"It's 5:01...somewhere"
One of the main reasons I continue to brew is that I really like good beer. I spend a fair amount of time discussing new and different beer styles, beers we have tried, brewing techniques and equipment. I enjoy many parts of beer. Turns out, I am not the only one.
The Brewers Association has released a report yesterday saying that the beer business is going well in the US, particularly craft beer. Per a Gallup Poll, beer has a strong growth trend in the alcoholic beverage preferred by adults in the US. The growth has been at the expense of wine being the preferred drink.
Also interesting, and confirmed in our house, we are drinking less imported beer, and of the increased consumption in 2008, 50% of the growth was from craft breweries. 5.8% of all beer by volume and 10.5% of beer by dollar value was from craft beer in 2008.
What does this all mean? We are buying more beer overall, we are buying more domestically produced beer, our increased consumption is mostly in craft beer, and we are paying a lot more for it. I can vouch for all of those.
If Mrs. Brew Meister and I are any indication, 2009 should be a good year as well.
Cheers!
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
A lot of people like good beer!
Friday, August 15, 2008
M&M
What are 2 beers that are Mmmm Mmmm good (according to me, Mrs. Brew Meister)?
Maudite and Matilda. We had the pleasure of trying both brews back-to-back during a recent Tap House visit.
The food at the Tap House is okay, although vegetarian selections are limited. Actually, the food was pretty good--a nice hummus and a deconstructed bruschetta were tasty--once the waitress remembered about leaving off the cheese. But the portions were small and the prices were high.
Same could be said for the beers. Tulip glasses were like buying gold, especially Matilda's price tag. Lucky for us, a high percentage alcohol makes us unable to consume more than a glass when we are out. We sipped, enjoyed, and now can confidently re-purchase these fine beverages for home consumption. Yummy and economical.
Monday, July 28, 2008
Don't try this at home
Or anywhere...
Schlitz high gravity. Ugh. Said new. Looked fancy. Was cheap. Smelled like, well a lot like "schlitz", but without the L, capisce? Undrinkable unless nose was held. Or, as I (Mrs. Brew Meister) found, take it with a tablespoon of straight lemon juice poured in. Then it was tolerable. Seriously, save the buck and a half.
Thursday, July 24, 2008
The Hefty Hefe
Although there are many reasons I would like to forget about the last batch of beer I brewed, something fun may have come from it all (besides an "ah-ha" moment).
My original idea was to make my super simple and tasty Paulaner clone even better. I had been kicking around the idea on an Imperial Hefeweizen for a few weeks, as that would satisfy Mrs. Brew Meister's love of summer beer and my love of strong, unusual beers...
I remember the first description of an Imperial beer by some local brewery that said, "We doubled everything but the water." That sounded like the type of reasoning I could use. So I tried the following:
8oz Munich Malt 30 minutes at 152F
8.8lbs DME 55% Wheat 45# Barley
1 oz Hersbrucker for 45 minutes
1 oz Cascade for 15 minutes
As stated previously...it boiled all over the place and caused the world's largest mess. After that, I transferred 3 gallons to the primary fermenting bucket. Then I went off the reservation...
I was unable to cool the wort, as my wort chiller plumbing would not fit the sink of the new house. I decided to throw in a couple of trays of ice, a gallon of lukewarm distilled water, and put the whole mess in the basement. It was still 100F at 6PM. I decided to set the lid on the bucket, but not fill the airlock. With the cooling wort, I knew the vacuum in the bucket would pull the water from the airlock into the bucket.
In the morning, around 5AM, the wort was around 77F in my 67F basement. I pitched White Labs Liquid Hefeweizen Ale Yeast (WLP380) and a pack of Dry Ale Yeast. I figured one would kick in, and the sooner the better. Fermentation started within a few hours and chugged along for 5 days at 65-67F.
After ten days, we kegged the results. Initially, it smelled a bit bitter. The Cascade hops were very present, but blended well with the malt and some caramel aroma. We decided to pull some of the liquid from the bottom of the fermenter. It tasted REALLY GOOD! It is a good sign when Mrs. Brew Meister is filtering the dregs with a cheese cloth into a pint glass. It was also really strong. I had two cups and felt the warm contentment set in.
