Genesee Schwarzbier, 2019 return!

I don't know what I love more about this can illustration. Is it the closed eyes, signaling relaxed enjoyment? The full face beard and red flannel of the mountain man? The jaunty pipe -- a PIPE, on a beer label, oh my God! -- with the little design on the bowl?

No, it's gotta be the BIG GLASS OF BEER! The dude is loving that beer. Happy to be here, folks, having a big old schwarzbier.

And so am I, now, and I'm a happy fella. I've been waiting for months for the reappearance of Genesee's Schwarzbier. Yeah, really, a canned seasonal from a lumpy old regional brewery in upstate New York, and it is a happy day that it has returned. My wife brought some home from a visit to her mother outside of Rochester, and I can only hope that it trickles down to Pennsylvania soon.

Schwarzbier has always been a favorite of mine. Dark, flavorful, mild, and utterly drinkable in large quantities. I recall the first time I brought a case of Kostritzer's classic home. I opened one, and started making dinner...and 40 minutes later Cathy came through the door, and somehow 5 bottles were empty.

But it's fairly temperate, so it's all good. Take a big lager-brewed swallow: smooth, creamy mouthfeel, a roasty and chewy flavor, a just slightly tangy finish of black malt, and hurra! We're ready for another!

I'm taking a sixer along to dinner -- Figs, a BYO Mediterranean place in Philly -- and it's going to be welcome. I still recall being at a busy German-tapped bar one night, when a woman came up and asked for "your lightest beer." Give her a Kostritzer, I called, and they did. She looked at me as if to say, 'you're blind,' and I urged her to try it. It WAS the lightest beer they had: the black beer.

Thanks for the winter gift, Genesee!

Scientists Invent Helium Beer! Munchkins Rejoice!

Every couple of years, it seems, something gets loose on the Internet about Helium beer; you know, beer that's been gassed up with helium instead of carbon dioxide or nitrogen, and so it makes you talk all squeaky, ho-ho-ho, that's a gas! And then the dreary science nerds come out and say, no, that's impossible, because helium isn't soluble in beer, stupids.



The FUN science nerds at Chemical & Engineering News, the weekly magazine of the American Chemical Society, took that as a challenge. After all, as one of them says in the following video, "We've heard nothing is insoluble; everything has some degree of solubility." They then prove the point by 'heliumating' a beer (a stout, looks like), and describing the results (less fizzy, but also less acidic due to helium's inert nature). Sadly, though, drinking it doesn't make you sound like a member of the Lollipop Guild.

 

Spitting on the head of Britain's national drink

I'll assume you've heard that beer is not allowed at The Royal Wedding™, yes? It was pissing me off more and more, and I was feeling more and more Paine at the very thought...when I saw this. Pete pretty much nails it, so go read. And no, I won't be watching a single second of The Royal Wedding™ unless some evil jackass puts a gun to my head and puts me through some reverse Ludovico technique...I'll be at a beer festival (TAP New York, to be precise), so watching the little bluebloods formalize their fornicating would be inappropriate.

Just too much to do...

So Friday I kind of bumbled through the day, getting caught up on phone calls and e-mail, writing scripts for the interviews I'm conducting this week for a few stories I've got to do. I did platelet donation in the morning, and it went smoothly, and sang a confirmation mass in the afternoon. Thomas was in Harrisburg at a mock trial state final competition, so Cathy and Nora and I went out for Chinese; got Szechuan (or however we're supposed to spell it these days) seafood, which was tasty, and split a bottle of Stone 8th anniversary, the "imperial mild," and it was good (though I probably should have had it when I got it), rich but very drinkable, and imposing enough to handle the spice. Then we went home and watched more of Season 1 of Heroes.

