Silence

Sorry for the silence and the hiatus... but I've got secrets a-brewing... I'm working hard and studying for something, and soon enough, I'll let you all know what...

Meal Pairing: Rock Crab and Old Brown Dog

Today, Mere and I decided to have a bit of a dinner adventure. We walked down to the local asian food market and bought up 6 Rock Crabs. We brought 'em home, boiled 'em up, and ate bastards. They were tasty little buggers that didn't need any sort of seasoning or butter; they were succulent and buttery right out of the shell. Anyways, I inadvertently stumbled upon a great Food/Beer pairing in the process. 

About half way through the meal, I opened up a bottle of Smuttynose's Old Brown Dog Ale and poured it for the two of us to share. Just looking for a little something to quench my thirst, I was met with so much more. The mild roasty nature of the Old Brown brought out the buttery and salty notes of the crab and vice versa. Much like cilantro cuts sweetness, the bitterness of the beer opposes the sweet of the crab. Anyways, highly recommended pairing, although I might next time look towards something like the Ommegang Witte to give a bit of a lemon-y flavor to accent the crabs, and might also include an adjunct lager such as a corona in the broth to add some more sweet and salty notes.

Two Glass Beer Kits 1: Sam Adams

One of my new favorite hobbies has been searching out ways to make a  two-glass complete beer set for those new craft beer enthusiasts on a tight budget, with limited space, or you just would like to make wise purchases on brewery tours. The first and most obvious warning about this is you'll end up drinking at least one variety of beer from inappropriate glassware. My first stop on this brewery tour is a brewery we're all too familiar with - Sam Adams (a.k.a the Boston Beer Company.) Their Porter Street brewery sells many varieties of different glassware ranging from the standard American Tumbler/Pint glasses to their limited edition Utopias glasses that are coupon redeemable if you purchase a bottle. However, there are two glasses that I think make the case for a complete set.

First, the Sam Adams "Perfect Pint" Glass. While there is a lot of advertising devoted to this glass, I'm pleased to say it's for a good reason. This glass is fantastic! We have two of these and they get used almost every time someone enjoys beer here. The mechanics of this beer glass are actually quite simple, what they've done is take the basic designs of a tulip glass (such as the bulbous body, curved outer lip, and stem-like base) and married it with a standard pint glass. They also added laser etching on the bottom to encourage the release of carbonation, making this a great choice for most lighter Lagers, regular Pale Ales and IPAs, and some porters and stouts. Generally, if your beer is regular strength and would benefit from some release of carbonation, this glass is the best you can do outside of the individually branded glass the brewery would use for this beer.

Second, the Sam Adams Balloon Glass. For this TGBK, the pivot point is obviously the tulip style glass, as the Balloon Glass is a hybrid of a tulip and a snifter. In this case, the glass is more snifter, sporting a spherical base wider than the lip. To properly use this glass, take anything that is higher than normal strength - Imperial Stouts/Porters/IPAs - and put them in this glass. This glass is also well suited to two types of beer due to the shape of their ideal glassware pairing - Belgian Pale Ales such as Duvel and Scotch Ales. Barleywines will also benefit nicely. All in all, while you could be pouring your Chimay or your Rochefort into a chalice, this glass will definitely concentrate the nose a little bit more.

What's Missing?: While it could be argued that the Perfect Pint glass would do a good job on Belgian Wits, it leaves a bit to be desired to lambics, rauchbiers, and bocks. Doppelbocks would be alright in the balloon, but regular bocks fall through the cracks quite easily. Again, this combination could be a little more strong for Trappist Ales/Quads, but it's quite reasonable for someone looking to get into craft beer with only two glasses.

Well, that sums up the first TGBK. It's likely I'll post another one relatively soon, as we'll likely be back to the Harpoon Brewery this coming weekend. As for now, I'm off to read my new copy of Brewmaster's Table by Garrett Oliver.

Cheers!

Beer Review: Smuttynose Star Island Single

I committed a bit of a beer faux pas while enjoying this beer, and I hope the beer world is able to forgive me for it. Our glasses are in a general state of dirtyness, so I poured this beer into a red plastic solo cup. Yeah, I know... it's just like being back in undergrad. Ok, on to the beer. Nose starts out very sweet, smelling of grain as if it's an Adjunct Lager. As it sits, the yeast begins to grow in the nose. After a couple of minutes, this begins smelling like an American Pale Ale. It does smell a tad like an american take on a lighter belgian wit, must be the coriander coming through. Doesn't excite me a whole lot, reminds me of the days when I thought that Blue Moon wasn't part of Bud's evil empire and was a very respectable product. Taste is a bit tart and tangy, perhaps a little bit of solvent taste coming through at the hop signature. I remember watching something where Peter Egelston made a comment about the "Single" style as a belgian session ale. I could see why. This beer is basically Smuttynose's take on wit-session ales. It's not terrible, but, on the other hand, not terribly exciting. I could see this being extremely popular with the blue moon crowd. At the same time, this beer self advertises as a "session ale," which I could see quite plainly - mission accomplished. I'm not a huge fan of wits or any beer than uses sour/tangy tastes quite yet, but I can't fault the beer for that. It accomplishes what it attempts to accomplish quite well and has that trademark Smuttynose yeasty taste that works so well in its Pale Ale and IPA.

My Rating: 8/10

Poured: I don't really want to talk about it...

BeerAdvocate: Link

DIPA/Imperial IPAs... a trend with staying power? A Primer and an Editorial

I'll ignore the fact that I've not posted anything in a long time and explore this topic a bit. A phone call from my father got me thinking. He said he was talking to the owner of one of his local liquor stores after seeing an influx of new brands on his shelves and they got to talking about IPAs. My dad, being a fan of strong hoppy brews, walked away from the store with some Bell's Hopslam, some Piraat belgian IPA trippel, and another relatively high caliber IPA. When asked about the expansion of his stock, the store owner replied something to the extent of "We decided to expand our stock to include more IPAs. If customers see 'IPA' on the label, they're going to purchase it." I've been mulling over writing articles about strong IPAs for a while, but this really put me over the edge. If you're already aware of the history/style notes of IPAs, you can feel free to skip a few paragraphs down to my editorial commentary.

IPAs are India Pale Ales. These beers are actually a piece of history (not in it's uber-hoppy American interpretation.) During British colonization of India, beer was transported by ships to the colonies. The brew itself was made a bit more fortified to survive the awful conditions on the ships that it would necessarily endure for months on end prior to its arrival. Fast forward to today: there are generally two types of India Pale Ales - American IPAs and British IPAs. In many cases, the British/European IPAs tend to follow the historical case. Scottish brewery BrewDog Brewing Co. recently made the decision to pursue a pure historical representation - a classic recipe put onboard a ship for three months prior to bottling. American IPAs, however, are usually nothing short of hop bombs. As of late, the Belgians, famous for their sweet and complex malt profile beers, have been attempting their own interpretation of the IPA, including La Chouffe's Houblon IPA Trippel (which actually uses all American hop varieties,) Piraat IPA Trippel, and Gouden Carolus Hopsinjoor. As you can see by the names, these are hybrid styles that combine traditional belgian ales (dubbel, tripel, etc.) with the hoppiness of an American IPA. Usually these aren't palate destroyers, but they are usually higher than 8% ABV like their strong belgian counterparts. For clarification, if the modifying word is before the style, it's an American or British IPA (eg. Double IPA.) However, if the modifying word is located after the style, it refers to the belgian hybrid interpretations (eg. IPA Dubble/Double.)

