SABMiller, Lost Abbey ’round table’

Tomme ArthurIf you haven’t already read Fortune magazine’s interview with SABMiller CEO Graham Mackay then you don’t have to hurry over to the CNN Money site to do so, because …

Only on the Internet could you have the brewer from Lost Abbey Brewing and the CEO of the world’s second largest brewer in a round table discussion (OK, with two guys maybe the table isn’t round). And only when Tomme Arthur (Lost Abbey) is blogging. (He, not Mackay, is the one pictured here.)

Arthur has taken the interview and added his own comments along with Mackay’s. For example:

How would you characterize the company’s fiscal year just ended?

The SAB Miller Answer- The year gone by has been very successful. Latin America was amongst the strongest regions of growth, but Europe was as impressive. And we also had very strong volume growth in Asia, so our performance all around is strong.

Tomme Responds- Well, we’re still in business after our first year. I think that’s pretty kick ass. We made a bunch of new beers and we didn’t kill anybody. As for Latin America, it was our weakest region but Europe was awesome.

How do you think this would have gone had Matthew Boyle (the Fortune writer who did the interview) had started with Arthur and invited MacKay to elaborate in MacKay’s blog? Oh, wait, he doesn’t have one.

Pucker up for the Great American Beer Festival

Beer judgeThe Great American Beer Festival has added two more categories – actually one category and one sub-category – for sour beers in the 2007 competition.

American-Style Sour Ales will compete with German-Style Sour Ale (Berliner Weisse) in Category 13. Wood- and Barrel-Aged Sour Beer (Category 16) “is aged with the intention of imparting the particularly unique character of the wood, the micro flora present in the wood and/or what has previously been in the barrel.”

Would you call that beer terroir?

Changes and additions for the competition at listed at the GABF website (scroll down to “Letter from the Competition Director”). They include both “small” and “big” beers. A category was added for Other Low Strength Ale or Lager, basically balancing Other Strong Ale or Lager. And the Imperial Stout category now includes a sub-category for American-style Imperial Stout.

Director Chris Swersey’s letter detailing the changes is interesting for another reason.

As long as I’ve been going to the GABF (only 14 years) there’s always been sniping about brewers making special batches for the competition, with added pop (more alcohol, more hops) to stand out in the blind judging. That’s the background. Here’s the message.

During the past four years, the style descriptions for the American-style pale ale family of beer styles have evolved to the point that the essential differences reflect alcoholic strength more than any other single quality. We have received numerous comments from brewers, judges, and consumers, which indicate that there is confusion regarding the alcoholic strength of beers entered in particular categories, with respect to the brand name of the beers themselves. For example, a brewery could intentionally under-enter a strong pale ale in the pale ale category, with the idea that the beer might outclass the competition.

The GABF has no intention of policing entries for compliance by alcoholic strength. Analyzing entries is impractical and expensive, and more importantly, this role would subvert the function of the judge panel. Over the years, the judge panel has told us what makes great beer, and we plan to continue to let them. With this in mind, the judge orientation this year will include a taste calibration session that focuses on alcoholic strength, along with a reiteration of the comments that we have received regarding alcoholic strength. Please be sure to enter your beers in the appropriate category based on alcoholic strength as well as other factors.

That pretty much speaks for itself.

10 years of Falling Rock

Chris BlackDon Younger is going to stop by. Will you?

Granted, Younger – the venerable Portland, Oregon, publican who founded the Horse Brass Pub in 1976 – has his own stool at Falling Rock Tap House in Denver, but he seldom uses it in June.

He’ll be in Denver this week because Falling Rock celebrates its 10th anniversary.

The circumstances will be grander than when the multi-tap (69-75 tap handles operating, depending on the day, and “No Crap on Tap”) opened June 9, 1997. Chris Black (above), one of three founding brothers, didn’t realize that many of the distributors would deliver beer warm, so the bar was open for about four hours that day, then closed to organize and cool beer for the next day.

Black has different special beers planned for each days the celebration, and Belvedere Belgian Chocolate Shop is creating different chocolates to go with each beer. The first 50 customers each evening get a bar with a label that list the participating brewery as well as how many days the Falling Rock has been open.

Chris BlackThe beers are all locally brewed, and Black helped in production of several. For instance, Saturday he’ll be pouring a batch of La Foile he helped blend. New Belgium Brewing typically uses beer from two or three of its 10 foders (four 60- and six 130-hectoliter wood tuns) for a La Foile release. Black sat down with Eric Salazar of New Belgium to taste samples from all 10 tuns, and together they came up with a special batch.