Saturday was crazier. Cathy left for Harrisburg at 8 to visit with an old friend of her family who is in the endgame of a nastily rapid bout of cancer. Thomas left Harrisburg at 8 to return here. Nora and I left at 8 to take her to Drexel for another robotics competition, and I came back and sang another confirmation mass (we had about 250 kids in the parish being confirmed over the weekend). When that was done, I went back to the house, picked up Thomas, and we drove north to Hellertown, to have lunch at the Braveheart Highland Pub. I had a pint of O'Hara's Stout, we split the smoked fish plate (excellent), and I had a caesar salad with grilled shrimp. A very nice lunch; then we hustled him over to Southern Lehigh HS for his final regular season forensics tournament, qualifiers for the national tournament (he made it to the final round today, but didn't quite make the cut). I drove back to Drexel, picked up Nora, drove home, met Cathy, we all changed. Drove to Nora's school, dropped her off with a friend's family for an overnight birthday party, and we drove to the annual fundraiser auction at Holy Ghost Prep.

I had offered a basket of three whiskies (Tomatin 12 Year Old (from John Hansell), a 1994 Knappogue Castle, and a bottle of Rock Hill Farms bourbon) with a sub to Malt Advocate, a book on Islay whisky (Peat Smoke & Spirit), and some other stuff; and also offered an in-house tutored whisky tasting -- 13 whiskies -- with cigars and snacks. That met some brisk bidding and wound up going for $1200; felt pretty good about raising that much for the school! We had dinner with the auction: lobster tail, lump crabmeat, sushi, poached salmon, stone crab claws, huge shrimp, and a crab casserole...all delicious. I shared around a bottle of Bernheim Wheat Whiskey and a bottle of Parker's Golden Anniversary (gave some of each to the two guys who bought the whisky tasting), had a couple beers (Lager...and Weyerbacher Muse). Then we went home and crashed...Only I'd had a big coffee on the way home from Drexel, and wound up reading till about 3!

Got up at 7:15. Cathy drove up to Southern Lehigh to help judge the tournament, and I did two Palm Sunday masses, then went to Roxborough to pick up Nora. Came back home, had some Prima Donna and sourdough for lunch...and haven't done much else, to tell the truth. We're all napping a bit today. Might have another beer tonight, though...

Snowy? Scared to Drive? Drink instead!

More snowy day deals:

Snowy Day Specials Today Only at Tria!

Tria Rittenhouse: Give & Sip Gift Card Special -- For each $50 in Gift Cards purchased at Tria Rittenhouse today, you get a $15 Gift Card for you! And you can use your reward right then and there. That's what we call instant gratification - buy a gift, drink some wine (or beer).

Tria Wash West: Special 5 for 5 Happy Hour -- We're offering our new and wildly popular Tria-style happy hour all day and night at Tria Wash West. (This is usually available Monday through Thursday from 5 - 7 pm). 5 great fermented specialties (2 wines, 2 beers and a cheese plate) for $5 each. That leaves more money in your wallet for holiday shopping.

The Craft Ale House out in Limerick left a tempting post on Facebook: "Have you ever dreamed of being snowed in at a bar? Todays your chance, come on in." Indeed!

Bars in the Philly area: got more stuff going on today because of the weather? SEND IT!

Down on the Ground in Bourbon Town

After a delayed flight from Philly (panic coming in to Cinci, I'll have to run to make my connection to Lexington! ...which was about 30 yds. from my arriving gate. Sometimes things just work out), I picked up my rental car, got a quick lunch (felt like Mex, felt like BBQ, went Mex and lucked into a brisket burrito: bonus!), and then hit Liquor Barn. Hansell and I figgered we'd have all kinds of bourbon and rye available, but no one at these things ever has the beers we want, so we made our own plans. I got a styro cooler, ice, and a sixer each of Bell's Two-Hearted and Great Lakes Ed Fitz Porter and Dortmunder, and a bottle of Stone XIII Anniversary just for fun. All set.

