Category: Front Page

 

Ancient Scandinavians quaffed an alcoholic mixture of barley, honey, cranberries, herbs and even grape wine imported from Greece and Rome, new research finds.

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SPENCER, Mass. (AP) — For more than a century, Catholic Cistercian monks known as Trappists have been brewing and selling what many beer lovers consider some of the best in the world. Eight monasteries — six in Belgium and one each in Holland and Austria — produce the only beer recognized by the International Trappist Association as authentic Trappist beer.

And starting Thursday, the 63 brothers of St. Joseph’s Abbey — about an hour’s drive west of Boston — will join them, selling the first Trappist beer brewed outside Europe.

Their ambitious venture was hardly met with enthusiasm by their exacting Trappist brothers in Europe.

After all, for nearly 60 years the monks in Spencer, Mass., had been selling jams and jellies to help support their community. Now they were interested in the real family business: beer.

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Attention Future Brew-masters: The idea of a beer garden will take on a whole new meaning for those who attend a Jan. 24 workshop entitled “From Garden to Glass: Home Brewing with Your Garden Harvest”

Rutgers Master Gardeners will inform participants which fruits and vegetables can be grown for home brewing during the 6:30 p.m. workshop at the EARTH Center in Davidson’s Mill Pond Park at 42 Riva Ave. in South Brunswick. Imagine: your own pumpkin or fig ale…

Michael Klaser, a home-brewer and amateur brew-master for the last 5 years, also will be sharing his experiences in the art and science of home brewing with produce. He has firsthand access to garden-grown ingredients, his wife, Diana, being a Rutgers Master Gardener in training.

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SAN GABRIEL>> Locals knew him as the “Beer Nazi,” a la the cantankerous soup chef from the TV show “Seinfeld.”

Affectionately, of course.

Sam Samaniego had no shortage of specialty craft and imported beers at his San Gabriel restaurant The Stuffed Sandwich, but you had to work for it. And it was that playful, cranky character and his intense love and appreciation for the local beer industry that made the beer and sandwich legend a pioneer for Los Angeles’ craft beer community.

Samaniego died Wednesday after a long illness.

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MAINZ, Germany — Beer companies in Germany woke up to a $150 million hangover Monday when five breweries and seven people were fined for illegally fixing prices by the country’s cartel office.

In secret phone calls and private meetings, the breweries agreed to raise the cost by five to seven Euros ($7 to $9.5) per hundred liters of beer, according the Federal Cartel Office known as the “Kartellamt.”

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Profiled by Ken Carman for The Professor

“Brutal?” Ah: no.

Small rock bubbles with a little pillow. Head dies fairly fast. A hazy gold, about a 10.

Mouthfeel: some caramel malt, but way in the background. Pale malt dominates. A Glacier-hop-like bitter with little flavor is on the top.

Aroma: sweet, somewhat citrus with caramel malt more in the aroma. The balance between the two is about perfect, but just in the aroma.

Taste is a bit watery with hop bitter dominate. No flavor, for the most part, just bitter. This misses “IPA” on a few marks, but it would help if they hadn’t called it “BRUTAL.” While an IPA is hoppy, yes, hop flavor absent with malt so far in the background makes mouthfeel and flavor both seem almost absent. That’s a problem: IPA should be more than just bitter, and a somewhat watery background. As it warms it improves some with body expressing itself a tad. Still seems almost brittle in bitter.

Beer Advocate… a 90? Wow. 97 on both style and overall.

Hate to bust the bubble here, but all that having been typed, doesn’t deserve a 2, but certainly not a 4. About mid-3 range is about right.

Welcome to the PGA beer rating system: one beer “Don’t bother.” Two: Eh, if someone gives it to you, drink. Three: very good, go ahead and seek it out, but be aware there is at least one problem. Four: seek it out. Five: pretty much “perfecto.”

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There’s no denying it, craft beer has been good to Birmingham in recent years.

But just how good has it been? A recent report from the Brewers Association shows that the industry had a $238 million impact on the state of Alabama in 2012.

As alcohol regulations were changed, the market for producing craft beer began booming in the Birmingham metro area, and doesn’t show signs of slowing down.

“With a strong presence across the 50 states and the District of Columbia, craft breweries are a vibrant and flourishing economic force at the local, state and national level,” said Bart Watson, a staff economist for Brewers Association, in a press release. “As consumers continue to demand a wide range of high quality, full-flavored beers, small and independent craft brewers are meeting this growing demand with innovative offerings, creating high levels of economic value in the process.”

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