Hacking All Grain Brewing with Kiwi Ingenuity and Simple Affordable Tools at Bevie in Auckland, New Zealand

Hacking Our Beer

How do you take the beer brewing process, and make it accessible to the average Joe? Simple, you hack it!

The processes for brewing quality beer have been refined over centuries and continues to evolve even today. From an outsider's perspective, it appears to be safeguarded by an eclectic club of weird scientists set on excluding ordinary folk from the inner circle. They mumble of gravity, sparging, yield, steeping and other incomprehensible nomenclature. They keep their brewing secrets close, their recipes even closer, and their influence as wide as it can go within their brewing circle of friends. 

While brewing good quality beer used to be a regular kitchen affair, a couple of hundred years ago, it slowly evolved into dark science, out of reach for ordinary people, like the Two Cowboys. Now, with the help of some simple equipment like a kettle, a pump, some tubes, and good ingredients like grains, yeast, hops and water, a company called Bevie, in New Zealand, managed to apply modern-day control-flow systems, and a mobile app, to unlock the highly complex all-grain brewing processes for ordinary people.

This is part of the TWO COWBOYS' EPIC GLOBAL TRAVEL & CULINARY EXPERIENCE - 2019! 

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They call it the Grainfather. It takes the best brewing practices from craft breweries and puts them into a simple to use, all in one system, to ensure anyone can brew a professionally produced craft beer, no matter their brewing experience.

You can also turn the Grainfather into a microdistillery by changing the top parts and adding the Still Spirits Alembic Pot Still Attachments. It is highly illegal to distill liqueur without a license in Canada, while pot smoking is now allowed (...go figure!). We are just saying that you can make fuel for your car or truck from your Grainfather brewing activities if you should ever need it. If you store the fuel in an oak barrel lying around, to keep it safe, it is between you and the RCMP to work out who gets what share when they come knocking.

There are many all-grain brewing equipment manufacturers and lots of equipment for brewing beer on the market. If you buy quality, it is expensive. People are spoiled for choice if they know what they are doing. Herein lies the problem - you need to know what you are doing! Short of learning from an expert or enrolling in beer school, it takes time, trial and error, and lots of learning to work out the best way for brewing beer from grains.

The innovation of the Grainfather is that it is a highly affordable, all-in-one system, for producing an excellent quality wort that you can ferment in the ways you prefer. It also drastically reduces your learning time and eliminates many costly brewing mistakes.

The one-pot brew system may not even be the most innovative around because there's been many that copied the approach and tried to improve on it. Some may also claim that not even Grainfather can be credited for coming up with the approach, although Kiwi's have been known for their innovation in all kinds of industries.

What struck us about the Grainfather is the innovation that Bevie put into the control of the brewing process. The smarts are in the software, not the pot! It offers the ability to a brewer to dial in an exact recipe and then execute it flawlessly, with a built-in controller, and the help of a mobile app on their phone or iPad.

Good brewing's foundation is precision and repeatability. Couple this with good ingredients, great water, and perfect fermentation, and you are on your way to consistently delicious craft-style beer and the envy of the neighbourhood. Not only do you get to execute the brewing tasks flawlessly, but you can also collaborate with other users, all over the world, on recipes and outcomes so that you have a massive database of brewing information on hand for your perfect beer. It gives new meaning to brewing with your mates!

Apparently, Bevie also has an answer for fermenting and serving your beer and provides you with another shortcut by having portion perfect fresh ingredient packs ready for a variety of standard brews. That is a story for another time.  

Observations

The brewing process is getting hacked. People are now liberated to brew their own craft quality beer consistently from grains with simple equipment and software that not only dramatically reduces the learning curve but assist in controlling the quality of the execution.

I don't want my beer to be made for me. If I did, I will just go and buy it from the next brewery or liquor store. I want to make my own beer, simply, affordably, consistently, and deliciously from available ingredients. That is what true beer liberation is about.

There are no gimmicks with the Grainfather offering a "one-push button dark magic beer brewing box". It is old-fashion grain brewing done right. They should have called it the "BigBrother" of beer. The whole solution comes in under $1,000 with free support and an ever growing database of brewing/distilling knowledge and beer recipes. It allows you to make a batch of 23 litres of beer with the ingredients of your choice.

