place/local/ingredients/sensory

Programming notes: Travel in the next many weeks means Monday recaps of the beer week that was will be intermittent through early May, and probably brief when they do show up. This next weekend I’ll be at the Ohio Hop Conference. Wednesday the 22nd I’ll be talking, virtually, to members of the America Homebrewers Association about New Zealand hops and otherwise answering questions about all things hops. If your are a member, please stop by.

Upfront, Weed v wine: The aesthetics and terroir of cannabis presents this question: Is weed ready for the same connoisseurial approach as wine? Why not beer? Why not consider the fact that weed and hops share many of the same odor compounds. Why isn’t the word dank used even once in this story? Seriously, California is rolling out an appellation system for cannabis. As I prepare to post this, the domain name appellationweed.com remains available.

Cask beer
– Around the world, Part 1. Who drinks in pubs around the world serving cask beers? What kind of experiences are they looking for?

– Stateside. “There has been no noticeable shift in cask beer consumption. Maybe that’s a good thing. It’s not getting better, but it’s also not getting worse.”

No avoiding AI
– This might be AI week upcoming at Beervana. So be on the lookout, because I won’t be here next Monday to remind you.

– An AI created brewery taproom menu. Scroll down a bit. Personally, I want a bit more than a hint of hop character in a classic pilsner.

– A chat bot does drink reviews. “I paired this Pinot Noir with a home-cooked meal for my dog.” Oh, boy.

You might also enjoy
– An everyday beer. “I don’t really want to break it down into its constituent parts, and the sun shining through the window behind me is warm, and I am comfortable and in good company.”

– This one-woman brewery brings Middle Eastern flavor back to craft beer. “I thought I was a pretty good chef; brewing can’t be that hard.”

– Sustainability. A business in Yokohama in Japan has started upcycling brewers’ malt lees waste to produce “craft beer paper.”

An interesting thought from Alister Reece.

“This also got me thinking about how so many of the beer styles we love and take for granted are a combination of location in a physical sense and locale in a population sense.”

I’m in the process of assembling a lengthy recap about what I’ve previously written “hop terroir” for the next issue of Hop Queries. Much of the research focuses on geographical differences, but there is more.

The first question asked here, back in 2005, was, “Does it matter where a particular beer, any beer, is brewed?” In thinking about this way too much in the years since, I’ve returned often to something Amy Trubek wrote in “The Taste of Place: A Cultural Journey into Terroir.”

“This broader definition of terroir considers place as much as earth. According to this definition, the people involved in making wine, the winemaking tradition of a region, and the local philosophy of flavor are all part of terroir. Unlike the narrow view of terroir, this humanist point of view is not really quantifiable. Terroir speaks of nature and nature’s influence on flavor and quality, but here the human attributes we bring to ‘nature’ are cultural and sensual rather than objective and scientific.”

You might also enjoy

– Changing colors. We were New York City last weekend (the photo at the top is the set for “Death of a Salesman”; they were pretty specific about the rule against taking photos during the play) when I read this story about how New Belgium is making over Fat Tire. Had we been at home in Colorado, perhaps I could have tracked down a can of the beer and provided drinking notes. I will put that on my to do list.

– The Meaning of Dry January. I was wrong last week when I typed the link I posted then would be the only one to a story about Dry January. Beer drinkers may choose to quote this, “One takeaway from my research is that lower-alcohol-content beverages are better. It’s easier in a social situation to drink and continue drinking and not worry about your consumption.” They should read the rest of the story.

– What are the elements that make a beer memorable? Context. Context. Context.

– The shelf turd abides. A “a vessel of ironic detachment.”

– You Were Never Going to Go to Noma Anyway. I spent too much time in the week reading about changes at Noma, the hyperlocal Copenhagen restaurant, blah blah blah. Because I’ve been reading too much about the place since I wrote “Brewing Local” and wondering about how fine dining, beer and inclusivity (or exclusivity) fit together. So I’d also recommend you take a look at “Noma and the Fizzle of Too-Fine Dining,” “Noma’s closing exposes the contradictions of fine dining,” and “How much does our food tell us about who we are?”

