monday links

Thursday, Alan McLeod quoted Boak & Bailey (first paragraph) and then added his own thoughts, as is his habit.

B&B: The news of the return of the Great British Beer Festival did somewhat gladden our hearts, even though we don’t really like beer festivals, and haven’t always had a great time at GBBF. It just felt as if something was missing from the calendar this year when it didn’t happen. All the old problems will no doubt still apply, however: how do you make a big, drafty conference centre feel anything like as pleasant as a pub?

AM: Somehow I don’t believe they were thinking of “Lucha Libre Mexican Wrestling and Mechanical Bull Riding” as the solution to that conundrum. Yee. Haw. We shall wait on reports from these events before issuing our final condemnations… err… thoughts.

Not many hours later, Daria and I were at the Great American Beer Festival. We walked by the wrestling, but did not stop. We never saw the bull riding. If you were looking for a specific brewery, the layout was at times confusing. But I liked that the “Fright” area was dimly (very dimly) lit, that the National Black Brewers Association area was much more prominently placed than last year, and the proximity of “Meet the Brewer” to Homebrew Headquarters.

So I thought, maybe they should rebrand the event as the Great American Beer Experience. Looking back at what Boak and/or Bailey wrote, I did not think, maybe even include a pub experience into the festival. That would be foolish. Instead, I considered that one beer experience does not fit all, and I happen to have photos from the weeks since I last posted anything other than an out of office message here.

The basic “Guinness Experience” (there are add-ons) rises through seven floors, finishing with a pint at the top, which offers a 360-degree view of the massive brewery and the surrounding neighborhood.

Some patrons at Helen’s Bar on the Beara Peninsula arrived and left by boat. We came and left by bike, and Guinness Zero seemed like the best option.

Several pubs in Dingle serve more than beer. We particularly enjoyed Foxy John’s Pub & Hardware store, which also rents bikes. This photo is from Dick Mack’s Brewery & Pub, which also sells leather goods.

A sideways few of brewers in the National Black Brewers Association area. Nine breweries were serving beer. A tenth black-owned brewery, Tapped 33, poured beer in the Meet the Brewer area.

YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY

– Because you might have realized there are still stories like this. Why beer is still changing and interesting. The kicker: “All that said, (Sarah) Real says she tries to keep brewing interesting for her across the board. ‘[It is about] where can I cross over [with my creations], or how can I say, ‘All right, I like what’s happening here. Should I tinker with it?’ Because I can absolutely tinker with a recipe forever. But I will also be like, ‘You know what? People like this one [as it is] or they like that one. Good. Let me start working on something else.’”

– “It is really the people here.” Why it makes sense for a brewery pub to close rather than pass into the hands of a new owner.

– Real ale as folk horror. “Beer loosens inhibitions. Beer puts people in touch with their animal instincts. Beer is magic.”

– 40 Years in Beer (Book II), Part 63. “Arguably the most famous state fair competition entry did not win a medal. It came from FOSSILS co-founder Barrie Ottersbach and was called ‘Smoked Spruce Ale,’ although some of the judges thought they detected Mr. Clean.”

– Un-diversifying. Tilray, the company which has been scooping up breweries that AB InBev and MillerCoors grew bored with, is planning to reduce the number of beers those breweries make. “We’re looking at how to take complexity out of our business.”

– What might Marcus Baskerville be up to? “An elevated bar and lounge experience with affordable cocktails and craft brews,”

* Should you wonder, the question in the title is a reference to a Todd Snyder song.

A few links before an upcoming hiatus that will continue until after the Great American Beer Festival. If you find yourself missing me, I’ll be there Oct. 11.

Were I inclined to take the time, which I am not, I would explain how the following links relate to a question I’ve been trying to make sense of for too long now. First I have to figure out how to properly phrase that question. Call it a work in progress.

– Tilray lays off 10 Barrel Brewing’s entire Innovation Brewing Team and Carnage at 10 Barrel. The usually wise Ron Pattinson once wrote, “I don’t want innovative beer.” I do.

– Craft Beer Can’t Afford to Be Local Anymore. Ahem, and not just because I wrote a book called “Brewing Local.” Local is still part of the DNA for, like, 90 percent of the small breweries in the country. Not 90 percent of the volume of craft beer sold, which is what this story is about.