Herein lies the problem. We want to brew more during the few weekly hours we can dedicate to this delicious hobby. Apparently, Bevie is working on a system that can do three times the volume of the existing Grainfather, and it will likely still be an electric system you can use in your shed. Yeehaaa!

The Two Cowboys has been on a journey for the last three years to liberate our beer. Bevie is giving us another option with the Grainfather to get closer to drinking what we make ourselves. We cannot wait to tell you what more they have installed for average people like us, on our beer and do-it-yourself journey.

Hendrik

Brewing Cowboy

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Photos

Smart Pot! 

One Pot

Learning Fast!

Traveling Cowboys: Hot Sauce and Dirty Poutine on the Alberta Prairie with Motoburrito, Turner Valley, Alberta

Travel is a Drug

Travelling is not a vacation. For a start, you don't always know where you are going and what you will be doing, seeing, who you will be meeting and how you will be experiencing. The unpredictability of travel turns it into a must-have drug for some, and a terrifying prospect for others.

We are self-confessed travel-junkies. We continuously hear the siren call of the open road. A week in a place is sometimes too long. We don't know where we will be next week or next month. All we know is that we won't be here anymore. We've sold our soul to unpredictability, opened our hearts to adventure and we are ready to be surprised by the fantastic people we will meet and the places we will explore on our journey.

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We don't like the world traveller, even if it is part of our name - the Traveling Cowboys. The word wanderer has more appeal.

The urban dictionary defines wanderer as someone that travels aimlessly. In contrast to wandering, some people are in a place for life, or at least for a predictable time. They are comfortable with intimately knowing their surroundings and familiar with everyone around them. Every day, month and season have predictability and a routine for them. They have goals like graduating, getting married, having children, building a house and ultimately retiring wealthy with lots of grandchildren.

The Wanderer is out place. I will contend that his or her travel is anything but aimless. Instead, it is a journey of wonder. Far from leaving or moving away from the familiar, the wonderer is drawn by the adventure of the unfamiliar. Some prefer a particular style of surprise, through the window of an RV, with a backpack, continent-hopping or Couchsurfing. Everyone has their favourite destinations. Alaska, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa, bush or city. However, all travellers have one thing in universal - absolute awe for the grandeur of the world around them!

Wanderers cannot get enough. The world is too big to explore in one lifetime. The more you do it, the more addicted you get to doing it.

On one's journey, you inevitably make friends with fellow travellers. We've made friends with Claudette and her team at Motoburrito in Turner Valley, Alberta, Canada. When Spring breaks on the prairie, they return like swallows from their travels, for a short three months, to serve the most delicious Mexican food from their food trailer. It is their way of financing their next journey and a surefire way to lure us back each year to catch-up, hear about the last trip, and find out what the plans are for the next.

Observations

Claudette introduced us to her homemade hot sauce. She finally revealed the secret to why a Dirty Poutine and a Taco at Motoburrito taste so much better than from any other attempt we've sampled. The secret is in the sauce. It is absolutely delicious. Kids have to be warned. This one is for adults only. It has a kick to it that will make you wish for ice cream in the morning.

Claudette's hot sauce is like the travel drug. Once you've tasted it, you want more. Once you have more, you are hooked and scheduled for an annual pilgrimage back to Turner Valley. We usually cannot wait for our next taco and poutine at Motoburrito and is always on the lookout for an excuse to do the next one. Apparently, they also do a Dirty Sanchez Burrito. I will let Claudette tell you more about that one...

Hendrik van Wyk

Wondering Cowboy

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Muchos Soldados! 

Biker Stampede

That Hot Sauce!

Taco Ladies!

Tacos

Poutinos

Cheesy

More Cheesy!

Two Cowboys: Every Cow and Bull Mount Comes With a Story at Longhorns and Leather in Coronation, Alberta

Making Lemonade

If you do something for the love of money, become a banker. For a life with meaning, preferably make something.

Enjoy what you do and get better at it, so that it adds value to your and other people's lives. When the world gives you lemons, make lemonade. Love lemons so much that you are vested in making the world's best lemonade. Then, make sure thirsty people everywhere can get it on hot summer days.

