Thirsty Pagan Brewing

Photos and text by H. Brian Rauvola

 According to their website, in May of 2006 Susan and Steve Knauss purchased the existing Twin Ports Brewing Co. and opened up Thirsty Pagan Brewing in the historic Russel Creamery building at 1623 Broadway, in Superior, WI. This simple sentence gives insight to the simple approach that these two took in producing a wonderful company, Thirsty Pagan Brewing. Building on a firm foundation of pizza and beer, our two entrepreneurs quickly took a down and out location to a thriving destination. "We recognize our potential in focusing on just two things, pizza and beer. Do those two things correctly, and the world will come to us," says Steve Knauss; and obviously, they juggle them well.

One of the exciting ventures of the Pagan is their reserve of Russian Imperial Stout being flavored and aging in bourbon barrels in the basement of the restaurant. This, plus updated and expanded fermenting tanks and equipment has increased their capacity and selection of micro-brew offerings (not to mention their schedule of local and regional musicians!)

The images shown combined a 2 speedlight flash system balanced with ambient light, one speedlight with a mini softbox or shoot-through umbrella modifier, the other snooted as a highlight. All of the elements for the juggling image were captured under the same lighting conditions as the main image.