Your dad was into craft beer before you were and he has one of the best breweries around to prove it. He was the MacGyver of making drunk, the Mozart of all things malt. He could bottle a beer with one hand, seduce your mother with the other and still never spill a drop.
So hipsters, next time you’re belly up to the bar, scratching your beard and staring at the tap selection like it was an assortment of Levi’s skinny jeans, remember this…
Your dad knew beer before you did and you can taste his knowledge on your local tap by ordering a Bell’s.
Much Thanks to Laura B. for submitting Larry Bell of Bell’s Brewery.
I tip my cycling cap and raise a glass of Oberon to you sir. You brew a beer that reminds me of being home in Michigan.
Bing Grand Cru (Taken with instagram)
Great Lakes Dortmunder Gold (Taken with instagram)
Enjoying a @newbelgium Sahti (Taken with instagram)
Here are my Top 13 beers I am looking forward to this year at Winterfest. I was shooting for Top 10 but there is just so many interesting offerings that I just pulled a Big 10 and kept going.
Barley Island
Barrel-Aged Muscles From Brussels | Belgian Black IPA
12.0% ABV 80 IBU firkin tent
A strong Belgian dark ale with a mix of dark malts and Belgian candi sugar in
the kettle. 4 different hops featuring Citra and Amarillo. Aged in a Buffalo Trace
Distillery bourbon whiskey barrel for 10 months.
Bier
Problem Child IPA | American IPA
7.3% ABV 90 IBU 1.072 OG on tap
2006 Beer Geek Challenge Winner Sean Tucker joined Bier to brew his winning
IPA that was never brewed commercially.
Brooklyn Brewing
Local 2 | Belgian-inspired Strong Dark Ale
9.0% ABV
Our special Belgian yeast adds hints of spice to the dark fruit, caramel, and
chocolate flavors. After 100% bottle re-fermentation, the beer reveals a marvelous dry complexity, enjoyable by itself or at the dinner table.
Boulevard
Tank 7 Farmhouse Ale | Saison / Farmhouse Ale
8% ABV 38 IBU 17.3 OG bottle
Most breweries have at least one piece of equipment that’s just a bit persnickity.
Here at Boulevard we have fermenter number seven, the black sheep of our cellar family. Ironically, when our brewers were experimenting with variations on 17
a traditional Belgian-style farmhouse ale, the perfect combination of elements
came together in that very vessel. You could call it fate, but they called it Tank 7,
and so it is. Beginning with a big surge of fruity aromatics and grapefruit-hoppy
notes, the flavor of this complex, straw-colored ale tapers off to a peppery, dry
finish.
Figure Eight Brewing
Ro Shampo | Imperial Red Ale
7.5% ABV on tap
Brewed with four varieties of hops and a blend of 6 malts, this is well balanced
with a nose that evokes thoughts of toffee, fine whisky, and cotton candy while
finishing with the satisfaction of a taffy apple on a warm autumnal day.
Goose Island
Pere Jacques | Belgian Style Abbey Ale
8% ABV 26 IBU bottle
Brewed with loads of malt and Belgian yeast, Pere Jacques is a wonderfully
fruity, malty ale. Pere Jacques’ complex flavors stand shoulder to shoulder with
the Belgian Dubbels enjoyed in the world’s finest beer bars. At the dining table
it’s the perfect alternative to a glass of vintage port.
Big Boris Barleywine | American Barleywine
9.12% ABV 70 IBU firkin tent
Our own cult classic, Big Boris sports subtle changes in each year’s brew. This
year’s version was brewed with pale and crystal malts and hopped with Chinook.
Aged for a full 6 months prior to serving, this year’s brew bursts with ripe fruit
flavors followed by a firm bitterness and a touch of alcohol warmth. Great
today, should be much better in 5 or 10 years- if we can wait that long!
New Albanian
C2 | Smoked Belgian Dark Strong Ale
10.7% ABV 20 IBU on tap
New Albanian, O’Fallon and Schlafly collaboration served at the NABC Booth
circa 17:00. C2 is a malt-forward bomb of a beer, with the batch split into 33
various wine casks for aging. Two of the wine casks are Missouri-built, and spent
five years in Napa Valley aging Silver Oak Cabernet. The other two wine casks
are Kentucky-built and have been at the Huber Winery in Southern Indiana
aging various Ports for the last 12 years.
Once fresh fig season arrived in September 2010, a portion of figs were smoked
and then the figs were split up and added to one of each of the two varietals
of wine casks. The barrels have aged eight months total, and the batch will be
blended back together in early January to age a short time together before being
packaged for draft.
