QUOTES OF THE WEEK
“Malting is about getting the barley to do what it wants to do in the field, but on our terms.”
— Will Durrant, Bairds Malt
From Some Kind of Wizardry — Malting, Climate and the Future of Barley at Baird’s Malt
People still “miss the good old days of being in a cowboy town where they’re used to having a $5 pint.”
— Jaime Torres, taproom manager at Silva Brewing
From Why a Famed California Brewery is Going Under
LEDE OF THE WEEK
I remember the first time I went to Banana Jam Café. It was 2011 and we were broke – a freelance writer and a Master’s student saving for a wedding. We used to walk straight past the bright yellow façade of the Kenilworth-based Caribbean restaurant to drink pints of Castle Lager for R12.50 in Hobnobs, the sports pub next door. Then one day we spotted a sign outside Banana Jam advertising free craft beer tastings.
We had recently moved to Cape Town and craft beer here was brand new. There were fewer than 30 breweries around the country, most of them out-of-the-way brewpubs that didn’t distribute. Somehow we seemed to have stumbled upon the only restaurant in the country championing craft beer.
— From A love letter to Banana Jam for their 25th anniversary
KICKER OF THE WEEK
“We’re still here and we’re still operating. We’re not closing. On the brewery side of things, we have a lot of amazing new and upcoming releases, which we’re excited to share with retailers and drinkers alike, the support of whom we’re eager to preserve,” says Justin Leigh. And, on a personal level, Jocelyn and I plan to continue living in Goldendale, while remaining committed to supporting the industry, with my legal work and, together, by providing consulting services to startups, breweries interested in developing mixed-culture programs, and, of course, whomever wishes to take the reigns at Dwinell.”
From Acclaimed Washington Brewery For Sale, but Owner’s Fight for Small Brewers Rights Just Beginning
ASSIGNMENT OF THE WEEK
Use what you want from these links and a few numbers below to write your own post titled, “Big craft and little craft: Their relationship and their future”
– The Best Time to Unionize Your Brewery Is Before Anheuser-Busch Shuts It Down
– Big Beer is Done With Craft
– With Georgetown shutdown, Elysian Brewing doubling down on overhaul of its ‘beloved’ Capitol Hill original
– Stone Brewing to cease all international exports
– As US craft beer industry goes flat, NYS bubbles with optimism
– Pubs employ more young people than ever before, but new employment costs could mean tough decisions and threaten growth
I give Alan McLeod credit for making “big craft” subject for discussion back when there was a beer blogosphere. You probably have a good sense of what that means. Otherwise, these production numbers from 2023 from the May/June issue of The New Brewer may provide perspective.
I added 14 breweries listed a regional brands owned by large breweries to the top 50 domestic craft breweries list (and took 14 off of that list, obviously). The new top 50 includes breweries such as New Belgium and Founders that were called craft when the started selling beer, and many consumers would call craft today. Those 50 breweries sold 58 percent of the new craft beer total. There are an additional 143 breweries that sold 15,000 barrels or more, about 4 million total. So not quite 200 breweries sold almost 72 percent craft beer. And then there were the rest.
LIST OF THE WEEK
– Poetica 3 Hill Farmstead Brewery 4.34
– Poetica 2 Hill Farmstead Brewery 4.28
– Poetica and Poetica 1 From Hill Farmstead Brewery, tie 4.27
– DDH Timbo Pils From Highland Park Brewery 4.17
– Palatine Pils From Suarez Brewery 4.17
From The World’s Best Pilsner, According to Untappd Ratings
Context: Pilsner Urquell 3.37, Budvar 3.30, GABF Czech-style Pilsner winner Reality Czech from Moonlight Brewing 3.78, GABF German-style winner Haha Pils from Arbeiter Brewing 3.76
BEER NAME OF THE WEEK
Scientists in New Zealand have named a crustacean after Fork & Brewer, a Wellington brewpub, after it won a competition held among seven breweries at the 10th International Crustacean Congress.
Pentaceration forkandbrewer is a marine isopod found off the east coast of New Zealand.
The beer was inspired by low country boil-ups in the American southeast. Potatoes and flaked corn were mashed in with the grain “to give a clean fermentable”, said head brewer Brayden Rawlinson (pictured at the top). At the end of the boil, prawns were added to infuse the beer, which Rawlinson said was reminiscent of an Oyster Stout. The beer was also infused with creole seasoning steeped in bourbon whiskey.
FROM BLUESKY
Mike Zoller wrote: “One noticeable thing at FoBAB* yesterday was the lack of activity on X. Typically the board is full of scrolling posts but yesterday it was the same 2-3 people and their same posts over and over.”
* FoBAB is The Festival of the Wood and Barrel-aged Beer in Chicago.
I would just point out that both the planet Earth and a cat’s eye marble are spheres.
So big craft would be the Earth and little craft a marble? That’s better than using the term “nano” brewery (meaning one-billionth the size).