Take away the golden moonbeam
Take away the tinsel sky
What at night seemed oh so scenic
May be cynic by and by

The first time I met a friend’s wife, a few minutes into a conversation that was bouncing about randomly and at a quickening pace, he said, “Don’t worry, his brain is hyperlinked.”

I mention that because the first story linked to here posted last month, not last week, and I’m going to totally spoil the ending by quoting it verbatim. And note the second time I read it I put on the soundtrack to The Fantasticks and fast forwarded to “This Plum is Too Ripe.” The four lines at the top come from the song.

So here is “You Can Go Homebrew Again,” and the final paragraph:

“While just about everyone that has brewed more than one batch of homebrew dreams of opening their own brewery, just about every brewery owner dreams of just being able to brew with the freedoms and joy of homebrewing.”

The holiday spirit fills our house at the moment. We drove 160 miles round trip yesterday to cut a tree in the Pike-San Isabel National Forest. Doesn’t look like a farm tree, but it is a great tree. That’s an explanation why brevity rules here this week, and likely the week after, and surely the week after and the week after.

Ingredients
– Early history of hops. As is expected from Lars Garshol, a thorough and well documented examination of the use of hops in beer. I’ll comment more in Hop Queries later this month, but for now. . . He mentions the 1970 discovery of a boat in the Kent region of England that was carrying a cargo of hops almost 1,100 years ago. In a 23-page paper that resulted, botanist D. Gay Wilson offers quite a bit about what was known about hops in beer at the time as well as a proper bit of skepticism about some attempts at history. I quoted this bit of wisdom from Wilson in “For the Love of Hops” and in several presentations since: “Beer is a popular subject, and the literature abounds in unsupported statements, misleading or inaccurate quotations, and inadequate references.”

– S. eubayanus found alive and well and living in Ireland.

Hard times
– In Chicago. “I think, unfortunately, in the short term, this is going to get worse. I think this challenge is here for the foreseeable future.”

– In the UK. There may still be a demand for interesting beer, but smaller brewers are being shut out from the market they created.

– In the US. Shoppers are beginning to spend cautiously just as rising input costs push up beer prices.

‘Tis the season
– What could be more true to the spirit of Christmas than standing in a crowded pub and singing Christmas carols?

– A brewery for winter.

– A list.

Obituaries
– Ray McNeill, via All About Beer and via The Commons.

– Martin Morse Wooster.

Wine
– Terroir.

– Wrapping up this That Was The Beer Week That Was with a little fun, because “Nothing says, ‘Merry Christmas!’ like wine-sodden guests hurling a bladed wood-cutting implement across the yard or garland-festooned living room.”

Ex Novo Brewing in Corrales, NM, has horse parking. The stucco building in the distance is the brewery tasting room.

(As an aside, it also has a diverse choice of beers on tap.)

Just down the road, a sign in front of Village Mercantile Home and Farm Store this past weekend informed those driving by that it was Small Business Saturday, created to benefit local merchants the day after Black Friday. The Mercantile sells a lot of horse feed and serves the community in which we once lived quite well. Ex Novo has quickly become a family (and horse) friendly gathering spot and also serves the village well.

That’s simply an observation occasionally worth considering when viewing this week’s suggested reading. Speaking of which, Alan McLeod titled his latest beer link-o-rama “The Laziest Beery News Notes Of The Last 167 Weeks” and I can’t figure out why. There was plenty to read, plenty to think about, plenty of serious things to think about seriously. Instead, I offer this as a much lazier effort:

– Buying beer and beer merchandise is not going to have the world.

– Don’t sleep on Gale’s Prize Old Ale. Martyn Cornell brought a bottle to share at Ales Through the Ages. I tasted about an ounce and I endorse his recommendation.

– Holiday ales. “Since Twitter is dying, perhaps we can get back to commenting on blogs. I invite you to discuss your favorite winter beers.”

– If you are paying a premium for flavor and “craft” why shouldn’t NA beer cost as much? (That’s me asking the question after reading the story.)

– Remember when beer weeks were special? “San Diego’s brewers have come too far to let San Diego Beer Week become just another week in San Diego beer.”

– Brewing Local, redux. Small world. This was a topic of The Session more than 10 years ago. And, yes, I wrote an entire book centered on the topic. One that shows up in this hip hop video.