In the American IPA category, there are two further subdivisions: standard IPA and Double/Triple/Imperial IPA. The standard IPAs range from a little over 5% ABV to around 7% and normally have between 30-70 IBUs (IBUs being the standard "International Bitterness Unit" on which IPAs, and other beers as well, are usually judged.) DIPA/Imperials kick up the ABVs from 7% all the way up to 21% (in the case of Dogfish Head's 120 minute IPA) boasting IBUs all the way up to 250 (in the case of Founders' Devil Dancer Triple IPA.) A normal DIPA/Imperial IPA will be around 9-10% ABV and have about 100-130 IBUs. All this technical jargon, but what does it mean? It means that you're going to be experiencing a beer that's generally going to be more bitter than your average beer. Bitter isn't the most appropriate word for the flavor profile. West Coast IPAs tend to be very citric and floral with a very "sharp" edge whereas other regional IPAs tend to be more full-bodied beer that has a detectable degree of malt (called the "backbone" in this case.) This "sharpness" generally is manifest in an astringency on the back of your tongue that tends to linger (called the "Hop Signature" among industry nerds.) A good point of comparison would be between California's Stone Brewing Co. and their IPA (not Ruination, their normal IPA) and Portsmouth New Hampshire's Smuttynose Brewing Co. and their "Finest Kind" IPA. Stone's offering tends to be very citric and floral, whereas Smuttynose's brew has a nice earthy floral taste due to the malt and the yeast they use. Smuttynose's tends more towards affirming the PA in IPA than its left coast counterpart. Anyways you get the picture (odds are if you're reading this, you already know the difference.) A quick note, regular IPAs are generally considered to be a late spring/summer seasonal brew due to the refreshing nature of the citric/floral flavors (much in the same way as Gin.) Imperial/DIPAs however have become adopted into the winter seasonal rotations (which traditionally included Barleywines, Winter Warmers, Stouts, Old Ales, Bocks and Doppelbocks) due to their high ABV and more full and intense flavor profiles.

So, here's where the issue arises. Over the past four or five years, the American craft beer market has become nothing less than obsessed with these hop wallops (with apologies to Victory Brewing Co.) to the point where almost every craft brewery out there produces some variety of IPA. IPAs are also thought to be one of the primary styles to benefit from oak barrel/bourbon aging (eg. Southern Tier's Oak Aged UnEarthly, Founders Hand of Doom/Bourbon Aged Red's Rye PA, and Great Divide's forthcoming Oak Aged IPA)  Is this just a fad, or is this a trend indicative of serious long-term attention? I'd like to present as many possible takes on the scenario as possible.

First, from a production standpoint, IPAs are among the most costly beers to provide. When evaluating pricing options on a per-barrel basis, no beer style demands more hops. Being the most costly ingredient in normal beers, hops can financially strain any brewery that's not careful. Almost everyone draws the comparison between hops and grapes in the case of wine. While it is the case that some styles use more hops than others (think of stouts... how many stouts can you think of with distinctly hop-forward flavor profiles? Aside from Smuttynose's Imperial Stout, I can't think of any,) it could be the case that this late market trend towards IPAs could actually affect what the consumer pays for all their beer styles. Look at it this way: a couple years ago, the world was hit with a somewhat serious hop shortage. Fletcher Street Brewing Co. in Alpena Michigan, our local craft operation, told us that they were forced to put their fantastic Paper Maker Pilsener on hiatus in favor of other beers such as their Maple Porter, Lumber Lager Red, Thunder Bay Bock, and Alpena Wheat Ale - all styles that don't traditionally have an abundance of hops. This 2007-2008 shortage was due to decreased production of hops due to non-ideal growing conditions, storms, etc. Imagine if the next global hop shortage was the result of the industry itself not able to have the carrying capacity to supply demand for uber-hoppy IPAs? Many small breweries might have to close their doors due to the inability to acquire a key ingredient for beer. An article in the Ithican, local newspaper to Ithica, New York, finds the prior hop shortage to have shot hop prices up as high as 400% in some cases. According to this same article, the Boston Beer Company (or, as a few of you may know it as "Sam Adams") was able to sell 20,000 lbs of unused hops to other small breweries to alleviate the pain caused by the shortage. It's unlikely that this case of brewery altruism would be able to continue if the supply of hops kept dropping every year and the price of hops, and consequently beer, keeps increasing.

On the other hand, maybe none of this would come true. Perhaps either the trend towards brutally hoppy IPAs might subside somewhat, leaving only a handful of breweries to produce these "lacerative mothers" (with apologies to Stone Brewing Co.) After all, Rogue's I2PA from Oregon is a solid DIPA, but in the world of outstanding complex behemoths such as Avery's Maharaja, Dark Horse's Double Crooked Tree, Stone's Ruination, and Russian River's Pliny series, should they continue to pursue such a brew? This is both a commercial and a stylistic comment. Such a decision could be perceived as a cost cutting measure and be taken the wrong way by craft beer consumers, many of which are up in arms about Bud/Miller/Coors cost cutting tactics. At the same time, if the brewmaster decides he just doesn't want to brew that style anymore and has a way of communicating that, it will probably disappear quietly. Another factor that could turn the tide is local farmers and breweries that have made the decision to grow their own hops. On a recent trip to Sam Adams' Boston Brewery, we were seated outside at their private Bier garden complete with hop vines and all. Their representative stated their interest in growing hops they can use, such as the German Noble Hop Hallertau, popular with several Sam Adams brews including their flagship brew, the Boston Lager. Perhaps breweries will begin buying local hops from hop farmers. After all, given ideal soil/climate conditions, you can grow hops with seeds and information found on the internet.

Could it be that this trend towards Imperial/DIPAs is a form of egoism? This couldn't possibly be the case if Stone CEO Greg Koch isn't an idealist about his views on the beer industry. At the 2009 Craft Brewers Conference held here in Boston, MA, Koch delivered a 45 minute speech about the value of "camaraderie" and "collaboration" amongst craft brewers. He views the craft brewing industry not as individuals in competition, but all working towards the same goal - delivering better beer to the consumer (or, more importantly, to everyone.) However, in a world where Koch's company can produce their Ruination IPA year-round, is what he's saying more than just rhetoric? One glance at Stone's website would reveal it's honesty - they serve many different breweries' offerings at their World Bistro and hold "Beer U" meetings where all are welcome to become educated about beer styles extending far beyond the reaches of their Escondido-based walls. On the other hand, Terrapin Brewing Co in Athens Georgia has other ideas. They produced a beer called "Hop Shortage" which was meant to "give the finger to the hop gods" as said by head brewmaster Spike Buckowski and use a ton of the hard-to-come-by plants. Not only did they address the concerns of the hop shortage, they also used it to draw attention to themselves and set themselves apart. While I'm sure they're fine individuals, this really rubbed me the wrong way.