Drove up to Frankfort to the motel, I'm set and into the Ed Fitz. John grabbed a Woodford at the Louisville Airport (had to catch up!), and he's on his way here. Dinner with the other writers -- Chuck Cowdery, Paul Pacult, Jim Murray -- is tonight, the birthday party, and some experimental whiskey samplings, is tomorrow. I'll tell you what I remember...

And...One Year of Memphis

Funny how that is: the same day I started my anti-PLCB blog, Brendan and Leigh opened the Memphis Taproom. You could argue that they were more constructive, I guess.

Cathy and I went down to Memphis for their anniversary celebration tonight. It was jamming, but we managed to wedge our way in and grab a Bear Republic Racer X (rocking hopper, and I expected nothing less) and a Schlenkerla Fastenbier (smoky, light, and...tart? Not sure about the condition of this one...). It was an awesome line-up of drafts. About then, Leigh came busting in, holding high a sampler of meatball sandwich chunks: delish.

We slowly slipped into the dining room (past Nodding Head's Curt Decker, who was "just going to stand here and drink cask Fuller's ESB till my eyes bleed," which didn't seem like a bad idea at all (Curt's wife Paula is Brendan's second partner in Memphis, and the third, Ken Correll, can be seen in the pic just over the tray Brendan's holding)), and found, to our surprise and delight, an empty table for two. We grabbed it, and tasted some other stuff: ham and onions on rye, a buffalo wing, some chicken liver mousse with dried fruit soaked in JW Lee's Harvest (awesome, BTW), and blueberry soup. Cathy got a Sly Fox Instigator (sweet and delicious, dark, rich), I got some of that ESB (smoother than silk, not as intrusive as the bottled ESB) and then I had another.

Then I had an Uerige Doppelstike, and it was one of the very best beers I've had in months. I may go back to Memphis tomorrow just to get more. Wow. Malty-dry (Germans are geniuses with that), hoppy, big, but not boozy, holy crap. Excellent beer. Then I tried Taras Boulba again... I don't get it. It's citrus peel-pith bitter, shallow, with just a bit of fruit character. Didn't do it for me when I had it the first time, after WhiskyFest NY at dba last year. Low alcohol, session beer, yeah, but it didn't make it for me this time either.

And then...we went home. Happy birthday, Memphis!

Early Election Results Going Well...

I mean about the Maine beer tax repeal proposal, of course. I told you about this back in June; the Maine legislature stuffed a big tax on beer and soda into a late-night session, to pay for a healthcare plan. I got nothing against healthcare plans per se, but as I always say: if it's good for the whole state, let the whole state pay for it, not just beer drinkers.

Well, the early projections are that the repeal of the tax is winning in solid numbers: 62% in favor of dumping it. The doctor groups in favor of the tax is taking it well: they're going to continue to support the program, but look for other sources of funding. Might I suggest a more broad-based tax that clearly states what it's for?

Shiver Your Own Damned Timbers

This International Talk Like A Pirate Day thing is getting right out of hand. First it was Scoats at the Grey Lodge strapping on the eye-patch and "ARRGH"-ing around, and that was weird enough. But now -- and I suppose we should have expected this -- Clipper City has jumped on the, er, gangplank and is hosting a party, with tickets, and costumes, and live music from the "Salty Dogs Band."

September 19. International Talk Like A Pirate Day. What Hath God Wrought?

A little speculation on skin and wine

We went out to dinner last night to an Italian-themed BYOB here in Newtown, Florentino's (which is excellent, BTW: a great find for us, and it's become our celebration spot). We were celebrating Cathy's latest promotion; she's doing very well with the new company. I took along a bottle of wine I picked up last week (and I was surprised to learn that it's available by special order from the PLCB), "Drink 'n' Stick," from "Some Young Punks," an Aussie outfit we were introduced to at a wine tasting in Portland, ME, last year.

