Rolling in the green: Hop season has arrived!

I originally started drinking craft beer because it just plain tasted better. It still does, but now there are other reasons to drink craft beer that are at least as important to me. I like the do-it-yourself aesthetic of the beers, preserving a traditional craft, lest all beermaking become impersonal and mechanized, and no one remembers why or how certain steps are important to the final product. Sure, the brewing of many craft beers is mechanized, especially at the bigger breweries, but the brewers there have an understanding of the process from end-to-end and a tasty final product (rather than simply profits) as their end goal. This is stark compared to the giant macro-breweries where many employees conduct a single task in conveyor-belt-like fashion, without ever understanding how it fits into the big picture. It reminds me of the great Cathedrals in Europe that could likely never be replicated today because the craftsmanship that went into them died out, and even if a sufficient number skilled craftsmen could be found, no one would be willing to fund such a project today. Luckily, in beer, the craft is more alive than ever, and there’s a growing number of consumers willing to pay for a craft beer. The best of all, craft beer (most of it at least) is still many times more affordable than, say, high quality wine, keeping it within just about anyone’s budget for at least an occasional treat, if not a daily staple.

I also like the way many craft brewers shows greater respect to people (their employees and their customers) and the environment than the macrobrewers. Sierra Nevada uses fuel cells for electric power and heat, runs heat and C02 recovery systems, and is proactive about maximizing water and energy conservation through efficiency. New Belgium is 100% wind-powered, incorcoporated green design elements in the brewery building, and treats their wastewater. Several smaller breweries such as Wolaver’s and Eel River are organic. And the hops shortage has prompted an increasing number of breweries are experimenting with self-production, kick-starting an appreciation for local hops that mirrors the local produce movement that began in farmers markets years ago. By contrast, Budweiser’s claim to greenness is that it uses 8% renewable energy (compared to NB’s 100%), and that they recycle aluminum. That’s about it.

Me and my brother Dan cutting down hop bines

Yesterday was a celebration of all of these elements I love about craft beer: great taste, great cultural tradition and craftsmanship, and great use of local eco-friendly ingredients. This was all courtesy of Brian Hunt of Moonlight Brewing, a one-man operation based in Sonoma County, that has achieved cult-like status for churning out one astoundingly well crafted beer after with its improbably small employee count. Yesterday was the first of two days devoted to picking his ¼ acre of hops, which will go into a fresh hop beer that will be ready some time over the next several weeks. Don’t ask me what kind of fresh hop beer, because not only do I not know, but as of yesterday even Brian didn’t know. He said he’d have to smell the crop we picked, think about it, and figure out what he wanted to make. It is exactly this kind of attitude, a respect for one’s ingredients that bases the final product on what the ingredients are suited for, rather than forcing them to fit some preconceived plan, that I love about craft beer production. It’s a world away from our current notions flying in raspberries from Chile in December, instead of focusing on making treats from fresh and local winter crops.

Cutting the bines

We started by cutting down the vines, excuse me, the “bines”, from the wires on which they were trained. This was the first thing I learned yesterday: the difference between a vine and a bine. Grapes grow on true vines, which climb using tendrils or suckers, and become hard and woody. Hops grow on bines, which climbs growing its shoots in a helix around a support and remain tender, green, and plant-like instead of woody. We made my brother do much of the cutting work, both because he’s an aspiring hop grower himself, and because he’s young and hearty. : ) I gave this job a try though, and cut down about half of the first row, of the four rows we harvested yesterday. Our tool was a bit makeshift (an exacto-knife duct taped to the basket of an apple picker), but it worked. This is another one of my favorite features of craft production: if the right tool isn’t handy, improvise! MacGuyver would be awfully proud. It’s one way to get around the fact that the benefits to scale are so great that while it used to be that self-production was the economical choice, today it’s an unavoidable fact that most things can be obtained most economically from Wal-Mart, McDonalds, or Budweiser. The cost of the equipment and supplies for hand-sewn, hand-grilled, and hand-brewed items ensures that today, a do-it-yourself lifestyle costs more, not less, than having others do it for you. At least homebrewers generally embrace the idea of tinkering, recycling, and jury-rigging such that almost anything tool be constructed or mimicked with a little improvisation instead of purchasing a shiny, new, expensive made-for-one-purpose only device.

