SV/SOMF: Pacifico Brewery!

Jerry and I went to take a FREE tour of the Pacifico Brewery in Mazatlan, I emphasize the free because it was a great tour, and I don't know of many free tours that give you all the beer you want in the museum at the end of the tour. In 1900 three German investors of Mazatlan signed documents officially giving birth to the new brewery, but did not actually open for business until March 15th the following year. In 1954 Mazatlan's brewery became part of Grupo Medelo, and is the smallest brewery in Mexico. The Mazatlan brewery has 500 employees working 24 hours a day, bottling over 1 hundred thousand bottles a day. This brewery only produces Pacifico beer and it is only destributed in Mexico with a 4.5 percent alchol, the pacificos in the States are only 3.7 percent alchol. The brewery has 2 and a half acres of land, and the largest brewery in Mexico has 269 acres of land by Mexico City.

The Brewery from the outside

The first investors

In the brew house "the Kitchen" where the first stop in the brewing process, we got to try the "Wort" where the rice, corn, barley and water is cooked. It does not have any alcole and taste really sweet. Then the hops is added and is sent the fermenting process where it is cooled at 40 degree Fahrenheit. In this building they hold 38 tanks and each one ferments in 12 day with 21 days being the full process from start to finish. Then sent to the bottling building with there being 2 lines that change out 4 times a day with the three different sizes of bottles. The Medelo Group uses recycled bottles, some of the larger brewery's have their own bottle making plants, where the old bottles are completely broken down and remade. Mazatlan get their bottles from the brewery in Obregon, Sonora.