All photos by Paul Kieu
Beers from a boxcar on the bayou: that’s a succinct origin story for Bayou Teche Brewing. Oh, but now you want to know more …
Since its opening in 2010, the award-winning microbrewery has crafted beer after beer to complement the Cajun and Creole lifestyles central to Arnaudville. The sleepy bayou town, dubbed “the heart of French-speaking Louisiana,” has emerged as a cultural capital of the South in the past five years, even to Cajuns and Creoles themselves. Located at the confluence of bayous Teche and Fusilier and spanning St. Martin and St. Landry parishes, Arnaudville is home to a suite of French-speaking businesses, with more planned in anticipation of the opening of a French-immersion campus, a center for adult French-language education. The campus will join the likes of NUNU Arts and Culture Collective, Les Deux Mondes (a group of circa 1890—1930s homes moved to the banks of Bayou Teche, sustainably restored, and made available to NUNU artists-in-residence and Airbnb-ers), and, of course, Bayou Teche Brewing.
Owner Karlos Knott dreamed of a brewery during his U.S. Army days in Germany; back home, on St. Patrick’s Day 2009, he sketched out a concept with his brothers Byron and Dorsey. The brewery opened just a year later in an old boxcar located on Knott family land. The Knott brothers and their families all quickly found their unique roles at the brewery and defined their joint mission as cultural ambassadors of Arnaudville and Acadiana. (The brewery even named local musician, Louis Michot, as its ambassador to the United States.)
“The brewery is run by the family,” said Karlos. “Byron and my son, Cory, do all the artwork and are also brewers. Dorsey and his wife, Laurin, run the taproom and work with Louis to schedule bands and food. My wife, Stephanie, is the CFO and keeps things in order. My dad guides the tours. I’m the head brew master and design the year-round recipes with the final say on the process. Courtney, my niece, is in the taproom pouring beers. But we all wear different hats, and all tasks are fluid.”
The brewery, now located in an eight-thousand-square-foot building adjacent to the original site, offers a well-rounded day of activities every Saturday to locals and tourists alike. The day kicks off at 10:30 am with an hour-long Vinyasa yoga class (aka “brewga,” as these brewery-yoga associations have been labeled) taught by NUNU Yoga Coordinator Lillian Saucier—the first indicator that the brewery offers more than just taproom and tours.
At 11:30 am, Puerto Rican transplant and musician Diego Martin-Perez takes the brewery’s pavilion stage, playing old blues, jazz, country, and Latin songs. Around that same time, Laurin begins cooking up a pot of red beans, meatball stew, or other Cajun classics over propane in big Magnalite cast aluminum pots, steaming big batches of white rice in a twenty-five-cup Hitachi Rice Cooker (all staples in a true Cajun kitchen). Laurin, who hosted a YouTube series called “The Cajun Wife,” always serves something that incites a little drooling. When large crowds are expected, a food truck or caterer will arrive onsite to vend anything from sausage poboys to pizza to boiled crawfish; in the tradition of Acadiana, brewery visitors will not go hungry.
Floyd, the Knott family patriarch, leads brewery tours in French or English every thirty minutes from 11:30 am to 5:30 pm. Beer is served in the taproom, which is colorfully decorated with Byron’s art. The family matriarch, Rose, can generally be found on the porch enjoying the music and talking to visitors.
At 2 pm, a local band takes the stage to play several sets, by which time the pavilion is rocking with locals, national and international tourists, bikers (of both the bicycle and motorcycle persuasion), yoga attendees, and more. And just as the festivities begin to die down, around 6 pm, Dorsey takes the microphone for an engaging two-hour session of music trivia. Saturday at Bayou Teche Brewing wraps up around 8 pm—or whenever the Knotts can persuade the last newly pledged or long-time supporter to depart the pavilion. Saturdays, in other words, highlight what is most important to the folks at Bayou Teche Brewing: family and community, culture, music, food, and, of course, high quality, skillfully brewed beer.
But Bayou Teche Brewing isn’t stopping there. The Knotts are working on a four-thousand-square-foot expansion to keep up with demand for their product. The taproom will also grow, and they have plans for more parking to support a new Biergarten, which will soon be implemented as an extension of the pavilion. The original boxcar brewery is being re-permitted as a commercial kitchen for catering purposes; and a small house that, among other things, used to serve as a church has been moved onsite to eventually operate as a dining venue and local art gallery.
The Knotts’ good work extends beyond their brewery. In 2015, Bayou Teche Brewing released Ragin’ Cajuns™ Genuine Louisiana Ale, official beer of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and the first college beer in the United States. Proceeds benefit the university and help sustain the institution during state budget cuts. Previous and ongoing partnerships have also been established with other local institutions such as Louisiana Folk Roots, the Teche Project, Bayou Vermilion District, Pig and Plough Suppers, TRAIL, and NUNU’s Le Feu et l’Eau Rural Arts Celebration. The brewery even dabbles in music production: It has collaborated on En Français: Cajun ‘N’ Creole Rock ‘N’ Roll, a two-volume album in which local musicians cover classic songs in French (a third volume will be released soon).
“We participate in and contribute to things we believe in, which is local cuisine, music, and local environmental causes within our region. We have a lot in the works at the brewery too and hope to soon offer activities Friday through Sunday,” said Karlos. “We are especially excited to host the Burning Crawfish Festival starting this year [scheduled for May 21]. It’s traditionally an underground event; this year the lineup is made up of a mix of the Cajun and Creole music we love and some alternative bands. The big papier-mâché crawfish is almost finished. It’s going to be a lot of fun and bring a bit of a new crowd to us.”
Bayou Teche Brewing 1106 Bushville Highway Arnaudville, La. bayoutechebrewing.com
