Portrait of a Brewer: Tom Nickel, Nickel Beer Co.

There are hundreds of talented brewing professionals giving their all to help maintain the San Diego beer industry’s storied reputation. While these industrious practitioners share numerous similarities, each is their own unique person with individual likes, dislikes, methodologies, techniques, inspirations, interests and philosophies. The goal of San Diego Beer News’ Portrait of a Brewer series is to not only introduce readers to local brewers, but dig in to help them gain a deeper appreciation for the people making their beer and how they have contributed to the county’s standout craft-brewing culture.

Today’s featured brewer is…

Tom Nickel
of Nickel Beer Co.

What is your current title?
President, owner & Head Brewer for Nickel Beer Co.; co-owner of O’Brien’s Pub; and co-owner of The Pub at Lake Cuyamaca

Where did you grow up?
San Diego, born and raised. I grew up in Diego near Cowles Mountain.

What was the first beer and/or alcoholic beverage you ever had?
The first sip I ever had would likely have been Champagne for New Year’s with my parents.

What was your a-ha moment that turned you on to craft beer?
The first beer that I can remember falling in love with was Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale. We regularly had Sierra Nevada Pale Ale – which was great – but “Cele” changed my outlook on beer and what it could be. It was my gateway into a much wider world and sparked a curiosity that has never stopped.

What led you to consider a career in brewing?
I wanted to do something that I enjoyed for a summer before I went off to do something that it seemed like I should be doing with my diploma. It started off as a desire to spend a summer working in a brewery anywhere in California. I had no experience even though I knew a ton about beer from brewing at home for about four years. The only place I could get hired was Home Brew Mart. I started at just two days a week, but within three months I was offered full-time work there (due to a shotgun wedding involving another employee). I told myself I would stay there until it was no longer fun and I ended up never leaving the brewing industry. That was now 30 years ago and it is still fun.

What was your first brewing/brewery position?
After Home Brew Mart, I went on to work with Tomme Arthur at the Pizza Port’s Solana Beach brewpug – a place I had spent my 21st birthday playing darts and drinking Swami’s IPA. It only lasted nine months, but we did some fun things that outlasted the job like founding the annual Strong Ale Fest, Real Ale Fest and Belgian Beer Party events. In June of 1996, I became the brewer at Stuft Pizza in Del Mar – which is now Oggi’s and no longer has an on-site brewery. I stayed with them until January 2005 and worked with a number of talented brewers, including Jeff Bagby with whom we won Small Brewing Company of the Year at the 2004 World Beer Cup.

What breweries have you worked for over your career and in what roles?
Ballast Point Brewing – Second Assistant Grain Miller, Pizza Port Solana Beach – Assistant Brewer, Oggi’s Pizza Del Mar – Head Brewer & Regional Corporate Brewer, Left Coast Brewing – Head Brewer, Pizza Port Carlsbad – Head Brewer, Julian Brewing (now Julian Beer Co.) – Co-founder & Head Brewer, Nickel Beer Co. – Founder & Head Brewer

Who have been the individuals that have helped you the most to learn and advance in your career, and how?
In my formative days of professional brewing, the trio of Jeff Bagby, Tomme Arthur and I spent endless hours going to festivals, talking about beer, traveling to brewing conferences and judging at beer competitions together. The time we spent together and the passion and ideas that we shared helped make me who I am as a brewer. A special shout-out to AleSmith Brewing founder Skip Virgilio, who often had to act like the adult in our group of precocious kids. Also, a special lifetime achievement award goes to Ralph Olson, who singlehandedly saved the Centennial hop from extinction during test trials. Without it and Sierra Nevada Celebration, I can’t say where I would be today.

What singular piece of advice would you give to someone interested in becoming a professional brewer?
Learn everything that you can – know the styles, history, ingredients and techniques as much as you can. I would also say the two things that helped me the most were reading every brewing book I could (in an age before everything was available online) and becoming the highest-level beer judge that I could. Talking about beer with other judges is the best way to truly learn how to taste beer. And knowing how to taste beer is invaluable when trying to create something great to drink.

What ultimate career goal would you like to achieve?
I always wanted to have my own brewery where I could make the beers that I wanted to. So, check. I wish I could find a way to brew more wet-hop beers, and I am working on that now!

What is your favorite beer you’ve ever brewed, be it on a professional or amateur level?
Wet-hop beers have long been a passion of mine, and it might be the haze of time talking, but the very first batch of Fresh Mountain Crystal IPA brewed at Nickel Beer Co. with San Diego-grown Crystal hops from Star B Ranch in 2015 likely ranks as my favorite of all time. Beers two-through-five would all be wet-hop beers, as well, including My Way IPA, Boats and Idahoes IPA, and Green Truck IPA.

