the session

Hosts Boak & Bailey have announced the theme for the next Session: How did it all start for you?

Continuing the “Beervangelism” theme, we’d like you to write about the moment when you saw the light. At what point did you realise you were a beer lover/geek/enthusiast? What beer(s) triggered the conversion? Did someone help you along your way, or did you come to it yourself?

In short; how did you get into good beer?

If you’re not familiar with The Session, it’s a beer blogosphere gathering where bloggers all over the world drink and write about beer based on a theme, and then post their thoughts on a designated Friday. In this case May 2.

All participants are welcome. See Boak & Bailey for details.

Jeff Bell/Stonch has posted the roundup for The Session #14: Beer People. Many outstanding posts, and one terrific suggestion from Jay Brooks.

But I wish I’d written this (and not only because it would mean I could still share a “snob beer” with my Dad):

Bob is my Dad. He drinks Labatt’s Blue religiously. Before Labatt’s it was Michelob. Before Michelob it was Pabst or Natural Light. My Dad has never taught me about original gravity or dry-hopping. He’s never taught me about the difference between a Kolsch and a Pilsner or cascade hops and chinook hops. In fact, my Dad has really taught me only one thing about beer in my whole life. He taught me that beer is something that can bring two people together on the same level and be genuine with one another.

Read the rest at Beer, Maine & Me.

In setting the theme for The Session #14: Beer People Jeff Bell asked for “pen portraits.”

At the risk of appearing lazy I’m letting the subject speak for himself. Ed Reisch was the fourth generation of his Springfield, Ill., family to oversee operations for Reisch Brewing Co. The brewery operated from 1849 until 1966, although Reisch left in 1964 to work for Pabst in Milwaukee

I visited him in December to collect his oral history, in this case using video. Here are a couple of minutes in which he talks about brewing Pabst and Andecker (Pabst’s high-end beer) in the 1970s.

The Reisch Brewery is gone . . . It was not insignificant — by the early twentieth century it occupied three acres and 11 building, shortly before Prohibition producing nearly 80,000 barrels annually. Ed Reisch was born in 1919, and played in the brewery as a youth during Prohibition, when malt syrup was produced there.

But the Reisch story continues . . . One of Ed’s sons, George, is a corporate brewmaster at Anheuser-Busch and George’s son, Patrick, is training to become a professional brewer. That will make six generations.

So more later.

This BBC documentary on the English pub, really about much more, is worth the 40 or so minutes it runs. Grab a beer and get in the mood for Friday’s Session.

Just for yucks, you might open a second browser when Pete Brown is being interviewed and head to his blog for a more current photo.

The Session heads across the Atlantic in April, with Stonch hosting Round #14 from his London stomping grounds.

The theme is “Beer People,” and he explains:

On Friday 4th April, the date of the next Session, I’d like you to write about people. Choose someone you know personally. That person might be a brewer, a publican, someone who sups at your local, or maybe just a friend who is passionate about beer. Let’s read some pen portraits of your companions on the path to fermented enlightenment.

I’m not sure about the enlightenment part, but I’m already looking forward to April 4.