The golden rule that budding entrepreneurs often miss is that you have to absolutely love and value what you do. When you are successful, you are going to do a lot of it. The second valuable lesson is to seek out people that value and benefit from what you do. Because these are the people vested in your success. Work hard. Become the best so that more people can have what you create.

It all starts with a love and passion for making something. For Dexter Dedora, in Coronation Alberta, it began with his passion for farming and the few remaining Longhorn cattle of Alberta. He mounts horns.

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In the early part of the 20th century, Longhorns neared extinction. However, the breed was kept alive because a few Texas ranchers and some in Southern Saskatchewan and Eastern Alberta, Canada, held onto small herds for mostly sentimental reasons.

Now, Longhorns are making a fantastic comeback as a breed. They are not just surviving symbols of the Old West but are cattle that are more and more in demand. They are attractive to breeders today for the same reasons they were successful a century ago. Their resistance to disease, ease of calving, longevity, and ability to thrive on poor pasture makes them unique. They also provide health-conscious Americans of the 21st century with lean and great-tasting beef.

Most of all, they are beautiful animals. The fashionable colours of their hides and those recognizable long horns make it a particular breed that serves as a talisman for what the Old-West was and still is all about. These are the symbols of a hardy folk - the people that succeeded with tenacity and perseverance and above all a love for their animals that made a particular type of life possible in a harsh and unforgiving land. The Longhorn had a significant part in it all. It is no wonder that there is an incentive to try and preserve some of the memory of a particular bull or cow that played a role in the survival and success of a family or a ranch.

If not the memory of a particular animal, then the reminder of more straightforward, harder, and somehow a more rewarding time in the West when hard work was rewarded, honesty and integrity valued, and where people still took care of each other.

Observations

Dexter's Longhorn mounts are not trophies. They are stories that he cajoles from, and share with every one of the masterpieces he lovingly creates in his shed. In some cases, the stories date back decades as he performs his lazarushian magic to bring the horns of an old bull or cow back from the brink of oblivion.

His polished masterpieces have travelled as far as Europe. All across Canada, they are treasured as reminders of a grandfather, a ranch, home or a specific animal. Above all, they are reminders of a lifestyle, culture and outlook of a pioneering people. People that know that there is fulfilment in making something of value, and in sharing it with people that you love and that are vested in your success.

That is why we will proudly display a Longhorn mount from Dexter's Longhorns and Leather. It reminds us every day to invest our time and energy in the people that care about us and value what we do in the same way as the Longhorn from which it came was once vested in the survival and success of its owner.

We are telling the stories of our makers to the world because celebrating these people is desperately needed. The time is coming when we will need them more than ever before.

Hendrik van Wyk

Longhorn Cowboy

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Photos

Gold

Worker Hands

Maker

Bessie

Longhorn Cow

Two Cowboys & Ranch

Eastern Alberta - 2018

Traveling Cowboys: Smithbilt Hats Enhancing Personalities Since 1919 in Calgary, Alberta

Oldish New Beginnings

Smithbilt Hats recently moved to a new location just down the street from their previously located spot. It is a 120 year old reclaimed and repurposed feed store building from a grain elevator that burned down in the sixties.

The former was incorporated into the new with the rebirth of the building thanks to some architectural ingenuity, perseverance from the builders and an appreciation and time-honored commitment to the classical roots of the business.

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The new building is breathing fresh air into the century-old hat manufacturing business we’ve come to love and admire. It provides additional space for new additions such as a woman’s millinery line and a multi-function room for small events. 

You can still pick your hat and have it shaped or serviced right there by Brian and his team. Because of the addition of a female touch, you can now also get your personality enhanced by accessories that Holly Allen and her team append to your hat. It adds to the unique experience and definitely improves your appearance.

Smithbilt has a strong commitment and connection with the Calgary Stampede. This year, it will be part of the maker’s hall. For the 150th Canada birthday celebration the Stampede is including this new initiative to help showcase the various maker arts and crafts associated with the Western heritage and culture of the show. It will include famous and new artists in buckle making, saddle making, apparel and more. Smithbilt will showcase hat making and demonstrate its unique hat shaping skills right on the floor of the exhibition. You will be able to walk away with your own hand-shaped Calgary-made Western hat.

