USA, NJ: Ross Brewing Company to set up shop in Port Monmouth section of Middletown

Sailing hasn't exactly been smooth for Ross Brewing in recent years, but the skies are starting to clear up for the Monmouth County craft beer operation, the Asbury Park Press reported on August 21.

It's been more than two years since the 2018 report on John Ross Cocozza's Ross Brewing Company and their plans to join Red Bank's booming craft beer scene — there already are three craft breweries and brew pubs in the town.

While Cocozza still plans on bringing his beers to local drinkers — including a core line-up of brews including the Navesink IPA, Shrewsbury Lager, Passaic Porter, Manasquan Wit and Raritan Red RyePA — the beer will no longer flow from the former fire house on White Street.

Instead, Ross Brewing Company will set up shop nearby in the Port Monmouth section of Middletown, with a goal of opening for the public by the spring of 2021, Cocozza tells us.

Cocozza, who signed the lease for the White Street space three years ago, said on August 19 that a number of issues resulted in the project not being able to get started in a timely fashion, and he expanded his search for an alternate space about a year ago.

The Port Monmouth property — 909 Main St., formerly the site of the Shoal Harbor Lobster Co. — has multiple buildings, one of which will be used as a production space with another functioning as a two-floor tasting room with views of the New York City skyline.

Just 100 yards south of Sandy Hook Bay, the property is nearby the New York Waterway's Beford Ferry and the Belford Seafood Co-Op, with its own 100-foot dock on the Compton Creek waterfront. This makes it, by Cocozza's reckoning, the first brewery in the state you can arrive at by boat.

The COVID-19 pandemic also caused some changes for Ross Brewing. The company had to re-submit its plans to both the state and its bank, who wanted to ensure that it was expanding its outdoor tasting area (they're now planning on 20 outdoor tables instead of the original four) and that the indoor drinking space had proper ventilation.

While construction has yet to begin at the Ross Brewing site, the company has been contract-brewing its beers at a number of area facilities (including Cypress Brewing in Edison, the Alementary in Hackensack and Orchard Hill Cider Mill in New Hampton, New York) for distribution in New York for the last six months.

They've been using their New York presence as a test market prior to Ross Brewing's years-in-the-making New Jersey debut, all the while keeping an eye on the ever-evolving craft beer market.

The brewery's original intended core-line up will still be mainstays, they won't be the full extent of the Ross beer roster.

"Of course, with the ever-increasing popularity of the hazy IPA — the North East IPA or New England IPA depending on what you believe the acronym stands for — that’s certainly something where we’ve looked at that," Cocozza said, "and (we've) come up with a few very, very interesting recipes that we’re big fans of and we can’t wait to be introducing those.”

The company also is developing fruited sours such as one German gose-style sour made with locally grown gooseberries along with raspberries and blackberries, and is exploring the possibility of collaborating with fellow local operations such as its Bayshore neighbors at Twin Lights Brewing.

“The key for us is we’re never going to ever put out a beer just because it happens to be the popular style," Cocozza said. "It has to be a beer that we enjoy ourselves. But if it’s a beer that we enjoy that also happens to be a popular style, that can be a win for everybody.”

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