The final consideration rests on the consumers end. With the new figures (from the documentary Beer Wars) emerging about the sales of beers, one out of every two beers sold is the product of the Anheuser-Busch/InBev megacompany. Brooklyn Brewmaster Garrett Oliver estimates that craft brew fans only comprise at most 5-10% of the American public. That being said, most websites like BeerAdvocate and other editorial beer blogs usually are guilty of preaching to the choir in terms of reader demographics. If you don't know anything about beer, the brewing process, or the politics of beer, you're unlikely to try different kinds of beer, let alone craft beer. If the average no-beer-knowledge American walked into a liquor store with the intent of buying beer, they will almost always go for something they're familiar with. What happens if that same consumer has a flash of brilliance and decides to pick something random off the store shelves or has recommended to them by a store employee, say a 6 pack of Dogfish Head 60 Minute IPA or Stone's IPA, and drink it? Well, unless they have a very refined and sturdy palate, it's unlikely they'll do anything except pour the beer down the drain or attempt to pawn it off on some unsuspecting friend who will likely have a similar reaction. This same consumer has learned their lesson about experimenting with craft beer and will retreat to the comfort zone of American industrial lagers. What I'm hinting at is that the recent trend towards IPAs might be hazardous to the same craft beer industry that is seeking the stake to drive through the heart of beer megacorporations. At the same time, perhaps I'm wrong? Living in Boston, almost every bar I go to has a Harpoon IPA tap handle. While not the best example of the style, it appears to be a fairly popular beer that has been able to win over a bit of the Bud Light/PBR crowd in the battle of the living room versus the dining room (the dining room being traditionally the spot where craft beer has unequivocally won.) These same people are willing to also take a chance on Allagash's White, their take on a Belgian Wheat Ale much like the famed Weinstephaner Hefe. Again, I know Boston is a fairly progressive city, which makes me even more hesitant. Still, to see the average Joe Redsox sit down to watch Big Papi attempt to crush a few out of the park and order a Harpoon IPA is something that makes me happy.

In the end, it's a question of staying power. Staying power belongs to those beers that are more than trends. The best example I can think of is the Russian Imperial Stout. Having existed since the court of Czarina/Empress Catherine the Great, these roasty devils continue to top the BeerAdvocate and RateBeer charts year after year. Their depth and complexity makes them a wonderful experience for a wide assortment of beer drinkers. Do I think that the IPA trend will continue along a similar path? Only time will tell, although it will probably not be as intense as the past year or two, but I think that Imperial/DIPAs will hold a legitimate place in craft brewing. While it might be detrimental to the industry in more ways than one to flood the market with these hop monsters, it's likely to level out a little bit. American IPAs are to hops what Bocks and Stouts are to Malt and what Belgian Ales are to Yeast - the quintessential example of an ingredient and how emphasizing that particular ingredient, while sometimes seeming improperly balanced, can make a very tasty beer.

Go Green!

I'd just like to say congrats to MSU! It's been a dream run through the NCAA tourney. No matter what happens in the final game, you've played incredibly. It almost brought tears to my eyes seeing Jim Calhoun, one of the best coaches who has ever worked in NCAA basketball talking so respectfully and reverently about the Spartans. Tom Izzo just proved that he is one of the best coaches in history. Let's ride this out, we've got the final game of the season on my birthday, so GO GREEN!

Also, since this is probably Jim Calhoun's last season, I think we should all recognize him as one of the best coaches who has ever been involved with Basketball. Coach Calhoun, you did get outplayed in this round, but you've certainly been the inspiration for generations of coaches. So, coach Calhoun, wonderful career, congrats on all the success. If you'd been playing anyone else... maybe I would have rooted for you... if there weren't any other teams playing that I liked... or anything...

Resident Evil 5... what a disappointment...

If any of you have a TV, you've seen the promos for the new Resident Evil game. To be honest, I don't really know what their marketing team was thinking. They show some footage of the game that's visually stunning (as the entire game is) as the "plot" which causes someone to commit suicide. They're literally saying "This product will make you want to kill yourself" because it's a "fear you can't forget." Here's the thing, not only is that an awful way to sell a product - especially a product like this that everyone was excited to play after playing Resident Evil 4 that you could have sold just by showing footage - but it's also disingenuous as hell. I played through the entire game, never once was I frightened. Not a single time. In fact, it becomes evident early on that this was Capcom's power play towards the action genre. Someone threw the game engine of Resident Evil 4 in with Gears of War, and this is what emerged... nothing but a disappointment in my mind, let's run through some of the things this game does well. (It goes without saying that this is going to be full of SPOILERS)

1. Visuals - The game is graphically stunning. From the environment down to the character models, everything is done extremely well. While the environments themselves aren't normally something to write home about (save for the lush African landscapes that you encounter for about half the game and some of the National Treasure 2-esque cave exploration scenes that are far far cooler than watching that movie) the lighting is consistently solid and the ambience of the levels enjoy a good bit of continuity.

2. Throwback Value - If you're a Resident Evil fan, you're going to get this game. No matter how much kicking and screaming you do about them making an action game, just face it, you want to see what happens to Chris Redfield. Once you start playing this game, you realize they've they've created an elaborate homage to early Resident Evil games. That's right, they've brought the patented Grenade Launcher and 40 different (not really, but something like 6-10) different type of rounds back. Also, remember the hunters from the original Resident Evil? Yeah, they're back too... except they're less green this time and more red. They will one-shot you just like they did in the old days too... they'll incapacitate you with their tongue or get right to the point with a claw through the chest. Wesker and Jill are here, there are references made to Leon Kennedy and his romp through Resident Evil 4 (via the "Kennedy Report",) and there are still the classic "piece the emblem together" doors that have been a staple of RE games forever.

3. Digestibility - This game is very user friendly. Anyone can pick this game up, even if they've never played a Resident Evil game before, and play it. That has to be what Capcom had in mind when designing this game - the generation that played the original Resident Evil is now older, many of whom probably were turned off by the radical redesign of the game engine from RE 3 to RE 4. When that was originally released, I was one of those people who thought "They're straying from their 'Survival Horror' roots and their stationary camera, which added its own degree of difficulty to the game, yet provided players with a really cool and frightening game experience."" You have to admit, it's terrifying when you walk into a room with a really weird angle shot that just shows the character and the door they just walked through and all you can hear is a scratching noise that almost certainly spells doom - or you walk down a silent hallway that has windows to the outside that the camera is actually looking through as a number of infected dogs ambush you - that's just genius. Anyway, RE 4 really did an incredible job of making a new survival horror experience based upon an action game platform. RE 5 tries to take up the torch, but ultimately just collapses into a forgettable action game. What doesn't this game do well.