Observations

Holly made a vital point during our most recent visit to Smithbilt. According to her, in the same way, an accessory completes an outfit, a hat gives a person personality. We were wondering if it is such a powerful contributor to a person’s identity, then surely people should take hat wearing a lot more serious. What you wear on your head and how you wear it tells a big story about you, your history, identity and outlook on life.

We made the discovery that Smithbilt has been giving personality to countless people since 1919. If they can’t help you, then probably, no one can. In our case, we have personality. Our Smithbilt hats are therefore merely enhancing it. That is why we wear ours proudly and with attitude.

Hendrik van Wyk

Enhanced Cowboy

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Old Stuff With Stories

A Lifetime of Stories

New Stories

Initializing

Personality Enhancement

Two Cowboys: Local Production and Community Support with Dave's Hot Pepper Jelly in Invermere, British Columbia, Canada

Your Maker

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People start businesses for all kinds of reasons.

As idyllic as some may make it sound, starting a business and working for oneself is not for everyone. Some people are born entrepreneurs. Others are not cut out for it. There are a few lurking surprises that may easily trip up budding and aspiring entrepreneurs.

First of all, it requires a massive investment - money, many hours of hard work, dedication, commitment, innovation and patience. All of these need to be orchestrated and delicately balanced, coupled with an enormous amount of luck for success. Then sometimes there is the bitter realisation that one might not make a whole lot of money from a specific endeavour after all. It is this last part that some entrepreneurs find particularly difficult to navigate.

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Facing reality and having to change course regularly is not easy for most people. It is paramount for a successful entrepreneur. If you are an entrepreneur, it can cost you your livelihood if you are too stuck in a particular frame of mind. These people are the ones that push on against the odds with, for example, an unrealistic profit goal as the primary motive for their labour. Their return on effort becomes a huge disappointment and usually continues to be, the longer they persevere. The harder they try, the worse it can become. The more they persevere, the more costly it becomes financially and emotionally.

Money, and more accurately, profit should not be the reason for being in business. It removes the agility that should naturally come with entrepreneurship. When people with an overbearing money motive become entrepreneurs, it is often out of necessity. They may not succeed in finding employment or be in a place that doesn't offer other opportunities to earn or enough for their standard of living. They are likely to be hampered by a lack of passion for what they do and for what it takes to succeed.

Financial reward should be the result or outcome of a successful business with the right foundational values. If a company exists for the right reasons, then profit becomes a by-product of an entrepreneur's overall success.

What then are the right reasons for being in your own business?

Makers and Connectors

Some people have a desire to become involved in all aspects of a company's operation. We call them the pathological learners. They are the makers and creators. One position, one job, product, a single career is not enough to stimulate their curiosity. Having their own business give these entrepreneurs an opportunity to do and try a lot of different things.

Their primary motive for being in business is to learn, explore and experience. They find new and innovative ways to accomplish goals. They are the inventors, engineers, creators and experimenters. Their success heavily relies on their ability to gather a team around them to fill the gaps they leave. They move from one fascinating opportunity and project to the next.

Other people start businesses with the desire to put a personal touch back into doing business. People are motivated by meaning and purpose and the synergy it provides with others. They are the connectors and value creators. Having one's own business intimately involves the owner with staff and with customers. It offers a chance to connect with people and with a cause that may not have been possible otherwise. Sometimes the reason goes beyond the business operations and involves a larger community or purpose.

We often get feedback from entrepreneurs that their single biggest reward from their business is the recognition they get from others. They are motivated by the contribution and value they provide to the lives of others. This gives them a feeling of accomplishment. They feel that they are offering a valuable service to their customers, and they pride themselves on doing the best job possible. The best part of doing it as an entrepreneur is that they get to choose the people with whom they associate.

If a business is founded on innovative production and the value it provides to stakeholders such as community, customers and staff, then it is on a solid foundation. Revenue and profits will come because the entrepreneur will be equipped to navigate the complexity of the endeavour and make the changes that ultimately unlocks value, and ensures the business' success.

The business then has a higher purpose.

