I selected the Audacity of Hops in part because of the 50th anniversary of the Judgement of Paris. I read Dathan and Jen’s recent recreation experience and it got me inspired. When I was teaching the Wake Tech program as part of the introduction I did a basic review of craft beer history. While it doesn’t relate directly to craft beer, the Judgement of Paris and the Slow Food movement were to me always from the same cradle, a turn away from industrial food and drink and the beginnings of a more bespoke path we are on.
The Audacity of Hops by Tom Acitelli is a history of the craft beer movement. It starts with Fritz Maytag buying Anchor Brewing and ends in 2012 with Budweiser being sold to create InBev in 2012. I regularly consult it when writing to make sure I get my facts and timelines straight. It is easy to read and consists of four sections each containing many background and insights to the industry at that moment. Even though I have read it completely, interesting stories continue to jump out at me. For example “The national brewing community is asshole-free” is attributed to Paul Philippon, formerly the owner of Duck Rabbit Brewery, in 2004. While I knew the concept, I didn’t realize he had first said it.
Another Carolina chapter features Durham with discussion of Weeping Radish, Daniel Bradford and his work with All About Beer magazine. In that chapter Acitelli highlights great writers who took inspiration from Michael Jackson and are still helping tell craft beer stories today. The chapters are short so if you need something light for a commute or flight it will be perfect. If you are a craft beer enthusiast or just looking for a great read at the Beach this is the book for you.
Brewers Association is pushing 2D bar codes or more commonly referred to as QR codes. They have been around since 1994. I have been experimenting with them for over a decade. Supply seems greatly outweighs the demand from the public or vendors in general for their use.
I first played with them at beer festivals, I would announce on social media a ‘secret menu’. If you scanned the QR code I’d have a growler of a special release hidden in our cooler for the public to sample, but I never poured a drop. Either the public didn’t know or simply didn’t care, far more interested in enjoying the festival than playing with their phone. At another brewery we went so far as to include them on the can label, but again the public wasn’t using them. I would bring up that at a weekly meeting we should discuss those numbers but they were never mentioned. The person who had proposed the idea was very into technology but the results weren’t worth mentioning.
That is not to say they can’t be useful in the brewing world. Often bags of malt will have a Certificate of Analysis (COA). QR codes are very for pulling a COA up to study and potentially save for record keeping for Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP). While not required for traditional brewing but as NA beer and other non-alcoholic beverages (THC seltzer) are becoming more common it’s a necessary practice. The other area I have found them of use was keg tracking. With the right software you can see a keg’s status, location, and maintenance history but in a more practical sense I found it an excellent backup to the kegging log. In the kegging log we would record the beer, batch, and how many and size(s) of kegs were used in a batch. It was a paper log that I’d enter into our production database regularly. Occasional I would note a batch would be finished, but the yield was low. I’d check our keg tracking software and discover kegs that hadn’t made it into the log.
Much like 3D televisions, those offering the technology are pushing more than the market is demanding it. But I suspect we will see great adaptation over time, just not from a consumer perspective.
Back to August 2013, when I reflected to a year of working at a brewpub. It’s definitely more a social interaction as a role rather the production environment. I compared the brewhouse to Mercedes Benz and while German built it had certain quirks that made it unique. The system used a step mash rest on many of the beers, it involves start the mash (think oatmeal mixture) at a lower temperature and over time raising it. In today’s era of well modified grains it doesn’t have the necessity except for wheat beers. It was a fun system mostly automated valves. To learn it I mapped each valve and location, then sat down in the brewpub and reviewed all the brewing steps and how they would proceed through the system. I took that list and map up to the brewdeck and by the third brew I had memorized it.
Time passes so quickly, I knew my one year mark as Pub Brewer was approaching but it zipped past this week. It seems then a fitting time to write a post on what I have learned.
Production and Pub brewing are different animals, while production may have tours occasionally, a Pub Brewer is a public face to the beer. Tours and talking with people with questions is a regular requirement. Who knew giving tours of the Capitol so many years ago would have prepared me for this task. At times I can delve into brewing minutiae but most folks want the basics and be entertain on the ride. This interaction is not just limited to customers, but there is a constant cycle of trying to get restaurant staff trained on the house beers, brewing process, and other basics. So if you don’t enjoy the education aspect of brewing I would suggest a production environment is better suited to ones skills.
In previous jobs there were always smart folks around. I could ask for a second opinion and get feedback, but in the brewpub it all ends with me. It’s not to say my supervisors aren’t very helpful and supportive, but they are more than an hour away so if I am in the middle of a problem it’s up to me to diagnose and solve it. This may be the best part of the job, it can be frustrating but the joy of solving a puzzle is fun, heck it may be as joob as the brewing.
