When being "annoying home brewing guy" pays off

The highlight of our weekend with friends near Philly was their (always huge) Super Bowl party. We've been at the party so many years now, we're fixtures along with the hot wings and pigs in blankets. As always, it was a great time, as evidenced by my disinterest in eating a full meal the next day.

This year my friends are in a new house, so I met some of their new neighbors for the first time. I ended up in the kitchen with the folks from next door, watching on the smaller TV -- I end up there a lot, because figure it puts me closer to the food and the "kitchen folks" usually aren't rooting one way or the other and want to talk about topics in addition to the game.

When I mentioned to my friends that I would try to make some beer for next year's party, their next-door neighbors started asking about the process -- so I went into all the details of boiling the wort and hops, adding the yeast and watching the beer ferment and age before finally bottling it. It's always a fine line between satisfying the genuine interest of someone who doesn't know how brewing works ... or being "that home brewing guy" who gets too technical and has nothing to talk about but his home brew.

When I talked about bottling, the neighbors mentioned a bottle of hooch that a friend had brought to their Christmas party. "It's a HUGE bottle, I think it was some sort of ale. It was less than half full, but still plenty for all of us and very good." They tried to indicate the approximate size of the bottle through hand gestures, but really only narrowed down the volume to something between 16 ounces and three gallons. I don't know if it was the amount I'd drank, but I really couldn't visualize what they could be talking about.

"It has a kind of a cork that sits down in the neck. If you think you could use it, we can have our son bring it over. We were thinking of putting flowers in it, but I think we're just going to recycle it."

What do I have to lose, then? I figured it was probably a decorative liqueur or champagne bottle of some sort and that with a little luck, I could get it cleaned and figure out how to cap it appropriately.

So, when their son brought in this bottle, imagine my surprise and shock and UTTER JOY. The smaller bottle is a regular 12 oz beer bottle, for scale:



So what the hell is the mystery bottle? It's a 101 oz (approx. .8 gallons) gate-cap bottle that previously held Tröegs seasonal Mad Elf. (Which sounds yummy enough to hunt some down.)

This bottle is already making me happy three ways -- I can avoid the hassle of capping at least 8 bottles of beer during my next brewing session (conditioning in that bottle will take quite a while, but I'm a patient guy). I've promised that in exchange for the gift, I'll be bringing the bottle back to the neighbors sometime filled with brew -- so we get an excuse for another party! Woo-hoo!

The best news? This happy incident has motivated me to get brewing again, however difficult it's going to be with my current electric stove setup. I cooked some starter wort today and pitched some yeast that will hopefully be happy yeast within the next day or so, which would leave me ready to brew by the weekend.

If my yeasties are dead (sadly, this is the more likely scenario) then I'll be putting in an order with Midwest sooner rather than later...

Goose Island Brewpub SAVED from closure

Hooray, weak real estate market!

Goose Island toasts 11th-hour deal to keep brew pub open

Trader Joe's, bastion of civilization.

So I went to Trader Joe's this morning, not because I'm running low on food but because it's something to do with spud and I'm still exploring all their products.

I didn't go into the beer/wine section last time I visited; I'm feeling pretty good about my beer supply at this point, at least until I can start brewing again. On this visit, though, I figured I'd take a quick walk down the last aisle, and what do I find?

OTTER CREEK COPPER ALE.

...and the skies opened, the angels trumpeted, the choirs sang, etc...

My favorite New England brewery, and the one I didn't think I'd be finding this far south. I paid far too much for a six-pack of Copper Ale, and I couldn't be happier about it.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

No scurvy in this house

I may be an amateur brewer and coffee lover, but when the sun is high, there's not a cloud in the sky and running the kid around on errands all afternoon kicked my ass, there's just no substitute for relaxing that tired ass on the deck with a vodka tonic.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled blogging, which should read somewhat less like a 1950s cigarette advertisement.

Interview with Dogfish Head founder

Today's installment of Here & Now on the Boston NPR outlet had a 5 minute interview with Dogfish Head founder Sam Calagione, it starts at about the 8:40 mark of the podcast. He explains how craft brewers have been affected by increasing grain prices and our unfortunate experiment with ethanol subsidies and using food for motor fuel.

The interviewer could've done a better job, but Calagione, as always, does a great job of explaining what separates craft beers from typical macrobrew. He also lays out in simple terms why changing the market for rice and corn hurts brewers who use barley and hops.

Their show archives use links to Real Player (welcome to the 20th century, why don't you just distribute the show on wax cylinders?), but I'd suggest pulling up their podcast directory and grabbing the show there.

Alabama lawmen harrass amateur baker

If I told you a state could outlaw baking bread, you'd say I was nuts. After all, they can't stop people from buying crushed grains, yeast metal pans. Even if they passed the law -- good luck enforcing it.