Observations

We met up Dave and Kathy from Dave's Hot Pepper Jelly in Invermere, British Columbia, to learn about the foundations of their jelly business. Kathy and Dave is one of the first sponsors of the work we do to promote local producers. It is about time we tell their inspiring story.

The company was motivated by Dave's love of hot and zesty foods. After trying a flavoured Jalapeno jelly, Dave thought he could do better and began experimenting with his own flavours. He started cooking up batches of Jalapeno jelly more than 20 years ago. Originally, Dave would give it away to his friends and acquaintances. After giving away several hundred jars, he realised there was probably a market for his creation. He set up his first outlet with the Invermere Farmers' Market.

When he met his wife Kathy, who was also a devotee of all things spicy, they decided to turn their collective passion for hot foods into a family business. The result is the ten flavours of Dave's Hot Pepper Jelly, many markets and lots of travel later, several retail speciality stores and supermarkets stocking the treat.

The next chapter in this business is still to be written. We have a feeling it has the potential to make a significant social and community contribution in the Invermere area. It may be the catalyst to inspire more makers to start businesses possibly with social value. This business is not just about jelly. It can be a whole lot more. When we listen to Kathy's passion, we are betting it will be.

We have two favourite applications, other than the obvious uses for Dave's Hot Pepper Jelly. The one is with fried Camembert cheese. Put the Camembert (or Brie) in a pan. Top it with your desired flavour from Dave's jelly and watch the cheese melt and the jelly caramelise. Eat with toast or on a South American arepa. Delicious!

The second application may be more traditional. We've put it on barbequed salmon while cooking on the grill with a little herb D'Provence, salt and a lot of lemon juice. It introduced spicy sweetness with a definite bite and cuts through the fattiness of the fish. Highly recommended!

Dave and Kathy have been supporters of our cause from the start, and we thank them from the bottom of our hearts for valuing the work we do. We hope we can return the favour manyfold as we encounter them on our travels through Alberta, BC and beyond. We encourage you to support them and their business.

Hendrik van Wyk
Hot (Pepper) Cowboy

We are a content company. We earn our livelihood from producing great content about inspiring people and their stories. We use Patreon to help us earn from our work. It allows us to have a closer relationship with our collaborators and grow our audience. 

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Brave Soldiers

Survival Pack

Lonely Jelly

Community Support

o-CNN: Get Your Inner Chocolate Fix With a Monthly Chocolate Box from Kako Chocolate, Auckland, NZ

Direct Subscription

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Part of the joy and fun of having your own business is being able to take it in any direction you want to go.

It is one of the reasons why Stuart at Kako Chocolate continues to innovate. He is a creative chocolatier that makes beautiful and tasty treats. Stuart is always experimenting with new flavours, colours, ingredients and packaging.

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During the last few years, he also shared his knowledge freely with anyone prepared to attend his chocolate mastery classes in Auckland, New Zealand.

Like any artisan maker business, Stuart has to overcome the massive obstacle of getting his product to customers. It is a constant struggle to deliver an affordable product, and also have enough margin to continue to be in business. Typical options include retailing, wholesaling and markets. A key strategy is to sell directly to consumers to maintain higher margins. At the same time, the challenge is to keep overhead low to hold on to the hard-earned cash.

A store on the main street of a town or in a shopping mall makes it easy for customers to find you, but the rents and license fees can quickly make it unprofitable. The alternative is wholesale supply. The typical portion that would have gone to the landlord instead ends up as retail margin in someone else's pocket. That is why markets provide an attractive option for makers. It is a more economical way to sell directly to consumers. However, there is not a market every day.

Online sales is another and increasingly popular option that allows artisans to sell and supply directly to customers without expensive overheads. Shipping cost makes up a fraction of the expense of the sale, and it allows the artisan to keep his or her product affordable with more margin in their pockets.

However, the online world is an enormous place, and it is hard (and can be expensive) to get the attention of prospective customers and keep the awareness of existing ones. This is the single biggest obstacle to overcome. Most artisans do overcome it if their product is delicious, unique and good value and they invest their time and marketing budget carefully in curated and engaging promotional online content.

