Month: October 2012

Written by Meghan Storey for craftbeer.com

As we look forward to fall, anticipating cooler temperatures, football, and holiday meals with family and friends, American craft brewers are also hard at work personifying fall’s flavors in their latest seasonal releases. With fall-themed seasonals, craft brewers focus on using the ingredients typical of the season, including pumpkin, spices and freshly harvested malts, barley and hops.

We asked Brewers Association member breweries to send us information on their latest fall seasonal releases, and here’s what they had to say:
Continue reading “Fall’s Bounty: Craft Brewers Welcome the Harvest”

Ken Carman is a BJCP judge; homebrewer since 1979, club member at Escambia Bay, Salt City and Music City Homebrewers, who has been interviewing professional brewers all over the east coast for over 10 years.

The Topic: Beer Snobs

Having dealt with a few pro-brewers and highly ranked BJCP judges with attitude problems, I know there is such a thing as a “beer snob” among craft beer lovers, competition judges and homebrewers. In fact I know one pro-brewer, no names mentioned, who thinks every time someone writes something on his brewery it has to be positive: essentially a promo. You may have read my comments before where this same highly ranked judge and pro-brewer would loudly lecture everyone during competition about how they should judge every, and any, beer. Or the highly ranked judge whose first comment to me when I questioned his ruling that a green apple taste was “always a defect,” because Pomme: which uses apples, might have that taste, he insisted there was “no such beer” as a Pomme. (Wrong.) And he then claimed I had “inferior taste buds.”
Continue reading “Brew Biz: Werts and All”

Written by Chris Outcalt for 5280.com

Don’t have tickets to the Great American Beer Festival? (This year’s festival did sell out in a record 45 minutes.) Don’t fret: Hold a mini-GABF at home. We spoke with Ian Clark, who operates one of Colorado’s tiniest commercial breweries, for tips on how to put together a beer tasting in your living room.

Pick a style: Although it might seem like a good idea to try as many different beers as you can get your hands on, Clark suggests sticking to one style, say, IPAs or stouts. By focusing on one type of beer, Clark says, you’ll learn more about that particular style and what flavors you prefer. “Whatever the style, it’s amazing when you sit it down side by side; it’s a very unique experience,” Clark says. “I love the education behind it.”

Quantity: GABF is all about quantity, but for smaller at-home tastings, Clark has found seven different versions of one style of brew works well. That number offers variety, but also ensures that you won’t completely blowout your taste buds.

Write it down: Clark jots down notes on each beer in a small notebook, including things like appearance, hop character, and mouthfeel. That way, he says, after the tasting is over, you’ll remember which brews you liked.
Continue reading “Beer Lesson: Host Your Own GABF”

May be a bit bass-y. Also includes the distillery equipment.-PGA

Written by Tom Becham for professorgoodales.net

On a recent Friday evening, I was at a friend’s house, guiding a group of guys through a beer tasting. I’d been invited by this friend as he is a beer-geek-in-the-making, and he’s been bitten by the bug of wanting to also convert his friends.

Many of the friends, (and there were about a dozen in attendance) while being inexperienced with craft beer, were scotch whiskey drinkers, and therefore I assumed they would have hardy palates and be used to complex flavors.
Continue reading “How NOT to Have a Beer Tasting Party”

Profiled by Ken Carman for professorgoodales.net

This was odd. I presented it at a beer tasting last weekend and it was well loved by all, even me: very pumpkin pie-ish. The color just right: pie in a glass. Had another bottle a few days latter and it was actually a little annoying: All Spice over the top. Clue: second serving was almost warm, first chilled just right. I highly recommend the chilled, unless your fav thing to do is open a can of All Spice and lick it clean. Cinnamon not that present, nutmeg somewhat, Perle hops… why did they bother? Really: in some beers hops seem to be tossed in because some folks think its “not beer without hops,” despite the fact the craft, and the art, of brewing beer is a lot older than the use of hops in beer. Thank the Catholic Church for the weird idea that Jim Koch, I guarantee, knows is false: “Hops are to beer like grapes are to wine.” (Actually, not necessarily always true in wine, though mostly. Mead is really a honey wine, there’s rhubarb wine, dandelion, etc.)
Continue reading “Beer Profile: Stevens Point Pumpkin Ale”

Written by Victoria Johnson for The Billford and businessinsider.com

Pumpkin beer, like anchovies on pizza or shorts on men, can be a divisive topic: you either like it or you don’t. If you don’t, well, walk on by—nothing to see here. But if you are, like me, a devotee of the gourd-based brewing arts, you are well aware that not all pumpkin beers are created equal. Which one is the best? More to the point, which one is the best for you?

There are so many pumpkin beers, and so little time in which to drink them. Let me make your autumn easier—for the past two years, I’ve held a pumpkin beer tasting, pitting competitors head to head in a bracket-style throwdown with the goal of finding the tastiest pumpkin beers out there. The Spiced Sixteen.

Each of the offerings was seeded* by a random draw and sipped out of tiny cups by a panel of twelve pumpkin-beer aficionados, who cast votes to decide which made it to the next round.** I’m going to spoil this year’s bracket for you now: DC Brau/Epic*** Fermentation without Representation came out on top. Which is, for the purposes of this article, a disappointment because it was a limited release offering from last year brought by a friend who collects and ages beer. If you can find it: cool! Enjoy! But otherwise: Consider what you want in a pumpkin beer. Light? Sweet? Pumpkin-y? Pie-y? Dark? There’s something for everyone out there, and I’m here to help you find it.

Written by Madeleine Davies for jezebel.com

Yesterday, CNN reportedon Rogue, a brewery in Oregon, that has recently been crafting a new beer using wild yeast harvested from their brewmaster John Maier’s 34-year-old beard. “Ew, gross,” you probably say, but Maier doesn’t know what the big deal is — “Yeast is everywhere.”

That’s true. Yeast is everywhere, even (as we ladies well know) buried deep inside our vaginas, waiting to go bad and ruin our week at any moment. But does that mean that we could possibly brew beer using the cause of one of our more common south of the border infections? Is “turn a yeast infection into a full-bodied IPA” the new “make lemons into lemonade?” We did some research and, in a word, no. The yeast used in beer is a completely different strain of yeast than the one that causes yeast infections. And there goes your artisanal brewery idea!
Continue reading “Just So You Know, You Can’t Make Beer With Your Vagina”