Category: Craft Schismists

Here We Are At 2021’s End… And What Have We Become?

Charts. I used to draw loads of charts. The one above from December 2016 [Ed.: fig 1.] was really useful as it succinctly describes the world of good beer from a wee titch in time before 1980 to the then present day without all the revisionist history imposed on us all by the BA.  I was very interested five to six years ago in how beer culture described itself – which in part led to me shifting away my focus from researching brewing history to reading the weekly news. And as we can see in the diagram, craft as it then existed died in around 2015* but the term has stuck around, generating suckers and shoots that are worth exploring and, seeking external structures, may be explored using a few agricultural terms as analogies: sports, scions and volunteers.

What’s that? Let’s define some terms. A sport in the plant world is a genetic mutation that results from a faulty chromosomal replication. A scion is the one bit of a grafting that is intended to bear fruit characteristics that is stuck on the bit that goes into the ground which provides other characteristics, often related to hardiness.  A volunteer is something left behind and forgotten in the ground that pops up the next spring, bringing both hazards and opportunities.

Like Wittgenstein pointed out, axioms or self-evident statements are a useful way of understanding something. This is as true in beer as metaphysics. We have established or at least argued (in no particular order) that beer creates aggregation, is a means to an end, is cyclical, is responsive, is pervasive, and beer resists. Does the exploration of where craft has gone through the lens of sports, scions and volunteers add to that list of axioms? Let’s see, shall we? Whatever the outcome its can’t have more holes as nationalism or style as a construct. Let’s hope it is at least as helpful as Ron’s new Dark/Pale and Sweet/Bitter continuum.

One last thing before we start. Another chart. Or, rather, an updated chart. To the right, is an update [Ed.: fig 2] of a chart that I created in 2016 or so trying to get a handle on beer culture at the time upon which I have layered notations. Back when craft was a unified battle against all external forces as opposed to today’s schism riddled word cloud that would make a 1600s Scottish Presbyterian proud. Remember. Craft died in 2015. In 2016-17 were were describing its entrails. Now we are describing something else. Its offspring? Its ghost?

So, to repeat, a sport in the plant world is a genetic mutation that results from a faulty chromosomal replication. I think it is safe to say that we have seen some sporting in the world of good beer.  A sport is something unintended by the original breeder of the plant.  While some will fundamentally misunderstand and call something like the hop Fuggles a landrace, it is actually a sport as its ancestors were hop plants already farmed and developed under the careful eye of husbandry.  As Martyn wrote in 2016, Fuggles were first found in a garden. And hops were big business well before Fuggles came along. No, what is really the sport in IPA isn’t the hop but the muck… the haze… the lactose. The over-allocations of the term IPA over the last few years to encompass these new forms is as faulty a replication if ever there was one. No one intended IPA when first used to later become as diluted in terms of meaning as it has become.  Note: this is a neutral observation at this point – no comment on any sort of fluid in a can marked with these three letters. But it is an example of a sport.

Next, we recall that a scion is the one half of a grafting that is intended to bear certain fruiting characteristics that is stuck on the bit that goes into the ground which provides other characteristics, often related to hardiness. This sort of intentional mixing of characteristics results in something a lot like a sport but it is guided by human intervention. It won’t necessarily make the fruit taste different but, though grafting on tougher root stock, can extend a growing range or defeat a certain pest.

As we can from the chart above, fig. 2, two things we could call craft in 2016 have occurred: (i) it has encroached into micro in terms of a reduced availability of traditional styles of beer even while (ii) it has itself undergone what may be a schism. In addition to craft and poor widdle cwaft we have something else which I may tentatively call new craft. Old craft is serious stuff. Newer craft isn’t the same – it’s a pear branch growing above a root that had every intention of creating apples.

Interesting, this newer craft is made with an intentional rejection of style and tradition while retaining at least a political claim to being somehow craft.  It is not just the hazy IPAs but also the fruit gose and hazelnut imperial bourbon barrel aged stout with kviek.** It may not be your thing or my thing but folk seem to be enjoying themselves. Whatever it is, by rights if it had any self respect it would ditch the label of craft and pick another name to express itself. New craft is mainly characterized by the sense of fun it conveys. Invention, unrestrained exploration and fun. That is itself an intentional scion branching off of craft. And it needs a new word. Again, this is a neutral observation at this point.

Finally, we have the volunteer. The thing left behind and forgotten. Early volunteer potatoes in the spring can be far sweeter and tastier than anything else but the plants also are a playground for blights and viruses that can wipe out the entire following summer’s crop in a whole regions. So, what has been hidden or forgotten in craft? Plenty. One reason for this is natural given in the constant in flow and out flow of writers,*** who move on to other interests like trade PR or comms – or simply more complex journalistic topics.**** Plenty falls through the cracks as a result.

Some things that were hidden or forgotten that have become obvious over the last couple of years. Leading to a well-founded righteous indignation and meaningful accusations. Look, if we take the GBH list of Signifiers 2021 published this week at all seriously, we have to recognize that most are deeply and quite rightly unhappy about bigoted aspects of beer culture. Which draws me back to the chart above, fig. 2. We now know very well that craft can also shelter anti-social and even abusive tendencies. Who were these bigots in beer culture before the newer voices called them out? Were they actually volunteers, all hidden? Or were they sitting there safely in plain view in a zone overlapping poor widdle craft and micro?

Well, they have actually been around as Josh Noel reported for as many decades as the good beer movement has been around. And as he wrote in relation to the time when craft was reinvented out of micro around 2002 to deal with the proudly pervy aspect that had reared its head, it was a time not unlike now:

By the early 2000s, craft beer was splintering into identities. It was cool, it was hip, it was counter culture, it was “you’re not worthy”…

Are we there again? Facing a splintering? I actually think we are. Just one built on new values and new issues. Something that is both fun and ethical. As we see in fig 1, there is always overlap and transition. Will we see new confident approaches, even organizations arise? Why not? Why should the new just defeat the baggage of craft at a moral level when you can beat it on the beer store shelves? After all isn’t that what macro was supposed to do in the first place, address all the wrongs big brewers inflicted upon society?

It may now be that craft is to this new fun, inclusive, ethical sort of beer as micro was to craft. Craft and its dominant culture is now your older sibling’s or uncle’s beer, now tied to themes and traditions that don’t interest people outside of the bubble or fest and events that now turn people off. The new beer and the scene that is building around it doesn’t seem to need craft and, in that respect, is much more like the 1980s inventive weld-your-own-brewery-equipment micro scene that the business oriented ambitions of craft rejected. Today? It’s more about the positive personal experience, not just about being a follower. The new fun beer is easy and tasty. The scene is positive. That’s axiomatic. It just needs its own name. Then I can put it on a graph.

