Inside the New Hijinx Brewery

Hijinx Brewing Company, which opened in 2012, has a new space at the Bridgeworks business incubator run by the Allentown Economic Development Corporation.  The brewery, which we profiled after its initial opening, was formerly located at founder Curt Keck’s house in his garage.

Their new home is significantly larger and much more impressive.  Their brewhouse, a 10 barrel system, is ten times larger than their previous setup.  Their new fermenters will allow them to brew approximately 750 barrels per year, and co-founders Curt Keck and Chris Becker hope to add two more tanks to the 4,000 square foot space in short order to expand to 1000 barrels (or 31,000 gallons) per year. 

With their massively increased capacity, Hijinx will be more available throughout the Lehigh Valley and will be distributed outside of the area for the first time.  They recently announced that their licensing has cleared and they’re set to start brewing shortly, with the first beers from the new brewery being tapped in mid-September.  The last batch from their first brewery was brewed on July 28th.  That brewing system, a small one-barrel operation, will be moved to the new brewery to serve as a ‘pilot’ system used to brew experimental beers and test batches before being put into production on the large brewhouse.

 The new brewery will also house a tasting room for customers to sample and buy beer, merchandise, and growler fills.  Keck said he hopes to have a bottling line installed within a year’s time to allow for increased accessibility.  In addition to Hijinx, the Colony Meadery opened at the Bridgeworks Enterprise building last year and distiller Anthony Brichta is aiming to open County Seat Spirits in the same building later this year.