Drink 'n' Stick is a Shiraz blend, a type we've come to enjoy, and we enjoy the irreverent labels and attitude of the Young Punks, too. Drink 'n' Stick, for example, has a "paper doll" label with a young woman and a variety of plastic press-on clothes to dress her with. As you can see by the succession of pix on the right, you can undress her, too, right down to the skivvies she's wearing in the actual paper label. Woo-woo and ooo-la-la, eh? (I apologize for the quality of the other two labels: they're small copies of two of SYP's other wines from the back of the Drink 'n' Stick label, but you get the idea.)

I swear, that's not why I got the bottle. I got it because we'd had a bottle of one of their other wines, "Passion has Red Lips," and really enjoyed it (better than this one: it was a bit inky and thick, and the fruit and acidity were smothered), and they were both quite reasonably priced. (I've yet to have a bottle of wine that cost more than $25 that I really thought was significantly better than a $15 bottle. This troubles me.)

But as we were eating, Cathy picks up the bottle, looks at skivvies-girl, and asks me, "If this was a beer label, would they have approved it?" Good question! Given the stuff that has been banned on beer labels -- Santa, the Mannekin Pis statue, Delacroix's "Liberty Leading the People" (and just why didn't Liberty take a minute to pin up her magnificent decolletage, anyway?) -- and then seeing this, it sure looks like a double standard to me.

Wine gets other breaks, too. For instance, wineries are often considered "farm" businesses, which gets them special considerations on taxes, permits, and sales...even when they have no vines on their property and buy all their grapes. Wineries are usually allowed to sell bottles of wine for take-home at festivals. Wineries in PA get to have stores to sell their products, other than at the winery. Brewers get none of that (don't even ask about distillers, the PLCB keeps a tight rein on spirits).

Fair? Well...no, but neither are the wildly different rates of taxation on beer, wine, and spirits: beer gets a huge break there. Federal's different, but most states are even more so: Pennsylvania, for example, charges only 8¢ a gallon tax on beer; wine is much more (and much more complicated, too). So it's not all one-sided.

Made for a fun conversation over an empty bottle of wine, though!

The Gods Must Be Crazy

I told you about "The Beer Brotha," the (mostly) beer blog written by a guy in Houston who calls himself "The American Don"...and then the dude promptly takes a month-long vacation from blogging!

He's back, and this post had me giggling. The Beer Brotha is a pisser...and some of the rest of us take ourselves way too serious. Do not MOCK THE GODS!!!!

Uh. Sell Beer. Joe and Jane Sixpack. Uh. Beer.

Beer gets Op-Ed attention in the Inquirer today; the Sheetz case goes to the State Supreme Court tomorrow. The editorial gets the general idea right, which is good: Pennsylvanians should be able to buy beer in six-packs, like everyone else in the United States. As the Inky says, "Beer must be purchased mostly by the case. Six-packs are available at bars and restaurants - at sky-high prices. The system is tailor-made to restrict competition and choice, and to artificially inflate prices."

So far, so good, although the average reader could easily infer that this "system" was put in place by the taverns and beer distributors, rather than put in place by the State and enforced by its booze law goon squad, the PLCB. But they miss the point. The Sheetz case is not about selling beer at a convenience store; if they win their case -- and they should -- it will not mean that every WaWa will be selling sixers of Coors Light. It's both more and less complicated than that.

What Sheetz wants is to be able to use the license they bought for their big Altoona store, a store that, like many in the chain, is so big that they've included a seating area for their large food menu. Other delis/pizza joints have the same thing, and there's no problem. That's the less-complicated part.

The more complicated part is mostly, pardon me, bullshit. The rub with Sheetz, supposedly, is that the company doesn't want to allow on-premises consumption of the beer; you can't drink it there, you have to get it to go. This is what has brought the case to the courts: a company policy that most Pennsylvanians could care less about if it means they can buy a sixer of Bud Light at a convenience store (Didja see that word? Convenience. Something the PLCB oughta look into).

