Lazy Magnolia, Mississippi’s brewery, started out with a gift from wife to husband that was really a gift from wife to wife, Leslie and Mark Henderson frequently joke when telling their story to neophytes learning about the first brewery offering locally brewed beer in the state.

As soon as I hear this, I remember the time I pulled off the same gifting trick, althought I was admittedly employing a slight paradigmatic shift.

As with all married men, last year I assumed, Valentine’s Day to be the perfect chance to get myself a little gift. I did just that by buying my wife some lovely lingerie.

Needless to say, the look of disappointment in her eyes was palpable, and neither the chocolate, nor the card I had stashed just out of sight was going to help fix the situation.

I was just stuck in a corner, the victim of a look most men know translates to “you pig.”

She didn’t know, however, I was taking this “gift to myself” thing quite literally.

The look of anger, disgust and maybe even contempt would be wiped away as rapidly as it appeared when she entered the bedroom later that night to find me wearing “her” gift.

All peace was restored in my world — except maybe my wedgie.

Leslie Henderson, owner of Lazy Magnolia, and her husband Mark have a story that’s not completely the same, but shares a common theme: Leslie’s gift to Mark — or herself — was a homebrew kit. Mark, an electrical engineer, was plenty good at home brewing, Leslie says, but she was so interested, she took his toy away.

After Leslie, a chemical engineer, got her hands on the kit, friends offered kind remarks time and time again on the quality of their creations. Soon enough, the couple found themselves owners of a brewery making 500 barrels of beer in its first year.

Now, Leslie says, this year they’ll be shooting for 11,000 barrels, and they just celebrated their fifth anniversary

That’s some growth.

And today, the operation is just as much about fitting in to the Southern experience as it is handling the day-to-day operations.

As I walked through the 10,000-square-foot brewery located in Kiln, or “The Kill” Miss., Matt McKiernan, one of Lazy Magnolia’s marketing gurus and one of the first of 14 full-time employees tells me Lazy Magnolia is all about fitting in with the community and the region.

They do so both through the relationships they build in communities in all five states where you can find Lazy Magnolia, and they also aim to become a part of the “Southern experience” along the Gulf Coast with every beer, he said. When you look toward involvement in the community, Leslie says you can’t survive as a brewery in a vacuum.

“The PR is just as much a part of it as the liquid. I’m sometimes overly focused on the quality of what’s in the glass,” Leslie said. “But you have to get people interested in drinking what’s in the glass before the quality of it even matters.”

And while Leslie says her role in her church, along with she and Mark’s role as leaders in their neighborhood association are great ways to connect with the community personally, it also helps people know about Lazy Magnolia.

Heck, you’ll also find them interacting with the community through their business’s waste.

Spent grains from the brewing of Lazy Magnolia beers don’t just go to the trash, they head to a local hog farmer, who occasionally throws a little bacon to the Hendersons and their staff, I’m told. Spent yeast, which is high in vitamin D makes its way on over to a local dairy farmer, too!

But what about the beer, you ask?

It’s gooooood!

Admittedly, I’ve only had the Southern Pecan and Indian Summer, but I can’t find much wrong with either. And like their role in the community over in “the Kill,” Leslie and Mark want their beers to be not only approachable, but also identifiable with local ingredients whenever possible. They also want you to be able to enjoy more than one or two without having to call a cab home, so you’ll find all of Lazy Magnolia’s offerings to be what beer nerds call “session beers.”

Southern Pecan, for example, uses locally grown roasted pecans. It’s got a rich brown coloring and very little bitterness. You can expect to taste the pecans as they are used like brewing grains during the brewing process. This one makes up about 80 percent of their overall business and took home a bronze medal in the 2006 World Beer Cup and can be found all over Mobile. Give it a try first, you’ll go back for more.

You’ll also find sweet potatoes used in brewing Lazy Magnolia’s Jefferson Stout and honey in the Southern Gold, a golden honey ale.

And while local ingredients are prominent in three of Lazy Magnolia’s brews, you’ll also want to head over to the Mockingbird Cafe in Bay St. Louis, less than a 10-minute drive from the brewery to check out Reb Ale, the brewery’s Pale ale and their Gulf Porter. The Mockingbird Café serves breakfast lunch and dinner (dinner on Thurs-Sat).

You might even kill two birds (pun not intended) with one stone and make your trip on a Saturday when Lazy Magnolia holds brewery tours. No reservations are needed and they start at 10:30 a.m.

If you can’t make the trip, don’t forget about the Mobile Baykeeper Hopsfest event in Cathedral Square on March 20. Lazy Magnolia will be there with some of their masterfully handcrafted brews. Tickets are $25 and can be found at Buck’s Pizza, Mellow Mushroom, Hopjack’s, Spring Hill Spirits and Momma Goldberg’s.

You can learn more about Lazy Magnolia and their beer at www.lazymagnolia.com or by searching for Lazy Magnolia on Facebook and Twitter.

Editor’s note: Pete didn’t really cross dress last Valentine’s Day. Hell, he’s still too embarrassed to even walk by Victoria’s Secret at the mall.