musing

MONDAY BEER LINKS, MUSING 08.11.14

EVERYTHING wrong with Beer at this moment. It’s a list. That would be more obvious if each item had a number in front of it. But it’s a list, and proof that (contrary to the impression I might sometimes toss about here) not all lists are bad. A comment from Pete Brown provides a bit of balance, “But the petty debates only matter if you pay attention to them: the momentum behind beer is now bigger and more powerful than a bunch of bloggers and hopheads can have any control over.” (Thanks to Roger Baylor for mentioning the comment — one disadvantage to saving things in Pocket and not revisiting posts.)
[Via Beer Compurgation]

The Belgian brewery: fifty shades of grey
Carl Kins — pro tip: a go-to source for information about Belgian beer — did not write this to help bloggers prep for the next Session, although anybody posting about their “First Belgian” might start by considering just what “Belgian beer” means.
[Via Belgian Beer Specialist]

Why Does Craft Beer Suddenly Seem to Have a Problem With Women? Not exactly suddenly, but evidence that things are no better in 2014 than they were in 2012 (Honest Pint: Sexist Shouldn’t Sell)
[Via Guys Drinking Beer]

Thanks to anonymous supporters Stone Brewing reached goal of Groundbreaking campaign! The campaign received plenty of negative attention but blasted right through its one million dollar target. Lots of large contributions. “But it looks like that some retailers and some ‘anonymous’ friends helped out and bought huge amounts of cases of beer in the last weeks…. I bet that retailers and wholesalers from all over the world bought the beers to resell it to their customers for a higher price.”
[Via Lieblingbier]

The Wine Blogging Community Is A Joke (But It Doesn’t Have To Be That Way). Is this true? “Because we (wine bloggers) are a joke of a community online, particularly when compared to our beer and spirits counterparts.”
[Via 1 Wine Dude]

– North American Guild of Beer Writers Awards

The deadline to enter is Aug. 25, and the whole process happens on line – right here.

“The NAGBW Awards honor the best beer and brewing industry coverage in eight categories. Journalism, feature writing, freelance authors, blogs and broadcast, published in print or online, are eligible.” For beer writing/broadcasts published between July 1, 2013 and June 30, 2014.

Those of us judging would really appreciate some top notch entries. Don’t be shy.

– British Guild of Beer Writers’ Awards

The deadline ot enter is Sept. 5 and involves the post office, so you might want to get those entries off early. Details are here.

“The competition is open to writers, broadcasters, photographers, poets, illustrators, designers, webmasters and bloggers whose work has broadened the public’s knowledge of beer and pubs over the past year. You do NOT have to be a member of the Guild of Beer Writers to enter and we welcome nominations by third parties – so if you have been impressed by a press article, book or blog about beer, please think about entering it.” For work published or broacast between Sept. 1, 2013 and Aug., 31 2014.

– The Geoffrey Ballard Essay Award

The first two are for published work. This one is for work you’d like to see published in Brewery History, the Journal of the Brewery History Society. Entries will be evaluated using the journal’s standard criteria for selection (i.e. excellence and interest to a wide audience) and will be published in the journal. The deadline is Jan. 31, 2015, and the details are here.

The winning essay will be published in Brewery History and also earns a £250 prize. “The unpublished essay, based on original research, should fall within the remit of Brewery History, i.e. it should be concerned with the history of beer and/or its ingredients; histories of existing and/or closed breweries; research on associated industries (e.g. malting, hops, retailing, &c.); or studies into the social, political and economic impact of beer and/or the brewing industry.”

MONDAY BEER LINKS, MUSING 08.04.14

The State of Beer (As Craig Gravina Sees It). Josh Bernstein kicked off this round of the “are there too many breweries?” discussion with an article headlined “America Now Has Over 3,000 Craft Breweries—and That’s Not Necessarily Great for Beer Drinkers” that drew 93 (maybe more by now) comments. Stephen Beaumont replied “No, There Aren’t Too Many Breweries in the United States” and backed that up with a bunch of math. Read ’em both and then set aside a little time to consider what Craig Gravina has to add (time because the post is about 1,200 words – a definite candidate for Pocket). Two excerpts, the first a quote from Sam Calagione at Dogfish head in Bernsteins’s article.

We’re heading into an incredibly competitive era of craft brewing. There’s a bloodbath coming.

Then from “The State of Beer.”

‘Craft’ in that sense, shares something in common with the Oscars. Films that are deemed ‘important’, or those that deal with important or serious issues like war or diseases, often win Academy Awards. They, like ‘craft’, are in fact quite the opposite of important. They are celluloid past time fillers. Beer is beer — craft or otherwise — it is not important, and those who make it are not significant. Is it enjoyable? Immensely.

I don’t agree on all counts, but there’s a lot in the post to think about.

[Via Drink Drank]

Pure, cheap and a bit dull – my rebuttal to commentary on The Economist article. Start with the Economist story and the comments it generated. Might be more comments there than you want to read, but the first page provides a sense of the reaction to the story. Then read Rory Lawton’s rebuttal. He’s got a dog in the hunt — he runs specialty events and provides advice/consultancy &#151 but that doesn’t make him wrong. I think it is an overstatement to talk about the “many wonderful, authentic traditions that this great beer nation once (my emphasis) had” because you can still find a heck of a lot more traditional beers enjoyed in a traditional manner today in Germany than you could find in the United States 25 years ago. But the relentless march to commodify beer needs to be halted.