As for the brewing it has been a fun and challenging year, first I taught myself how the system worked. My favorite comparison is that the brewhouse is like a Mercedes Benz, it runs like a dream, but if you try to start it in 3rd it will kick you. We made a couple repairs when I started so it won’t be another few weeks until I hit a year brewing on the system, but then my numbers will be pretty close to the project 600 barrels a year on the system. I would perhaps brew more in a production environment but I don’t know if it would be as much fun. This year if the numbers continue on the current track I’ll probably brew more.
(Summation) hard work, odd hours, but more enjoyable than other.
Never got to 600 in the year, but I was on to the next job about four months later. The company stopped brewing operations at the location and left equipment as showpiece. They never bothered to even pull the grain from it’s storage space such the waste.
Congratulations to Tidal Creek Brewhouse on their 6th anniversary. I was aware of them, but haven’t the opportunity to visit yet, I’ll correct it next time.
North Carolina
Western NC
Both Highland Brewing and AMB get shout outs in the latest edition of Brewer magazine. The interview with Leah is great because it examines the challenges of reshaping their space into a destination location.
Triangle
Wanting to invest in a brewery and potentially make money back, Gizmo Brew Works is seeking investors. It’s no secret that they filed for Chapter 11 protection a while back and hopefully this program will help get them back on their feet.
Vicious Fishescloses their Cary location with that being their production space, what does it mean for Angier their last location? Since it doesn’t feature regular taproom hours I suspect a full closure looming.
Mordecai Beverage Company is also closing. It has always struck me as funny when the media declare it as Raleigh’s first brewery and bottle shop, which simply wasn’t true. Around 11 years ago the first one opened where I was working. I was against the concept, because we would never have as many options as a Total Wine a half mile away and it made sales more difficult because bottle shops rightly thought we were competition. Within 6 months we closed the bottle shop portion and remained a brewery. Perhaps it amuses me because the first person who wrote about Mordecai as a bottle shop and brewery had written an article at Compass opening that made it a major point to mention it and forgot their own words. That doesn’t mean the concept doesn’t work, Glass Jug Beer Lab has had success with it. But I think it’s because Chris and Katy built their brand and later added the brewing component into the mix.
This weekend features South Coast Grand Opening party and Joymongers 10th Anniversary, check out all the fun at events.
Back to a post from 2013, recently I was at an industry event, an established friend in the industry asked for tips for a new guy we were chatting with and I went with this Trust Your Gut. Anytime I have ignored it’s hurt an outcome, anytime I paid attention it’s resolved it.
It is the one thing I have learned the last few years. If my gut reads something is wrong when I check invariably there is a problem that needs to be corrected.
Case in point I brewed a beer last week and a few minor things stick out in my mind looking back. That pump is running a little louder-harder than normal. The grain bed seemed to settle in a higher and odd position to normal. My gravity during mash out was lower than normal. We get our grain pre-milled, but the shipment didn’t get milled, or crushed, properly so when I went to empty the mash tun I discovered that fact. Looking back at all these little things they clued me in there was a problem but I didn’t know exactly what until it was too late. From now on I will double-check each bag of grain to make sure it has been milled. Thankfully it was the first of a two batch session so I was able to compensate on my next wort(batch) and even them out.
If you didn’t clean it, assume it is dirty.
If you didn’t check it, assume it didn’t get done.
In the end you have to remain mindful of your surroundings not just to get the job done right, but also safely.
Okay, I’m getting around to Hazy IPA, for as long as I’d been brewing I never made one until about 5 years ago. While not the biggest fan of the style, I drink them when out because I want to see what people are doing in the space.
Hazy IPA, or New England IPA, is described by BJCP as “An American IPA with intense fruit flavors and aromas, a soft body, smooth mouthfeel, and often opaque with substantial haze. Less perceived bitterness than traditional IPAs but always massively hop-forward.” Alchemist Heady Topper is often regarded as the originator of the style. The soft body comes from a good amount of oats and often wheat malt. The abv is between 6-9%. It’s golden to light amber in color, often in the orange range. As it mentions reduced bitterness comes rarely if any bittering addition, rather mostly a combination of late addition hopping in the kettle and dry hopping often during fermentation and post-fermentation.
Why are Hazy IPAs so damn expensive? A number of factors are at play. First the amount of hops being used. In your big national brand beer may use around .5 pound per barrel of beer (31 gallons), craft brewers have moved that needle closer to 1.5 pounds per barrel, then better examples of Hazy IPAs I have seen are using between 4-6 pounds per barrel. The next factor is the hops being used in these beers. Old school hops will average between $8-12 a pound depending on market conditions, newer hops (since 2010) are running around $13 to $15 a pound if not more. The last major factor is yeast, when the hops are added during fermentation, some of the hop oils will coat the yeast cells, reducing their ability to properly reproduce and ferment, so a fresh pitch is required after the use. Live yeast culture for a brewery can run hundreds of dollars per batch.