1. Real-Time Inventory - I know this is becoming all the rage now with games like Dead Space which do not incorporate a pause into the usage of your inventory, which you're forced to manage in real time, but this should be adjusted based upon the difficulty level of the game. If you're playing on easy or normal, the game should pause. Expert players should have to be proficient enough with the inventory to be able to do things on the fly. RE 4 incorporated this in with a very good and logical system of give-and-take: players could use healing items from the inventory, but they could not reload. This was brilliant and should have been kept. Instead, players are forced to manage 9 measly inventory spaces through the entirety of the game, forcing them to spend time either before levels or after dying to manage that inventory, the partner's inventory, and a meta-inventory that had a ton of spaces. I think this was their way of reconciling the small real-time inventory with the flow of the game. There was some allure of a random stranger that somehow could sneak past all the Ganados in RE 4 and set up shop, complete with a huge blue torch, without anyone noticing. That, and he had the power of teleportation, one room he would be peddling his wares and, one room later, he was handing out prizes at the shooting range (not to me though, I was too busy getting laughed at by the phantom crowd.)

2. A Fear you can't Find - This game wasn't even remotely scary. There are some points that are pretty interesting that they could have exploited more to make it absolutely bone chilling. For example, there are some enemies later in the game, the "Reapers," that are basically huge cockroaches. They emit this gas which causes everything around them to be really hazy and blurry. You stick a couple of these enemies in a really dark yet open room with pillars and a couple pinpoint light sources and what do you get? Instant terror. Instead, the only time anything even remotely approaches terrifying is a result of the player not doing their homework and scouting an area.

3. Less-than-memorable Boss Fights - The coolest boss fight in this game is the fight against the huge Oruboros thing on the ship. You needed to disable the arms and then hit them with a huge satellite laser beam to blow them up. It truly is a cinematic moment. What wasn't cool about this was that Sheva wasted all my ammo and so she just sorta sat in the corner and would occasionally attempt to knife the Oruboros wormies that the boss would throw at you - this, at least, was pretty funny to watch. Aside from that, the Gigante, the giant Crab, the giant Bat... uninspired bosses with less than memorable fights. You shoot something, something changes, you shoot whatever changed, end of fight.

4. Clumsy Controls - I hate, I hate, I hate games that have the generic action button for the most part. The reason? What happens in this game... You have to jump over something, attach yourself to cover, or jump down from somewhere so you run over to that spot and mash on the x button... and wait... and mash on the button, and wait.... and finally give up and sit there. Two seconds later, the game realizes what's going on and responds, "Oh, my bad, X for Jump Down." Gah, so frustrating. When playing the muliplayer game, this manifests itself by reaching a zone-door and yelling "Come On!" about 8 times before the door lets you go through. Seriously, work on your engine, make it instantly context specific - there's no excuse for a game of this caliber that's being advertised this widely to be so damn clumsy. Resident Evil 4 had an infinitely better game engine on a last generation console!

For all these reasons, I would say that RE5 bit off way more than it could chew. It might have been an ambitious endeavor, but the end result wasn't great. Sure, it was graphically impressive, but that seems to be the industry standard with high quality titles. You have to have something which stands out. This game is a tired action game that only appeals to fans of the series through familiar characters and an appeal to RE4 fans through a similar (yet inferior) engine. If I were considering buying this game, I'd play the demo on XBL first and keep in mind that what you're playing is the whole experience, then delete the demo and go on with your lives. By the end of this game, you'll be way more interested in not having to play it anymore than you will be to see how it ends.

My rating: 3.5/10

* = A little shout to those Eddie Izzard fans out there

Holy Shnikes!

I'm almost done with my thesis! A few days, and I'll be pretty much finished!  Hooray!

Just started a cellar

Just started cellaring some beer! We've got 2 2009 Founders Imperial Stouts, 2 2009 Kentucky Breakfast Stouts, 1 2006 Samichlaus, 2 2009 Kuhnhenn Fourth Dimensia Old Ales, 1 Founders Curmudgeon Old Ale, 1 2007 Samichlaus Helles, and a 2009 Bell's Hopslam (just for the hell of it... had one on draft the other night that had obviously faded, but it tasted like a fruity strong ale instead...)

Another Review: Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron

Today, I'll be reviewing Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron. This is truly an exceptional brew from Sam and the folks over at DFH. Picked up a bottle for a little over $2 at Publick House Provisions last night. Poured about medium aggression into a DFH Snifter. My first impression... really? Brown ale? Looks like Founders Breakfast when poured.

It pours a dark ruby fading soon to black with about a half an inch to an inch of chocolate head.

Smell is very earthy, maybe a little banana bread, some dark fruits (might be my nose misinterpreting the fruit,) and smells quite boozy. Actually, it smells a bit like the last Raison D'Extra I had. So now I'm thinking less Stout and more barleywine... what's this beer up to?

Taste is amazing! This really is a unique beer. Brown Ale? Well, I don't know what the beer judges would certify this as, but I definitely think it tastes like a Palo Santo aged Barleywine or Old Ale... The boozy character drops almost completely off and there's the dark fruit, some coffee, some chocolate, some deeply masked resin-y and spicy wood. From the first taste I was ranting about how interesting the wood was that was used. Upon further drinking, it warms into some vanilla, more coffee, more fruit. The Palo Santo bite sits on your tongue after drinking, which is a very interesting. The taste conceals the 12% extremely well. Near the end of the glass, it's very chocolate-y with perhaps a hint of tobacco. It's truly a joy to serve this one at around 45˚ and witness the taste unfold.

Mouthfeel is nice, thick, and creamy. The pinnacle of the mouthfeel experience is perhaps around 55˚-65˚, where it's smooth and velvety, like chocolate milk! Very full-bodied. I've heard some call this medium-bodied... man, what beer are they drinking?

How did I only buy one bottle of this stuff? Well done DFH! This is definitely going to be added to my beer rotation! They just starting releasing this stuff all the time? Might have to buy a bunch of 4 packs and cellar them! I bet this opens brilliantly after a year. All in all, you shouldn't miss this beer for it's originality, and, if you're a barleywine/old ale fan, you especially shouldn't miss it. However, just as a warning, I think this beer might be a tad murderous on the palate. The Palo Santo resin definitely coats your tongue early on and continues through the whole experience. Mere and I shared a snifter over the course of about 2 and a half hours (we wanted to enjoy it as much as possible,) and we definitely saw the taste slowly evolve directly resulting from the Palo Santo influence.

My rating: 9/10

Poured: Snifter - Medium

BeerAdvocate: Link

LIVE REVIEW 2!: Seadog Apricot Wheat

So, tonight, after dinner and a few brews at the Roadhouse, I'm reviewing a Seadog Apricot Wheat. I have to say, I'm not expressly a fan of wheat beers, but I did enjoy the Sierra Nevada Unfiltered Wheat. I will say that I am a fan of apricot beers... or, ok so I enjoy Magic Hat #9 whenever I feel like it. That being said, here comes a Seadog! It pours a medium amber into the glass with about one quarter to half inch of off-white fizzy head that dissipates quickly, leaving no lacing whatsoever. Nose is straight apricot and nothing else, but it's not overwhelming. It's a flat apricot scent. The taste is much like a magic hat 9, except for there's no bite at all. Instead of having a huge amount of character, this beer is just flat. Granted, many of the wheat beers I've had have been flat, this beer is absolutely unforgiving. It's got the bare minimum of mouthfeel for a medium bodied beer. While I've not tried Dogfish Head's season offering Aprihop, I have to say that my go-to apricot beer (yeah, because we all have those) is Magic Hat 9.