Well, that wont' stop the state of Alabama.

I'm not going to post the link here for various reasons, but according to online forums one of the people quoted in that story has been visited by Alabama's bakery police, who aren't too happy about his yeast-related activities. It sounds to me like they're just trying to put a scare in people who would flaunt their prohibition on amateur bakeries, because if they were planning to send in the SWAT teams with a warrant, they have all the probable cause they need from that article.

If you're thinking I've lost it, because clearly the story is about a home brewing hobbyist and not a baker at all -- then I would ask why the law should see any difference between the two? Grains, water, yeast and heat are combined to force a chemical change that creates an all new food product that dates back to the dawn of civilization.

Of course, one source of the ongoing stupidity is clear from the article -- too many people who would rather police the fate of other people's souls when they should be examining their own.

But as I usually do, I'd rather put the blame on bureaucratic inertia and the unfortunate majority in this country who've never seen a problem they couldn't fix with some extra government interference. We just never learn.

The number one lesson, though, is that it's OK to break a stupid law -- people are doing it every day -- but don't rub Big Brother's nose in it. He bites.

For Michelle

Just for you, I'll say some nice things about Anheuser-Busch Companies Inc., St. Louis MO.

As a homebrewer, I couldn't make half of the beers they do, even if I wanted to.

They distribute and own a piece of Red Hook, who make some great beers.

They import Leffe Blond, which is one of Ruth's favorites.

"Here's to good friends, tonight is kinda special, blah blah blah Lowenbrau."

Grolsch bottles are handy for homebrewing.

They haven't messed up Hoegaarden yet. (Ok, that wasn't very nice, actually, but I'm trying!)

And it's not that I'll refuse to drink a Budweiser. I'm not a snob.

You like wine, so I know you have taste buds -- stick around and we'll drink the A-B marketing spiel out of your vocabulary yet!

"May I add just a word about good, wholesome beer?"

Another post delayed by sick baby.

Budweiser may be swill, but I really enjoyed hearing this recording of August A. Busch Jr. welcoming the return of 3.2% pseudo-beer to distribution on April 7, 1933.

[Soapbox ON]
It's too bad that the fundamental mistake of prohibition -- a misguided belief that government action can force humanity closer to any one person's arbitrary "ideal" -- is probably MORE prevalent in the US today than it was then.
[Soapbox OFF]

You have questions, we have a brand positioning statement that positively correlates with your market segment's preferred product framing

I was just reading Stan Hieronymus's take on the Miller Lite Brewer's Collection. I should take pains to point out, as Stan does, that Miller does not expect me to look at or think twice about their beers, much less drink them.

However, that doesn't stop me from shaking my head with despair at his email interview with Miller:

First, it’s important to note that these are not intended to be craft beers and are not targeted at craft drinkers. These are craft-style light beers. Additionally, “all malt” is one, but not the only, criteria that defines craft beer. The Brewers Association describes craft as beers brewed with a traditional process using malted and specialty grains, hops, water and yeast to deliver the aroma, taste and appearance characteristics not typically found in mainstream beers. That’s what we’re delivering — a unique consumer taste experience not typically found in light beers and consistent with craft-style beer.


What Stan doesn't quite say outright, presumably out of courtesy (lucky I have none) is that the whole point of Miller introducing "Craft-style light beers" obviously has nothing to do with creating a quality product or convincing their fans to expand their taste in beer.

In the end, their internal justification for these products is no doubt to temporarily boost margin growth by slapping the trendy "craft" label onto a slightly more expensive container of the same old grain adjunct beverage -- see also the words "Ice" and "Red" back in the mid-90s.

But of course, I'm far too cynical to think that's their only goal.

In Miller's perfect world, each of the 85% of people who drink the standard macrobrews will walk into a beer store to buy Miller Lite and see the familiar Miller Lite label on one of those "craft beers" he's been hearing so much about. He'll remember how he didn't think that Sam Adams he had at his brother-in-law's party last year was half bad, so he'll pick up a six pack.

He'll drink a couple, and decide that they're pretty good, for dark beers -- but that they're not so much better than his Miller Lite that he needs to spend more money on them. In the end, the next time he's out with his buddies and has the chance to drink an Otter Creek or Allagash or Flying Dog or Lagunitas, he's going to say "Oh, yeah, I tried one of those 'craft' beers. They're alright but I think Miller Lite is just as good."

And the Miller Brew Marketing corporation smiles, as research shows they've watered down the "craft beer" label sufficiently to keep smaller breweries from pulling any decent portion of their market share. Soon enough, the "Brewer's Collection" vanishes from shelves and distributors everywhere as Miller decides to reinforce their core brands by investing an amount equal to the total annual revenue of five smaller breweries in a series of ads for "The High Life."