What's it really about? Well, the Inky bellows about "surly beer sellers who now maintain a monopoly." Get it right: the beer sellers are surly because either the State won't let them sell six-packs (the distributors), or because the State set up rules that led them to base their business model on a monopoly on selling six-packs (the tavern owners).

The taverns are going to have to roll over on this. Places like The Sixpack Store, Suds, Quick Six, and The Foodery have built a business around giving us what we want: sixpacks to go, a good selection, in and out. They see a heavily bankrolled chain moving into their business, they're probably going to fight it. But when the dust settles, it's going to be the same scene, just more competitive. There are only so many licenses; business will go to the stores that best serve the variety of consumer needs.

But the beer distributors are the ones getting screwed, and we're getting it right along with them. They've got the expertise, the selection, the space, the cold rooms...let them sell sixpacks. Please! If you're going to level the playing field, level the whole thing.

Some of you will probably think I'm being too hard on the Inquirer. They are calling for sixpacks for the citizens, after all. But this is a complicated issue that goes to the heart of the problems with the PLCB: interpretation of arcane, archaic laws that would be better off being completely replaced, rather than tinkered with. If I'm dealing with a 'major daily,' I expect the full story.

Take a look at The Beer Brotha

I don't usually make an announcement when I add someone to the list of blogs/bloggers over on the left side there. I'm making an exception this time, because The Beer Brotha deserves some hits. It's a different take on beer and beer blogging, written by a black American from Texas, who goes by "The American Don." I wish the guy would post more often.

"Don" made a comment on my Cinder Cone tasting note, and Blogger automatically linked his Blogger profile to his name. So I clicked it. I liked the way he wrote, and what he wrote about, and when I saw he only had 45 hits on his visitor counter...I thought I'd lend a hand.

Yes, some of this is race-based. I only know three black beer geeks (Dell, James, Eric...yeah, I'm pointing at you), and about that many black brewers. I'd like to see more -- I'd like to see every part of America in the craft beer scene. So when I found The Beer Brotha, and liked it, well, you do your part to broaden, y'know? Do your part and check it out.

Don -- Heat's on, man, get blogging.

Happy Easter!

Whew. It's been a long busy week of singing and work. I had a rehearsal with my church choir Tuesday night that went exceptionally well, we sang Holy Thursday, I sang late prayer with the choir director Thursday night at 11 (all a capella, almost entirely dark in the church, and I volunteered to do it again next year), sang an all a capella Good Friday service with our small chamber choir, Easter Vigil last night (big service, and I carried the five-foot Paschal candle into the church), then 10:30 mass this morning... I'm bushed, but spiritually charged.

Workwise, I did my next Portfolio column (beer festivals) and the final edits on the one that's up now on Düsseldorf and Köln and three short pieces for a new project you'll hear about soon. Then Wednesday I had to run upstate to take back the kegs from the Upstate Beer event at the Grey Lodge two weeks ago. A weird day, weatherwise, with rain, and a bit of snow, fog, cold and wind, but things went like clockwork -- "One" Guy Hagner was nice enough to meet me right off an exit on I-80 and saved me the climb over the ridge in Berwick, I got a quick "hey, I'm here" call from Mike "Bavarian Barbarian" Hiller at the last minute before leaving the Bullfrog, where Terry had graciously agreed to hold Mike's keg for him (and we'd sampled Terry's delicious "Unique", a singel that was excellent, and a 'kegs gone wild' sour apricot that rocked) -- and I was an hour ahead of schedule when I came zipping over the ridge into Millheim to return the last keg to Elk Creek.