The crew, picking the hops from the bines

Next, we set the bines in a pile under a sunshade, sat ourselves down in some chairs, and started picking. The shade was key, not just for protecting the hops from drying out in the sun, but also for our own protection. It got up to just about 100F yesterday, and sitting in that glare for hours would have been tough without any shelter. The hop picking circle was a lot of fun, and really brought out the communal aspect of agriculture and hop production. As Mike, who was sitting next to me, mentioned, it reminded him of an actual harvest process from real agricultural times, in which the family and neighbors would gather round together, work in concert, and bond over the work, telling stories and teaching the process to the kids. Of course, the one aspect that was missing was the back-breakingness of that work. We had only about half the hops on a ¼ acre of land to harvest, or as Brian put it into context when I asked him what recipes he would make, “Recipes? Plural? Haha, no, this will yield one 14 barrel batch of beer.” But still, I had to agree with Mike. It reminded me of the barn raising scene in Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (a staple of visits to my grandmother’s house as a kid), minus all the color coordinated outfits, singing, and dancing, of course. Over the course of the morning, we picked Cascades, Chinooks, and a Canadian Red Vines, which we separated into buckets and placed in Brian’s refrigerated room, which was a welcome temporary respite from the heat.

The freshest Death ever

We also savored Moonlight beers straight out of the tanks. Death and Taxes was the first Moonlight beer I ever tasted, and it has remained my favorite, across the two years I’ve lived in SF and through yesterday. It’s a black lager with a rich, balanced blend of dark flavors that never fails to surprise me with its boldness and simplicity. The aroma is full of coffee, but the taste follows through with a rich smokiness. Tim, another of the hop picking guests, mentioned that as a former smoker, the trace of tobacco flavor in the D&T keeps him from ever wanting a cigarette. The tan head on the beer is dense and long lasting, and even though the body of the beer is light, it is full of crisp, dry flavor. This is a lager I can (and do!) love, and a session beer (4.2% ABV and light bodied) that doesn’t compromise flavor. If I had had this beer in England at the GBBF, I wouldn’t have come home lamenting low ABV beers. I can’t quite convey in words just how rich and thick the flavor is in contrast to the light body. It is truly a feat.

We sat around in the early afternoon, after the last of the hops had been picked, sampling beers fromBrian’s stash that he brought out disguised with paper wrappers to make us guess what they were or what was in them. Since many were oddball beers that he had picked up in his travels (kelp beer, gooseberry beer, heather beer, etc.), we were often way off. But as the selection moved closer to home, the group was surprisingly accurate and quick. Death and Taxes from a bomber (it is usually only available on tap, so he thought it might throw people off) fooled almost no one, and Adair needed just one sip, and Tim just a smell, from one of the newly available bottles of Pliny the Elder to guess what it was.

Gravensteins

On the way home, I made my brother Dan put off the nap he was craving for just another half hour so we could take a detour to Sebastopol for Gravenstein apples. I’ve been dying to make cider for months, and now that it is apple season the time feels right. I got a giant box that by my best guess is about two bushels (or eight pecks). Never mind that I only got online to try to figure out the requirements of cider making after I had all these apples. Problem number one: I need an apple press. Problem number two: you need a blend of sweet, tart, and bitter (bittersweet or bittersharp) apples to make the best cider. So, I’m going to hold onto these for a couple weeks, eat some of them, and pick up a whole bunch more when I head out to Dobbins for NCHF. That’s apple country and I figure that I can get a whole variety of apples out there of the types I need, and that I can get them to press them for me, so that I can just bring home the juice. Problem number three? All this cider isn’t going to be ready to drink for months. But that’s ok, I can wait. And having two weeks until I pick up the rest of my apples is giving me a bunch of new ideas. I think I’ll also make cyser, which is apple mead, and that I’ll split my batches of cider into several fermentation vessels so that I can make some sweet, some dry, etc.

Brew debut: The Northern California Homebrewers Festival

I’ve posted about many a beer drinking festival here before, but I believe this is the first time I’m posting about a beer brewing festival.  Of course, every festival is a beer brewing festival for professional brewers, in attendance to share and promote their beers, but I’m talking about festivals you and me, the enthusiasts.  A few weekends from now, September  19^th & 20^th, I’ll be at the Northern California Homebrewers Festival.

The festival seems to be a little more structured than most I’ve been to in the past in that they have an actual speaker.  And by actual speaker, I mean someone other than the Stumptown Brewery guys who got up on stage at the end of their Beers and BBQ Revival and encouraged women to strip for the title of Miss Stumptown and men to get their girlfriends to strip, as if this earned them the Mr. Stumptown title.  A bit sexist, no?  If there’s going to be stripping, let’s at least have a little equal opportunity and get some naked guys up there.  But, preferably, I like my festivals a little heavier on the brews and a little lighter on the boobs, that’s all.   This year’s speaker at NCHF is ‘The head brewer of Stone’.  I’m not sure whether this refers to their founder, brewmaster, or lead brewer, but at least it pinpoints a particular brewery.  Last year’s was Vinnie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Company, discussing sour beer and wood aging.