That is why the direct subscription model is becoming more and more popular particularly for artisans producing consumable products like chocolate, coffee, jams, jellies and more. The thinking is that a customer is likely to buy the product anyway, and the maker fills the anticipated need with a periodic (monthly or weekly) delivery of a favourite and something new, to keep the interest.

The subscription model is favoured over a simple once off sale because, while it may have been relatively easy to get the attention of an online customer once, it is becoming increasingly difficult to get attention and keep it regularly. Ideally, once a customer is engaged, it is better to retain it without the need to entice them frequently for another sale in a very noisy online market. Rather, keep an open channel with the customer through a captivating communication flow like a subscription.

This way everybody wins. The artisan has a steady commitment of customer orders and can plan production accordingly. He or she has the opportunity to make the product more affordable and earn more from it while building brand loyalty. The consumer has the convenience of online shopping and delivery, and one less thing to worry about in their busy schedules. In most cases, the products may even be more affordable and better quality than the store bought options. There is ample opportunity for the maker to innovate and experiment and get timely customer feedback on new products, flavours, preferences and tastes.

This is precisely where Stuart's latest innovation lands. More chocolate, different flavours, more margin, simplicity and great value for chocolate lovers through a My Chocolate Box subscription. All Stuart and his team's chocolate experiments and innovation delivered directly to consumers through a monthly chocolate subscription service.

Observations

My Chocolate Box is a deliciously tasty new way for chocolate lovers to experience a better quality chocolate delivered directly to their door. Unfortunately, the chocolate subscription service is currently only available in New Zealand at the moment. However, if you are in the consumable artisan product business anywhere else in the world, you should pay attention.

Each month, a subscriber receives a chocolate box containing an assortment of gourmet New Zealand handmade Kako chocolate products. They promise not to use flash packaging, which in the chocolate business can sometimes cost more than the product itself. Instead, the subscriber gets more bang for their buck, with lots more product. Less cardboard and plastic. More chocolate!

Stuart's commitment to the new service is to get his subscribers the perfect balance of quantity and quality to wholly capture and keep their chocolate attention. His target for 2017 is to have 2,000 chocoholics enlisted. It sounds like a whole lot of fun and a great way to generate a huge amount of value all round for everyone involved (including the Dentist).

We congratulate Stuart on his newest innovation at Kako and will eagerly follow his journey as he makes his chocolate (prescription) subscription business a reality in New Zealand. Who knows, we may have some of it in Canada soon.

P.S. To become a Kako Chocoholic enlist here: https://www.sweetest.co.nz/my-chocolate-box/

Hendrik van Wyk
Truffle Cowboy

We are a content company. We earn our livelihood from producing great content about inspiring people and their stories. We use Patreon to help us earn from our work. It allows us to have a closer relationship with our collaborators and grow our audience. 

If you Sponsor us on Patreon: http://www.travelingcowboys.com or Donate to our cause on GoFundMe: http://www.forwardthefavour.com we can do a lot more for you, your business, event or community.

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You Beauties!

Careful now...

Yea, don't drop it...

Two Cowboys: Advanced Composite Manufacturing for Hand-Built Personalized Fishing Rods at Maven in Auckland, New Zealand

Happy Places

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Marry art, design and modern composite material manufacturing and what do you get? A husband and wife team in New Zealand that works together to make beautiful, one-of-kind, purpose-built fishing rods!

According to Gayleen Pratt, the driving force behind the Maven brand, it is as much about fishing, as it is about engineering beautiful, functional pieces of art. You'll believe her when you see the care she takes to apply a thin layer of lacquer to the windings of a beautiful custom fishing rod. A piece for a lucky customer somewhere in the world. She does it several times over several days to complete a fishing rod that can take up to two weeks to make.

This is a short promotional clip...

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Maven was inspired by a childhood spent fishing the Firth of Thames. Gayleen grew up in the typical natural Kiwi kid playground of a jetty, on an ocean inlet somewhere on the coast of Aotearoa. It is the place where kids usually pass the time swimming, fishing, playing and generally living the good New Zealand life. It is also where they dream about their future. Gayleen and Stephen never knew that what they may have taken for granted growing up, will one day become an essential part of the inspiring story behind the Maven brand. Artful Fishing.