My Rating: 5/10

Poured: Sam Adams "Perfect Pint" - Medium

BeerAdvocate: Link

A Future For Industrial Beers? Of Garrett Oliver, Søren Kierkegaard, and Beer

This morning's post is inspired by a comment made by Brooklyn Brewmaster Garrett Oliver at last year's American Craft Brewing Festival. I haven't heard the entire speech, but one snippet made its way to my ears via a YouTube video posted on BeerAdvocate, "There is no future in industrial brewing." I'm going to meditate on this subject just a bit, as I think it's an interesting comment that may have some validity. What this means is that I'll meander for a long time about philosophy, sociology, and psychology and then, if you're lucky, return to beer. If you're willing to hear me rant about Kierkegaard for a few minutes, I promise, I'll talk about this.

My first impression was that this statement was outright false. I hate to do this, but I'm going to reference the work I'm doing on my Masters Thesis. Having read much Kierkegaard, he makes some points that, more or less, boil down to the fact that when "the masses" are given freedom and equality, they squander it. They learn that society or anything in it is a glorified "race to the bottom" with the winner being the one that can set the bar the lowest. The bar, in this case, is the lowest common denominator by which all humans can meet with the lowest amount of effort. Because men are equal, there is no difference between the President, for example, and a janitor. These comments, while not expressly applicable today, were very penetrating at a time when this resident of Copenhagen watched the legitimacy of an absolute monarchy become twisted and tainted under the overbearing freedom of the post-French Revolution public. And while, in a perfect world, the President and a janitor are equal under the law, Kierkegaard saw a society where classes had become obsolete as the public had access to the same things those former nobles and aristocrats had. Kierkegaard's comments do still speak some truth today in the "lowest common denominator" department. 

The arrangement of American capitalism is such that Americans work extremely hard (in most cases) relative to the hours they work. I don't have any actual data to back this up, but I can't help but taking this from watching and reading news reports about domestic issues stemming from individuals being overworked and underpaid, especially in this economy. Therefore, there is a vast quantity of blue-collar America that is willing to settle for whatever comes their way after work is out. Work demands the use of their intellect, their quantitative analysis skills, their problem solving capacity, ability to communicate with others regardless of differences, and, most importantly, the ability to lead others and manage multiple tasks. Coming home, they check any effort at the door and become another faceless and nameless individual among that abstraction "the public." Not to say there isn't anything wrong with that because of the American socioeconomic arrangement, but the public doesn't strive to keep a high standard of education (just look at American schools,)  of health (look at our health care system, our life expectancy, our food choices - while healthier foods are emerging all the time, we still have a society flooded with outrageously unhealthy food,) and of intellectual activity. This American doesn't want to read better books, watch better TV, eat better food, chase intellectual pursuits, and, most of all, be told what to think by someone who is equally as good. After all, one man's money is just as good as another's in the market. In essence, these individuals are worn down and used by their employers day after day. When they return home, they find their family, who they love, to be nothing short of a burden. Secretly, everyone who has a stressful job wishes for that peace and quiet at the end of each day which cannot be reconciled, even by the arms of the person that loves them the most. This same person sits down after work, turns on Larry the Cable Guy, cracks open a can of Bud, eats a greasy burger and fries that they picked up on the way home from some fast food behemoth and zones out with processed media and processed food, tired, stressed, depressed, but worst of all, apathetic.

Craft brewing is really reflective of hope. It's not "progress" per se, but hope - the hope of an American future that is able to embrace a public and a private, an America that is able to embrace economics not as a means to keep themselves afloat, but to make this wonderful country even better, an America this is as concerned with the state of their children's welfare, the state of the healthcare of those they've never even met, and the state of their government. A man or woman that can walk into a beer store and choose the beer they'd most like to drink, not the beer that's easiest to identify or the easiest to follow the person in front of them, is also a person that is more likely to make an educated choice in the next Presidential election, that rejects the processed media of our age in favor of research and truth, that understands economics enough to understand the selfish nature of our mega corporations that cry out for help, not for the American public like the Auto industry - one of the backbones of American industrialism and the American identity, but like those financial executives who just long for more lining to their pockets while so many worn down Americans buckle under their weight. 

So, with all due respect to Mr. Oliver, I disagree. I think there is just as strong a future for industrial brewing as there's ever been because, to choose industrial beer is precisely not "to choose" anything, but to let tradition, comfort, or popular culture choose for us. It's easier to see the impact of the craft brewing revolution of the mid-eighties to the mid-nineties with many local stores that used to carry just Coors, Miller, and Bud carrying local favorites such as Bell's Oberon, Founders' Centennial IPA, and seven varieties of Sam Adams, but that could just be the "lowest common denominator" ideology telling us to shut up and be happy so they can go back to their recliner-and-Bud lifestyle. In order for craft brewing to have some hope, my generation and the future generations need to start making it clear that we should ask more of our country, our people, and ourselves. 

We're a creative people that has always embraced our individuality and freedom, just look at our craft brewing offerings: almost every craft brewery offers a range of beers that covers a spectrum from light pilseners and amber ales to porters and stouts. Some of these are outrageous - Founders Devil Dancer Triple IPA with over 200 IBUs, Various breweries that have toyed around with Peanut Butter Porters, and those breweries like Russian River, Ommegang, and Allagash that have used wine and/or wild yeasts and bourbon barrel secondary fermentation delving into the world of sour ales. America is at the cutting edge of craft beer as a result of our unwillingness to settle for those antiquated categories of "ales" and "lagers" as defining our beers, we want crossovers, we love our Southern Tier Raspberry Porters and our Peak Organic Espresso Bean Aged Amber Ales, and our Dogfish Head ales that're brewed with equal parts historical anthropology, scientific knowledge of the brewing process, and insanity.

So, Mr. Oliver, after so ardently attempting to disagree with you, I guess we end up going in the same direction - while there is just as reasonable a future for industrial brewing as ever, our future generations are going to be the ones to make this change. My generation, in this past Presidential election, has stood up and told everyone that we're not going to take it anymore. We don't want to bear the burden of the baby boomers who took over the world and are now too old, bored and apathetic to worry about cleaning up their mess. We're making their mess our rallying cry. In our future, you're right, there is no future in industrial brewing but, there is always the chance that this mess will weigh too heavy on our hearts and minds, and we'll become worn down, and our resistance to the lowest common denominator will dissolve, and we'll slump down into the pit of cultural stagnation and wait for our next generation's desire for change will burn white hot, and see whether they'll succeed where we've faltered. The future is in our hands.