*Change? Remember #IndieBeer or craft v. crafty? No? No one does.
**is at least two adjectives before the substantive style noun is a hallmark of the new?
***…and newbie drinker.
****It reminds me of something I read about a turning point in the early church: what had been society of saints became a school for sinners. Who now relies on the authoritative teaching of craft in light of what we now know? To be honest, while Boak and Bailey may find value in the few remaining digital beer mags that “pay talented people to tackle big subjects at length and for that we thank them” that’s no guarantee pay creates consistently high quality content.  It also causes another form of forgetting: the topic that goes unexplored. So we have constrained formulaic approaches defined by editors who have creditors. We have the standard B.O.B. We have the newbie style guides. And… what? More ra-ra revisionism? What else?

Your Beery News Notes For The Start Of This The Coming Darkest Month

It gets better. We tell our teens that but it is a bit hard to believe sometimes. Like in a pandemic exiting its second year when the sun is well below the horizon. But there’s only a few weeks of this darkness and there is beauty all around even in these troubled times. Up there? That’s Angela Merkel, in November 1990, at 36 campaigning on the Baltic coast in Germany’s first election after reunification. Fabulous. She reportedly drank five schnapps with them. As discussed in early 2019, Merkel has always been handy with a beer glass. I probably disagree with most of her politics but that presence and style will be missed. She strikes me as an excellent example. Do what needs doing. My mother would say that: “it just takes doing.”

There. A bit of positivity. Let’s keep it going until we can’t. First up, I loved this duo of tweets, each of which is oblivious to the other. One, a map of the inns of Southwarke England circa 1550. The other?

What a thrill to discover a 17th C traders token in the Thames mud from the Bell, a tavern mentioned by Chaucer at the beginning of the Canterbury Tales as being close to the Tabard where him & the pilgrims met en route to Thomas Becket’s Shrine in Canterbury.

The Bell and the Tabard are both on the map. Neato. Also neato was an excellent piece that I missed last week by Evan Rail on the problem of appropriation of Indigenous matters in beer branding as well as some very fundamental misunderstandings:

“I can only speak from my point of view, and my point of view is that we—meaning society—mistakenly think of Native Americans as a race,” Keyes says. “And what we’ve got to remember is that each of these tribes individually are sovereign nations. They have their government entities. And every tribe has its different culture. Not all tribes are just a Native American culture that’s the same.”

Getting thing wrong is always central to bigotry. The bigot always wants to control the narrative. This all particularly caught my eye as I am also in a family with Indigenous members and work with Indigenous governments as part of my work. And what mystifies me about the bigots is how they miss how fascinatingly rich Indigenous culture actually is. This article also caught my eye as this very week I had to give the heads up to another major brewing publication that it had very recently published that same very derogatory racist obscenity that Evan discussed in that recent piece. Happily, it was immediately removed – and was removed with thanks.

Also, see this post from the Oregon Hops and Brewing Archives about a very specific question on the similarity among brewing competitors advertising a century ago:

I’m left with some lingering questions, the biggest being these: did these two breweries hire an advertising firm, did the newspaper have this book and create the advertisements, or did the brewery have a book of phrases they chose from? My sense is that the book is for a newspaper, given the instructions for setting up a printing machine and information about inks in the latter part of the book.

Conversely perhaps, did you know that Instagram may hate beer? How about these these outfits? Do you like them? No? Me neither, but I do like honest tasting notes:

I think perhaps if I have a lifetime of connections like this I can handle a lifetime of being told my tasting notes are too personal, that who I am is wrong, of failing future wine exams. I think perhaps, if anything, I will make it more so. 

That makes much more sense that a concept limiter, the expertise in narrowing – like a little wheel. Look at that: water’s contribution is actually a binary. A toggle switch. Little good comes of toggle switch understandings. No, no need of that. Stretch your own arms wide, as wide as you can. There was an exceptionally fine example of this in terms of personal tasting in Kate Bernot’s best beers of 2021 as published in (Craft) Beer & Brewing mag. Consider this:

The aroma promises an herbal, not-too-sweet blend of licorice, Tootsie Roll, star anise, gingerbread, and dark cocoa, while the flavor delivers bigger fruit that lends a cherry-cordial and Black Forest–cake impression. It’s like dessert and digestif in one. Gorgeous.

Impression! Less of the style guide references or list of ingredient and more of the personal and taste memories. Good. It’s my personal approach, too. Along with this.* Don’t be sucked in by the actual negs, the forces of poor widdle cwaft. You be you.

In other news, the beer writers of Britain gave each other** awards this week. It lead to some unhappiness and subdued response to that was offered: “The bigger story here tho is how many new writers were recognised for first time in these awards.” In another sort of awarding, Ron finished up his fun in Brazil with a few more interesting and honest notes about the integrity of the process:

“What will we be judging today? We already awarded medals yesterday.” I ask Gordon over breakfast. “Not all the categories have been judged yet.”

You quickly see from Ron’s posts that they center on styles and that styles are more like a skills competition as opposed to playing the actual game. In addition to judging submissions after awards have been given, we also learn that the best may be rejected if they are not fitting into that square peg of style. What’s that about? So much for best of show. Surely, not great.

The process of awarding awards is often a funny thing. Consider Drake’s actions this week to remove himself from the Grammys. People think I am just a bit of a crank about these things but it isn’t so. I do this for a living. Let me tell you something about myself.  As part of my work, I oversee and advise upon many aspects of the process and substance of awarding contracts at a very high level, for up to nine figure procurements. I buy things bigger and more complex than very large craft breweries. Right down to the details. I have worked with engineers to draft specifications for evaluating grades of steel that consider the stages from the fabricator back to the steel mill back to even the mines where the ores were dug. I love it. And those experiences inform these other experiences. Which leads me to the observation that I would not select the award of a pencil supply based on the process Rob described. It’s like folk are just making stuff up!***

We need to pay attention. These sorts of awards that Ron participated in are based on the construct of style. Which is really little different from the characteristics of the various concretes or the range of coverages one needs to consider to ensure the proper sort of workers compensation policy is acquired for a particular job. All of which is timely as the question of style keeps on giving and, weirdly, not one opinion seems to be the same… even when – and perhaps especially when – people think they agree with each other. Only for example, let’s start with Boak and Bailey who approved this comment from Stan’s summary of the situation:

What a frustrating discourse! It is pretty obvious that it is helpful and sometimes demystifying to categorize beers by style. It is also obvious that some people police the style taxonomy in a way that is off-putting and hostile to outsiders.

Oh, simple comment maker. It isn’t that at all. Nothing is binary. And nothing is obviously obvious. No, we can ignore that. “Get a therapist!” says one Aristotelian. Another thoughtful person, who loves the whole thing so much they seem to really want an end to all beer – even for the best of reasons – didn’t like the idea that style is even being discussed.**** But discussed it has been. Lesson: ignore folk who tell you to shut up.

Next, the call that everything is great. Think William Blake, “All Religions Are One” for a mo. Maybe that’s it. So “Drink what you like!” we are told, conversely. We are told style and those who define it are gatekeeping and that this “reinforces the negative stereotypes of the industry.” That may be a very good argument with a very good goal – exploration and inclusion. Other cultures can be actually wonderfully enriching. But, as we see to the up and the right, that can lead to appropriations, circumstances where anything in a can can mean anything now. Nothing demystifying about that. Just a blurrier blur.