Tim Bowser wasn't in, but he'd told me to get a sample of the Trout Stout they'd debuted on St. Pat's. I walked in, and saw two guys I'd met when I picked up the keg -- the assistant brewer and a friend of Tim's (and I obviously missed both their names, and I do apologize!) -- having lunch: a couple chunks of cheese, a loaf of fresh bread, a rough-looking ring bologna, and two pints of stout. What a great-looking lunch. I was handed a pint of stout -- excellent: bitter, refreshing, and tasty, hope it joins the lineup -- and we talked about how things had been pretty damned busy on St. Pat's. I finally had to ask: is that a local ring bologna? Yes, it was, from the meat market down the street, they made their own bologna, jerky (got some of that, too!), hams...yum. I got a ring, jerky, fresh-roasted peanuts, and a drink, and headed on down the road.

I was going to stop at Russell's in Bloomsburg for lunch, but when I called to make sure they were open, I was told that they were closed till 4:00...the place was being sold, and they were in closing; they would re-open at 4 with new owners. Yow! Hope it stays largely the same. I wound up stopping in Lewisburg at the Towne Tavern for a chili cheeseburger and a Sam Adams Lager. There were Landshark Lager signs everywhere. Kinda odd; we don't see any of that down here around Philly. Interesting. Good burger, but far from phenomenal; the onion rings were pretty great, though.

Anyway, Friday dawned and Cathy finally gave in and realized that ham was the way to go for Easter. Bang! I got right on the phone and reserved one at Rieker's Meats (thanks again, George and Nancy). I donated platelets (and actually did; I've been having a bad string of failed donations, bad sticks, etc., glad we snapped that), and whipped over to Rieker's: what a beautiful ham! Went home, got a really interesting interview with Jon Myerow of Tria, did the Good Friday service, and then had a great fast-breaking dinner with the family at Florentino's in Newtown (eggplant parm that was more like an eggplant Napoleon: no breading on the eggplant, and it was sliced thin and piled high); split an excellent $15 bottle of red Zin with Cathy. I even finally got on my regular Friday night chat with some old beer buddies for our annual "Good Friday Catlick Beer Night" and drank a 750 of Church Brew Works Triple 2000 and a Rochefort 10.

Yesterday was spent shopping, getting haircuts, doing interview prep for my upcoming work week, and cleaning. Today after mass I made up a glaze for the ham with brown sugar, apple cider, dry mustard, ground Valencia orange peel, and ground cloves. Cathy made scalloped potatoes and roasted cauliflower, and family came for lunch. The ham was magnificent. The Rieker's ham cost about twice as much as the plastic-wrapped, perfectly edible hams from the supermarket, and it was fully worth it. Wow, what a good ham. I can't remember the last time I saw my dad eat so much meat. I'm really looking forward to ham sandwiches. I had my last bottle of Tröegs Scratch #6 (the 'Dortmunder'), a Reading with my mom, and a Sea Hag IPA. Now I'm getting ready to have...something. Not sure what. Might go with whiskey, I've got the bottle of Weller Antique out, and it seems a shame to put it away without having some...

Happy Easter, folks. Sorry I've been away so long.

Capone's bulletin...

I don't normally run alerts for bars with beers on tap, but Capone's has something special on: two years of Tröegs Mad Elf -- 2006 and 2007 -- and the non-cherry Naked Elf as well. That's a great 3-beer tasting education on what fruit, yeast, and age do to a beer.

The East End Black Strap Stout and Grisette Matt has on make a nice reason to go, too.

Benefits of Beer Proselytization

Seventeen years ago, I worked at a small start-up pharmaceutical company in Ft. Washington, PA. One of the friends I made there was a young chemist, Tom Lawler. Tom was a good guy, and we got along well, but Coors Light was where his beer world began and ended. I decided to open his eyes to the variety that was available -- which wasn't really all that much, in 1991, in the Philadelphia area.

The first cracks in the wall were Yuengling Lager and Killian's Irish Red (which was a significantly beefier beer in those days). Tom took to them, and we ran around in Berks County, drinking Yuengling and eating the local Pennsylvania Dutch chow. We grabbed a new toxicologist at the firm, Les Gibbs, a Bud man, and broke him in on beer variety, too.

