Author: Ken Carman

One Bottle Collection beer for every 5 days before Christmas. Rating system: not actually meant as a “tense” comment. All these beers either don’t exist anymore, or I tasted in the past. Hopefully, if not so hot before, they’re better now. If they do still exist. Or hopefully, if not better they’re as dead as the… Dickens.

Ghost of Christmas Present… remember him? Jolly, fun: the kind of guy you’d invite to a party for the season, and the kind of beer you could bring to a festive affair and not be totally laughed out of the room by festive beer geeks. That’s the best a beer gets in this series. Now Ghost of Christmas Past isn’t a great award. You can see from the picture he can be a bit of a grump. Probably from mediocre’ beer. And best not bring a Ghost of Christmas Past Beer to a beer geek festive affair. You’ll be the limp wet noodle of the party. A Ghost of Christmas Future beer? You remember that guy, right? If you want to be laughed at, have to bring most of your offering home and feel like you’ve just attended your own funeral instead of a party, bring a Ghost of Christmas Future beer. Some Ghost of Future Beer might best serve as embalming fluid.

Sam Adams Special Winter Lager

Hopefully this has changed, for my memory of this Lager is nil. Not a good sign. And Sammy has done better. Of course early Sam, if I remember right, suffered from contract brew blues. Some folks simply shouldn’t be in the contract brew biz: like Oldenberg which is where a lot of contract beer in the South used to come from. No “contract” at all, just “whatever we have that’s the closest.” (Actual quote from a tour guide there years ago.) This was most likely an Oldenberg brew. Sam has better control over its brews these days.

Not spicy in any sense. A lager, just a tad darker than most but no roast, not that much body.

I’m going to be honest here: I have yet to have a Winter, seasonal, lager that has impressed me. It could be done, of course, but IMO the season practically screams “ale,” so it had better be a damn good, and complex, one.

I remember it as unremarkable, though not offensive in any way. So another bland Christmas past award.

Continue reading “From the Bottle Collection 4 Days Before Christmas Beer”

One Bottle Collection beer for every 5 days before Christmas. Rating system: not actually meant as a “tense” comment. All these beers either don’t exist anymore, or I tasted in the past. Hopefully, if not so hot before, they’re better now. If they do still exist. Or hopefully, if not better they’re as dead as the… Dickens.

Ghost of Christmas Present… remember him? Jolly, fun: the kind of guy you’d invite to a party for the season, and the kind of beer you could bring to a festive affair and not be totally laughed out of the room by festive beer geeks. That’s the best a beer gets in this series. Now Ghost of Christmas Past isn’t a great award. You can see from the picture he can be a bit of a grump. Probably from mediocre’ beer. And best not bring a Ghost of Christmas Past Beer to a beer geek festive affair. You’ll be the limp wet noodle of the party. A Ghost of Christmas Future beer? You remember that guy, right? If you want to be laughed at, have to bring most of your offering home and feel like you’ve just attended your own funeral instead of a party, bring a Ghost of Christmas Future beer. Some Ghost of Future Beer might best serve as embalming fluid.

Written by Ken Carman

1995 Anheuser-Busch Christmas Brew

I hate to slightly disappoint my readers, expecting a total dis on all things AB, but I don’t remember this one in the slightest. If I hated it; I’d remember. If I loved it; I’d remember. Solution: a rather bland, unremarkable, past attempt at competing with craft beer by the leader of the, “Oh, shisen, do we have to compete? Can’t we just legally drive these guys outta the biz with nasty tactics?” movement. Well, leader sometimes. Miller: now Miller/Coors, has been numero uno in the nasty more than a few times. The only thing missing is an actual numero uno with a bullet or two.

That we know of.

And you have to give them just an ounce of credit for trying instead of the usual past tactic: telling distributors if they carried craft beer there would be no Bud products.

I haven’t seen this bugger for a while. Of course I haven’t looked for it. Maybe they still make it. My guess it was superior to some of their more aggressive attempts, like a Michelob version of Stout that tasted like they used way too much Black Patent and hardly any other malt. Kind of like chewing on a burnt up log from a yuletide fireplace.

So one rather bland Ghost of Christmas Past award.
Continue reading “From the Bottle Collection: 5 Days Before Christmas Beer”

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

Note: these pictures are a lot better than what I usually take. That’s because I didn’t take them. Courtesy of The Barley Mob.

