25April2010: Beer linkorama

Before moving on to beer-related links here’s one about one of my favorite topics I try not to bore you with too often: the state of journalism.

The synopsis: 18 years ago a librarian penned a tongue in cheek “survey” about librarians and sex for a humor column in a library bulletin. Nearly two decades he’s retired and blogging. Blog readers suggest he publish the “survey” again. Now it’s being treated as new news (it is neither) by bloggers and more traditional media alike. Will Manley has stirred up craziness on many levels, and it seems to still be growing tentacles in the blog world, on Facebook and everywhere else. So here’s one of his questions:

Here’s what really blows my mind. The newspapers are following the lead of the bloggers in presenting this story. In other words professional journalists are getting their news from blogs that may or may not be reliable. Don’t they care that this survey was a tongue in cheek attempt at humor? Does this worry you about the news industry and journalists in general?

Back to (mostly) booze:

  • Bill at It’s Pub Night in Portland examines “The Bomber Price Penalty.” He doesn’t pull any punches, concluding “The fact that no other product is priced with a volume penalty instead of a volume discount leads me to believe that bomber pricing is simply a swindle.” He backs this up with numbers, comparing bomber prices to a six-pack equivalents.
  • And because Oregon has a beer blogging culture as rich as the beer scene Patrick at the Oregon Economics Blog riffs on Bill post by examining Beeronomics: Non-Linear Pricing. Put on your thinking cap and learn about high demanders (probably you when it comes to beer), low demanders and how high demanders may benefit from price discrimination.
  • Beer styles. Still in Oregon, Jon Abernathy examines indigenous American beer styles, linking to this from Mario Rubio and “600 Words About Beer Styles” by Brian Hunt of Moonlight Brewing in California.
  • Beer history. Ron Pattinson compares brewery output in in London and Vienna in 1865. “Of course, Vienna’s breweries were later overshadowed by those of Bohemia and Bavaria. Their role in the development of European brewing, in particular the spread of bottom-fermentation, has been largely forgotten. Much as the Viennese style of amber Lager has retreated into obscurity.”
  • More connecting the dots. Brewers on the continent, particularly in Belgium and even more particularly those who brew and blend lambics, often lament the growing appeal of sweet drinks. Yvan De Baets put it quite succinctly in Brew Like a Monk: “One of the main goals of Belgian brewers should be to fight against the Coca-Cola flavors and those kind of gadget tastes. We should be about cultural tastes, not animal tastes.” This link is a couple of months old — some items get bookmarked and not read for a while, sorry — but Salon gets right to the point in Sugar high: Why your food is getting sweeter. Bottom line: “Regardless of everything we have learned, however, our food just keeps getting sweeter and more sugary.”
  • Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition. This review calls Daniel Okrent’s book “the most persuasive and best-documented explanation as to why and how America decided to ban alcohol.” And you thought all he knew about was fantasy baseball.
  • For the record. The best place to be in America on Saturday was not Munster, Indiana. It was in New Orleans for Jazzfest. The festival continues next week, but getting a room will be a challenge because a big convention is also in town: it’s Digestive Disease Week. I imagine they chose New Orleans for the restaurants.

    • Beer magazines, circa 1994

    BeeR the MagazineInspired (again) by “The 5 Most Boring Topics in all of Beer Journalism” here’s a glimpse at what appeared in three magazines at the end of 1994.

    I picked 1994 because BeeR the Magazine was new (and not long for this world) and because many the breweries that claim a lot more ink (or bandwidth) these days than do the founding pioneers weren’t yet in business. Although they are deserving, I didn’t include brewspapers (such at Celebrator, Ale Street News and the Brewing News family) because our archives were destroyed in the Flood of ’06.

    All About Beer, BeeR and American Brewer were then the big three of glossy magazines. About the time BeeR died Beer Connoisseur I passed through town (lasting not even as long as BeeR). These days, of course, we have DRAFT, Beer Connoisseur (unrelated to V1.0), Beer Advocate and Beer Magazine, plus Imbibe offering regular beer features. You’ll spot many of these on the top row at Barnes & Noble or Borders, safely out of the reach of children. (American Brewer lives on, by the way. It always targeted the beer trade but in the 1990s also served information-thirsty beer newcomers.)

    ALL ABOUT BEER (November)

    Features
    * Born to Brew – A look inside the brewing dynasties.
    * Vietnamese Beers
    * Pubcrawling Toronto

    Columns
    * Michael Jackson’s Journal – Czechs & Balances.
    * Fred Eckhardt – Brewspeak: A Beginner’s Guide to Craft Beer.
    * Alan Eames – On Groaning Beer and Babies.
    * Byron Burch – Stylistically speaking, Oktoberfest.

    Departments
    These included news, homebrewing, Lucy Saunders on festival foods, collectibles, brewpub visits, book reviews and “Beer Talk.” The beers reviewed: Abita Amber, Labatt Blue, Purgatory Porter (it was spoiled), Redhook ESB, Berghoff Dark, Christoffel Blond, JJ Wainwright’s Select Lager, Red Tail Ale.

    BEER (November)
    That’s the cover at the top. BeeR was the brainchild of Bill Owens, who also published American Brewer. From the beginning Owens, himself a well known photographer, attracted very talented illustrators and photographers, although the magazine lasted only about a dozen issues.