Maven was launched in Auckland in 2007. Gayleen and Stephen applied their passions for design, technology and off course, fishing, to create something beautiful, functional and unique. They brought it together for something equally at home on super yachts, as it is at the local lake, or a jetty in the hands of a Kiwi kid.

Maven rods blend purist design aesthetics and an impeccable technical pedigree to create a modern classic. Each features a retro-chic longitudinal pinstripe and arch pattern. "The lengthways pinstripe is a world-first for a fishing rod", according to Stephen. "We wanted to create something that would be truly treasured and bring many years of enjoyment. It should be a trusted friend, with which you share many happy moments, in happy places."

Observations

Maven's team works from a state of the art facility situated on the edge of native bushland in Auckland, New Zealand. Their products are jewels of engineering. If you can ever call a fishing rod a piece of art, then this is it.

I am sure some people can get wax-lyrical about their fishing rods. How it helped them to land the big one, or caused it to get away. Granted, Maven's products are beautiful, and they are state-of-the-art. However, we found something more profound than fishing rods during our visit. The real story behind Maven is the passion of two people for engineering and design. This is not so much a fishing rod business, as it is a business for beauty, function and ingenuity.

Stephen walked us through the manufacturing process, and he kept using familiar phrases. Words we've become used to hearing over the months we've been profiling high-achieving producers. "We needed a way to do this, so I made that." "This is different from what other's do, so I made a machine that can do it." "It is a special tool I made to solve that problem."

Stephen may as well be tinkering on the next Pagani or space rocket. The end product will be phenomenal because it is not really about the product. It is in the process, method and ultimately the joy in the journey to get there. No matter what he makes, it is simply a path to, and an outlet for his real passion. The art of engineering and design.

Here is another example. We all know Apple makes great computers and mobile devices. However, it is their design and engineering ingenuity that results in great computers and mobile devices. You can have the right idea, but without the means to pull it off, and the passion for the process of making it, it will forever remain elusive.

I have no doubt that Stephen and Gayleen can take the next project and pull it off as well as they are doing Maven's fishing rods because the smarts and rewards are in the process of designing the making. As with many businesses we discover in far-away little New Zealand, this is yet another example of world-class and remarkable. We are honoured to tell the story and hope you enjoy it with us.

Hendrik van Wyk
Fishing Cowboy

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Two Cowboys: Grown Up Cookies With Real Treat and Scotch in Cochrane, Alberta, Canada

Grown-Up Cookies

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Have you ever had your cookie with Scotch? Didn't think so.

Most people outgrow cookies by age twelve and rediscover it when their babies cut teeth. The next time a substantial amount of cookies make into your diet is when little Suzie signs up for Girl Scouts. The excuse is that you have to help her make her sales target. Yeah, right. There are other occasions when cookies feature in our lives. Christmas, birthdays and tea time with English relatives.

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That was before we met Jacqueline Day. She introduced us to grown-up cookies, or rather cookies for grown-ups. Thanks to her we've invented a whole new reason for cookies. Cookies with Scotch! Let me introduce you to her fledgeling cookie empire called Real Treat.

She describes her flavour creations as unapologetically delicious. She is allowed to do that because she's taken flavouring cookies to a whole new level. Without compromise. I mean top class chef quality creations wrapped in a cookie form factor! The layers are there, the textures are there, the pairings are divine. This is no ordinary cookie.

Jacqueline mentioned that Real Treat is serious about ingredients. That is a given. The traditional bits are there. Butter, sugar, eggs, and wheat flour forms the base for most of them. Then comes in-house candied lemon peel, smoked pecans, organic dark chocolate, cinnamon caramel. The list goes on and on with exotics that make it into the recipes.

Anyone can add exotic ingredients and make just another cookie. For Jacqueline, it is not only the quality of ingredients that make Real Treat cookies a real treat. It is rather her processes of flavour pairings that she infuses into the base. It delivers a balanced and delicious surprise every time you let one melt in your mouth.

All her cookies are hand-made and baked in a tiny little kitchen in Cochrane Alberta. She sells them at farmers markets and pop-up stores and selected retail stores across Canada (list on her website). She recently launched her online cookie store to ship all over Canada.

Observations

Chefs are entertainers. 