We got there at about 7:30 am after leaving Nashville at 3:30am. There’s a time change and we didn’t want to be late for our 8am judge gathering. Luckily we called for information and pulled up maps. The address is Patten Parkway. A one block “Parkway?” Well, whatever. If Tony Giannasi, master homebrewer, builder of grand, huge, tap displays, competition organizer and alien from the planet Snorpschnatch… (OK, I made that one up, but since the oceans on Snorpschnatch are all high gravity ales he probably wishes he was.) … (If Tony) hadn’t been standing outside with boxes of prizes and corny kegs of beer we would have thought we were in the wrong place. The Honest Pint in Chattanooga is a work in progress: not open yet. And as you can tell from the chandeliers alone it will be magnificent.
Continue reading “Brew Biz: Werts and All”

Without intent, I have collected well over 1,000 beer bottles since the early 70s. When something finally had to be done about the cheap paneling in this old modular, I had a choice. Tear down the walls while, oh, so carefully, replacing the often rotted 1X3s. Or: cover them with…

The Bottle Collection

Written by Ken Carman

Mediocre picture for a less than mediocre beer. This one’s about middle age-wise in a collection that started in the early 50s. Early 90’s probably. Wild Boar Special Amber wasn’t all that “special at all.” Listed as an Oldenberg product, just south of Cincinnati, OH. Most likely a contract product. I remember it as bland, slightly “amber,” few hops if any and OK carbonation. The Bunny Bread of even craft contract brews.

The problem is I did a tour of the old Oldenberg facility about that time. Nice place. Huge German-style beer hall. The beer: they had three unremarkable taps for samples. I asked the tour guide what they did if someone contracted a Robust Porter, since they didn’t have one, or an IPA, and she proudly announced that they would give the closest brew they had to that style.

Considering the beer I had that day, this beer and other Oldenberg contract beer I’ve had, I believe her. They used to contract brew for McGuires in Pensacola and the product was very unsatisfactory. They told me Oldenberg simply wouldn’t work with them. So the contract was dropped. Only recently did McGuires contract out again, since they don’t have a bottling line. The experience was that bad.

Wild Boar is a restaurant chain. Probably the contract-ee. Apparently the brand has been revived with another, hopefully better contract brewer: Dubuque Star Brewing Co. in Dubuque, Iowa. Being sold at Wild Boars in Atlanta from what I can gather.

Interesting collectible.

Not so interesting product.

I’m not crying that this version of the brand is gone.

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

Written by Ken Carman

Corsair Artisan (Micro Distillery)
1200 Clinton St.
Nashville, TN (Old Yazoo location)

And

400 East Main Street #110
Bowling Green, KY 42101

Why would a writer who loves beer, has written about beer for many years, judged beer and who has never cared for distilled products write about a distillery? Well, because this distillery has a very distinct beer flavor to their story. And because I, personally, have found a new respect for distilling: the process, the dedication and the creativeness that keeps pace with some of the more experimental micro brewers out there.

Continue reading “Brew Biz: Werts and All”

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

Fine examples of Beaker culture beer bearing vessels

Written by Ken Carman

Topic this edition: The Beakers, the Carmans and BEER!!!

Every time one of the homebrew clubs I am a member of comes bearing beer to a public event I think of my super great Grandpa, whoever the hell he was. We do know that a lot of the Carman heritage dates back to England and, specifically: Wales. Apparently one relative went to Wales and found we had all escaped religious persecution (Perhaps not all, but maybe most?) and there was “no one home.”
Continue reading “Brew Biz: Werts and All”

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

The Topic: Worst Beer in the World?

There has been a lot of noise on the net about Olde English 800 3.2 being the worst beer in the world. Why am I suspicious? The full 800 is merely a mediocre’ malt liquor: a style that was marketed at first in an attempt to encourage young Blacks to show their manhood by becoming alcoholics in the 70s. For some odd reason this pissed off the African American community. Go figure. Some smaller brewers got burnt by that campaign despite the fact they offered sans the racist marketing, simply because major brewers, who weren’t sensitive enough to promo without racist assumptions, screwed it up for the other brewers. Go figure again.

The term “malt beverage,” just so you know, is not the same. It’s all gotten very legal where malt beverage is a term brewers must use for various reasons that go far beyond the focus of this edition of Brew Biz. Malt liquors from those days, and those still around like 800, tend to use cheap ways to pump up the abv. Corn. Rice. Squeezed kidneys from diabetics that just ate a whole box of donuts.

Kidding.

They tend to be a bit harsh and not a lot of complexity. Kind of like very weak Ice Bocks without quality ingredients: essentially instead of brewing quality, freezing, removing water, you just put it up with sugary crap.

A 3.2 Malt Liquor is an oxymoron.
Continue reading “Brew Biz: Werts and All”