The party kicks off the day before with Mr. Hoppy, made by Twisted Pine Brewing in Boulder. Gordon Knight founded Twisted Pine, where he brewed on New Belgium’s original five-hectoliter brewhouse. He later sold the company, but eventually was reunited with the brewing system when he started the Wolf Tongue Brewery in Nederland. That’s where he created Mr. Hoppy, a beer that Jim Parker (then the Wolf Tongue GM) called “hop water.”

There are a lot of reasons to post this at Appellation Beer (as opposed to Beer Travelers), but the best might be to remember Knight. He epitomized what I want to write about.

Knight was a Nebraska native who earned a Purple Heart as an Army helicopter pilot in Vietnam. He moved to Boulder in 1988, and soon turned from homebrewing to professional brewing. He also worked as a professional helicopter pilot, most often in fire fighting. He died in 2002 when his helicopter crashed while he was fighting a fire near Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado.

Reflecting on Knight’s life, brewer Brian Lutz said: “Gordon didn’t have jobs, Gordon had passions. Gordon’s job was his passion and visa versa. That’s a good way to live and I thank him for challenging me to do the same.”

Let’s hope a few Coloradoans with good memories raise a glass of Mr. Hoppy in his memory on Friday.

Just a few of the others beers:

– Great Divide’s Hades (strong, golden and Belgian) makes its official debut on Sunday.
– Black Triple 6’s from Wynkoop on June 12. This is a variation on a beer brewed 6/6/06 by Wynkoop, which Chris helped make this time. Brewed in the manner of a Belgian tripel but with coffee in the recipe.
– Chris brewed a batch of Odell Double IPA with Doug Odell on the brewery’s five-barrel pilot system for June 15. The recipe includes a new high alpha (18.8 AA) hop called Apollo.
– June 16, Avery Salvation (a Belgian strong golden) aged since September in Eagle Rare Bourbon barrels.

The celebration runs through June 17. Then we can start resting up for the 20th anniversary of San Francisco’s Toronado in August.

Session #4 roundup posted

The SessionSnekse wraps up the fourth round of The Session, this one focusing on local beers.

Hitting the road this summer? Might want to check out Local Brews: A Field Guide before traveling.

Many of the contributors did more than offer a single tasting note on a beer that was available locally. You’ll find lots of excellent regional tips.

Session #4: I’ll have green chile with that

Chama River Class VI Golden

Corrales Bistro BreweryWhen we started The Session in March I was hoping each monthly host would not feel constrained to make the theme a particular beer style, so kudos to Snekse for making the June theme Drink Local.

If New Mexico has a state beer adjective it is hoppy, and the state beer style would be India Pale Ale. As I headed down the hill from my house to the Corrales Bistro Brewery for lunch, conversation with my friend Ron and a beer I was thinking “good day for an IPA.”

The temperature was nearing 80 – this is a great time of year in the Rio Grande Valley, with windy season mostly over and morning temperatures still in the 40s, lots of sun and afternoon highs looking at 90 – and I was looking forward to sitting out on the back deck with a clear view of the Sandia Mountains.

As I’ve written before, the most basic route to “downtown” Corrales takes me past the Milagro Winery, so you get a bonus picture of part of its vineyard. Mission grapes were first planted in Corrales in the 1880s, but most were gone by the 1930s. This vineyard was planted in 1985 with more traditional vinifera.

Milagro Winery

If you look at the menu board (above) you’ll note – as I did upon arriving – that no IPA is available. Sometimes the Bistro will have one from Turtle Mountain (up the hill in Rio Rancho), and sometimes from Chama River or Il Vicino (both in Albuquerque). No. 10 is blank because the keg of Turtle Mountain IPA ran dry.

The surprise was that the Bistro’s first brew was available. Understand that the brewery is not the top priority here – owner Fritz Allen wants to run a taproom featuring New Mexico beers, and you won’t find any other place with quite the cross-section of beers (all local) that the Bistro offers.

The brewery is a stitched together three-barrel system that doesn’t include a way – other than the help of nature – to control fermentation temperatures. That presents a brewing problem most places, but particularly in New Mexico. Thus, at the suggestion of Il Vicino brewer Brady McKeown (who lives in Corrales), Allen decided to started with a farmhouse ale brewed in the manner of a saison and with a yeast that likes higher temperatures.

He studied Phil Markowski’s Farmhouse Ales before tackling the project.

Simply called Summer Farm Ale, this beer is light in color and body and didn’t suffer in fermentation (no band aid!). It’s lightly spicy – the brewery serves it with a lime – though not brimming with yeast character.

The picture at the top is the other beer I drank, the Class VI Golden Lager from Chama River (simply called Helles on the board here). I’ve written about that beer before.

It went quite nicely with a pastrami and green chile sandwich wrapped into a tortilla.

I didn’t really mind the State Beer wasn’t available, but I sure as heck was going to have a basic local dish (the green chile, not the pastrami).