[Via Berlin Craft Beer]

Tree House Brewing Co. Finds Fertile Ground in Western Massachusetts. A feast of photos, but also a look inside another small brewery that has attracted more attention than you could have imagined not many years ago. Fact is that although The New York Times and Washington Post carried stories about New Albion Brewing 35 years ago it is better known today than it was then. Frank Prial didn’t write about drinkers lined up for beer at New Albion, as they sometimes do at Tree House. And I’ve never seen Jack McAuliffe quoted this was: “So I guess at this point it doesn’t particularly matter what we brew because we’ll sell out of it and sell out of it fast.”

[Via Good Beer Hunting]

Sierra Nevada Beer Camp was the best festival of the summer that nobody went to. No lines for Pliny the Elder and Supplication? That did not seem to be the case in Philadelphia.

[Via Westword]

The New Home of IPAs. I’m not in love with basing anything on lists from Rate Beer and Beer Advocate or any discussion of best IPAs that includes neither Bell’s Two Hearted Ale nor Firestone Walker Union Jack, but Carla Jean Lauter (The Beer Babe) offers serious analysis that makes a drinker reconsider some assumptions. And the data provides still more proof that hops travel better than hoppy beers.

[Via Medium]

MONDAY BEER LINKS, MUSING 07.28.14

Based only on what I read in the blogs I subscribe to and my Twitter feed Stone Brewing’s crowdfunding campaign was the worst idea since Miller Lite (Exhibit 1: Crowd-Funded Brewery Campaigns Are Bullshit; Exhibit 2: On Rich and Successful People Wanting Free Money). I didn’t see a whole lot positive, except for the very basic fact that plenty of people are happily signing up for the Stone program.

I’m more interested in the potential impact of Stone’s brewery in Berlin — if and how Stone’s presence changes beer in Germany and Europe, and if and how Stone’s beers change when they are brewed in an entirely different geographical and cultural place. Better to wait and see rather than guess.

Craft Breweries Scale Up But Keep It Real. This Wall Street Journal article blurs the facts here and there, but ventures into total bullshit when referring to a collaboration beer produced by New Belgium Brewing and 3 Floyds Brewing: “Their latest joint effort resuscitated a once-forgotten wheat beer called Grätzer, introducing drinkers to an ancient style and an unfamiliar brewer at the same time.” Poppycock. Polish homebrewers deserve credit for reviving Grodziskie (Grätzer is German name). That the article overlooks the fact the collaboration differs in character from traditional Grodziskie in several different ways isn’t what bugs me the most. It’s the insinuation that “America craft beer will save the world.”

[Via The Wall Street Journal]

The (Non) Beer Bubble, Part Deux. Interesting math and some smart thinking from Bart Watson at the Brewers Association. What it doesn’t address — hey, it’s not his job — is the aspirations of these brewery owners, if their business plans are realistic. I’d ramble on, but we’re in Oregon right now, part of summer travel that has included visiting schools our daughter, Sierra, might want to attend. Were I much younger and thinking about starting a brewery (I’m never going to be again and I’m not about to) then paying college tuition x number of years down the road would be part of the equation. I’m not sure it is for many of these Sierra Nevada wannabes.

[Via the Brewers Association]

Governor Cuomo Announces Formation of NY Craft Brewer Workgroup. Here’s one paragraph from the press release: “The workgroup will help coordinate and improve communication between all segments of the craft brew industry and state government. Members will also work together to identify emerging needs, including research on new varieties of hops and barley, production methods and consumer trends; as well as making sure that the state has the infrastructure in place for this growing industry.” Promising.

[Via a press release.]

Second thoughts on the mysterious origins of AK. Your beer history fix of the week.

[Via Zythophile (Martyn Cornell)]

Bootleg Biology’s “Chief Yeast Wrangler” Talks Delicious Science. Meet Jeff Mello. Your beer geek fix of the week.

[Via Epicurious]

Peach Pie Heffy from Laht Neppur Brewing was not the best beer I sampled Wednesday at the Oregon Brewers Festival, but it was worth thinking about and a perfectly pleasant three-ounce experience.

In fact, it does taste like peach pie, with a bit of crust — reminiscent of Key Lime Pie from Short’s Brewing. Jeff Alworth said it didn’t taste like beer. I understand his thinking but I suspect that the underlying beer character — mouthfeel, some balancing non-sweetness from hops and fermentation byproducts — helped make it something I was happy that I tried.

Jeff said that he and his friends, who gather annually for the OBF experience as much as the beer and mostly avoid overthinking beer, had once played a game where they’d get a sample and then classify it as “beer” or “not beer.” Those conversations are not uncommon at OBF.

I amused myself a while Wednesday by eavesdropping on people discussing Peach Pie Heffy or just thinking about trying it.

“Oooh, that sounds gross.”

“Those guys make some good beers. They should have brought one of those.”

“This would be good on a hot day.” (It was pouring rain at the time.)

Beer? Not beer? I guess it depends who you ask.

*****

Related post: Shock Top Twisted Pretzel Wheat.