C2 will be released in mid-January or thereabouts. There are only 8 bbl of C2,
so it will be an extremely limited release.
People’s Brewing
Aberrant Amber | American Amber/IPA
5.5% ABV 48 IBU on tap
American Style Amber with an twist. We started with a classic Extra Special
Bitter, 22% Caramalt giving it an Amber hue. We then added a large addition of Amarillo and Centennial hops for the bittering and dry hopped with
Amarillo, giving it notes of grapefruit and tangerine. The complexity of the
malts and hops in this beer make it a great ale for anyone who loves flavor.
Sun King
Cuvee de Sun King | Flemish Brown Ale
5.3% ABV 23 IBU on tap
Our first ever sour, Cuvee de Sun King was aged in Oak barrels for 6 months
with three unique Belgian souring bacteria. It is tart, crisp and delicious.
Walking on the Sun | Chile Cream Ale
5.3% ABV 20 IBU on tap
Walking on the Sun is our cream ale that was infused with a combination of
Jalapeno, Habanero and Ghost peppers for a uniquely spicy drinking sensation.
Upland
Lambics | Belgian-style Lambic
Our lambics start with a turbid mash of unmalted wheat, are fermented with
Brett and lactic bacteria, and aged in oak for over a year. Whole fruit, sourced
locally whenever possible, is added to impart enticing aromas and flavors. After
aging several more months, we bottle condition it for a zesty carbonation.
Dantalion | Dark Wild Ale
Dantalion is the result of an experiment in the darker regions of sour brewing. It
is a dark brown, mysterious Brettanomyces-fermented brew, with a light blend
of spices that reveals highlights of citrus and licorice. Aged in oak for approximately 18 months and bottle conditioned.
Also Great Fermentations is doing some experimenting with Blichmann’s Hop Rocket, using different hops to infuse some beer with, should be pretty cool
New Belgium 2010 La Folie (Taken with instagram)
[video]
Last of the Triplet Vanilla Porter (Taken with instagram)
I just finished putting my first keg to rest in the new keezer. This will also be my first successful all-grain batch. Let me backup.
This past November, I set out to produce my first all-grain batch. I came up with a recipe for an English Northern Brown Ale. My first of many problems occured when I purchased my cooler that would become my mash/lauter tun.
The problem was simple. The cooler simply didn’t have enough insulation. It couldn’t maintain a temp to save its life. Over an hour it could lose as much as 14 degrees. This should have been a red flag right away, but I chalked it up to human error and bad instruments.
I pressed on with brew day and soon knew I had a couple of problems. For one, I wasn’t hitting mash temps, no surprise there. Second, my SG readings where appallingly low. Degratatated, as my wife and I like to say, I finished out the day and put the brew into the fermentor, hoping something resembling beer would come out.
I could have done a couple things when I realized I was having some problems. Adding some DME to the boil would have helped beef up the wort and make up for the problems during the mash. However, anyone who has been apart of a brew day, especially one where you are trying something new, will know; it’s easy to lose your head.
I wanted to make sure I monitored the progress of fermentation so I could see where this beer was headed toward. During the birth of my daughter, I had acquired some syringes that had these really long small gauge tubes that connected to them. How I got them is another story and not related, nor interesting. I game up with the genius idea of putting the long tube into the fermentor, keeping it in the second port of my carboy cap. All I had to do was come by, hook up a syringe, take a sample, then take a reading. Seemed like a great idea at the time. Then I saw this.
This was my first time seeing an infection and I was just shocked. I decided to take up the mantra of the modern day homebrewer and relaxed, tried not to worry, and had a homebrew. I decided that I should just bottle it and see what came out the other end. To make an already long story short, it wasn’t good. I ended up dumping the whole thing.
After that disaster, I decided to do a couple of things. The first was replace my cooler. I went with the clear choice by most members on homebrewtalk.com and got a Coleman Xtreme. It has nice thick walls to keep temps steady during mash. I always got a smaller cooler than my previous one so I wouldn’t have a lot of extra headspace where heat could be loss.
I also doubled my efforts with sanitation. I didn’t worry about taking any readings until I was ready to package the beer. I gave the yeast a good four weeks to do what they do and didn’t think about it.
I know have a Pale Ale racked to a keg that is very promising. It is still too early to put a final stamp on it, but all signs point to a solid product. The lost Brown Ale served as a good reminder that I need to slow down and think about what I am doing in all aspects of brewing. From purchasing equipment, performing a mash, or taking readings, there are a lot of areas where one bad decision could cost you a batch. The feeling of dumping an entire batch of beer is something that sticks with you. I don’t intend to relive that experience again.
Pietra De Noël (Taken with instagram)