Another Quick Review: BBC Coffeehouse Porter

Today, I'm doing another very quick reviewski of a bottle which one of our friends procured for us: Berkshire Brewing's Coffeehouse Porter. First of all, thanks to Erica for buying us this wonderful bottle! This beer pours nice and dark into the glass. The first pour yielded a good 2 inches of light creamy head, the second one poured was a little less aggressive for that very reason. It appears black upon first inspection, but a close look shows that it's a deep muddy ruby colored around the edges. As the head fades, there's a little bit of retention, but not too much. The nose is very pleasant: coffee liqueur (in this instance, I think it smells like Bailey's,) milk, sweet cream, perhaps a very buried hint of vanilla. The taste is very nice and sweet. This time around, the coffee brings forward Kahlua, especially when swirled around in the mouth as it even gives off a false hint of booziness. This beer is like the lovechild of Left Hand's Milk Stout and Peche Mortel, meeting somewhere closer to the Left Hand brew, yet retaining a nice "I was here" note left by the coffee. The best thing about this beer is that it's very sessionable if you're into coffee beers at being a tad over 6% abv, it's not going to knock you down super quickly.

My Rating: 8.5/10

Poured: American Pint - Medium

BeerAdvocate: Link

A quick review... Peche Mortel

Today, I'm going to do a lightning fast beer review of Dieu Du Ciel's Peche Mortel. We picked up a bottle after hearing that it was the best coffee beer that's brewed, to go along with Mere's Coffee beer phase. This beer checks in at 9.5% ABV and pours pure black into a glass. There would be little natural head, but I poured a bit aggressively to bring out a nice creamy brown head of about half an inch. First smell is very deceptive: it was sweet and a tad bitter but very "bright." I didn't know what to expect at all from the smell. I've had a decent amount of coffee beers lately because she's been going through her phase, and this one smelled was completely different than all of them. After pouring and agitating the ingredients, it evens out a lot more with a nice roasty smell. The taste is a perfect balance of stout and coffee - not too bitter, not too strong. The coffee taste is a nice substitution for hops for providing a bite. As it warms, it only gets more rich, roasty and creamy. It's nice and heavy on the tongue, as you'd expect from a limited release high octane imperial stout. All in all, very very good beer. I'd even go so far as to say I enjoyed this more than an Oaked Espresso Imperial Yeti I had a few nights before.

My rating: 9/10

Poured: Snifter - Aggressive

BeerAdvocate: Link

A Depressing Sidenote

While working on my thesis this morning, I watched something occur that I could only call depressing. There is an older man who lives in the building across the alley from me that must have problems with his legs. He walks a little hunched over, taking small scrapes across the ground at a snail's pace. After wondering for a while whether he has the health insurance to see a doctor about trying to find a working solution to his problem, I witnessed something unbelievable. It's snowing here, of course, after having two 60 degree days. Cars have a thin layer of snow on them as a result. This morning, this man shuffled along to his car and grabbed his snow and ice scraper, and began to go to work. A minute later, a figure emerged from the building and opened the rear door of his Volvo, only to drop a few bags and what not in before himself getting in. I sat there thinking: "Wow, they'll let this guy clean his car? He can barely walk! What is it with Americans these days?" Only then did I realize there was another person loading things into his car before jumping in to the backseat. This car had the possibility of having three people other than this older gentlemen in the car; all of them, it stands to reason, could probably walk much better than him. Why the hell didn't anyone help him? If it weren't for the fact that he would have been done before I could get out there, I had half a mind to go out and help him myself and yell at his kids or whoever they were for allowing this frail old man to work for their benefit without helping or even offering! Seriously, what is America coming to?

New Tasting Notes Up

Just so you know, there are a couple new tasting notes up on the Boston Beer Club site. The link can be found on the right hand side of this page. I'm not going to be posting much here for the next two weeks, as they're really integral to my thesis. Oh, and Congrats to Oskar Blues for kicking ass and taking cans, their sales increased 64% last year!

Duvel Salmon

So, this is one of my staples of cooking, I love it. It's very simple, and, at the same time, very good. It's baked salmon with a Duvel lemon butter caper sauce.

What you'll need

1 Bottle (1 Pint 9.4 fl oz) Duvel

4 Tbs Butter (half-stick)

1 Lemon

1 Clove Garlic

Re-sealable Jar of Capers

Cooking the salmon is easy enough - preheat the oven to 350, make sure it's thawed (if you bought frozen,) place on a sprayed baking sheet, and coat with olive oil. If you're feeling especially adventurous, you can put a few of the pieces of diced garlic and just a tad of lemon zest on each filet. Cook from 13 - 16 minutes... but keep a close eye on it to make sure it's not getting burned. You can always bump the temp down to 325 and add a couple minutes if worried.

For the sauce, you should first melt the half-stick of butter on low heat. Once you've done that, add about 2 tbs of Duvel, stir to remove some of the carbonation and cover. You should use this opportunity to get the capers out (use as many as you'd like, they do add a nice bitter/tartness to the recipe that works well,) dice the garlic, and zest a lemon into a ramekin. Once you've prepared everything else, add the contents of the ramekin to the small saucepan and stir. This should sit on low heat until the salmon is done so the alcohol can cook off, the capers can release some of their bitterness, and the garlic can soak in everything else. Once your timer goes off, pull the salmon out, plate all the ingredients, mix the sauce well, drizzle over your filets and then spoon some of the capers and garlic on to the top of the filet as they're a bit reluctant to come out with pouring, and eat!

Btw, some of you may have noticed that the recipe calls for a big bottle of Duvel while only using a few tablespoons of it. This is because Duvel goes extremely well with this recipe - I highly recommend pouring yourself and whoever else is sharing this recipe with you a nice tulip/wine glass of duvel to share with dinner. Also, I usually accompany this with asparagus and mashed potatoes.

Founders Porter Cake

For Mere's 25th birthday, I decided to give something a shot. I wanted to bake her a cake using beer! I thought it'd be a nice way to make her something creative that she'd enjoy using something that she loves. As such, I'd picked up a sixer of Founders Porter on a recent beer excursion and was determined to make a cake out of it ever since drinking it. I'm sure you could sub in any beer for this, as long as it's chocolate/coffee heavy. What this recipe gives you is a two-layer cake with chocolate ganache filling and icing.

Cakes!

2 8-inch cake pans

1 12-oz Bottle Founders Porter

3 Sticks Unsalted Butter

1 1/8th Cup Cocoa Powder

Melt the butter in a large saucepan/medium sized pot over medium heat. As the sticks are almost metled, add the founders porter and stir until flat. After those two ingredients are well mixed, slowly stir in the cocoa powder until the whole thing is a creamy chocolate mix and approaches a simmer. As soon as this begins simmering, preheat the oven to 325. Make sure your racks are in the middle.

3 Cups All-Purpose Flour

3 Cups Sugar

1 Tsp Salt

2 Tsp Baking Soda

While the previous porter creation is heating/mixing... mix all these ingredients in a huge f'in bowl. Make sure they're well mixed.

3 Large Eggs

1 Cup Sour Cream

Mix these together well at the same time in a separate smaller bowl.

When the porter/chocolate mixture is done, add to the eggs/cream mixture and mix really well. Then, take the resulting mixture and add it to the dry ingredients and mix until smooth. I recommend using a hand mixer on the lowest setting and tasting it to make sure the mixture isn't grainy. Grease and flower the two cake pans, and add the cake mix to them. You should bake them at 325 for 20 minutes, and check them with a toothpick every 5 minutes after that. They should stay in until the toothpicks come out clean. Take them out, let them cool for 30 minutes at least, level one of the cakes (they will dome,) and get ready for the ganache.