I am force carbonating the beer now and will drink it over the next 2 weeks. I would let it age a little longer but:
a. It already tastes really good.
b. I think the beer may begin to taste oxidized if I wait too long. It spent too many hours in the relative open before fermentation started.
I will post a full review next week.
Cheers
Monday, July 21, 2008
Serv-ish
In this modern world, it seems that the customer isn't necessarily right--or even part of the equation. Doing the job right matters, of course. And in this economy, price matters--slightly less when there is greater quality, but still. There is an old business adage: "We can get it done fast, well, or cheap. Pick any 2." But I, Mrs. Brew Meister, can honestly say that service matters.
Take, for example, a so-so beer. Back in the days of grad school and tiny income, Parrothead and I had to sacrifice our burgeoning love of fine beers for "cheap canned stuff". Not that CCS can't make for a fine evening, especially a hot summer one without air conditioning.
Sometimes, we'd even splurge beyond Ameri-Canadian yellow fizz for a Sam Adams.
Years ago, for example, the Cranberry Lambic was available in abundance. It was one of my favorite beers. Then, one day, it disappeared from the shelf. I was crushed. The internet was fairly unsophisticated, but I was able to squeeze out the customer service e-mail addy for Samuel Adams. I gave them a glowing review of the lambic, then lamented that my local store no longer had the fine beer. Their response was that it had gone away; that was the end of the road.
I had to hit Jungle Jim's for any backlog of supply, rationing the beverage for lambic-worthy nights (or people). There were too many of both, and too little of the beer.
Years later, I found the Cranberry Lambic again as part of a seasonal pack. I had to buy 12 beers, just to get 2 of my favorite. Then we moved to another state, and the seasonal pack there didn't carry the lambic. We moved again, and I was toyed with on another box that promised my fruity treat--only to find the box had 4 of another variety, and they had mistakenly left out the lambic. That e-mail to Sam Adams didn't net me any sympathy, or even a coupon.
I guess my point is, when it comes to quality, some businesses know they have the good stuff and know that the customers will come. So maybe they don't try anymore.
On the other hand, a 12 pack of college CCS, Molson Ice, mistakenly had some half-filled cans. Molson was so sorry, they sent my husband a beautiful, leggy blond--right to the apartment--with a full case of bottles. Too bad for him, I was the one home to receive it. She was really cute, too. Ha! The beer was much tastier, since Customer Service had stepped it up a notch. It became our CCS choice for the rest of college.
***
P.S. Customer Service also extends to accurate bottle labeling. We are loving the Unibroue beers, but they are very expensive. In order to try a new beer, we would wish to know more about the contents before splurging. Short of consulting the Crackberry while we are in the store and trying to find some decent interweb signal to help us search, we'd rather have a clear description of the beer--right on the label. Lucky for them, we'll keep buying the products, because those we have tried have been Made of Awesome. However, I may have to e-mail Unibroue about label descriptions.
Sunday, July 6, 2008
Yoink!
Yeah, we know we said our next batch would be Imperial Stout.
But I, Mrs. Brew Meister, have had to make a change and declare a nice, summery white be brewed next. Another trip to Indianapolis and a pass through the Brugge Brasserie and the Broad Ripple Brew Pub have inspired the orange peel and coriander craving.
My darling husband allowed for the change of venue for our next batch, and he's working on it immediately. We also enjoyed a little Blanche de Namur, but got a tad giddy over the flavor of La Fin Du Monde, and that probably helped solidify the inspiration for this brew session.
Never fear, though, because the new house and temperature control, plus a couple of extra kegs from the LBS, will allow that Imperial Stout to follow...eventually.
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Belgian Epiphany
I have always been a hophead, inspired originally by British Bitters and IPAs. Then I moved on to West Coast ales with insane amounts of hops and a higher-than-normal ABV. Moylan's Triple IPA and Rogue Brewery's Brutally Bitter (among others) were my choices. Everything went off without a hitch. Primary fermentation lasted 6 days, secondary fermentation lasted 8 days. At the end of secondary, the beer tasted a bit fruity in the nose, with banana or apple, followed by a warm tongue-coating maltiness. The hops were still surprisingly apparent in the taste. The alcohol was pronounced as it went to the belly. It finished with a sharpness reminding me the beer is still too young. The batch was primed with corn sugar and bottled in an assortment of glass and Brew tap bottles.