What is your least-favorite beer you’ve ever brewed on any level?
I stopped brewing our annual hefeweizen this year, as it always felt like something I had to do. I am happy to no longer have it in the lineup, and we have replaced it with other light, summertime beers that I enjoy drinking more.

What are your favorite and least-favorite hop varietals at present?
My favorites are Krush, Strata, Mosaic and Simcoe. I don’t have any varietals that really turn me off, but there are roughly 150 varietals and we only use about 15 to 20, so there are nearly 130 that I guess I am not crazy about.

What are some of your favorite brewing ingredients that aren’t hops?
We don’t use a lot of crazy stuff outside of an excess amount of wet hops. I do love fresh blood oranges in beer, but I can’t stand most extracts. I love pepper beers of all intensity and spiciness. I also think vanilla is great in a wide variety of styles. 

If you weren’t a brewer, what do you think you would do for a living?
I have no idea. I can’t imagine I would have lasted long in the corporate world if only for the dress code. I still wonder what I am going to do with my life when I grow up.

In your opinion, what non-brewing position is of great importance at a craft-beer company but often gets overlooked or less credit than those making the beer?
As a small outfit, we don’t have anyone in marketing or sales, but in any other company I think someone with a strong sales background outside of the industry is always a major plus. For us, having someone in our tasting room becomes the salesperson to the customers walking in the door. No matter how good the beer is, if that person is not on point, the customer is not going to have a good experience. Customer-facing team members are as crucial to success as everyone making the beer.

What is your favorite beer style?
If it isn’t West Coast IPA, am I still allowed to call San Diego my home? But thankfully it is so that is OK. I would say a 6.3 to 6.6% (alcohol-by-volume) hoppy IPA that is clear with clean but not overpowering bitterness would be just perfect.

If you could wipe one style of beer off the face of the earth, what would it be?
I think anyone who has ever talked about beer with me would know the answer to this – anything that uses the term “IPA” that isn’t actually an IPA. I am looking at you hazies. By definition, IPAs are bitter. You make whatever hoppy beer you want, just call it something else.

What single brewing company’s beers and/or ethos/style has been most influential on your style?
There is no way to underestimate the impact Sierra Nevada had on me as a company. Such great beers, wonderful people, and they always seem to do the right thing for the industry. That said, there are countless individuals from all over the U.S. that have impacted me as a brewer. Tomme Arthur and Jeff Bagby top that list as we did so much together back in the ‘90s and early 2000s.

What is your favorite San Diego County brewing company?
I cannot limit this to a single place, but I can list a top 5: Burgeon Beer Co., Societe Brewing, Mcilhenney Brewing, Burning Beard Brewing and Pizza Port.

What brewer or brewery would you most like to collaborate with and what would you brew?
We do a pretty good amount of collabs at Nickel Beer Co. and for O’Brien’s Pub. We did 25 collaboration beers for the pub’s 25th anniversary, releasing two each month with Tyson putting together a beer dinner with both breweries each month. It was nuts, but an amazing experience that created incredible memories. I have had the honor of working with just about all of my favorite brewers and breweries. Among them are Russian River Brewing, Sierra Nevada, Kern River Brewing and Firestone Walker Brewing. And though we have done several collaborations with Beachwood Brewing, I have always wanted to get Julian Shrago to brew with me in Julian. If it were summertime, I think I would be very tempted to brew a cream ale with him, otherwise, it would just have to be a West Coast IPA with a lot Krush and Nelson. I am also looking forward to working with Ketch Brewing later this year on a beer inspired by the Convoy District.

What is your favorite brewing company outside of San Diego?
It would be a WWE Heavyweight Championship match at WrestleMania between Beachwood and Russian River, and I would cheer either winner.

What three breweries that you haven’t yet visited—local or elsewhere—are on your current must-see bucket list?
Sierra Nevada Brewing in Asheville, North Carolina tops the list of places I want to go in the U.S. I haven’t been to Green Cheek Beer Co. since they took over the Bagby Beer Co. location and I would like to see what they have done with it now that the sting has subsided of Jeff having to close. And on the heels of that, whatever Jeff Bagby does next, I will be there on opening day.

What are your favorite local beer events?
My favorite fest was the Karl Strauss Collabapalooza Festival. I am not being paid to say the following – the San Diego Beer News Awards is now my favorite local event on the calendar.