So, we have these structures and they help us to avoid the blur. We see, accordingly, Mr. B declared his entire agreement with Garrett Oliver when he rightly and righteously proclaimed:

…[he] says quite simply something I’ve been ranting about — hello, IPA category! — literally for years. Words matter. Styles matter. Expectations based upon words and styles on a label matter…”

…err… right before Mr. Oliver wrote a significantly but not entirely different thing:

Brewers can – and should – call beers whatever they want to. What I want is for brewers to WANT to hold the line on some things. I don’t think calling a deep amber beer “Pilsner” is good for customers or for brewers. That said, in the end…self-respect is always voluntary…

Voluntary. Which raises a point: really? When is a rule voluntary? If style is so central to understanding beer why can it be applied or not applied here and there however folk want. Should it be voluntary? Jings. What ever did the poor folk do before the early 1990s when the concept was invented? Were they happy? Were they maybe happier?

No wonder folk throw up their hands. It wasn’t always so. I came across a voice from the past this week, echoes of the past in something called Brewing & Beverage Industries Business magazine in which you can learn (on page 8) that folk today lack a proper understanding of brown bitter: “…balance in beer, how very uncraft…” You can also learn (on page 10) that folk today lack a proper understanding of Belgian beer:

I remain convinced that, were you to package them differently, or present them already poured rather than in the bottle most younger drinker (sic) would be every bit as enthusiastic about them as they are about Brewery X’s new bourbon barrel-aged Imperial porter or Y Brewing’s guava milkshake IPA…

See, it’s all their fault. Folk who don’t get it. The “younger drinker”! Can we tie that argument all together: awards now suck because the disfunction of style sucks because new craft sucks because young people who want new craft today… suck? Really? Isn’t something else the problem?  Hasn’t uncontrolled style division and propagation as a top down exercise itself caused craft’s cacophony as opposed to clarifying anything? Who pushed that propagation of sub-style after sub-style? Those who benefit from manufactured complexity. And who is that? Surely not the reader of a well thumbed copy of Modern British Beer.

What to make of these ye oldie fartie views? Are they the last bastion of the fight against all these young people***** and all these  strange tastes? There are a lot of strange tastes going around, it’s true. There ought to be a limit. Or at least proper labelling.  Which leads to one last thing, that I think I would be more concerned about supply chain issues if the supply on the chain were not lychee:

His shipment never left Southeast Asia, posing big problems for Urban Artifact’s Petroglyph beer, a top seller. But then, Kollman found a different supplier who already had a container of lychee sitting at the Port of Los Angeles. A lychee lifeline? Not so fast. “Two and a half months later, that [order] never left the port” either, Kollman tells me in a recent phone interview. “So we just dropped that product line.”

If the lychee supply fails, drop the product line. Make something else. Because the next thing is just as good as the last. Transitory. So lacking of structure that the next fruit flavour that comes along is tomorrow’s darling. Somewhere eight or ten years ago, did we see this coming?  Isn’t it like a culture that we have just encountered for the first time – even though it’s been there all along? What do we call this anti-style thing? Is it just… fun?

As you think about that over the week, please also check out the updates from Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday and from Stan every Monday, plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast, and at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. (Or is that dead now?) There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. (That’s a bit now and then now.) And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. The AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword (which he may revive some day…)  And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

*I really need to print off some of these and sell them. I hear that 15 quid is the going rate.
**Surely a top journalism award.
***The “style beer” thing kills me. Just made up. Except it really isn’t. But is that what is happening? Stay tuned!
****Eine selbst beschrieben Auslander.
*****Diese lästig Jugendlichen!

The Very First Thursday Beery News Notes For The Second Half Of November 2021

I like this image above. It is a bit of an edit off a photo from Great Lakes Brewery off the north shore of Lake Ontario (as opposed to the one to the south of Lake Erie). Depth of field hit very nicely. Gran’s hand towels being put to good use. And clean lines every day. Best practice. Speaking of which, let’s see what else is worth noting in another week in the life of good beer and related stuff, shall we?

First off, Katie Mather wrote a very interesting piece of these times about a trip to sip natural wines in Paris which was as much about herself:

I ended up at Notre Dame every day I was in Paris. The resilient aura of a burnt-out cathedral was something I hadn’t been prepared for. I stared, making excuses to pass by, marvelling at the Medieval-like wooden supports bolstering the flying buttresses just like when they were new, wrong-footed by the stained glass rose window I had first seen in a Disney film, now blackened with soot. A dark emblem of survival—or perhaps a reminder of how close it has been to ruin, of being rescued, and still being rescued, and maintaining that iconic but now fragile facade. I was unwell, and I found a hand to grasp in the sight of this building. It seemed as tired as I was, of holding itself up, of being under so much of its own weight.

I am a bit interested in natural wine as I’ve known for a long time that I’m fairly sensitive to sulphite-based preservatives. This has been brought a bit into focus in the last few months as I am working on an intermittent diet that sees me weeding certain things out of my diet. Turns out I also have a problem with wheat and barley. Like a glass of red wine, good crusty bread triggers a histamine reaction. As does… beer. Weeping eyes. Inflammation. Drag. But manageable.

UPDATE: ghost tips over beer!

In his blog by email, Dave Infante took a very grim lesson from the Bell’s Brewery sale:

Remember early last decade? Selling out was anathema, and the U.S. craft brewing “movement” looked unstoppable. Now it’s starting to look insolvent. Sales are slowing; reports of workplace discrimination are up; a generation of new drinkers are reaching for hard seltzer and canned cocktails to power the party. In a 10 mere years, craft brewing’s rock-ribbed corporate antagonism has given way to self-imposed purity tests and fading relevance. In the same time, its product has morphed from zeitgeist-y leader to cheugy afterthought. Craft beer remains a product with a value proposition. But make no mistake: a dark night of the soul has fallen on its anti-commodity, independence-over-everything cultural dogma.

He’s probably right. Craft sucks. Right? Or is it “craft – doesn’t suck!” Can’t remember. Never mind – just remember who was calling craft “cheugy” back in May. The cool kids, that’s who.

Gary Gillman has been doing a fabulous job exploring eastern European brewing history with a focus on the role of Jewish culture. This week he wrote about  hops:

Hop-growing in the former Austro-Hungarian province of Galicia was an established but relatively small-scale business up to World War I. Prior to 1850 one source, Penny Cyclopedia (1838), states “a few hops” were grown, a cottage industry at best. By 1879 hop-growing is on a more solid footing. The Journal of the Society of Arts was particularly approving of quality, stating at their best Galician hops could hardly be distinguished from classic Bohemian Saaz.

