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Brew Biz: Werts and All

Written by Ken Carman for Professor Good Ales


Hoppin Frog
1680 E Waterloo Rd, Akron, OH 44306
(330) 352-4578

  Ken Carman is a BJCP judge; homebrewer since 1979, club member at Escambia Bay, Clarksville Carboys and Music City Homebrewers, who has been interviewing professional brewers all over the east coast for over 15 years.


The Topic: Time to Hop Over to the Frog!

 Millie and I were headed south from her vacation at our place in Beaver River, NY, and after my 3 months hermitage there. I go there once my northern tour is over. After visiting my tour bus in northeast Ohio we were driving through Akron, Ohio; home to one of my fav breweries: Hoppin Frog. I suggested we stop by and check out the Frog. Oh, I’d been there many times before: stopping by to buy bottles for my Beaver River Beer Tasting every year. But I’d never had time to check out what, to me, was the “new” Tasting Room.
 Before the Tasting Room quaffers stopped by a quick paced brewery and bought a bottle from employees who were also busy brewing, bottling and trying to avoid being tickled to death by the giant golem named Gus the Gross who lives in the cellar. I kid about the golem, of course. But stop by shopping couldn’t have been the best of on site brewery marketing methods. So Fred Karm created the Tasting Room. Continue reading “Brew Biz: Werts and All”

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The Dark Side of Pumpkin Beer: 8 to Try

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Pumpkin beer’s not all sugar and spice: There’s a faction of fall brews that depend as much on sinister roasty malts as they do on gourd meat and cinnamon. Go on over to the dark side and search for these sultry seasonals.

Avery Pump[KY]n: This barrel-aged beaut wins the biggest pumpkin (beer) contest, topping out at about 17% ABV. A beastly spiced porter aged 6 months in bourbon barrels (there’s the “KY”!), the beer’s a sibling of Avery’s Rumpkin (a pumpkin ale aged in rum barrels) and the newest addition to the brewery’s Barrel Series. Huge additions of nutmeg, cinnamon, allspice and cloves are joined by alcohol spice and offset by chocolate and toffee malts and vanilla-bourbon sweetness.

RedHook Out of Your Gourd: Nearly sessionable at 5.8% ABV, this pumpkin porter reads cola-like with just a smidge of dry pumpkin juice in the middle and earthy maple in the finish.

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Wild Mountain: Come for the Great Outdoors, Stay for the Beer and Barbeque

Written by Franz Hofer for Tempest in a Tankard

 

A half-hour’s drive along the winding Highway 119 out of Boulder and just east of the Continental Divide, Nederland exudes a rough-hewn and offbeat charm.IMG_9301 Nederland, which means both lowland and the Netherlands in Dutch, came by its name when a mining company from Holland purchased the nearby Caribou Mine in 1873. Indeed, the name of the town is more than a little ironic, given that Nederland sits at an elevation of around 2500 meters (8200 feet) above sea level. But for the miners who trudged up the mountain to work and then down again in the evening for a cold one after a long day, the moniker was more than apt.

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Soda a Sweet Complement to Beer for Craft Brewers

This is how many brewers made it through Prohibition…-PGA
sodabeer

Among craft beer fans, Sprecher Brewing Co. might be best known for its Sprecher Amber — or perhaps its Black Bavarian.

But the Glendale-based brewer’s most popular brand, by far, is one with a sweeter taste: Sprecher Root Beer.

Sprecher Brewing sells around three times as much root beer and other sodas as beer. And, while that’s unusual within its industry, Sprecher isn’t alone among U.S. brewers that also sell soda. The dual beer and soda makers include other smaller Wisconsin brewers, as well as Chicago-based MillerCoors LLC, which has a sideline business in root beer tucked among dozens of large brands that include Miller Lite and Coors Light.

To be sure, most of the nation’s brewers, including more than 2,700 craft brewers, aren’t in the soda business. And some, such as Chicago-based Goose Island Beer Co., owned by industry giant Anheuser-Busch InBev NV, have sold their soda operations to better focus on the growing thirst for craft beer.

But, for other brewers, sodas remain a lucrative venture.

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Beer Profile: UBU Ale

Profiled by Ken Carman for PGA

pgaprofileubu-ale I have had this several times and looked back at it, wondering, what was that like? In days where craft brewers push styles into new territory this is a forgettable beer. Caramelize malt sense, a bit Maris Otter and Munich-ish malt-wise with a hint of molasses and raisin. A slight bitter. The nose is exactly the same.

Great clarity through brown-ish quaff and foam head that lingers slightly the walks away. SRM about 12?

Slight molasses like sweet caramelize malt dominates. Hops seem a slight afterthought.
There’s nothing defective about it. It’s perfectly drinkable.

83 and 75 on Beer Advocate, 88 and 94 on Rate Beer.

Sigh.

UBU just offers me nothing to make me want to come back. With a hint more hops, oaking and maybe a slight sense of rum barrel aging, this would be one hell of a platform on which to build a great beer. But as it is? Just a good foundation crying out to be built on.

3.5

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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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______________________________Beer HERE

FredricmartianKen Carman is actually Fredric Brown reincarnated. Only the fetal fluid was too much St. Patty day beer like, hence the green color.

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Beer Profile: Saranac Legacy IPA

Profiled by Ken Carman for PGA

Beer-Profile1-258x300saranaclegacy

85% on Beer Advocate, 77 Rate Beer.

Bordering on being a Pale, but still an IPA, Legacy is splendor in a glass. The clarity is superb with jewel like light yellow highlights. SRM about 3. Fine bubble head mixed with pillow it seems to linger forever.

Aroma: pale malt way in background with hops dominate… light pepper spicy. These are not pepper-like phenols: hop driven, and not strong in any sense. Hint of malt sweetness.

This presentation is Utica Club-like, but the taste is that of a fine ale yeast, pale malt: light, and solid hop bitter. A hop focused light ale, yet the malt supports that as the perfect platform. A fine quaff for sure. Smooth, easy to down as one admires a remote Adirondack lake.

Impressive in its perfection.

4.5

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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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____________________________________________Beer HERE

IMG_20141004_160514791_HDRKen Carman, on the right, is an obnoxious man who smells like over roasted Fruit Loops and who just happens to own PGA. Don’t like it? Tough bananas baby.

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The Uncritical Embrace of Craft Beer?

Written by Fraz Hofer for Tempest in a Tankard

IMG_1176We see a similar narrative trajectory in the craft beer world. We know the broad outlines of the story. Insipid lager washes over North America like a tsunami in the post-war period, itself answering a desire for lighter beers. But then along comes a new generation of beer drinkers not content to drink marketing form over brewing substance. Hops carried the day, the more bitter and aromatic, the better.

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