    Table of Contents
    * A Question of Taste – A sensory exploration.
    * The Art Guys – Using beer stuff to create art.
    * The New Art of Ale – Randy Mosher on America’s innovative ales.
    * Smuggler’s Brews – Snagging a few pilsners in Iraq.
    * Garbage Pail Willie’s Last Great Batch – A story of homebrewed beer in Chicago.
    * Plastic, Fantastic Brewpub – Northwestern Brew-Pub & Cafe in Portland, Oregon.
    * Biere Au Naturel – Organic beer.
    * A Glass of Wendy – Written by Garrison Keillor (yes, that Garrison Keillor).
    * Proclaiming & Declaiming – Two Scottish musicians prefer stout.
    * Eat Me, I’m on Irish Time – Kelly’s Irish Times in Washington, D.C.
    * Das Münich Bierfest ist Goodt – Oktoberfest in Munich.
    * Germany’s Other Brewfest – Oktoberfest in Stuttgart.
    * Sing a Drinking Song – Beer at music festivals.
    * Europe on a Gallon a Day – Tips from Tim Webb.
    * A Really Cold One – Beer ice cream recipes.
    * Book Reviews
    * Michael Jackson – “On Meretricious Myths and the Sweet Taste of Truth.”
    * Homebrewing – Charlie Papazian.
    * Beer Festivals – Various reviews.

    AMERICAN BREWER

    Features
    * 1994’s Best Tap Handles
    * Financing on Tap – Tips for raising capital.
    * Reviving Cincinnati’s Brewing Heritage
    * Beer Engines in New England
    * Interview with Paul Shipman of Redhook. Headline “Dark Clouds Over Paradise.”
    * Rogue Ales in Japan
    * Star Union – An Illinois brewery reborn.
    * The Perennial Hop – In the American Northwest.
    * Music Festivals – A different story than in BeeR. Bill Owens sometimes asked writers to rework pieces to suit his two magazines.
    * Micro Goes Macro – Gordon Biersch.

    Departments
    Regular features included a column by Dick Cantwell (who still has a column in AB), a report on festivals, classified ads for brewing equipment, and BeerScopes (as stupid as the name implies).

    Category 23: Looking for harmony in beer

    Samuel Adams Longshot Homebrew Contest Category 23Perhaps it’s because I live in a state where Area 51 is famous, but Category 23 has an ominous ring to it. Particularly when you are asked to judge the category in a homebrew competition. Strange beers, experiments, successful and otherwise.

    This year the Samuel Adams LongShot American Homebrew Contest is all about Category 23. There will be no judging of pilsners, pale ales or stouts. Just beers that fit in Category 23 as defined by the Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP): “This is explicitly a catch-all category for any beer that does not fit into an existing style category. No beer is ever ‘out of style’ in this category, unless it fits elsewhere.”

    Not every beer entered need be crazy. This is the category where you’d enter a honey ale, for instance. But it is one where wild and inventive beers are welcome (a honey ale aged with wild yeast and wood chips). A bottle of Chocolate Chili Bock — released only to make a point and not for sale to the public and pictured above — accompanied the press release about the contest.

    “. . . as the years go on, the number of entries with unique ingredients that don’t fit into the first 22 traditional categories have multiplied,” Boston Beer founder Jim Koch said for the press release. “So why not channel all the creativity that we know is out there in the homebrewing community and see what they can come up with? My taste-buds are ready!”

    Boston Beer celebrates its 25th anniversary this year — today, in fact, because it was on Patriots’ Day 25 years ago that Koch began deliver beer. The Wall Street Journal had a story today, the Boston Globe last week.

    Maureen Ogle, author of “Ambitious Brew,” summed it up nicely in the Globe when she said Koch “remains innovative and he’s constantly experimenting. A lot of the other craft brewers lost sight of that when they expanded.”

    It seems fair to add the turn the LongShot contest has taken to a list that starts with Triple Bock (1993).

    Back to the contest. This isn’t like the knife fight in “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.” There are rules. You can read them here. What’s noteworthy, given plenty of discussion in the blogosphere about the proliferation of “beer styles” and beer evaluation in general is that a) Category 23 makes room for “beers without homes” (to steal a phrase from Tomme Arthur of Lost Abbey Brewing) without adding new categories and b) because of what’s central in judging this category.

    In part: “A harmonious marriage of ingredients, processes and beer. . . . The overall rating of the beer depends heavily on the inherently subjective assessment of distinctiveness and drinkability.”

    Isn’t that how we should assess all beers? Of course. It’s just more obvious when you aren’t focused on if a beer conforms to style guidelines.

    A few details

    * As in the past, three regional judging competitions will take place to narrow the entries down. Three finalists from each region (9 finalist total) will move on to a second round of judging.

    * The second round of judging will take place in Boston, with four finalists earning a trip to the 2010 Great American Beer Festival, where winners will be announced. The two winning beers will be brewed and distributed nationally.

    * Details are at the Samuel Adams website. After signing in, click on No. 4 on the right, then the Longshot logo.

    Brewers and their stainless steel

    “A brewery is no place for a Norwegian with a stainless-steel fetish because you can really blow your bank account.”

    From Mark Stutrud, founder of Summit Brewing in Minnesota. The Star Tribune article also quotes a 29-year-old grocery warehouse worker who aspires to be a fiction writer. If he’s stretched for cash, he said he’ll buy a cheaper non-malted alcoholic drink, rather than switch from craft beer to the standard stuff. “It’s an acquired taste, and it’s hard to go back.”