Speaking of things easterly, here’s your Belarus update: still finding myself filling the hours at home rather than sprinting out into the local upsurge in the delta, I came across a video blogger who rides the rails of eastern Europe looking for former Soviet things to talk about. In this episode, it’s about five beers from five cities in Belarus.  Half seem to be gak. It is an interesting way to turn to Jeff’s thoughts (which we may have discussed before) about nationalism being the way to understand beer:

In the 44 years since Michael Jackson wrote The World Guide to Beer, people have become much more sophisticated in the way they understand and describe our favorite malty substance. The subject is incredibly complex, and over that span we have collected, classified, taxonomized, and shared information, refining what we know along the way. This effort has produced a shared (if disputed and endlessly debated) vocabulary and conceptual framework for discussing beer. For the most part, people have identified and developed the big concepts and we now focus on refining them. I was therefore surprised to discover a huge dynamic in beer that hasn’t gotten the classification/codification treatment: national tradition…

There is a lot in there to disagree with – that the subject is incredibly complex or that big concepts have been identified. Or that people have become more much more sophisticated. Consider this on that last point. But it is a reasonable additional way to look at a subject mired for a few decades in one fixed conceit – style. It is reasonable to have a number of ways to look at one thing to cross reference and improve understanding. But it is hampered by words like nation and culture that are greasy and malleable. Nations shift and cultures morph. Consider the political and cultural constructs just in Gary’s post above. And the concepts are prone to being coopted. Me, I am more of a globalist technology and trade story arc person myself.  But that is another way of looking at things in addition to style and national tradition, isn’t it. No good comes of the unified theory approach except perhaps in physics. Maybe.

I raise all this by way of background as this week, Stan wasn’t entirely on board with the nationalist construct or at least the rendering of it that made the era of craft special. He wrote thusly by way of counter example:

Last week, during the virtual portion of the Master Brewers Conference, Greg Casey discussed “The Inspiring Histories & Legacies of American Lager Beer.” Casey, who worked for several of America’s largest brewing corporations before retiring in 2013, is writing a trilogy of books that focus on the period between the 1840s and 1940s. He points out that America gave the world “ice cold beer here!” Americans learned about brewing adjunct lagers from the Germans, but made them their own. They perfected chill proofing, allowing beers to be served crystal clear even when cold, changing the look of beer and the culture of drinking beer.

See, this is why we have all those facets of a topic. Like history. See, America did not give the world adjunct beer after receiving them from the Germans. The Germans handed it around themselves as part of their global mercantile and military empire from before the First World War. For example, Germany took over the “port city of Qingdao in north-eastern China in 1898, and ruled over it until 1914” and established Tsingtao beer. See also Argentina. As Boak and Bailey explained in Gambrinus Waltz, they also brought it to Britain. In Japan, a German trained Norwegian (who did admittedly touch down in the USA) founded what is now Kirin. In a bit of a twist, in the 1920s rice-based adjunct beer took off in Canada, to sent it the other way sending it south into the US black market during American prohibition.* Americans then took it with them where they went and often stayed. All of which leads me to think that while nationalism may not be the right unified theory, the paths of nations and the interacting influences upon them may as important as the history of technological advances if we are to understand why beer is what it is.

Speaking of beery culture, the local version got weird this week. I have to admit, I used to drop in at the place a few years back as it was handy to my ride home from work in the family car. Small pitcher of basic adjunct lager and a basket of onion rings was my order.

In a more sensible context, retiredmartin prodded me to read this post from the blog Prop Up The Bar which I liked for a number of reasons but especially the man on the street view:

As I arrived the gaffer was on the phone making a very angry call, his mood not improved by muggings here standing underneath the ‘table service only’ sign at the bar. During his phone call he threatened to “just shut the pub” which would have made this an epic pub ticking fail. Not sure what had upset him so much, but looking at my picture maybe he was on the phone to the company that looks after the shutters.

See also Lord Largis illustrating the “non-tick”:

I hadn’t eaten properly and as the bus approached the Hussey Arms I remembered how good the food is in there, but I’ve been spending too much on takeaways and meals of late and I’m trying to cut this cost down. I had an R Kelly lyric pop into my head. “My mind’s telling me no, but my body, my body’s telling me yes”. But as it was now dark and I wasn’t overly convinced that I knew where my first pub to visit was, my mind won and I remained on the bus.

I like that clarity of the vignette. Much uncertainty, conversely, surrounds a news release that informs us that two of Ontario and Canada’s best established craft brewers have done a form of a deal focusing on efficiencies in distribution. Trouble is… it seems to be more than that. As Jordan stated:

Getting increasingly angry about this entire set of messaging and the general level of competence. Insulting to everyone’s intelligence to dangle the shiny thing at exactly the same time as letting the majority of staff go.

Ottawa’s news source The Review had more on the background:

“I can confirm that layoffs took place today, but they are largely not related to the Steam Whistle announcement,” said Beau’s spokesperson Jen Beauchesne, in a Tuesday afternoon email to The Review in response to an inquiry about the layoffs and the Steamwhistle announcement. Most of temporary layoffs which occurred this week are because Beau’s is slowing down production, while the company does maintenance work on its lines and brewing tanks, said Beau’s co-founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Steve Beauchesne. “We have been having some fermentation issues,” Beauchesne said. “We need to empty the tanks and do a deep clean.”

Questions have arisen but, look, the Beauchesnes are family brewers from a small town in far eastern Ontario and (a rarity) I happily call them friends. They are great fun folk who I’ve had over to the backyard and who’ve had me to their fests. The times, however, may not be kind and if the business changes coming are greater than they are in position to discuss today, I can only wish them and their community the best.

B.O.B.** of the Week:  Mr B on a rather good brewery in his neighbourhood. The denial of standard B.O.B. context at the outset is an interesting variation on the brewery owner bio.

Finally: “Man driving 870 miles in world’s smallest car” – not about beer but, still, please send your 500 word essays as usual on how it is still like beer to the regular address to be entered in the context for our weekly prize of a photograph of a ten dollar bill.

That’s a lot. Busy week. For more, check out the updates from that same Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday and from Stan now on a regular basis again every Monday, plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast, and at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday (where a parsing of press releases was featured this week accompanied by giggle, chortles and the mewing of cats) and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. The AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword which may revive some day.  And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

*See The King v. Carling Export Brewing & Malting Co. Ltd., [1930] S.C.R. 361 at page 373.
**“Was ist eine B.O.B.? Das is eine B.O.B.!!” Translation: Brauereibesitzerlangweiliglichbiografie.

Your Thursday Beery News Notes For The First Frosty Nights

First up this week, reality. We still had a fig tree out in the backyard with all its leaves on Wednesday. Doubt it will have them today. Have to check once it is light out.  One way or another it’s almost an eight month growing season here by balmy Lake Ontario. Not something you could say even ten miles to the north. Harvested another load of parsley Monday. Pulled up a frisée endive that was mixed into supper, too. No snow yet. With any luck most of the leaves will be off the trees before it comes. Don’t want to have to deal with sawing fallen limbs. I plan to chop the willow back Saturday, saving the long branches for a bit of wattling next March. Suburban peasant.  Suburban pleasant.

Next, the coolest thing of the week was seeing that small object to the right. It’s a 1,000 year old, 14-sided die from Korea with carved instructions for a drinking game. One side says “let everybody hit you on the nose” while another says “drink a big cup and laugh loudly” all of which indicates a state of civilization far advanced from my youth spent playing caps and sticking playing cards on my forehead. DSL was pleased at the find.