Ganache Filling!

This one's fairly simple. You're going to need the following things

2/3 Cup Heavy Cream

1 Cup Semi-Sweet Morsels

Put the cream in a small pot and heat until simmering. Put the morsels in a heat-proof bowl and cover with the simmering cream. As soon as the cream hits, begin mixing. This should result in a ganache at almost perfect temperature to apply to your cakes. Let it cool for maybe 5 minutes and then smear it on the leveled cake in a somewhat even fashion. What you do with the rest is up to you, I drizzled it over the stop of the non-leveled cake and spread so that it was somewhat even, then left it out to cool (obviously, at this point the two layers of the cake should be connected by the ganache.)

Frosting!

3-4 Cups Confectioners Sugar

1 Stick (1/2 Cup) Unsalted Butter

1 Tsp Vanilla Extract

2-4 Tbs Milk

Using a hand mixer, mix these ingredients. You can add more milk if it's too solid. Butter should be room temperature when you add it (probably should have said that earlier... oh well.) I used this to glaze the top of the cake... shortly thereafter after added candles and served!

You can actually taste the beer in there, the Founders Porter added a nice balanced coffee/chocolate influence. Most importantly, she loved it (despite me missing some of the finer points of cake baking and causing the cake to be aesthetically a little messed up.) Thanks so much to Mere D. for the recipe - This cake was adapted from the Irish Car Bomb Cupcake recipe over at SmittenKitchen.

The Beer Industry: A Tale of Triumph, Defeat, Economics, and Inebriation

Blogging on my other site, the Boston Beer Club page, has recently brought me face-to-face with my interest in craft beer. In this, I am far from being alone. I remember reading one blog that had been around for a while which predicted a sharp increase in the number of beer blogs that are created and are posted on regularly. After making this prediction, he stated that his hypothesis was semi-correct, with only a slight rise in the amount of beer blogging this year. While I've been drinking craft beer for years (albeit, without realizing or appreciating it,) there are several things about the beer industry which really draw me in.

First, it is full of extremely passionate individuals. Take, for example, what appears to be an ongoing dispute between two of the nations most reputable craft breweries - Dogfish Head and Brooklyn. In a recent article published in The New Yorker (which you can find linked in my Dogfish Head Brand X article,) the debate was posed between brewmasters Sam Calagione of DFH and Garrett Oliver of Brooklyn regarding a term coined by Jim Koch - Extreme Beer. This discussion boils over past superficial beer-geekdom past the now painful terms of "macro" versus "micro" into the realm of phrases like "industrial beer." The core of this tension lies at the underlying philosophies, not to mention lifestyles, of both individuals. Dogfish Head is portrayed as the Apple Computers of beer, with Sam providing a very unique creative vision to the driving force that is Bryan Selders much in a way similar to Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, or perhaps you prefer Lennon and McCartney. I've always been a firm believer in the creative fusion two gifted people, I can attribute it to my background in politics and philosophy, and it is almost "empowering," for lack of a better term, to see this at work. Returning to the subject, Dogfish Head has always taken risks, and pushes the envelope more than any craft brewery of its size. Indeed, the same New Yorker article states that DFH boasts more "Extreme Beers" of any brewery in the world with beers like Fort, World Wide Stout, and 120 Minute IPA all reaching upwards of 18% ABV. For Sam, "Extreme Beer" is a form of expression to an individual who finds anything with an audience to be legit. Garrett Oliver, on the other hand, finds the term to be counterintuitive. Oliver, who, as I've read from many sources, is a beacon of unique classiness. He makes a point to dress up for beer related events, dinners, and functions and states, through interviews and publications, his dedication to the craft brewing explosion. Beneath it all, Oliver and Sam want the same thing, they just differ on the route to get there. Predictably, Sam's approach has less tact while sporting an unusually wide range of creativity. Rather than using outright brute force on your palate, DFH brews beer that is interesting enough to continue garnering wider audiences. In Sam's world, extreme beer will slowly creep across the nation and eventually take hold through sheer variety. On the other hand, Garrett's approach appears much more cunning and strategic: in his plan, beer wouldn't have any inflammatory rhetoric, indeed using much of the same as the more well-known breweries, and infiltrate and conquer from within. This seems to be the opposite of Sam's characterization of Budweiser's American Ale, where AB-Inbev uses "culture vulture" tactics to hijack the craft beer explosion while simultaneously speaking ill of dark beers and/or different beers - "Beer Racism" as Sam states. Regardless, Oliver believes terms like "Extreme Beer" drive people away and further enforce stereotypes about the difference between beer and wine, for example, at the dinner table. As someone who has authored a book and several articles on the subject, Oliver has become intimately familiar with the now difficult decision of what beverage to serve at the dinner table; those most holy shrines of the modern suburban family. Ultimately, both individuals have an extreme passion for beer and stand united on core values while divided by tactics.

Secondly, each brewer is able to make their own unique "fingerprint" on the beer world. In this age where most everything is democratized - freedom of thought, freedom to choose a career path, freedom to try new things - similarly, each individual can use whatever means they would like to get to the end product: beer. From DFH's crazy marketing ploys to the antiquated breweries of belgium that have adhered to the Beer Purity Law of the 16th century, each can choose from an almost infinite amount of variables to brew their own beer. Contrary to what most people think, achieving consistency in a beer may be one of the most difficult aspects of brewing. From a beer geek's perspective, this is why there can be so much respect attributed to what Founders Brewery calls the "Mainstream Shooby Dooers;" Bud, Miller, and Coors - whenever you walk into a store with a mind to buy any of those brands, you always get a similar product despite how much beer they brew. If any of you have surfed the BeerAdvocate forums, I would say that about 20% of the total discussion that occurs is comparing a beer from year-to-year. The most hands-on example of this I can relate to is my review of Southern Tier's Choklat Imperial Stout. Shortly after reviewing the beer, I logged on to BeerAdvocate to find a thread regarding differences between the 2008 Choklat and the 2007 beer of the same namesake. One user complained about this year's batch not being as "thick" in the mouthfeel of the beer, and too "hot"- a term that's generally used to describe a lack of properly concealing alcohol content when the beer is obviously attempting to. Other users either agreed or disagreed accordingly with the bottom line being that beer is still a beverage produced "organically," and thus subject to inconsistencies. Yeast - not hops or malt - is the engine in the beer-as-car metaphor; it is ultimately responsible for any motion that occurs. Because yeast is a living organism, it is always subject to some uncertainty and inconsistency even in this era of scientific enlightenment. Every yeast has been analyzed and is known to behave differently at varying temperatures and can be thought to have a reasonable "ballpark" range of certainty with regards to fermentation. To make matters more complicated, breweries often use different types of secondary fermentation including "bottle conditioning" - a frequently used technique where the secondary fermentation of the beer occurs in the bottle on store shelves. Beer that is bottle conditioned is frequently better served for aging as the beer may "mature" over a span of time. The best styles for cellaring are Lambics, which use a different type of yeast that "spontaneously ferments" the beer, high ABV stouts, barleywines, old ales, strong ales, and any other ale that exhibits a certain degree of malt complexity that can persevere after the hops fade away. This also says nothing of the belgian style ales that frequently use tertiary and beyond fermentation cycles. For those of you that aren't that familiar with beer, the term "Double," when applied to beer (for example, Stone's Double Bastard, Rogue's I2PA Double IPA - or higher, think Chimay Tripel or Three Philosophers Quadrupel) refers to the amount of fermentation cycles a beer has. All this combines to make beer a completely unique experience, almost every time! Think of it this way: you just returned from the store with a six pack of your favorite craft beer, let's say something like Sam Adams Boston Lager or Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. You buy this "old standby" beer because it's something familiar to you and you can enjoy one just about any time and place without needing an occasion, unlike that bottle of Deschutes Abyss you have in a dark corner of your basement. There is almost the same amount of effort that goes into ensuring the consistency of the taste on behalf of Sierra Nevada or the Boston Beer Company as Deschutes puts into their annual batch of Abyss. Albeit a bottle of Sam Adams Boston Lager or The Abyss... you're never tasting the same beer year-to-year.