However, my wife traveled to Europe several times for work when we first married. She would go to England, the Netherlands, and Germany, and come home talking about some of the great European beers she was trying fresh off the tap. While I did enjoy a Hefe or Bock, she never really brought home any of the Belgians. My only real experience was local sources of Lindeman's Kreik and Framboise. Not good samples in trying to convince me of the Belgium brewing magic.
I have since traveled several times to the Netherlands and once to Germany, but never made time to research or find good beers. It was usually whatever they served in my isolated Dutch hotel, or the one local Irish establishment in the heart of Schweinfurt.
During an extended work trip last year, Mrs. Brew Meister and I methodically sampled every variety possible. We started with the grocery store close to our lodging. Grolsch Kanon, Le Chouffe Blond, Paulaner Naturtrub, Hoeggarden's Grand Cru and Verboten Vrucht...oh, there will be more on beer travel later.
I was fascinated with the complexity of these brews. Many were malty, vinous, yeasty, heady, and downright delicious. After we returned home, my thoughts were still with these styles. In fact, the first batch for 2008 was a Belgian Dubbel based on a "Joy of Homebrewing" recipe. I was probably inspired by time spent in Europe drinking as many new dubbels, trippels, witbiers, schwartzbiers, hefeweizens, farmhouse ales--and anything else I could try.
When I visited the Local Brew Shop, and asked, I was recommended the "Joy" version with a few minor alterations:
I had a few friends over to show them the joys of homebrewing. It was also an easy sell, as we sampled a few beers from the style
I forgot to check FG, out of practice. Still, all and all, a great way to kick off the Brew Year.
Why I brew beer
I began homebrewing in the mid-90's with my wife. We were just married and moved to a college town in Southwest Ohio. We both drank beer in undergrad school, although I was much more *enthusiastic* about it. We lived in a great area that had plenty of bars and restaurants, but we were just starting our independent lives, and we didn’t have enough money to go out often.
Then we found the local grocery store. We would often go to the store for the salad bar dinner and beer to take home. While picking up beer, we had found an entire aisle of mysterious names, and unusual descriptions. (This was an entire aisle at a store that had maybe five aisles; they were serious about their beer.)
I hate to admit it, but the first time we made the plunge from the normal Natural Light and ABC Lite was a Woodchuck Cider. I am sure it was my beautiful, new wife that wanted to partake in that creation. It was good, and unusual, and fun to try something new. I still backed it up with the twelve of our normal beers, since I still was very *enthusiastic* about beer.
From there, we made a regular ritual of getting the salad bar dinner and picking out a few new beers. I quickly gravitated to the commonly available British and Irish beers: Samuel Smith, Bass, Harp, Guinness, and Boddingtons. She gravitated toward more exotic and malty beers, Lindemans Kreik, Sam Adams Cranberry Lambic, Paulaner Hefe and Munich, Warsteiner varieties, Ayinger Hefe, and Hacker Pschorr all come to mind.
Here is the part of the story that is a bit ironic: I really have no memory of how we made the leap to brewing. I do remember I came into contact with a few brew shop catalogs and was fascinated with the process. But I don’t know who gave me the catalog, or where I got the idea to look for information. Maybe someone gave me a homebrew to drink? We have no recollection. We’ll just assume we were inspired after a particularly good session of sampling. It could be…
After reading a book or two, reading some online journals and websites (I was on the CATS-MEOW listserv before the whole Interweb fad started), I placed the order for my first setup. It was a plastic fermentor, plastic bottling bucket, airlocks, hoses, a 20’ wort chiller, and an extract kit for an IPA from one of the big catalog sellers.
That first batch had all of the potential in the world. It had a strong malt flavor, was citrusy and bitter, and had a great copper color. The problem was that it smelled and tasted so good as it fermented, and while it sat in the secondary, I sampled it several times prior to bottling. By the time it was bottle conditioned, air damage had taken hold. The cardboard notes sat right at the front and finished with a slight burning sensation.
But I was in. It was great fun to make, sample, taste, and talk about. So even though the first beer was a failure, I relaxed--and made another homebrew.