Another fun feature of NCHF, aside from keeping the on-stage focus on racking to secondary and off ‘racks’, is their homebrew competition.  Clubs can enter a keg in one either or both of two styles picked to go with this year’s theme of ‘The British Isles’: Irish Red Ale and Scotch Wee Heavy.  I can’t wait to try all those Wee Heavys, and luckily it will be my duty to do so as a festival attendee since all festival participants can contribute a vote for their favorite.

And last, but actually first chronologically and probably first in terms of festival events I’m eagerly anticipating, is Homebrew Chef Sean Paxton’s dinner on Friday night.  This is a man after my own heart who interprets “course” liberally, actually referring to a collection of several items with each course designation such that his “six course” dinner is probably more accurately a “fifteen course” dinner paired with ten different beers, many of them homebrews.  This year’s menu isn’t up yet, but last year’s is probably a good guide for what to expect.  Phew, I feel strangely full just reading all of those courses, and yet very, very hungry.

And, I almost forgot, but this festival will mark my debut as a ‘competitive’ homebrewer.  Now, I mean competitive in a strictly narrow sense of ‘having entered competitions’ since it will probably be a long while before I’m competitive in the broader sense of ‘being in the running for winning competitions’, though you never know!  I’m not entering the NCHF competition itself, since that is only open to clubs, and all of my attempts to join a SF homebrew club have been stymied thus far, but Gail and I will be entering our secret brew in the California Homebrew Competition (held at Stern Grove) and the Queen of Beer Competition, which both have entry drop-off points at NCHF.

Now all I have to do is practice setting up that giganto-tent, which has luckily recovered since being traumatized at Boonville.  Cheers!

Just Fred — Beer of the Week

Beer of the Week is something I like to pull out every once in a while around here when something impresses me enough, for whatever reason, that it deserves a column of its own.  There are lots of fabulous beers that never get named Beer of the Week, and lots of weeks that never get honored with a beer, but that’s often because there is so much else swirling around the beer (a whole rest of a flight of beers to be drunk, a brewery to be toured, a festival to attend, beer friends to be made) that any one beer just becomes a small part of the overall story.   Beer of the Week is a simpler concept: one beer, one review, end of story.  Indeed, it’s where I started with this blog, and nice returning point every once in a while.

This week, we have a BotW because I made a resolution lately to stop being a stockpiler and to drink my ’special’ stuff when I feel like it, because, hey, life is short.  The exception, and of course there is always an exception, are the beers that I am deliberately aging.  However, I differentiate that scenario from just accidentally holding onto a beer for 3+ months because the time never seems right for cracking it open.  Even the name of this post’s BotW seems unassuming and weeknight appropriate: Fred.  Just Fred.  Ok, actually it’s Hair of the Dog’s Fred.  Still, what kind of name is that for a beer? All of their people-named beers seem to lend themselves to confusion.  Mentioning enthusiastically in front of my grandmas that “I really love Fred!” would get them so excited about the almost-given-up-on prospect of great-grandchildren that I might suddenly be the favorite grandkid again… that is, until they heard me praise Fred’s “spiciness”, at which point I imagine they’d feel intensely uncomfortable, never mind the consequences of letting slip that “I had Fred after dinner last night.” 

Seriously though, this is one hell of a beer.  It was light amber colored, with a thick, long lasting off-white head.  I poured it into tumblers (we don’t have a lot glassware at chez Hopster) for myself and my roommate Kathleen, and each had over a finger’s worth of foam that persisted as we drank the entire bottle.  Or rather, as I proceeded to drink the entire bottle after commandeering
Kathleen’s share when we realized how hoppy this was (hops just aren’t her thing). 

The aroma alone is pretty intoxicating, with intense floral and green hop scents and powerful baking spice aromas from the yeast and rye malt.  There was also another smell that came through “loud and clear”, actually the first thing I smelled upon pouring the beer, and that was sour green apple.  This is usually the smell of the chemical acetaldehyde, which is a flaw in just about all styles of beer (Except Budweiser, but then, who reads The Thirsty Hopster and drinks Budweiser?  No one I hope.  And if you do, let me know because your next craft beer is on me.  I just can’t in good conscience let you continue in this vein.  It’s like those mothers who get arrested when Child Protective Services finds out they’ve been off galavanting around and letting their kids forage in the garbage.  At least this is my understanding from what I see on Law And Order: SVU.  So please, think of my clean criminal record.  Let’s keep it that way — don’t drink garbage).  Anyway, the point is, the acetaldehyde was unmistakable.  It’s usually either a sign of a sanitation problem or a very young beer.  Considering (A) everything else that was so right about this beer, and (B) Hair of the Dog’s all around stellar reputation, I want to give this the benefit of the doubt and assume that it is something that will die down with more age or that was specific to this batch, or this crate, and the way it was handled.