We toured the Yuengling and Lion breweries (talk about back in the day...our first Lion tour featured scrounging up some hardhats, and duckwalking under tanks in the crowded old fermentation hall). We took a day off work to go down to the old Dock Street brewpub at 18th & Cherry for May Day, when they released their bock and had a farmer bring three goats into the city.

The high point while we were at Greenwich was probably in 1993. (Warning: long and rambling reminiscence ahead.) Eight of us did "The Long Ranger Trip," a three-day journey into New England, where we visited New England Brewing (where I first met Phil Markowski), New Haven Brewing (where we had a very funny and profane tour and walked away with an unexpected free case of each of their beers...those were the days) the Hartford Brewery (where the beer tasted like there'd been a cleaning solution incident, except the alt, which was good), Northampton Brewery (where one of our gang got a quick French lesson), Commonwealth (a sadly missed brewpub that was all about cask ale), Harpoon (we sucked down a lot of Oatmeal Stout on the tour, during which it started snowing heavily), Cambridge Brewing (where we had one of the coolest yards of beer I've ever seen; a dark beer floated on top of a lighter one, and the dark spiraled down into the light), and then a harsh run up a very snowy I-95 that ended just short of the Maine border where we finally gave up and ditched it for the night in a hotel. We'd planned to visit the Portsmouth Brewery and Gritty McDuff's and Geary, but the three hours it took us to go fifty miles up I-95 convinced us otherwise.

The next day we made the 11 AM tour at Catamount, did some drinking at the Inn at Long Trail (still a favorite stop; we dropped off about half the guys here, they were going to stay and ski at Killington), took in the self-guided tour at the old Long Trail brewery (and bought lots of stuff from the powerfully cute woman in the hospitality room), and then finished up in Brattleboro at The Latchis (back when they were still brewing; we were terribly gruffty and rough for the white linen dining room, but the waiter was extremely gracious about it) and the last stop, appropriately, was McNeill's (as rough and gruffty as we were, but friendly, and the beer was excellent).

As you can see, the beer education process had gone well. The point of this whole long post was last night, when I was over at Tom's house for the Super Bowl. The three of us -- me, Les, and Tom -- stood in his barroom, where beer posters lined the overhead, and his "shrine" of Yuengling collectibles and antiques sat proudly below the plasma screen. Each of us was holding a glass of draft Tröegs Nugget Nectar from the sixtel he'd reserved for this occasion, served on his two-tap home draft system (Miller Lite on the other tap, he's a reasonable man). That's when Tom gestured at the shrine, and held up the beer, and said to me, "You know, this is all your fault." We clinked glasses and grinned.

The pleasure of having turned someone on to the fuller joys of the broad spectrum of beer was gratifying. Getting invited to a party where there was draft Nugget Nectar was a nice side benefit as well!

Lobbying at ABC

I got invited to a meet-n-greet the Pennsylvania Brewers Guild (I'm not going to link that, the site's two years out of date. Guys!!!) held at Appalachian Brewing's Harrisburg location to get the attention of state legislators and PLCB members. I was honored to be invited as a non-brewer, but I was leery of going, if only because of the logistics.

The event was Monday night in Harrisburg, and I already had a commitment to do a tasting and talk for the American Industrial Hygiene Association's convention at the Convention Center in Philadelphia. (Believe me, it came as a suprise to me, too: thanks to Jon Myerow at Tria for dropping my name to them.) The problem was that the AIHA tasting was over at 5:30, in Center City, and the thing in Harrisburg started about 7. I told Sean Casey (owner of Church Brew Works) that I'd just have to see how traffic went.

Well, it wasn't too bad. I was in the Passat and rolling at 5:32, which helped. The Schuylkill was a mess, according to KYW's traffic reports, so I decided to slip down the river on the north side, pick up the Lincoln Drive out to Mt. Airy, and take Germantown Pike out to the PA Turnpike. And you know, there were a couple of slow spots, but I made it in about 50 minutes, which seemed to have been pretty good time. So I headed west to Harrisburg and threw the coal to it.