Good news. Movement on the unionization of craft front with the creation of the Brewery Workers Union in the UK under the IWW banner. A bit of a manifesto explains why now:

Why do we need a union? As the interest in and sales of craft beer has risen significantly in the past 10 years it has also meant more workers are being exploited, suffering harassment and abuse, working in unsafe conditions, working long and unsociable hours leading to serious injuries all on insufficient pay, leading to physical & mental strain, burnout and fatigue.  We have seen the ongoing issues with BrewDog and a wealth of other breweries in the UK, as well as active organising from other trade unions, in the US and across Europe.

On the other side of the economic divide, Brewdog has updated* that its plans for global domination are well on track:

Despite facing numerous challenges in 2021 we have managed to continue growing strongly and our UK wholesale sales for October are up 48% on October 2020 (which was also in growth). As well as growing strongly we have also created over 600 brand new jobs this year. We are determined to continue to share our passion for great beer with as many people as possible and to do all we can as a business to fight climate change. And we are determined to use every challenge we face as a catalyst to become better as a business.

Passion. Climate Change. Better. Growth. Perfect setting for a union. Relatedly, this message from Ren is the same as it ever was. Craft is a haven of cheapskates:

“Hi! Can you basically give us a ton of free info that we can use to improve our brewery, our charitable endeavor, and help us make more money?” *Sends them my rates* *Crickets* I would love for this to stop happening once a week. Pay Black people for our knowledge.

See also Ron circa 2014 when it was shocking for brewing history research to be considered a paid consultancy. Speaking of whom, he has some good advice if you happen to live in an empire a few months away from total collapse. Pay attention to the beer supply:

The more observant among you might have noticed that I’ve started writing about Germany and Austria in WW I. There’s a good reason for that. One that I’m not going to tell you quite yet. It is very revealing, though, to look at the war from the other side. The food and booze situation at home for the Central Powers made Britain look like the promised land, overflowing with milk and honey, Or at least bread and beer.

Ever look at a small brewery tax credit regulation? He’s one recently issued in Ontario, good old Ont. Reg. 711/21. All you really need to know is the formula [(A × B) ∕ F + (C × D) ∕ F] × G × H × J × K!  Works on a sliding scale from more than 4.9 million litres but not more than 20 million litres of beer. Which is a lot of beer for businesses called small beer manufacturers. Is there anywhere where small means small?

As mentioned the other week, the Chicago Brewseum’s Beer Culture Summit is happening this weekend. Here is the list of events. I’ve signed up for Sunday if anyone wants to chat in the comments. Looking forward to this presentation:

Archaeologist and historian Dr. Christina Wade, archivist Tiah Edmunson-Morton, and organizer, attorney, author and documentarian Atinuke “Tinu” Akintola Diver discuss the unique experiences (both successes and roadblocks) they have seen throughout their careers researching, collecting and documenting beer and brewing history in a man’s world. This session is moderated and hosted by co-founder of the Albany Ale Project, Craig Gravina.

Speaking of the “ye” and the “olde” did you ever wonder why there is still so much old oak still around in the forests for booze barrels? It’s not because of booze barrels.

Once upon a time, I used to make home brewed ginger beer at about 1.3% based on a recipe from Clone Brews by the Szamatulskis. Great slurping by the bucket out in the garden. I was reminded of that by this rather extended commercial business news item on one Jamaican drinks maker bringing a similar if stronger sort of thing to market. I am not sure how you could ever make money on the 1.3% version – except it was so simple to make yourself who would bother buying it?

Stan and Jeff are having a bit of a parallel chat about the hop varieties which most attract a buyer’s attention. I have to admit something. I don’t have any interest in which hop varieties which most attract a buyer’s attention. I find folk rhyming off hop varieties as they sip a beer to be entirely missing the points. Most beer drinkers don’t care. But govern yourselves according to your own interests. Me, I like 1400s beer shipping records from the Baltic Sea. So go figure. Here are Stan’s questions:

Jeff Alworth posted a question yesterday from Atlanta (hey! we used to live there); more than one, in fact. So here are two I am thinking about: a) Is Citra/Mosaic becoming a marker of style in the way Saaz is in Czech pilsners or EKG in bitters? and b) Do [brewers] feel like the pairing has become so successful it’s constraining the style?

Beer price hikes coming in the US, in France and around the globe. I think things may be worse than this bit of PR gobbiltygook from Sam Adams might suggest, especially given their botch of the seltzer market by over-producing their Truly gak:

Truly is still in a premium position in the fastest-growing area of the alcoholic beverage industry, and it will be a strong platform to use in launching other products. “We are well positioned to succeed in 2022 and beyond,” founder Jim Koch said, “as consumers look to drink more ‘Beyond Beer’ products.” That success will come partly from raising prices across its portfolio by 3% to 6% in 2022. Those hikes reflect rising costs on raw materials like aluminum and glass, but they’re also designed to shore up its profitability now that the industry is maturing. Management had been prioritizing growth and market share, but now that focus is shifting toward achieving a stronger earnings profile.

See that? Raising prices to “shore up profitability” means paying more for less and covering up mistakes with the new cash. Craft. Reminds me of an ancient Korean saying: “let everybody hit you on the nose”!

Once again, a week of the good, the bad and (just above) the uh-guh-lee.  For more, check out the updates from that same Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday and from Stan now on a regular basis again every Monday, plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast, and at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. The AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword which may revive some day.  And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

*Where did I put that link. Nov 1 at 11:20 am if you have it handy. Along these lines, it was. What a crap news service this is. No, here it is. Martin Dickie on LinkedIn. Why the hell do I follow him on LinkedIn. Why the hell am I on linked in?

The Middle Of September 2021 Edition of Your Beery News Notes

Where to begin? It’s been a good week in my hometown. CHeery even. The summer is lingering and the backyard crop of tomatoes and grapes has been coming in. Eighteen months in, it is one of the most normal weeks so far even if we see elsewhere things are returning to other more difficult norms. I was reminded of even a third norm by the wonderful image above of the lonely pub by John Bulmer from 1964 that passed by on social media this week. Lovely and evocative. It reminded me of me. Or at least mine. That empty space? Space like that was where my people lived. Or did before they move up and/or away. This norm of today shall also pass.

Update! Lisa Grimm on new bad stouts in Ireland:

…with Heineken recently releasing Island’s Edge, and Guinness rolling out their new Guinness 0.0. Island’s Edge has been expressly positioned as a stout for people who don’t typically drink stout, and to that end, it includes tea and basil in the recipe to make it, to paraphrase, less bitter and more refreshing, though none of the flavours of tea or basil are noticeable in the resulting beer. So, having had a pint of it recently, I can confirm that it does, indeed, lack those flavours…along with most other elements of flavour.

Next, I had to grab a screen shot of this image to the left from Stan‘s weekly round up. You can open it in a new tab for the full size. It’s super tiny because it’s a huge image from the Craft Brewers Conference on an indoctrination education session on lager brewing. These images always make me scratch my head year after year. It was all about hazy beer education a few years ago and massive barrel ales a few years before that. Beyond clubby. Chasing the tail in lock step with every other brewery in attendance. That once again is the business plan for these fiercely independent and sometimes off center breweries. That’s weird.