Getting past the aroma and into the beer itself was like going down a deeper and deeper rabbit hole.  It’s a whopping 10%, and heavier in body than most 10%ers, with a thick, oily mouth-filling texture and noticeable alcohol warmth.  The hops & spice continue their dual reign in the flavor. and I imagine it’s those 10 varieties of hops in here that give the beer it’s “oiliness.”  I keep using that word, and it probably sounds off-putting, but I mean it as a sincere compliment.  If I had distilled hop oils in a vial, this is what I imagine that they’d taste and smell like, all flowers and nectar and resin.  Except, the bitterness wasn’t over-the-top.  It’s not benign at 65 IBUs, that’s for sure, but it shares time with the other elements of the beer.  The rye is more assertive in the flavor than in the aroma, overtaking some of the other spice components.  I think Hair of the Dog knows how to work with rye better than any other brewery I can think of, and I wish they’d put out even more rye beers. 

In all, this beer had just about everything I want in a beer: a dense and persistent head without a bursting and seltzer-y carbonation, a layered aroma that pulls in the best that each of beer’s three non-water ingredients has to offer, a luxuriously thick texture, a pungent and varied use of hops that avoids brutal bitterness, and a collection of spice flavors that shifts and shimmers and only gets stronger as the beer warms up.  Try it if you can find it, but be warned, even just one bottle was enough to entirely bowl over my expectations and nearly bowl over the rest of me.

It’s a wrap: Belgian fusion tasting at The Trappist

Nicole and Chuck pouring the beers

This past Sunday was the 5^th installment of the Thirsty Hopster Tasting Series, and the first time we’ve partnered up with a local bar to enhance the experience. Initially, I thought ‘enhance the experience’ would just mean that everyone would be guaranteed a seat and there’d be no more discreetly hustling crates of beer to and from the park or makeshift seats fashioned out of couch cushions in my living room. But no! Chuck and Nicole from The Trappist went above and beyond: opening up the bar early especially for us, putting together and awesome plate of cheese, figs, olives, and other snacks, and providing better tasting commentary than I could on my best day.

The theme was a loose one I came up with when wondering about the two way traffic of ideas (or lack thereof) between Belgian and American brewers. Belgian and Belgian-style beers have gotten big in the US lately, with imports booming and domestic brewers innovating on classic Belgian styles. What I haven’t heard as much about is an impetus within the Belgian brewing scene to pick up on what the Americans are up to, and to innovate on American styles. So, we set out to find the best beers brewed by Belgian brewers in non-Belgian styles (generally American or British).

The group discussing the beers

Before diving into the beers themselves, I think the best insight of the day on this Americo-Belgian beer trend came from Tim  from William’s Brewing in San Leandro. He noted that when we Americans brew Belgian-style beers, we usually mean that we use their yeasts. But when Belgians brew American-style beers, they usually use… their yeasts. You’d think that if yeasts are what “define” one family of beers from another that a Belgian brewing an American-style beer would use American yeasts, but nope! They change up just about everything else except the yeast. This seems rather obvious on one hand, but struck me as I kept thinking about it as pretty important. There’s no particular reason why a Belgian-brewed beer has to use a traditionally Belgian yeast strain. On one hand, I think this means that there’s an untapped source of innovation there for Belgian brewers (brewing with other yeasts), so long as they think their customers show any kind demand for the crisp flavors of low-ester yeasts. On the other hand, it means there’s also a potential for a global convergence on high-ester Belgian style yeasts, if we adopt them at such a rate that they become the standard in every geography. I don’t really believe this will happen, especially considering how tiny the craft beer market still is in the US. I’m just throwing it out there as a possibility. In reality, I think that if anything the selection of craft brews styles and flavors out there will continue to diversify, both in the US and globally.

I have no official tasting notes from the event, but I will give a few words on each of the brews:

• Belgian Scotch Ales
  • Scotch Silly from Brasserie de Silly: Deep clear amber color, think off-white head. Very malty and very sweet, as expected with a Scotch, but gets its Belgian twist in its exceptional fruitiness. For me, the high sweetness and high fruit flavors together were a little overwhelming. I usually like either a strong dose of one or the other, but both together tasted cloying. 8.0% ABV


Miriam & Ben (who came in from NYC for the tasting! ok, not only for the tasting...)

