Stan Hieronymus

Fighting crimes against beer

Earlier this week “Garrett Oliver on the Crimes Against Beer” generated the flurry of tweet and blog posts you’d expect in reaction to an article with that headline. And Ray Daniels tweeted “Cicerone is here to help!”

Today Bloomberg Businessweek posted a feature on Daniels and the Cicerone Certification Program. It’s short and it’s a business story (“If I had tried to start this business 10 years earlier, I would not have had the credibility to carry it off. It needs to be the right time, and you need to be the right person.”) But it’s an excuse to talk about beer education.

The story points out that 15,000 people have passed at least the first level Cicerone exam and the number of participants is growing exponentially (thus a new website, rumored for debut next week).

And it’s not the only game in town. The Master Brewers Association of the Americas began hosting Understanding Beer Flavor seminars last year and so far 1,600 have attended classes around the country. Like the Cicerone Program, the MBAA certifies stewards through an examination process.

Yes, those of you itching to comment, I know there are still more. And I could also point out The Brewers Association has just fancied up its Draught Beer Quality website.

Instead back to the MBAA program. Karl Ockert, probably best known as former brewmaster at BridgePort Brewing and now the MBAA technical director assembled the program. Jeff Alworth wrote about it here.

The MBAA has a couple of seminars upcoming, one in Cold Spring, Minn., Sept. 7 and one Sept. 15 in St. Louis. Perhaps they could have chosen a better date in St. Louis. That’s an official beer holiday here because Schlafly’s Hop in the City is that day.

Here’s some of what will be covered, according to a flyer for the seminar:

* Describe beer styles, flavors, and aromas
* Learn how raw ingredients and the brewing process affect beer flavor
* Understand how to maintain beer freshness
* Use the appropriate glassware for each beer type
* Assist customers with pairing food with beer
* Build a vocabulary that goes beyond “malty” and “hoppy”
* Enhance the image of beer

See, somebody’s looking out for Garrett Oliver’s beer.

Drink them while they are fresh

Boulevard 80-Acre Wheat Ale

You might have heard that Stone Brewing released a beer called Stone Enjoy By 09.21.12 IPA in the last few days ago. (That’s not the date on the bottle above, and we will get to that right after explaining what Stone is doing.)

Stone released 09.21.12 only in Chicago, New Jersey and Southern California, and come Sept. 21 (also a Friday) “if any beer remains on the shelf it will be immediately removed.” A press release calls this a “35-day package-to-drink cycle.” Most Stone beers list a shelf life of 90 days, some longer.

Stone head brewer Mitch Steele talks about brewing the beer, the hop additions, and the hops used as well as the volatile nature of hop aroma in this Double IPA in this video from Stone.

Of course other beers dosed with large amounts of late hops — at or near the end of boiling, then in dry hopping — are just as fragile. (Yes, I just use IPA and fragile in the same sentence.)

Research at Sierra Nevada Brewing has determined the levels of the compounds that produce those floral, spicy, etc. aromas that have made highly hopped beers so popular drop dramatically the first three days after bottling. They migrate from the liquid to the head space to the liner of the bottle cap, and perhaps eventually into the atmosphere. After three days an “average” IPA might contain the same level of myrcene, for instance, as a pale ale immediately after bottling. How fast the aroma continues to fade in the following weeks depends on many factors, including storage temperature and the amount beer is agitated in shipping.

Just another way that American IPAs are different than the historic India Pale Ales that presumably continued to improve, at least up to a point, during a long boat ride.

The bottle at the top is Boulevard Brewing’s new 80-Acre Hoppy Wheat Beer.1

What struck me as I poured a bottle into a glass last week was, first, that the hop2 aroma (fresh citrus, like buying pineapples fresh where they are grown) jumps from the glass when it still two feet from your nose — but, then, the “best by” date, only a little more than two months off. This on a bottle just released. That’s a short lease.

Turns out that Boulevard does not plan to continue to keep the date Stone-short (a new phrase that makes sense only within the context of this post). Julie Weeks at Boulevard emailed this explanation from brewmaster Steven Pauwels:

“When we introduce a new beer we want to make sure that the customer has a chance to taste the beer the first time at its optimum. Any new beer in our heritage line-up gets short coded during the launch-phase to make sure the consumer gets to taste it as fresh as possible.

“During the development phase we work a lot on stability and come up with best by date that we confirm with real life data when the beer gets to market.”

I will continue to seek out this beer as fresh as I can get it, and I hope on tap. It’s 5.4% ABV, so not officially a “session beer” but one you can have a few of during the course of a Saturday afternoon watching college football. And there’s a lot more hop going on than the 20 IBUs would suggest (Blue Moon White has 18 IBUs, Fat Tire 19 IBUs), a reminder that hops are about a lot more than bitterness.

Which, of course, is the point of Stone Enjoy By 09.21.12 IPA.

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1 Extra credit if when you saw the beer name the first time you thought of James McMurtry’s “60 Acres.”

2 If you can keep up with Jeremy Danner on Twitter you know “Bittering is a blend of CTZ, Bravo, & Summit. Cascade in the whirlpool and Cascade and Nelson (Sauvin) for dry hops.”

Which speaker is not like the others?

– Sam Calagione, President, Dogfish Head Craft Brewery
– Luiz Edmond, President North America, Anheuser-Busch
– Bill Hackett, President, Crown Imports LLC
– Tom Long, President, MillerCoors LLC
– Dolf van den Brink, President and CEO, HEINEKEN USA

Rhetorical question.

From the press release:

ALEXANDRIA, VA – The National Beer Wholesalers Association’s (NBWA) 75th Annual Convention will be taking place October 14-17 at the Manchester Grand Hyatt San Diego in San Diego, California, where it’s always 75 and sunny!

For the first time ever, NBWA members will hear from leaders of some of the nation’s most prominent brewers and importers together, all on one stage, during the General Session on Tuesday morning, October 16. Participants include:

Sam Calagione, President, Dogfish Head Craft Brewery
Luiz Edmond, President North America, Anheuser-Busch
Bill Hackett, President, Crown Imports LLC
Tom Long, President, MillerCoors LLC
Dolf van den Brink, President and CEO, HEINEKEN USA

One stage. Last man standing? Who you betting on?

The Session #66 wrapped up; #67 announced

The SessionCraig Gravina has wrapped up The Session #66: One Beer to Rule Them All and put a nice bow on it. And to keep things moving along, Derrick Peterman has announced the topic for #67: “How Many Breweries in 2017?”

Sixty-seven Sessions into this once-a-month silliness, Peterman will host the first Session contest.

“And for incentive, if five years from now your prediction is the most accurate one, in addition to enjoying beer blogger bragging rights, I will personally buy you a beer.”