Category: Front Page

Note to Big Beer: Beware the affronted hipster!

MillerCoors, the joint venture between SABMiller SABMiller and Molson Coors Brewing TAP -0.51%, is facing a class-action lawsuit from craft beer enthusiasts for having the audacity to imply that Blue Moon—one of the fastest-growing beer brands in America—was a craft beer.

Given the affection that hipsters have for all things vintage, retro, and old-man chic, I’m a little surprised the lead plaintiff didn’t slap the MillerCoors marketing director with a white riding glove and demand satisfaction with pistols at dawn. Such was the offense taken.

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Kent Battle Martin has been called many things throughout his time as the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau’s Malt Beverage Labeling Specialist.

A 2014 Daily Beast profile described Battle as the “beer bottle dictator,” characterizing him as the “tyrant,” and “pedantic pain in the ass” that has approved every beer label design in the U.S. for the better part of a decade.

Indeed, since joining TTB in October 2004, Battle has single-handedly reviewed every malt beverage label application ever submitted. But on May 28, that came to an end.

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Profiled by Maria Devan

Pours thick and black. No head. Sits in the glass like oil. Black gold.

Nose is rich chocolate and very milky creamy. Smells like fudge. No orange on the nose?

It has some good roast, caramel and even some mellow coffee. I expected orange. Taste is roast that is not shy. Lot’s of chocolate and some orange peel that comes across as bitter in places in the drink. It’s actually so well in the background it’s hard to describe. If it wasn’t for a faint bit of spice and pith from it to draw my attention I would have missed it. Then it comes over me slowly. How fresh and light that orange peel is and how it’s just a hue in this chocolaty beer. Finishes with a lingering chocolate, a touch of bitter,smooth and creamy. As this drank it’s lightness became defiant.

4

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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Maria Devan lives in Ithaca, NY and is a great beer writer. That’s Maria in the middle. The other two are not, but they are lucky to have her as a friend.

“Go eat your bread with joy, and drink your wine with a merry heart, for God has already approved what you do.” — Ecclesiastes 9:7

When Rev. J.P. Channels came to Fort Collins from the Midwest late last year to interview for a leading church position, he found himself on a brewery tour.

“We love our beer, and folks in our congregation love Fort Collins beer,” explained Melissa St. Clair, pastor of Heart of the Rockies Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). “In fact, when J.P. was interviewing out here, we kept selling the beer.”

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The best way to discover what beer truly means is to travel to one of its ancient homelands, then methodically sample everything in sight, as if Earth’s very survival depended on it. Sound like a plan? Since it’s unofficially “Germany month” in our office, consider this delicious approach to the historical region of Bavaria, found mainly in southern Germany. Dotted with over 600 (mostly small) breweries, Bavaria is not only insanely beautiful—think, Sound of Music beautiful—it’s also one of the world’s most important regions for brewing, home to the 16-day bacchanal that is Oktoberfest and scores of centuries-old breweries, hop farms, even world’s oldest commercial brewery, Weihenstephan (also the world’s oldest brewing school.)

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A relatively new method of brewing called Kettle Souring is making sour beer cheap and affordable for breweries and consumers. Kettle soured beer has joined the mainstays with early examples like Bend Brewing’s Ching Ching to more recent hits like The Commons Myrtle and Biere Royale, Anderson Valley’s Gose, Breakside’s La Tormenta and many more making sours more approachable than ever.

 

Sour beer (more a descriptor than a style) has been one of the hottest trends in American craft brewing for some time now but the time, costliness and margin of error due to inexperience set the bar very high. Where classic sour styles like Lambic would take a year or more to develop in Belgium and then under ideal conditions where everything from the dust and cobwebs of an old brewery to the microbes and bacteria in the breeze coming off the fields was conducive to the style. American brewing had been more influenced by German industrial brewing practices than anyone where the emphasis is on producing clean, technically efficient beer with traditional ingredients in shorter periods of time was the goal. So most American breweries were unequipped to capture spontaneous yeast and bacteria in the air or to let a risky souring project sit in oak barrels for a year that may turn out badly. Even with the ideal conditions for mixed wild/sour fermentation, brewers are afraid of their brewhouse being infected by these bugs that could then cause off flavors in all beer, even those not meant to be soured. Now a new method called Kettle Souring is becoming one of the trendiest methods for brewers to bring their beers down to a low PH in a matter of days and without the risk of cross contamination. This method has made recent beers like Anderson Valley’s Blood Orange Gose and Breakside Brewery’s Passionfruit Sour affordable and in large quantities at major grocery outlets for the first time.

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Lately, I’ve read variations on the following a LOT:

“I don’t even know what “craft beer” means, anymore.”

“The term “craft” has simply outlived its usefulness.”

It was always stupid, “Craft” – what does that even mean?” There’s no “craft” to making Budweiser? Miller? “It’s like a clubhouse we invented so we could keep out the Big Kids.”

These are actual quotes and only a tiny fraction of what you’ll find online. For those who may not have encountered this sort of confused breast-beating, let me explain:

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Written by Franz Hofer for A Tempest in a Tankard

Earth Day 2015 is now receding in the rear-view mirror, but it’s worth keeping the Earth Day ethos in mind whenever we fire up our brewing systems. With the annual Big Brew festivities rapidly approaching, we may even want to challenge ourselves to put some of the following ideas into practice.

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Written by Franz Hofer for A Tempest in a Tankard

Rabbit was a rare bird on many a North American menu until relatively recently. Sure, the French had their Lapin à la moutarde and the Germans their Hasenpfeffer. But it wasn’t until European-influenced chefs on this side of the pond began wondering where all the rabbits were hiding that artisanal producers began to answer the demand for this lean and delicate meat reminiscent of chicken in taste and texture.

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