• Belgian Stouts
  • Troubadour Oscura from Brouwerij De Musketiers: Very light color (medium amber) and lightness of roast (small bit on the second half of the taste) for a stout. Probably more similar to the prior beer (Scotch) than the following one (Export Stout). More drinkable than the Scotch Silly, but still showing strong Belgian-style esters. 8.5% ABV
  • De Dolle Extra Export Stout from De Dolle Brouwers: My favorite of the first three (the malt-driven beers). The carbonation rush was intense at first, bursting even, which was too much in my opinion, but it calmed down as the glass warmed. Nicole gave us some great tasting notes of which I only remember ‘pine’ and ‘licorice’, and in fact I could taste the licorice in the middle of the taste. Darker and roastier than the Troubadour, this one is unmistakably a stout. The alcohol is more noticeable as well, even though these two aren’t far apart in ABV. 9.0% ABV.
• Belgian IPAs
  • Gouden Carolus Hopsinjoor from Brouwerij Het Anker: This was a total about-face from the stouts, but there was really no good choice in terms of whether to drink IPAs before stouts or stouts before IPAs. It was very light in color for an IPA, straw colored, but not light in flavor. It had a really aromatic nose, full of perfume-y and earth-y hops and a big lemon kick. It was only mildly bitter, so many of the non-IPA drinkers proclaimed it the first IPA they ever enjoyed. It was a really nice departure from West Coast IPAs that often all have the same light amber color, pine and grapefruit aroma, and bitter flavor. I love those WCIPAs (Is this an acronym yet? It should be.), but I like most of all when someone does something new that’s just as good as the old stand by’s, if not better. 8.0% ABV.
  • Houblon Chouffe Dobbelen IPA Tripel from Brasserie d’Achouffe: Ah, at this point, I was long caught up in conversation, and failed to take mental notes. However, I will make it up to you with another recommendation…

Me & Michael, kicking back from our talking and picture-taking roles respectively

I’ve been hearing scuttlebutt for months now about Linden Street Brewery, a new distribution brewery going in over in Oakland, not far from The Trappist. Apparently they specialize in California Common style beers, which got me pretty excited since this is a style that needs a little more attention. It’s an ale-lager hybrid style, using lager yeasts fermenting at ale temperatures (which are higher), that Anchor rescued from oblivion. To-date, Anchor Steam is still the only commercial example you can find reliably, though there are others that pop up in smaller brewpubs here and there, or as seasonal releases. I had previously emailed the owner of Linden Street to find out what their deal is, and how an enthusiastic beer drinker could get a hold of their brews, but unfortunately he told me that their ‘unofficial’ Friday get-togethers had gotten too big, and there would be no more until their official opening. So, you can imagine how excited I was to find not one, but two Linden Street beers on tap at The Trappist, and that both were California Common style beers. One was a traditional light ale-lager hybrid, while the other was black. I tasted a few sips of them both and quickly snapped up a glass of the Black. It was incredible: dark, smoky, and heavily roasted, but still really crisp and refreshing. If you like Moonlight Brewing’s Death and Taxes, you’ll like this as well. I just hope they have their official opening soon so that I can get it at more places! In the meantime, make your way over to The Trappist fast, and see for yourself!

Beer Chef Slow Food Weekend Stone Dinner

If you are at all interested in food culture or in eco-sustainability and the whole green movement, it’s hard to miss all the hubbub that has been brewing over the huge Slow Food Nation event in town this weekend.  I won’t be able to make it, unfortunately, since I’ll be in LA for a wedding.  However, much as I would love to try all the slow bites on offer in the tasting expo over the weekend, at least know I can taste some slow brews Thursday night at Bruce Paton’s dinner.

Dinner with the Beer Chef is a near-monthly event put on by Bruce Paton, the Executive Chef at the Cathedral Hill Hotel.  It’s a multi-course dinner with dishes he has prepared to match beers from a particular craft brewer that will be served with each course. His Five Guys and a Barrel dinner in April was one of the most spectacular beer dinners I’ve been lucky enough to attend.

This Thursday, August 28th, the Dinner with the Beer Chef is slow food themed, in preparation for a weekend that will be full of slow food events. The beers served will be from Stone, a San Diego-area brewery known for their hoppy IPAs that has built a shrine to organic, local, sustainable foods and beer in their beautiful ‘Bistro and World Gardens’ in Escondido, CA.  The food will be a awesome-sounding three course menu prepared with seasonal ingredients from more local, Northern California farms than I can name here.  Check it out for yourself.  I’m not sure if there are spaces left at this dinner, but if it sounds good to you, it’s worth going to the Beer Chef’s website where you can make a reservation or get more information about future events.