Hops: Dolcita, Citra, Mosaic plus Lupocore, Prysma
I’d been holding off this style spotlight until I could find this beer. Proceeds from the beer will go to ARCHR (Asheville Regional Coalition for Home Repair), which supports low-income families that are still rebuilding from the hurricane’s flood and destruction. But it wasn’t just Hi-Wire and NoDa collaborating, also Haas (hops), Country Malt Group, and Hart Print all donated ingredients and printing. It struck me as a solid IPA, with plenty of hop punch, but the body kept it quite drinkable. So if you see it, buy some and support Western NC recovery.
Dense white and resemblance of pale orange juice with an aroma that matches the nose. I’d like a bit more aroma on this beer. The flavor hints at dry tannic finish. It was the only can that had a date 5/11/26 so it was fairly fresh.
Hops: Freestyle Hops Co. Cold Pressed Hop Juice from New Zealand or Wai-iti, Superdelic & Nelson Sauvin
Dense white foam with pale gold color that almost looks like OJ that had been left in the refrigerator too long. Bright hop aroma in the nose. The flavor fell a bit flat like it was old or 100% hop extract. You need a portion of organic material from the hops to round out the hop oil, you can use as much as 75% replacement rate but in my experience I’d never go all oil. It leaves a point of confusion, because the Freestyle is what the Untappd listing describes for the beer, but the can itself had the later hops listed.
The deepest orange of the day’s beers and also the least murky in appearance. Strong hop aroma with notes of Citra. Also the most bitter of the days beers, but not in a bad way it more balanced it. Something about it reminded me of Sweet Tea, the beer almost bordered on a West Coast IPA.
Side note, I kept going back to OJ in descriptions, but I don’t really eat tropical fruit so admittedly my descriptors are a bit one note. Often descriptions will mention tropical fruit character. That’s why I keep trying to better understand Hazy IPA as a style. That’s all for today, but I am sure it’s a style we will return to again.
Start off the week Beervana has a history on Cascade hops. I didn’t know that Coors played such a big role in the hop’s growth. Not sure you can identify Cascade hops? Crack open a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale.
Latest edition of Southern Brewing News is out, the North Carolina section didn’t make the edition but South Carolina is there.
South Carolina
Over the weekend South Coast Beer Project had a soft opening and as of now they should be up and running, congratulations!
North Carolina
Brevard
In honor of the nation’s 250th birthday 5 area breweries will feature a Patriot pint program.
Triangle
The Bottles and Cans shop has done a rebranding into Taps and Social bottle shop. Good luck with the brand refresh.
In Raleigh there came news that Tobacco Road is closing their off Glenwood location, it’s been on the market for a while, the good news out of it is will reopen as Clouds Brewing downtown location. Their old location was across the street so people around there will be familiar with the concept. I am told they will be brewing some small batch projects at the location.
Last in events this week Bond Brothers Brewing will be having 10th anniversary party.
This week we go back to April of 2012 at Redhook a keg exploded while being cleaned. It inspired the article below. While plastic kegs do exist still they are generally one time use only and far safer than what was on the market then. It’s a good thing the industry has largely walked away from the reusable plastic kegs, they never had the durability of steel.
The number of brewers has risen from 2000 to now around 9000 so I think safety is still not given the priority it should to be but Master Brewers and Brewers Association have both stepped up and offer much better safety education than back then.
I was at brewery recently and asked where the Material Safety Data Sheet(MSDS) were for their chemicals. I was told they would have to call their chemical vendor for copies. I know the vendor and as company policy they recommend that 2 copies be kept printed on site, 1 to take to the hospital in event, 1 to remain onsite. Last thing in event of accident is having to call your vendor asking for something you should already have onsite. So there is still work to do.
The Redhook tragedy this week resonates a major concern of mine in the brewing industry, Safety and Training issues. I have had the experience to work in a couple of industries and by far brewing more lax than most when it comes to these issues. Don’t get me wrong my boss believes in safety and makes it a priority, but when I bring up training and how they interrelate I get a blank stare.
These are not isolated events, I hear a story like this about once a month. I know a brewer who nearly took his head off when trying to prep a barrel improperly.
