Stan Hieronymus

Whatever happened to ‘extreme’ beer?

Did I miss the memo?

Stories about — and therefore praising, because almost all stories about beers not brewed by large corporations include a certain amount of praise — “extreme beers” seem to be appearing less often.

(And, yes, I’m aware that the Beer Advocate “Extreme Beer Festival” recently concluded. That’s one reason for the question.)

Maybe my radar needs adjusting. Or maybe they’ve been drowned about by tales of passionate nano-brewers.

The subject popped up again yesterday when Adrian Tierney-Jones wrote about the Charles Wells/Dogfish Head collaboration beer DNA New World IPA. Sam Calagione (who wrote a book titled Extreme Brewing) was there for the roll out, of course, and Adrian talked with him.

And afterwards I had a few words with Calagione and asked the question that was bugging me. Extreme beer? ‘It wasn’t about strength but innovation and flavour. I’m not hung up on nomenclature.’

And in that millpond the ripples keep spreading.

I’m still trying to wrap my head about this DNA beer, and understand just what “a reduction of our 60 Minute IPA” means, but it sounds like something that would have been called “extreme” not long ago.

The man who would grow hops

Things you would not have seen twenty years ago:

– A “multimedia web narrative” created by college students.
– Farmers in Colorado growing hops.
– A Colorado brewery making a “fresh hop beer” — that is using hops taken directly from the bine.

The project is called “Hop to Sip” and the website promises regular updates between now and harvest in August, when Odell Brewing will produce a beer with Crystal hops grown in the Colorado Gold Hop Yard. It is a collaboration of stories from the Rocky Mountain Collegian, CTV, KCSU, and College Avenue at Colorado State University.

I’m already thinking I’d like to have that beer Odell is brewing with Larry Leinhart, the farmer in the video. He worked for both Pabst Brewing and Anheuser-Busch.

Hops link-o-rama

Seitz Farm TerroirThis is happening Saturday and I won’t be there. Who is scheduling my life? Wait, by the time the first beer is poured Saturday at the Urban Chestnut Brewing Hopfenfest I will have already done Saturdays at the Kernel, seen Helen Mirren in The Audience and, the time difference being what it is, be settling in for a pint of something on cask.

As greedy as it might be I’ll still pause a moment and wish somebody could put a glass of Seitz Farms Terroir Lager in front of me. Florian Seitz, who I have visited at the family farm in the heart of Bavaria’s Halltertau hop growing region, will in St. Louis to watch drinkers try a beer made with his hops. He doesn’t get to do that very often. “As a grower you are proud when you see what happens with your hops, when the product made from your own product is good,” he said when I was at the farm.

I’d like to see the look on his face Saturday.

And while we’re talking hops:

* More on how opinion has changed about what makes for good hop aroma (in some cases, of course) from Ed Wray.

Descriptions of new varieties used to be accompanied by notes on what percentage of them you could use before the flavour became unacceptable, and I once spoke to a retired Allied brewer who said he was only allowed to use a maximum of 25% Bramling Cross.

For further reading, see Rejected in 1960, Rejoiced in 2015? (Or buy the book.)

Made With British Hops* The British Hop Association has a new logo for brewers to use on pump clips, bottle labels and marketing materials. From the press release: “Ali Capper of the British Hop Association said ‘As a result of our recent work to promote British Hops, brewers were getting in contact wanting to promote the Britishness of their beer and I realised that we needed a new customer-facing logo. We’ve created something that will work at very small or larger sizes, that is clearly British and that promotes the provenance of British Hops.'”

The logo is available at the British Hop Association web site.

Ales for ALS* More hops with numbers, and in this case to support ALS research. Almost three dozen breweries have already signed up for Ales for ALS. Loftus Ranches and Hopunion are giving away a blend of proprietary hops to participating brewers, who will donate a donate a portion of the sales of the beers they make with them to ALS TDI, the world’s leader in ALS research.

The geeky details: Vinnie Cilurzo of Russian River Brewing and John Mallett of Bell’s Brewery designed the blend of 35% HBC (which stands for Hop Breeding Company) 462, 25% HBC 369 (otherwise known as Mosaic), 30% HBC 344, and 10% HBC 366.

The ALS Therapy Development Institute (ALS TDI) aims to discover and develop effective treatments and a cure for ALS.

This wasn’t in Jack McAuliffe’s business plan

This from the zoning application by The Rare Barrel in West Berkeley (California):

“We will be a gathering place for artisanal brewers, home brewers, beer enthusiasts and food lovers in general. We will bring to Berkeley well-paying jobs both in the brewery and the retail area that do not require an advanced degree.”

The headline on the story: City approves sour-beer brewery for ‘beer geeks.’

This probably made it easier for those sitting on the the zoning board to give the application a thumbs up: “The brewers will contract with several existing breweries to produce wort, an early stage of the beer, in kettles off-site so as to avoid ‘bakery’ type odors associated with brewing.”

Making economics interesting: Beer in the wine aisle

I’ve steered clear of the recent “wine-ification” of beer kerfuffle because I don’t have anything to say I haven’t already (New Beer Rule #7: Beer is not the new wine was written back in December of 2007, thus predating about half the breweries in the United States).

But today Mike Veseth, who I’ve mentioned here many times (including about his fine book, Wine Wars, and that he has another, Extreme Wine, on the way) asks the question: Is Craft Beer the Next Big Thing in Wine?

Remember the context and that the discussion revolves around economics. And it pretty much starts with an answer to the question he asks in the headline.

(Yes) — if you are thinking about things in terms of market spaces. The wine market space and that of craft beer are increasingly overlapping as craft beers infringe on wine’s turf (and low alcohol wines threaten to do the same for beer). And if the common battlefield isn’t huge at this point, it is certainly growing and warrants attention.

Much of it won’t appear new if you’ve been reading the beer compared to wine discussion for the past several years. But, you know, not everyone has. So it’s worth taking the time to move from Point A to Point B and so on with him. Words like innovation (“Innovation is a hot topic in the beverage business these days and craft beer presents more opportunities for innovation and product development than most wines if you are aiming at that market segment.”) and complexity are used. It’s interesting to read what somebody who does not live in the beer aisle has to write about beer.

So craft beer has a lot in common with wine and maybe a couple of advantages. With these products more widely available and a growing customer base that is ready and willing to experiment, I think it is plausible and wine and craft beer will increasingly share market space and must take that competition into account.

Something to think about.

And one quick side note:

At the end he suggests that some wineries might start to brew beer. Of course, that’s already happened. There are several wineries across the country who already do brew beer. Notably, in 1997 Korbel Champagne Cellars started Russian River Brewing in northern California and hired Vinnie Cilurzo as brewmaster. Six years later, Korbel decided to get out of the brewing business. Natalie and Vinnie Cilurzo bought the brand and started a brewpub, then a production brewery, in Santa Rosa. Do you think Korbel wishes it could take that decision back?