.”