A Recap of San Diego Beer Week
The first-ever San Diego Beer Week is now history, and it was a major success. The ten-day event featured 300 beer events, with more than 40 area breweries taking part.
Beer Week was sponsored by the San Diego Brewers Guild. Colby Chandler, the Guild’s president, said:
Our first Beer Week was a great success and I am proud of the way our brewing community came together to pull it all off….In 10 days, we managed to host more than 55 beer dinners, 30 cask nights, 25 meet-the-brewers, and so many other unique events. I know that Beer Week is only going to improve going forward.
If you missed out on this year’s event, circle November 5, 2010, on your calendar. That’s when next year’s Beer Week kicks off.
Hat tip to the crew at Karl Strauss for the write up and to Sean-o for posting it at 2 Beer Guys Beer Blog
Time Out for Travel
Several travel-related stories landed in Ludwig’s inbox over the weekend. Marika Josephson of the Carbondale Craft Beer Examiner took a day-trip to Charleville Winery and Brewery. The route from Carbondale to Ste. Genevieve runs through Chester, IL, the birthplace of E.C. Segar, who created Popeye and the home of the “Popeye Character Trail.”
Another Beer Examiner correspondent, Halina Zakowicz, takes us to the world’s most expensive pub. After 9/11, the authorities moved the Great Dane Pub in the Madison, WI, airport beyond the security gate. Now a brew will cost you five bucks, plus a $150 (or more) for the plane ticket. The good news is you still don’t need a boarding pass to get into Great Dane’s downtown location.
On the other side of the pond, Boak & Bailey’s Beer Blog explores the pubs in Highgate, in north London. Maryanne and Paul are pretty sure they’ve been to both the Prince of Wales and the Angel Inn, and are busily rummaging through their travel notes to find what ales they had there.
The Friday Mash
Joshua Kay of the Ann Arbor Craft Beer Examiner reviews the Jolly Pumpkin Cafe and Brewery…..The Brooklyn Brewery received a grant from the State of New York which will allow it to expand its on-premise capacity from 8,000 to 50,000 barrels….The latest art-related post on the Brookston Beer Bulletin features English artist George Moreland and his depiction of “alehouse politicians.”…The folks at Brewvana answer a burning culinary question: what is the proper beer pairing for Rocky Mountain oysters?…Finally, as if you needed any more reason to visit Portland, the Oregonian’s John Foyston provides a rundown of establishments that offer games. Not just darts and pub trivia, but Skee-Ball, which Paul excelled at in his formative years.
Beer, The Pilgrims, and Thanksgiving
We’re sure a lot of you are serving beer with Thanksgiving dinner. Which is what the Pilgrims likely did as well. Most of us are familiar with William Bradford’s famous diary entry about cutting their trip short and landing at Plymouth because the Mayflower was running out of beer. But what did they drink? This is where Beer historian Bob Skilnik comes in. According to Skilnik, the Pilgrims didn’t drink “small” beer, as has often been reported, but drank strong “ship’s beer,” which we’d call “high-gravity” or even “extreme.” He also contends that the Mayflower’s crew hadn’t really run out of beer. They were hoarding it for the trip back to England.
Hat tip: Tom Cizauskas at Yours for Good Fermentables.
The ABV Arms Race Escalates
U.K.-based BrewDog has laid claim to having brewed the most potent beer of all time. Their creation, called Tactical Nuclear Penguin, checks in with an an ABV of 32 percent, beating the previous record of 31 percent held by German beer brand Schorschbraer. BrewDog describes the beer as an “uber-imperial stout” (how long before the GABF adds this style to the competition?).
How do you make a 32-percent ABV beer? BrewDog explains:
This beer began life as a 10% imperial stout 18 months ago. The beer was aged for 8 months in an Isle of Arran whisky cask and 8 months in an Islay cask making it our first double cask aged beer. After an intense 16 month, the final stages took a ground breaking approach by storing the beer at -20 degrees for three weeks to get it to 32%.
For the big chill the beer was put into containers and transported to the cold store of a local ice cream factory where it endured 21 days at penguin temperatures. Alcohol freezes at a lower temperature than water. As the beer got colder BrewDog Chief Engineer, Steven Sutherland decanted the beer periodically, only ice was left in the container, creating more intensity of flavours and a stronger concentration of alcohol for the next phase of freezing. The process was repeated until it reached 32%.
Five hundred 1/3-liter bottles of Tactical Nuclear Penguin will be sold. Half of them will be sold for £30. The other half will be sold as a package deal for £250, with will include one share in BrewDog company stock. The brewery aims to raise £2.3m to build a new eco-friendly, carbon-neutral brewery in Aberdeen.
Two For the Road
The United Kingdom has some 500 brewpubs, and visiting them would drain most beer travelers’ energy–not to mention their budget. So lift a glass to Georgia Brown, a travel writer at The Guardian. She’s put together a list of the Ten Top UK Brewpubs. These establishments are located in places like Oxford, Bury St Edmunds, and Brighton; oddly, nary a one can be found in London.
Closer to home, the Make Mine Potato food blogger did some Colorado beer touring with his two-year-old daughter. She appears in the photo gallery along with the fermenting tanks, bottling lines, and beer samples.
Beer Hunting in Toronto
Maryanne and Paul’s first article in All About Beer was about one of their favorite cities, Toronto. They’ve been back a number of times since then, and can’t wait to return. Their appetite for a return trip was further whetted by Alan McLeod’s account of his recent visit, which took him to the Queen and Beaver and Cafe Volo. Come to think of it, they’ve got C$100 sitting in a jar, waiting to accompany them on their next trip across the border. That could pay for quite a few pints.
2009 Utopia
Boston Beer Company has released their 2009 Utopia. The world’s strongest beer comes in at a whopping 27 percent alcohol by volume so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the recommended serving size is two ounces.
Point/Counterpoint (Hops Department)
The other day, The Zythophile directed his wrath at beer writers who propagate false information about the history of hops. He’s back, this time trying to set the record straight. Why did it take 9,000 years or so after brewing began for brewers to start using hops? That, he says, is “one of the great unanswered questions in the history of beer.” Nevertheless, he combs through the historical evidence and offers us “A Short History of Hops.” It’s a fact-filled account, with cameo appearances by Hildegard of Bingen, Richard Fuggle, and a “Mr Golding of Malling.” Worth the read.
Ghosts in the Steel City
Lew Bryson, who’s touring the Keystone State for a fourth edition of Pennsylvania Breweries, laments the closing of two Pittsburgh breweries, Iron City Brewing Company and Penn Brewing. Both brands are contract-brewed elsewhere in the state, but Lew is worried that Penn might disappear.
Update #1 from Lew (11/23/09): Penn Brewing owner Tom Pastorius and a group of investors have finalized a deal to buy the brewery, which means that brewing may return to the Steel City and the restaurant may reopen.
Update #2 (11/24/09): Lew now says that the local papers are now reporting that Penn Brewery could be open again in January. Our fingers (and Ludwig’s paws) are crossed.