Everything they do with food and flavour is intended to solicit a reaction. If you want nourishment then cook a steak, make a sandwich, eat some McDonalds and drink Starbucks. If you want to be taken on a journey and experience flavour entertainment, find a good Chef, Chocolatier, Brewmaster, Gelato Master, Winemaker or Barista. These people specialise in olfaction and gustation titillation. 

Jacqueline is on the same journey. She entertains people with cookies. We predict that today it is cookies. Tomorrow it will be something else. What drives her? The pleasure of seeing the surprise on people's faces when they enjoy her cookie creations. It is this surprise reaction, and her drive to learn, discover and create that makes Real Treat cookies so unique. As with all makers, her cookies contain a little bit of Day personality.

It is this that we appreciate about a Real Treat Cookie paired with our favourite peaty Scotch. They both come highly recommended.

Hendrik van Wyk
Cookie Cowboy

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Two Cowboys: A Lifetime of Making at Wild Rose Jewellery & Gifts in Okotoks, Alberta, Canada

New Home

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Garo Yanikyan was born in Armenia. At the age of twelve, he started with his apprenticeship pulling gold wire for his uncles. With his family members, he trained to become a Goldsmith. One day he would travel the world and settle in Okotoks, Canada.

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In those days and within those cultures, people were born into a vocation. One grew up with it and in it. It was who you were, even before you picked up your first implement to make your first ring. You were expected to do it. Your trade was you and your family's identity and association.

Years, even decades of work will pass to improve your techniques and hone your skills until finally, you became a Master Craftsman. It was the way to support and provide for your family. Until one day, it became your duty to lead and train new apprentices to follow your footsteps.

Passing on knowledge and experience to the next generation assured the continuation of the craft. It was the work that made it possible to earn a living and provide for one's loved ones. It is was also the work that contributed to the values of one's community and the beauty of one's life.

It was in this life where the journey started for Garo. It would eventually bring him to a small town south of Calgary called Okotoks. Here he became the master Goldsmith for Okotoks. He raised his family and contributed to this community. Yanik became Okotokian. Canadian. He is Wildrose Jewellery.

In Okotoks, he watched life go by for more than thirty years. For a small oil town at the Foothills of the Rocky Mountains, that is more than a lifetime of change. It grew from a sleepy little farming community to one of the fastest growing and popular living destinations in Alberta, Canada.

A lot changed since Garo and his wife arrived in the early eighties. Not only did the town grow, but the people also changed. The world has changed for the Goldsmith. The appreciation for the millennium-old craft of goldsmithing declined as people's expectations increased.

Progress or Regress

The age-old demands of quick turnarounds and bold or delicate new designs prevailed. Only now, the distinction of the craftsman is getting replaced by a machine that does it faster, better and cheaper.

It is the birth of jewellery manufacturing. Rings are now designed on computers. Milling and casting machines fabricate faultless and perfect copies, on mass, in automated "factories". Machines do a better job at making jewellery, and it costs almost nothing to put out thousands of items. The smith's road is coming to an end. Garo's world is disappearing.

"People still need to get things fixed," Garo says. "That, machines cannot do, yet. It still makes me useful." While Garo's world is disappearing, the rest of us are also losing something profound. Soon we may be living in a world with no Goldsmiths. Old-world Artisans like Garo, are disappearing from our towns and communities that are now driven by automation and a fixation with consumerism. With them, they take thousands of years of knowledge and skills that were honed through generations of artistry. With them, they take away art. The evidence for civilisation.

By losing them, we are losing a kind of person. We are losing a producer, a maker and an artist. With this loss, we may be losing our very identity.

At least we will have our perfect rings.

Hendrik van Wyk
Wildrose Cowboy

Get rewarded for supporting our local Producers: Receive special offers and invitations from the Two Cowboys and our Producers when you subscribe to our email list.

We are a content company. We earn our livelihood from producing great content about inspiring people and their stories. We use Patreon to help us earn from our work. It allows us to have a closer relationship with our collaborators and grow our audience. If you Sponsor us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/twocowboys or Donate to our cause on GoFundMe: https://www.gofundme.com/twocowboys we can do a lot more for you, your business, event or community.

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