The same idea is bouncing about in Kate Bernot‘s excellent, subtle and perhaps surreptitious piece on Oregon’s Full Sail Brewing’s perhaps last chance effort to regain some reputation in the craft beer marketplace. The plan? A fantasy of chasing and copying Boston Beer’s now decade or more and well established run as far away from actual beer as possible. There are three references spread across the article to that strategy. It’s like a plan to marry rich. Plus look at this:

… Full Sail’s beers weren’t being placed on shelves in desirable places, primarily because low prices on the Session line of beers led them to be shelved next to light beers, while the drinker Full Sail wants to attract might only be shopping in the craft section… To correct this, Full Sail raised prices on June 1 on most of its beers by a couple dollars per pack to bring them more in line with other regional and national craft breweries. Though it goes against the laws of supply and demand, the switch led to an +11.5% boost in sales on Session beer in Oregon and Washington markets three months after the price change… Tiernan says part of the boost for Session is shelf placement next to other craft breweries, and part of it is a more strategic approach to the idea of “value.”

Entirely anti-beer consumer initiatives like that might be described as the “premiumization of old craft”… or perhaps lipstick on a pig. Time will tell if the bait and switch has a lasting effect with the beer buying public. It’s probably far too late. As Jeff on the ground both tweeted and was quoted: “I suppose a few folks are still kicking around who feel warmly about [Full Sail], but not many…” Dead cat bounce?*

Ian McKellen helps out on quiz nights at his pub.

There was an interesting hour of radio provided by the CBC’s new season of Tapestry and its interview of Edward Slingerland, academic and author of Drunk: How We Sipped, Danced, and Stumbled Our Way to Civilization. He also confirms or at least bolsters my suspicions or at least speculations that alcohol pre-dates community discussed here four years ago.

…in the standard account, alcohol’s this kind of byproduct of agriculture, and it happened after agriculture. But once I started doing the research for the book, if you dig into the archaeological record, what it looks like is hunter-gatherers were making alcohol in a serious way, way before agriculture. Probably this goes back 20,000 years or so, but we certainly have direct evidence 13,000 years ago that people were making beer in what’s now Israel. And then we have sites like the site in Turkey called Göbekli Tepe, where hunter-gatherers — this site’s probably 12,000 years old — were coming together, building these massive ritual complexes.

He does unfortunately use the word “myth” to describe the idea how alcohol makes people aggressive suggesting those people were already aggressive before describing how alcohol just dampens control. That, to me, is describing removing the guard against bad behaviour that would otherwise be left in place. Odd argument. Also uses “neo-prohibition” while advocating for measured control. As in temperance. Which is pretty close to what people mean by “neo-prohibition”…But a good listen nonetheless.

Question: is Matt suggesting that Boursin spreadable cheeses are his perfect hangover cure?

Ron shared a few thoughts on him being compulsive which he believes is the basis for his success as a beer historian:

I realise my head isn’t like everyone else’s. Compulsive behaviour. It’s part of me. When I looked out of my office window and saw someone touching every sign along the road, I didn’t think “What a weirdo”. No. That’s just like me, I thought. A bit more public and odder looking, but basically just like me. Being compulsive has its advantages as a researcher. It means I go through material fully. Really fully. Whenever I see beer analyses or price lists, I have to record them. It’s a pain in the arse, quite a lot of work, but I can’t help myself. Thirty years of such compulsive behaviour has left me with some amazing datasets.

Mostly unrelated, making beer can sometimes remind me of the consequences of drinking beer.

Finally, this quotation from the CBC and Dr. J Nikol Jackson-Beckham gave me pause:

“If you weed out a bad actor but do not change the culture, when the next bad actor comes along, they will thrive in the same environment.” Dr. J, “The unthinkable has happened, finding your way after harassment, discrimination, or abuse has changed everything.”

I paused for the message itself as well as the long haul Dr J. is on. I wrote about her thoughts in 2017 in a post titled “Peter Pan As Craft Beer’s Archetype” and it may well be that not much has changed. Fight!

That’s it. As you start at the bottom of the glass or at the floor before you, for more check out the updates from Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday and from Stan now apparently a regular again every Monday, plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast, at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday (the talk was of awards this week) and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. The AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword – when he isn’t in hiatus as at the mo, more like timeout for rudeness! And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

*Investment concept referring to a late final brief upturn of a plummeting stock. Refers to the fact that even a dead cat will bounce on the sidewalk if dropped from great enough a height. Not sure this is actually true but the image is effective.

The New And Improved Beery News Notes For A Thursday

Take a week off and you get all sorts of ideas. Like packing it in. Like… really… why do I do this? Then, after I read this “see you later, blog!” post from The Kitchenista I remembered – I do this because it is easy! No one picks on me or gives me crap like she had to put up with. Sure, playing the role of an irritated grump helps with that but, really, this is a doddle. Why? Because beer does not matter. Sure – if you are in the trade, it’s your investment or your career but that’s maybe 1% of all the people who encounter beer. There is a whole whack of beer writing aimed at that audience, little of which gets noted here given it’s a yawner. That being said, what is up?

Speaking of not yawner, I like this bit of a major culture backstroking from Dogfish Head on Tuesday. Click on the thumbnail. It’s the response they had to put out after someone had the bright idea to repost Sam’s Big Lie that craft beer is only 1% asshole. It’s not like it’s an apology as that would be admitting how stupid the statement is but still…

Speaking of dinosaurs, I also noted this comment on Tuesday by brewer Jenny Pfäfflin which goes off in another direction:

There’s a huge lack of self-awareness from an older generation of established brewers who have obviously failed to look beyond their own success—but still get a pass because of who they are. 5 yrs ago, I would have killed to work at certain breweries, today I’m relieved I don’t!

There is a whole lot of presentism in the discussion that ensued. Older being five years ago is a bit weird but also weird is the idea that the present is some sort of stasis. 2027? All that you see around you in beer will be like wide leg jeans and 8-track cassette decks. Have a brown ale and think about that for a mo. As the wise Chrissie Hynde once put it, time is the avenger.

While you do that, consider how fine a thing an endorsement from NHS Martin is. He recommended a very minimalist blog with the URL of evoboozyscribbler.co.uk this week and I might just add it to the bookmarks if only for its rather earthy tone:

With Liam working yesterday and needing to head off early we moved onto The Royal George. Bit of history as this is the first pub that I ever fell asleep in. Not through booze, a secondary school friend lived here and I stayed over a few times back in the 80’s. Nice cool pint here, sat outside in the impressive seating area with Euro 2020 bunting flags still in position flapping around merrily. And there is a Dyson Airblade in the toilet so it’s win win here.