UPDATE: People who know more than me call these sorts of stories "conspiracy theories" and "wacky shit"; and granted, I don't see C-suite execs at Miller signing off on a business plan that comes down to "We want to make our upstart competition look bad by associating them with inferior product."

But on the other hand, if a doofus like me can identify "decreases consumer interest in craft brands" as a beneficial side-effect of following their usual strategy of slapping trendy labels on product barely discernable from their flagship brands, why wouldnt' they reach the same conclusion?

More advertising

Budweiser's commercials are now bragging that they have bottlecaps that keep air out of the bottle.

Coming up next: "Budweiser's exclusive beer-containing glass will keep our beer from spilling out of the case and soaking the inside of your refrigerator!"

To the EXTREEEEEEEEEEEEME

I once thought that between Vanilla Ice and the Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie episode of The Simpsons, there were no longer any valid non-ironic uses of the word "extreme." However, I'm more than willing to make an exception to that rule for the craft brewing industry.

I already linked to Brookston Beer Bulletin in the "What I'm reading now" sidebar discussing this NYT story on extreme microbrews, but I decided to also post directly to the Times article -- it's that good.

Not only are Dogfish Head 90-minute and Lagunitas Maximus two of my fave beers, it's great to see a mainstream outlet like the NYT continuing to discuss craft beers and treat them with the same respect as other premium food and drink.

On a related homebrewing side note: A couple months ago I brewed the Hop Head Double IPA kit from Midwest Homebrew Supplies, and to my not-so-refined palate, it's nearly as good as DFH 90-minute, my fave of the "Extreme IPA" variety.

Homebrew diary: Oatmeal stout bottling

Finally got the oatmeal stout out of the secondary and into bottles today. Got about 43 bottles out of this batch, pretty close to my earlier batches.

Now we wait. I wasn't that happy with the flavor of the sample I tried, but I didn't like the earlier batches pre-carbonation, either, and those turned out OK.

Homebrew diary: Oatmeal stout days 2&3

I was way too tired yesterday for an update (something exhausting about spending an hour of my day moving blocks of ice around in the street).

Rapid fermentation yesterday and a very nice looking krauesen on top of my brew. Today, it's slowed to a crawl and I have a vast amount of sediment in the bottom. All normal, considering the massive yeast starter I used -- I wanted to make double-sure I would be able to move the beer out of the fermenter within a week.

I'm pondering the possibility of brewing again the day I move this beer to the secondary, but since we also have to get ready for a trip...maybe that's not such a fabulous idea.

Homebrew diary: Oatmeal stout

It wasn't a good day to try and brew, but with a trip coming up for Christmas, I had to get some beer in the fermenter today so I could get my winter beers brewed and drinkable before the first of spring. I used the Oatmeal Stout extract kit from Midwest Homebrewing Supplies.

Yesterday I activated my Wyeast pack and made a starter, as well as getting all the necessaries out of the basement. If I'm going to store my gear in the basement I need to start wrapping it in a trashbag, I'm washing everything twice because the dust is so heavy down there.

During Theo's morning nap I got everything staged -- water in pots, equipment in sanitizer. I started warming up water about a half hour before his long afternoon nap, knowing I wouldn't be done when he woke up, but far enough along that I could still feed him, bathe him, make dinner and not make any massive mistakes. Several hours later, I'm still trying to figure out if I succeeded.

The first speedbump was the specialty grains -- I use a technique for steeping the grains I picked up on the Midwest forums, where instead of teabagging the grains in the brewpot, I soak them in a small amount of water in a saucepan, strain them into the brewkettle, then dump them back in the saucepan to repeat the process.

I didn't consider that the grains, in this case, were mostly rolled oats -- and thus, when I lifted the lid on the saucepan after steeping a half-hour, I had OATMEAL, making the rinsing and straining process a much bigger PITA than usual, and leaving me way behind on getting the boil started.

Once I was boiling, all was well and normal; I had set several containers outside to collect the day's snow and sleet, making wort cooling a cinch. I poured the cooled wort into my carboy, topped it up with water to 5 gallons, and pulled a sample to check the starting gravity...which came out at 1.060, nearly .020 higher than the expectation on the recipe.

I checked my hydrometer on a cylinder of water -- right on the money, 1.000 corrected. No matter how I played with the hydrometer, I didn't get anything close to the recipe expectation. The only other times I've had this issue, it was not enough water...but I fixed that issue a couple batches ago, and I'm 99.994% sure I was right at 5 gallons.

I decided that chances are that despite my efforts the water I added wasn't completely mixed with the very thick wort from the boil. I gave the carboy some extra shakes, pitched my yeast, and put the carboy in the basement; now I just keep my fingers crossed...

We'll call it...Lleb's three-livered ale!

Looks like it will require a legal battle, but Bells brewing seems determined to keep a product in Illinois.