Brewing can be dangerous work and as an industry we need to do a better job watching out for each other. The current growth phase of craft beer makes these events likely to become more common rather than less. In 2008 we had 1,483 craft brewers, today we have at least 1,938 probably more since the Brewers Association did the total. So roughly 500 new breweries plus another 900 in the planning stage, but where did these people come from? What training did they get? Schools like Siebels and Davis can only train so many, but even then most graduating don’t get hands-on training. So roughly a quarter of the breweries in the US are using staff that are undertrained and may not be aware of all the safety issues at hand. Look at the ProBrewer forums and you will see how many head brewer positions asking for less than 5 years experience. Factor in the breakneck speed that craft beer is growing with people are buying larger tanks or often times inferior *cough*Chinese*cough* equipment. All this builds to Safety and Training issues potentially becoming a major industry blackeye over the coming years.
The Brewers Association could spend less effort on brewer’s profiles and play an important role in focusing attention on these important matters. Industry promotion and customer education are important topics. But a single panel on Safety at the CBC each year though isn’t nearly enough attention. There needs to be staff time dedicated to improve practices.
Breweries need to make this a priority, the Brewer’s Association needs to step up, and as brewers we need it to watch each other’s back. It is too important not to and in the long term it will help our industry’s success. Safety is too important to be left to chance.
We have work to do but overall we are in a better place than then.
Gruit, no it’s not some comic book movie hero, it’s a beer style. In the modern sense it’s a beer made without hops, it instead relies on spices and herbs to balance the sweetness from malt. While I discussed dying beer styles recently Gruit probably would top that list. I have perhaps seen 2-3 commercial examples over the last decade. Note I said modern because we start with Lars on the history of Gruit.
It’s commonly said that “gruit is the beer that was brewed before people started using hops,” and it’s fascinating how many errors there are in that short, simple sentence.”
Like many stories involving beer it goes back to taxation. Reinheitsgebot, beer purity? Not really, taxation and regulation definitely. Why do British ales tend to be low abv? Taxation and regulation. Hammurabi code? Same. But I had never seen this history on Gruit before and it was well worth the read.
The Triangle Business Journal has the news of the sale of the building that was home to Hatchet Brewing. The former building owners were great, I don’t think I have ever worked with a landlord who was so committed to helping a business succeed. They live in the neighborhood so seeing the space empty had to be painful. They are savvy folk so when the right buyer came along it made sense to sell.
Follow up on last month’s story of Cabarrus Brewing signing to a state wide distribution contract. The owner confirmed they signed with Johnson Brothers. What this means is they can focus more on brewing and sales. Cabarrus is surely in grocery stores around Charlotte, but this will allow them to expand to further markets without becoming a trucking company.
Asheville
Sierra Nevada to test sell Shred, a beer soda, at their brewery taprooms. At first I couldn’t wrap my head around the idea but as Beeraficionado points out, if you think it terms of a Shandy or Radler suddenly the concept makes sense.
Mills River Brewinghosted its 2nd annual Cheese and Pickle Festival Saturday. Beer, Cheese and Pickles sounds like a winner to me.
Sandhills
Back to the Sandhills, Railhouse Brewery is coming to Southern Pines. They are taking over the former Southern Pines Brewing Pennsylvania taproom. This will be a great opportunity for Head Brewer Jason Hull to play with specialty brews as the location features more taps than the original restaurant location. Can’t wait to see what he dreams up.
I was shopping at my local grocery store recently when I noticed Carolina BreweryBBQ sauce on the shelf, now this is nothing new for them. But it did get me thinking about brand extensions or copacking it’s sometimes referred to in the industry. Beyond the usual brewery swag (i.e. hat, tshirt, or coaster) it’s something that promotes brand awareness outside of the beer aisle. I don’t count the other brands of products like THC seltzer in this, because often you have to pay very close attention to the label to realize it’s the producer’s product.
I have been struggling to come up with examples that are Carolina based. But interestingly there are two more based here in Pittsboro. BMC Brewing or Bite My Cookies has always had that aspect part of their brand since founding. They take spent grains from the brewing process and make cookies that they sell in their taproom. Owner John Rice commented on a tour that formulating the cookies does take some experimentation, because since the spent grain has no sugars left the recipe needs to be balanced to make for a tasty treat.
Just across the promenade from BMC is Fair Game Beverage Co. While they make distilled spirits, they have taken a similar path with Apple Brandy filled Chocolates. In their case they do have a partner that makes the chocolates for them.
Mother Earth Brewing has taken the concept as far as a branded hotel. It may be my favorite example of the bunch. Kinston is a drive from most of the Carolinas, so setting up the Mother Earth Motor Lodge means you can have a great time at the brewery and not have to worry about driving home. The retro feel of the place is a nice touch of kitsch. Add in a mini golf, a pool and table games it makes for a great family destination.
What interesting brand extensions have you found in the beer world? Share in the socials.