Things had just gotten underway when I got up to the second floor at ABC (they were running late), so I grabbed an Iron Hill IPA (and a Nodding Head IPA; I was thirsty), ran back through the gauntlet of brewers and legislators, and got some brisket and wild game galantine (really, it was quite the spread) on my plate before I made a fool out of myself drinking on a substantially empty and caffeine-ravaged stomach.

After that I looked around. Wow, good turnout! Western PA in particular showed up well: Erie, Straub, Sprague Farm (Minnie Sprague came up behind me and startled the life out of me), and a seriously wired Matt Allyn who'd just gotten his approvals and printed off some quick ink-jets of his newly approved labels and was really excited to be there, legal and all (and the Wynona's Big Brown...Ale was great). Out front it was ABC (duh...), Tröegs, Victory, Stoudt's, Iron Hill, Yards, Lancaster, Barley Creek, Church, and The Lion (if I missed you, let me know, I'll edit you in!). Artie Tafoya (of ABC) and Sean Casey were grinning like demons; they were pretty happy about the whole thing.

It seemed pretty good to me, too. Hell, I met my new state rep, Chris King, over a couple beers at the Lion booth (I got the new Steg 150, an anniversary beer, a kind of crisper Vienna lager: full review coming soon). The folks who did show up were pretty well-disposed to beer, of course, and were listening to what the brewers had to say. I liked what they were saying, too, only disagreeing with them on a couple points as a consumer. But it certainly did spark a lively discourse of ideas, which is no small thing: at least someone was there saying it, and people were listening.

I hope the Brewers Guild grows, and continues this sort of thing: they have to, it's a matter of survival (hope they update their website, too). It's good for everyone. And guys...we, the beer-loving public, can help. Just tell us what letters to write. Another good reason to update the website!

Pittsburgh Brewing News

Two bits of brewing news from Da Burgh, one great, one not so.

Great news: Rivertowne Pourhouse, the new brewpub in Monroeville, opens on Monday, June 11, according to a reader who I believe preferred to remain nameless. (Read more about the Pourhouse here.)

Not so great news: construction of the Pittsburgh Hofbräuhaus, the Iron City outpost of the Munich powerhouse, has been delayed again. The site is still being prepared; no construction has yet taken place. Bummer.

Another Summer Beer: Otter Creek White Sail

Otter Creek has been doing some new and exciting stuff since Morgan Wolaver bought the place and made his organic beers full-time. The Otter Creek brand wasn't banished, thank God, and they've been having a great time with their World Tour beers. This isn't one of those, just a Summer seasonal Witbier with orange peel and coriander. Let's open it up.

Hmmm...pretty clear for a wit. There's a wet oats smell to the head that's kind of nice, but no real citrus or coriander. Wow. Pretty light on the spices and flavorings. I get the coriander when I pull some air through it, but not really any citrus. I hate to get overwhelmed by a wit, and I hate to complain about this after bitching that the Steg Midsummer White was over-spiced, but there's just barely enough flavorings here to make this something other than a wheat ale. Sorry guys, there's just not enough here.

Maui Brewing Bikini Blonde Lager

Another beer Maui Brewing sent me: Bikini Blonde Lager. Supposed to be a helles lager, let's have a taste. Pours plenty of foam, with a brilliant blonde body. If I'm gonna get picky...the foam's kinda big-bulky, too many large bubbles, but that's pretty picky. Flavor's good, not real hoppy, which I was a little nervous about.

Body's right, malt's there, but...it's finishing a bit sweet, not with that elusive malt dryness that marks the classic and notable helles. I like just about everything else about this beer, but that sweetness is bothering me, and putting me off from that sip after sip evaporation that the style should bring to my drinking.