The beer industry is interesting because everyone likes an underdog story. The chimerical goliath that is Miller, Bud, Coors is the bane of most craft brewery's existence. For those of us living in areas very conducive to beer geekdom, such as Boston, it's easy to find places where people only come either for the crowd or for the wide beer selection such as Deep Ellum or Publick House - RFD in Washington D.C. - HopCat in Grand Rapids, MI - The Tap Room in Grosse Point, MI. These places ally themselves with craft breweries in an attempt to load David's slingshot for that one perfect shot that'll fell the great beast. BeerAdvocate website enforces their policy of respect beer, even when discussions regarding how "low quality" that American behemoth's beer is devolve into yelling matches or outright "flaming" (to use a forum term)- the most entertaining being between those Stella Artois fans and Bud drinkers who have yet to realize their both drinking the same company's beer. What most BeerAdvocate members are griping about in the long run is the influence of capitalism on beer. Their main argument: Bud, Miller, and Coors doesn't respect beer; they only brew to turn a profit as evidenced by their huge corporations. Craft breweries are of the mind, for the most part, that competition among "allies" is a good thing as long as its to the detriment of the enemy. However, competition is a double-edged sword. In our times of advancing technology, people long for simplicity. Everything from governmental policies to small-scale social problems long for a cooperative solution where all entities can compete for the good of the whole. This form of neo-communitarianism (I'm going to avoid using those words which ignite others so in communism and socialism as they've become bastardized beyond their theoretical significance to have a highly negative connotation) can't exist under a society of such strict capitalism. Say Dogfish Head were to finally find the "golden bullet" beer that appeals to every crowd of beer drinkers and is hailed as an excellent beer world-wide. The temptation would be to take their recipe and expand so as to fell those foul American macro-breweries. Then what would they be? They would have become that thing they hate so, (notwithstanding Sam's crazy attention deficit neurotic push for variety in beer) and would be the new Bud, Miller, or Coors. They would obviously have to make the tough decision between being filthy rich and returning to a world where that temptation is left to the vast sea of craft breweries emerging in America. After all, who is to say that if DFH backs down, whether Bell's, Rogue, Sierra Nevada, Sam Adams, Founders, Alesmith, Russian River, Southern Tier, Stone, Brooklyn, Victory, Port Pizza, Deschutes, Three Floyds, Smuttynose, Goose Island, etc. (you get the picture) would take the torch and become a corporate monstrosity. I know this stands in stark opposition to the mission of most of these small craft breweries, but this age of capitalism makes craft brewing a game theoretic puzzle on a large scale - wouldn't you rather become the king given the chance because you'd be worried about someone else screwing things up? Another place I've heard this argument is among my single friends at the bar when they say, "if these girls are just looking to go home with some random sleaze ball for one night of fun, it might as well be me because I'm actually a decent human being" which is, for the most part, always a true and logical statement. But then again, who is to say that the smaller craft breweries aren't just killing each other if Garrett Oliver is right and 90% of beer consumed in the United States is Bud, Miller, or Coors? It just makes you wonder.

I see beer as embodying the soul of many nations, many lifestyles, and many situations both good and bad. It can simultaneously embody the ambition of an entrepreneur such as Sam Calagione and the profit driven capitalist character of Bud, Miller, or Coors. A good mid-point is Jim Koch, who sells more craft beer than anyone in the world. He is at least partly responsible for the revolution in craft brewing due to his ad campaigns which stress the care they take with the various ingredients in each and every batch of beer brewed which, in turn, sparked those big corporate brewers to begin using the terms "hops, malt, and yeast" in their commercials as opposed to goofy situations mimicking the latest Pepsi ad campaigns. While we in Boston are partial to our Sam Adams, I can see the cross-over between commercialism and craft brewing that was so expertly engineered by Koch who, by all rights, should be revered as a genius of his trade. Sam Adams brews something for everyone (my favorite being their Holiday Porter) with 21 different varieties of beer including several extremely limited offerings such as Triple Bock, Utopias (the pioneer "extreme" beer,) and MMM (Millennium.) With their new "Imperial Series" coming out soon, this truly cements Sam Adams as the bridge over the troubled waters that embody the strife between the beer-industrial complex and the world of craft breweries.

With that, I'll leave you for now, as I have other things to do; namely, prepare for a thesis meeting this afternoon.

Working Out

Last Semester, I got really behind in my fitness plans. Ironically enough, I ended up losing weight. However, it's not "good" weight to be losing. I'm pretty sure I've lost a decent amount of the muscle mass I worked so hard to put on or tone up the previous spring. As such, I made a promise to myself that, since I'm very close to my ideal weight (currently, I'm at around 153 lbs, a weight I'd never ever think I'd get to - this is about 10 lbs lower than my ideal weight,) and since I don't like living this unhealthy of a lifestyle, that I'm going to start working out again. When I say "start," I mean literally... starting over from the very beginning, as if I've never touched a weight or a piece of workout equipment in my life. From my previous experiences, this is the easiest way to go... start working on free weights and very slowly build myself up. I'm more worried about getting a significant amount of Cardio with the weather being as cold as it is, but I've said that I'd like to get out for at least an hour of walking every day just as a start. On top of that, I'm working on major/opposing muscle groups odd days of the week. I'm going to institute another one of my little tricks that works really well, which is keeping a "workout diary" where I must initial every workout I did for a given day. This will make me not want to shirk responsibilities when I must answer directly to myself. 

I'm hoping this will also normalize my beer hobby a bit. I know that I've done a ton of writing about beer and trying new beers, but I need to try to get that spending under control a little bit. I'm hoping to buy beer maybe every two-to-three weeks and have it last a while - although the release of Kentucky Breakfast later this month is going to totally bone that :P. We'll see... maybe I'll wait until the next beer meeting to buy beer... yeah, that'll last... for less than ten minutes.

Anyways, this isn't so much a "journal entry" type of blog post, I was just trying to give some helpful tips for those of you wishing to make good on New Years Resolutions to get in shape or keep weight off. Good Luck!