Soon 30 years ago, Daria and I were standing on the former “killing floor” of a sausage factory that had become Left Hand Brewing with co-founder Eric Wallace (this was one of those times when you remember exactly where you were when you heard something). Wallace, who figures prominently in this VinePair story, said: “The large brewers are not tooled to do what we do. They’ll have to build less-than-efficient breweries to make beer like we do.”

I should, and will, maybe even at GABF, talk with Wallace about just what he meant when he said, “We can make your beer more efficiently.” I’m not prepared to abandon the thought embracing efficiency means abandoning inefficiency altogether. Or that innovation does not include what Tonya Cornett has been doing for so long in Oregon.

That’s already more than I meant to write this week. There are dots to be connected, but not now. Instead, a reminder that should you be jonesing for beer links between now and well into October visit A Good Beer Blog on Thursdays and Boak & Bailey on Saturdays.

The biggest news last week was Teamsters Local 322 has requested Sapporo-Stone Brewing to recognize the union as the exclusive collective bargaining representative of Stone Brewing’s employees.

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The Minnesota State Fair concludes today. I mention this because the World Brewing Congress, also in Minnesota, wrapped up only two days before the fair started. It was have been so nice to stick around for all manner of unique Fair Food, much of it fried. In recent years, the fair has added specialty drinks as well. Like Blueberry Pancake Lager, Purple Maize (after all, it is Minnesota), and Mini Donut Beer.

A few lists:

– Best fair food
– New fair food
– Returning specialty sips
– New specialty sips
– Drinks that almost happened

Makes glitter beers seem pretty tame.

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QUOTE OF THE WEEK I
Also name of the week

“I think that the dirty little secret of Montana is that we like our beers a little sweeter than we want to admit. I mean, I love IPAs. I drink them all the time. But I think the biggest segment of drinkers like a slightly sweet, smooth beer. The commonality between a Coors Banquet and Cold Smoke is that they’re both a 10 IBU, malt-forward beer.”

— Al Pils

From More Than Just IPA: Across America, Craft Beer Has Surprising Pockets of Regionality

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QUOTE OF THE WEEK II

Read more

I am enamored with the potential of question and answer format that Alan McLeod debuted last Thursday. I may give something similar a whirl one of these months. But given that this week’s dispatch is being filed from the Indianapolis International Airport, brevity wins.

POSTMODERN

Last week at the World Brewing Congress (where the photo above was taken), I don’t remember how the conversation turned to the proliferation of beer styles. But Dan Vollmer, senior manager product strategy & research at Boston Beer, said there must be a better way signal to drinkers what to expect from a beer. Samuel Adams best two seasonals, he said, are Octoberfest and Summer Ale. “They both tell you when to drink them,” he said.

Joe Stange started using the term postmodern beer in 2011, if not earlier, at the blog he called Thirsty Pilgrim. He elaborated on it in a 2015 post for Draft magazine (archived by the Wayback Machine). Now Courtney Iseman acknowledges “postmodernism has been a bit of a moving target in beer.”

LOCAL

In case you missed it, I wrote a book titled, “Brewing Local.” I have opinions about “local beer.”

A dozen years ago, this was the topic for The Session.

Last week, Jeff Alworth wrote, “What’s curious is how contingent that concept of local is.” It is, he admitted, a pretty bloggy blog post. One that invites comments (which he would appreciate), kind of like The Session, back in the day.

YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY

– “Thank You For Paying Black People” I’ve been disappointed not to come across more dispatches from Barrel & Flow 2024. As well as this field report, there was news Em Sauter has a new book, “Pairing Beer With Everything.”

– Not all tastemakers are vintners. Bow & Arrow Brewing CEO Shyla Sheppard and Crafted for Action founder Jen Price snuck into Wine Enthusiast’s wine-heavy Future 40 Tastemakers 2024.

– Because Jack D’Or lives on (you know if you know). The Beer Nut makes a pilgrimage to St Mars of the Desert. He also found Fantastico! “Anyone looking for juicy haze here will be disappointed. I have to say I liked this more serious and adult take on the style, one that isn’t trying to convince you it’s secretly a soft drink.”

– Mash like its 1893. And there is this, “Allegedly, some breweries add fir pitch to the kettle at a rate of 3-4 lb per 100 barrels of wort to impart a pitch flavour to the beer, as the lagering vessels are not pitched but only lacquered.”

– Speaking of local. The sale of Magnolia Brewing in San Francisco (again) means it will be locally owned (again).