If you were to leave San Diego, where would be the next-best place you’d want to brew?
In a sense, I did leave San Diego to brew in Julian, but I don’t think I am cut out to leave San Diego. Everyplace has some issues, but San Diego is about as close to perfect as it gets for a city.

Which musical genre or artists are on your brew-day soundtrack/playlist?
100% metal – Mastadon, Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden stations on Pandora. Heavier stuff if my assistant brewer Ray gets to choose.

What do you consider your greatest professional accomplishments?
Winning Small Brewing Company of the Year at the World Beer Cup in 2004 with Jeff Bagby was certainly great, however, I would list two other things above it. I am very proud to have cofounded the San Diego County Craft Brewers Competition with Chad Stevens nearly 20 years ago. Running the competition and judging is a source of great pride for me. On the beer front, the awards and accolades for 1701 TriCentennial Barleywine tops my list. In 2002, it took a gold medal and Champion Bottled Beer at the Chicago Real Ale Festival, first place at the Toronado Barleywine Festival in San Francisco and a Gold Medal at the World Beer Cup. I entered it in three competitions, and it took the highest honor possible in each one.

What are you proud of having achieved in your personal life?
This question assumes I have a life outside of beer. Can I mark it N/A? I believe most of my notable achievements have come on my professional side, but I think the greatest thing I have ever done is to have realized at any early age, thanks to my dad, that I do not need to do what others expect of me. He gave me a degree of freedom I did not know existed and it has led to a life of doing something I love. I also enjoy that I can identify all nine of Beethoven’s symphonies. And getting into Yale to major in Medieval History is something I am proud of, but don’t talk about much.

When you’re not at work, what do you like to do for fun?
I love going to the Rady Shell – I would see almost anything there. Michelle (my significant other) and I have season tickets to The Old Globe, which is a great escape for us. Pickel ball is a new but intense obsession. And Michelle and I love to play games – and more appropriately we each like to win games, which makes life interesting. I am going to save the final thought on this for the next question.

Where do you like to drink off-the-clock?
Burning Beard is a great escape for me, and a place I can always find a beer that piques my interest. On the retail side, I love my monthly Gypsy Jazz jam nights at Hidden Craft in downtown San Diego. Michelle and I play games and listen to the music of Django and others. Hidden Craft is a true hidden gem in the downtown bar scene.

What is your favorite beer-and-food pairing of all time?
The pairing I am certainly most proud is when Garrett Oliver chose the aforementioned 1701 TriCentennial Barleywine to pair with Colston Bassett Stilton blue cheese at a brewers-and-media event for the 2002 World Beer Cup Awards Ceremony. As a young brewer who had just turned 30, I thought it was the coolest thing ever. That said, literally anything that my business partner and longtime friend, Tyson Blake, cooks and pairs with beer is the best food pairing I have ever had. I have never met anyone better at bridging the flavors between food and beer. Picking out one is like asking which of Monet’s paintings are the greatest? 

If you could somehow plan your last beer dinner before dying, what would you drink and eat, and who would you invite to join you?
Tyson Blake would be the chef and architect of the entire meal. And we would need just a little bit of wine so that Michelle could be there. Sitting around my table for 12 (including Tyson) would be Brandon Hernandez, Colby Chandler, Tomme Arthur, Jeff Bagby, Eric Rose, Paul Segura, Vinnie Cilurzo, Skip Virgilio and Jim O’Brien.

Who do you think you are (a purposely broad question)?
I am a guy who has been lucky enough to both discover a passion and be able to spend my working hours pursuing that passion. I am blessed to have such wonderful parents who didn’t blink when their Ivy League-educated son told them he was going to be a brewer. I truly love San Diego – its diversity in culture, climate, terrain and, of course, beer. So many things make our beer culture so special: the homebrewers and homebrew clubs, having White Labs founded here, the many competitions, the beer bars, the breweries and, most importantly, the community of customers who are as passionate about the beer they drink as are those of us making that beer. I will add one final thought because, apparently, I get to. I love the everyday nature of beer. It is special, but not just for special occasions. It brings people together and creates community. It is a small and simple thing, but an important thing. I never want beer to lose that everyday, working-man feel. Beer is not like expensive wine or rare spirits. The world’s best beers can be had any day at a reasonable cost. Best of all, you can share it with a friend, which I look forward to doing with my good friend, Brandon, very soon when we tap our mutual August birthday collaboration, Violet IPA.

If you’re a brewer at a San Diego brewing company and would like to be featured in our Portrait of a Brewer series, drop us a line at [email protected].