Perhaps conversely, an interesting set of arguments were made by Courtney Iseman during my brief sabbatical which I think is worth noting even though it is a reflection on something I avoid – fests:

People, Kimberley and I both express in our conversation, seem to have forgotten whatever sense of social etiquette and what’s right they may have had during the pandemic. Now that some events are happening again and folx have been getting back to gathering at bars and pubs and breweries, it’s been a rude awakening: it’s like some people have pent up energy that they’re letting out in problematic, discriminatory, even dangerous ways. With this in mind and certain big festivals, in particular, looming on the horizon, Women of the Bevolution founder Ash Eliot reached out to me a couple of weeks ago with the idea to take a deep dive into the current state of safety at festivals…or the lack thereof.

See, I am one of those guys who also find drunk guys piggish and fests often a bit of a flaming mess so, you know, I agree but I don’t seek to make them safer. I just avoid them like the sensible avoid anti-vaxxer rallies.

I would also be remiss and a false friend to Lew Bryson if I didn’t link to the story of the white hot, a upstate NY phenomenon he introduced to me via a side bar in his book New York Breweries a decade and a half ago.

Few food items are more synonymous with summertime in Rochester than the White Hot. Though Zweigle’s is the most famous manufacturer of the local delicacy, it was first produced by a lesser-known company. The details of the White Hot’s origin story lie largely with the recollections of Frederick Tobin, the first president of the Tobin Packing Company (formerly the Rochester Packing Company). According to the meat magnate, the iconic tubular treat was first dispensed at the Front Street establishment of the Ottman Brothers.

From the archives I would note that fifteen years ago I posted about an early encounter with a Tobin’s hot. The comments from old employees and feuding family members are charming.

Beer styles: genres, agreements, important or just unimaginative puffery? As a means to that end, consider the meaninglessness of IPA as you think about that question and this newbie guide:

Safe to say, IPAs are a beer universe unto themselves. Brewers are continuing to push the limits of what this style can encompass, both in terms of the ingredients and the techniques used to brew them. But there is one unifying factor to IPAs: hops.

See, I think that is another sustaining fib of this present framework, as sustaining as the 99% crap was for the big craft set. Me, I got suckered into drinking an IPA the other day and, there it was, another Sunny D clone. Nothing hoppy about it. It could have been labeled a fruit beer – which would have been most truthful. It even had “sour” on the can even though it was all sweet and sugary fruit candy. Cloying gak. But it also had the magic three letter I-P-A and that was all the buyer, a pal, needed to know when he bought it to proudly hand to me one evening in his back yard.  If that is the present that Jenny Pfäfflin is happy about, well, call me Dino.

Update: compare and contrast with Ron’s guide to IPAs:

I’ve been thinking a lot about beer styles as I pound the local streets two or three times a day. Dodging dogs as much as possible. IPA is incredibly popular. But what is IPA? After much thought, I think I’ve cracked. It might be a bit too prescriptive so I may have to loosen it up a little.

That’s it for now. We can benchmark this week’s roundup with the observation that good beer seems overdue for the next big thing. Perhaps it will be something other than beer. Perhaps it already is. Should we care? Not really. It’s just not that important.

As you start at the bottom of the glass or at the floor before you, for more check out the updates from Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday and (if I dare say) from Stan mostly every Monday, plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast, at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. The AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword – when he isn’t in hiatus as at the mo, more like timeout for rudeness! And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

The Last Of August’s Thursday Beery News Notes

What was that? Summer 2021? Done? It’s still going on here as I am on an actual holiday and doing fun stuff like getting new spectacles for my face and a new electrical panel for the basement. Wooot! This is the dream and I am livin’ it. I even had 330 ml of a 3.8% beer yesterday and watched a Netflix show about the Korean buckwheat noodle dish naengmyeon, as recommended by DSL.* Both a drinking and then hangover dish apparently. Now I know why my buckwheat noodles suck. I didn’t immediately rinse and rub them in ice water. And, yes, a hundred other reasons. Never again. Probably. Maybe.

First off, it was good to read “The Ancient Magic of Malt: Making Malt Sugars and Ale from Grain Using Traditional Techniques” by sometimes reader Merryn Dineley in the journal EXARC.net,* 2021 (vol 2) who set the record straight:

This paper is presented as a historical narrative as well as being an explanation of basic ‘mashing in’ techniques. I aim to tell the story of the development of my understanding of how to make malt and malt sugars from the grain. I have learned from other experimental archaeologists, from ancient technologists and brewing scientists as well as from ethnographic research and the study of traditional style malting, mashing and fermentation techniques. One of the common myths about the origins of beer thousands of years ago is that grain was perhaps left in a container, it got wet and, somehow, turned into beer. This is impossible. The conditions for making malt and malt sugars do not exist in this situation. 

A bit later in time but still in the past, Rob Sterowski at “I Might Have a Glass of Beer” wrote about Epochal Barrel Fermented Ales, a brewery intent of brewing the old fashioned way:

Possibly the most erudite of Scottish brewers, Young deserted the world of academic philosophy to devote himself to a study of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century brewing literature instead, and Epochal Barrel Fermented Ales is the result. A skilled home brewer, he has set up his small brewery in Port Dundas to make beers influenced by the way it was done two hundred years ago. His beer is fermented with a multi-strain yeast, cleansed to rid them of excess yeast and then allowed to mature to completion in oak barrels with a handful of whole-cone hops. The finished product is naturally carbonated in the bottle.

As Boak and Bailey noted, suggestions that the #MeToo and #BLM movements’ efforts to expose craft beer’s ugly side have faded were found wanting with the news of an open letter to England’s West Berkshire Brewery. You can click on the image to the right to read the complaints yourself. It is certainly one of the long failings of the drinking entertainment pleasure trade to address the piggish attitudes that go along with booze. So it is good to read that folk won’t be bullied to keep quiet when it comes to bigotry and harassment even if a lot of the privileged voices have wandered away.

I wasn’t familiar with English comedian Sean Lock. He passed away this past week but I am glad to know he had a hobby.

Update: I failed in not mentioning “Empire State of Mind” by David Jesudason published in GBH (thereby upping their average significantly) who looks at IPA from the point of view of the “I” as in India:

My father’s love of empire, and his belief that Britain was a civilizing force, was mirrored in the drink he called his own: the India Pale Ale. Of all of his beliefs, this one was particularly confused. His friends were Lager drinkers, and his adoption of IPA was a way of pretending to be refined in the days before the craft revolution had taken hold. But where he saw a drink that was emblematic of genteel, colonial India, I see something very different: Owing to the beer style’s association with the East India Company and its brutality, I can’t help but think of bloodshed, oppression, and enslavement.

I noted that it was an parallel to “Britain’s Idyllic Country Houses Reveal a Darker History“, the recent NYer piece on England’s National Trust but also cause for reflection on my own family’s path. One side included servants at big houses like that of the Collins publishing family as well as a great-grandfather who was a Sgt Mjr British army out in the empire while the other side, displaced highlanders in Greenock, built the ships that shifted the sugar that came out of the colonial system. Many died young, many had lives of if not poverty then at best modesty – with much drink caused troubles in industrial towns before many emigrated the hell out of there. If you have any doubt as to the way that IPA is code for empire consider this from that NYer article:

“At the end of the day, we went to a very, very, very rich country and transferred a lot of its wealth to this country, by trade, entrepreneurship, and looting,” Dalrymple said. In 2003, Angus Maddison, a British economist, calculated that India’s share of the global G.D.P. went from 24.4 per cent to 4.2 per cent during two and a half centuries of colonial rule. In 1884, the British state had a total income of two hundred and three million pounds, of which more than half came from its overseas territories, including seventy-four million pounds from India. Taxes were levied across the world and sent to burnish the metropole.

