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Location: Cluj-Napoca
Gypsy brewing since: January 2019
Brewer: Adi Oros

General information:

Having a garage to get you started with homebrewing may not be essential, but it definitely helps, as the lads at Bereta have shown. To his luck, Adi had one just waiting to be put to good use, so in November of 2017, he brought in his kettle and brewing supplies and set to work.

Nobody expects their first beer to be anything special, but Adi’s first concoction turned out to be an IPA that, to this day, he still considers one of the best beers he ever made. Under the guise of a local NGO promoting craft beer, he not only improved his palate, but also sought feedback on his brews. The second beer was something on the unintentional sour side (bottle conditioning is not always beginner friendly), but the path to being an experienced brewer is patched with blunders. In July of 2018 he joined his first homebrewing contest, and while his DIPA did not take home the prize, his subsequent homebrews have received a thumbs up from both friends and dedicated beer reviewers.

Hard work and great ideas have a way of paying off, and later that year, he joined the Bereta Brewing Community contest with his own suggestion: a vanilla breakfast stout. It caught the eye and the taste buds of the lads at Bereta, and he became the second of 5 lucky homebrewers to try their recipe on a full scale equipment. The beer was launched mid-February 2019, but to Adi, it prompted the decision to invest more time in brewing. Shortly after, he headed up the road to Bere a la Cluj, and brewed 3 more beers which were dutifully launched in April.

In Adi’s own words, Blackout Brewing was born from his passion for science, books and music, and that shows in the names and labels for his releases. Still true to his homebrewing roots, Adi plans to continue testing his recipes in small batches before taking them out to be gypsy-brewed, and is just as keen on experiments. Admittedly, his brewing equipment takes a beating now and again, like that one time when his experiments with cultivating yeast from Oriel Beer bottles resulted in a Brett infection that took his equipment on a trip to the hospital to be sanitized. But all ideas come with a side dish of trial and error, so here’s hoping for more exciting brews in the future.

With an ever growing range of beers, in May 2020 Blackout reached another important milestone, becoming the top rated Romanian brewery on Untappd.

Blackout beers can be found either on tap or 330ml bottles, and as with any gypsy brewery, you can pick them up from the usual parent brewery locations, or online, from Berero Store.

Check out how it’s made: Delicate Psycho batch 3

Products:

(BEERS MARKED WITH C ARE AVAILABLE BY THE CAN)

Brewed at the Bereta brewery:

• BBC Vanilla Breakfast Stout with coffee from Yume Roasters – 8% ABV
• Weirdo – NEIPA – 6% ABV – C
• Double Weirdo – NE DIPA – 8% ABV –  C
• Chromatics – DDH DIPA – 7% ABV – C

Brewed at the Bere a la Cluj brewery:

• Delicate Psycho – DDH IPA – 6.5% ABV
• Quantum Suicide – Russian Imperial Stout – 10.5% ABV
• Quantum Suicide Coffee Series (collaborations with Espresso Studio and coffee from Yume Coffee Roasters):
  – Costa Rica – 10.5% ABV
  – Costa Rica Anaerobica – 10.5% ABV
  – Ethiopia – 10.5% ABV
  – Honduras – 9.5% ABV
• Glitch – DDH Double IPA – 8% ABV
• Delicate Psycho – Galaxy Dry Hop – DDH IPA – 6.5% ABV
• Anti-Cake – Imperial Porter with coconut, coffee and vanilla – 11.5% ABV
  – Bourbon BA edition – 12% ABV
• Pilsdeț – Dry-hopped Pilsner – 5% ABV
• Exclusion Zone – Bourbon BA Barleywine – 12% ABV

Brewed at Oriel Beer brewery:

• Vintage Babe – Farmhouse Ale – 7% ABV
• Sour Babe – Kettle Soured Farmhouse Ale – 6.2% ABV

Collaborations:

• Get Your Hands Off – Brett IPA (collaboration with Oriel Beer) – 8% ABV
• Berea Clujenilor – DDH DIPA (collaboration with Hopdrops and Player One, brewed at Hop Hooligans) – 8.5% ABV – C
• Save The Rave – Black IPA (with Double Drop Crew Brewery) – 7% ABV
• Dopamine – DDH DIPA (with Hopdrops, brewed at Bere a la Cluj) – 8% ABV
• Wearing Purple – Imperial Stout with dried plums (with Berero Store and Wicked Barrel, brewed at Ground Zero) – 11.5% ABV
• Haze Deprivation – West Coast DIPA (with Hop Hooligans) – 9% ABV – C
• Alter Ego – NEIPA (with Bere a la Cluj) – 6.3% ABV
• Chocolate Chip Trip – Imperial Milk Stout with cocoa nibs, coffee & hazelnuts (with Propaganda Brewery) – 9.5% ABV
  – Bourbon BA edition
• Pucker Face – Berliner Weisse (with Hophead Brewing) – 3.4% ABV
  – Berries
  – Mango & passion fruit
• Abusement Park – Triple IPA (with Bereta) – 9.9% ABV – C
• Pint Jumper – Irish Stout (with Player One) – 4.8% ABV

Seasonal, limited edition & contract brewing:

• Nelu Ipa – IPA (brewed for District of Toast) – 6.5% ABV
• Almond Suicide – Quantum Suicide aged on almond extract – Russian Imperial Stout – 10.5% ABV
• All Together – NEIPA (special release of Weirdo – NEIPA, for the All Together collaboration campaign) – 6% ABV
• Helmet – DIPA (brewed for Jaxx American Restaurant) – 8% ABV

For reviews, check online on Untappd and RateBeer.

Contact details:

Facebook: www.facebook.com/Blackout-Brewing/