By CWF Admin|2022-09-01T12:10:24+00:00September 22nd, 2015|
The Baladin brewery was originally created in 1996 as a brewpub (production and bar) in Piozzo – a small village in the Langhe area in the province of Cuneo – by its founder and master brewer Teo Musso.
The first brewing system, produced by Teo himself in Belgium with the help of his friend Jean-Luis Dits from Brasserie à Vapeur (Pipaix – Belgium) and located in an almost “squatted” garage next to the pub, was built using old milk vats.
Initially, Baladin only made a few beers and they were only served on tap. However, only one year after opening the brewery, Teo started thinking about bottles and new recipes, which in the meantime are more than 30 (in fact, many more by the time you’ll be reading this…).
The goal was immediately clear: making beers with a strong personality – both in terms of taste and image – which would distinguish themselves in the world of catering and gastronomy, both in Italy and today even abroad.
To cut a long story short, a few years after its creation the cellar for the wort fermentation (i.e. the room where the fermenters are located) had to be expanded after the first commercial success. As he could not move the entire facility without compromising the identity of the newborn brewpub, Teo decided to convert a former chicken coop owned by his parents. In order to transport the wort, he even had a “beer duct” built: a 300 meters long underground duct connecting the brewery to the cellar.
Years later, the whole brewing system was moved to the “chicken coop”. Its production capacity grew from the initial 500 liters to 1,000 liters. Soon after, the success reached by Baladin required a much larger facility which could brew 2,500 liters (by the way, each system has always been built according to Teo’s specifications, who didn’t want to lose the habit of “engineering” DIY and had to adapt the equipment to the needs of a craft brewery, which was rather new in Italy at the time…). Even the chicken coop became too small, and a larger structure became necessary. The occasion presented itself when a former 2,600 m² aluminum fixture factory at the foot of the Piozzo hill, in the nearby village of Farigliano, became available. The idea was to avoid building from scratch, but rather renovate the available premises without destroying any more green [Read More…]