Good for someone to finally point out in depth the obvious issue with IPA as a placeholder for good beer.  Might as well brand US craft lager Berghof.

Note: craft.

One of Canada’s few pre-Confederations tavern/inns/hotels, the Queen’s Inn, is up for sale in my fair town. I wrote about it in 2004 when it was just 165 years old and I was only 41: and is ripe with history and charm:

…he remembers one particular customer who continued coming in until he was in his 80s. The gentleman, Mitchell recalled, was blind and had a booming voice. “Give him two drafts,” the bartender told the younger Mitchell. “We just put the price up to 50 cents. Have fun.” “I didn’t know what he meant. I put the two beers down and said, ‘That’ll be 50 cents.’” “Forty-five is all you’re getting,” the man bellowed back.

Another pandemic affected business. And, on that theme, Josh Noel pointed me in the direction of the tale of overzealous expansion which ended in the collapse  of Ale Asylum of Madison, Wisconsin:

Dilba said the pandemic “didn’t help” the business but added, “there were other extraneous factors, which I won’t get into, but the pressure applied by the pandemic was significant. And we’re not alone in that. Everybody in this world is in this fight together that really made moving forward very difficult.”

Factors cited elsewhere in the article include too many local beers, too many out of state beers in local bars and rent increases. Maybe also it’s because Americans are just drinking less, according to VinePair or, rather, the authors of the polling study they echo:***

Sixty percent is down nearly five percent from 2019. It’s down even more compared to 2010, when 67 percent of U.S. adults replied “yes” to the survey. There seemed to be a shift in drinking habits from 2019 until now. The average number of drinks per week (3.6) dropped to its lowest since 2001. Additionally, men (63 percent) reported drinking at a higher rate than women (57 percent).

Good reason to find another career than drinks writing! One person who does not care is likely Sister Doris Engelhard, the brewing nun in Germany whose story as told by NPR was the retweeted topic of the week:

“I only brew beer that I drink myself, so if the other sisters want to drink a wheat beer, they’ll have to buy it themselves,” she says. She also waves away any question about the intersection of her faith and her beer. “Beer is part of the Bavarian soul. If you’re not happy with yourself, you won’t be happy in a cloister,” she says. “And eating and drinking are part of that life. It’s not about being pious. All I need to do is believe in a higher power that accepts me as I am.”

Speaking of good stories about good outcomes, the BBC reported this week on the life of Cesar Kimbirima, a child soldier in Angola who found himself left for dead, now running a Wetherspoons pub:

…as the sky started spinning, and his consciousness faded to black, he thought it was over. His life would end in the long grass, while his blood poured into the dry Angolan earth. More than 20 years later, that dying soldier pours pints at the pub he manages in south London. As he chats to punters, and waves to babies in prams, there is no hint of Cesar Kimbirima’s former life.

There. That is it for now. Not sure if there will be an edition next week as I am driving to the sea. We will see. During these last lazy days, for more check out the updates from Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday and (if I dare say) from Stan mostly every Monday, plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast, at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. The AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword – when he isn’t in hiatus as at the mo, more like timeout for rudeness! And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

*who once posed as me just to be nearer Lars.
**an archaeological foundation of some sort out of The Netherland with an address on the fabulous street, Frambozenweg!
***Hah! I’m one to talk.

Your Thursday Beery News Notes For When July Is Closer Than May

I will be positive. I will try to be positive. That’s what I say to myself. Every week. I will try. I do try. But it is trying, isn’t it. Not even sure it is all that interesting.  Far better being interesting than being positive. That’s why #ThinkingAboutDrinking >>> #BeerPositive.  Not schmarmy.  No need of that. Nope. I will try to be interesting. I will be interesting. I will. I will try.

As a start, it was interesting to see in The Telegraph the vision above of Canadian PM Justin Trudeau looking like Castro and Zappa’s love child while drinking a pint of ale as HRH The Queen had her back turned and Chuck looked pained but also comfortably numbed by the gin. By way of my review, an excellent G7 moment captured. Canadian politicians must love beer.

Elsewhere, there are few people writing about beer these days as interesting as Dr. Christina Wade of Braciatrix who wrote this week about a topic near and dear to my heart – beery references on cuneiform tablets within the records of Sumerian society:

Administration was a key part of these organizations. According to Peter Damerow, beer was not a simple agricultural product but, ‘belonged to the products subjected to the centralised economy of Sumerian states’. Indeed, he stated that the consumption and production of beer were separate entities and beer held this positon even after the decline of Sumerian culture. 

I say near and dear as I wrote of a similar thing in 2017, shared that info and had a merry chat with the good doctor.

Sticking with history, Martyn also wrote an extremely interesting piece this week drawing information out of the William Helliwell* diaries of the 1830s (much discussed in Lost Breweries of Toronto) that Jordan shared – and then contextualizing the info into London’s porter scene of that time:

William seems to have seized every chance to look round breweries on his journey: he visited two in Rochester, New York state and two more in nearby Albany on his way to New York to catch a ship to England, where he arrived in mid-June after a six-week journey from Canada. In London he had an introduction to Timothy Thorne, owner of the Westminster Brewery on Horseferry Road, from Thorne’s son Charles, whom William knew in York. The brewery, which made ale and porter, had been founded by Timothy Thorne in 1826. 

Leonard Lispenard of NYC took a similar trip in 1783 and trained under his cousins the Barclays. Did he keep a diary? Hmm…

Even more recent history was discussed by Boak and Bailey as they wrote about the demise in the later 1980s of a traditional pub in London’s Docklands, victim perhaps of a misplaced application of the new Duran Duran laced lifestyle:

We came across this small story of the loss of a specific pub through ‘Eastenders’, an episode of the ITV weekly documentary series World In Action available via BritBox. Jess being a Londoner, and Ray being a hopeless nostalgist, we often find ourselves watching this kind of thing and there’s invariably a pub somewhere among the grainy footage.

Never a good look for a writer to look for an expert to confirm a premise after the article’s been approved. Far more interesting was Max’s walk to Litoměřice:

I needed to have my computer serviced, which meant that I would have to do without it for a couple of days, which meant that I wouldn’t be able to do much else than fuck all at home. The thing had been acting up for some time already – some issue with the hard drive – and I’d decided to wait until I finished with a couple of big projects I was working on, always hoping it wouldn’t give up on me. It didn’t, and the timing could not have been any better. With the covid restrictions on all the fun stuff mostly lifted, and the weather finally nice, now I had the perfect excuse to take a couple of much needed days off to partake in one of my favourite activities: getting a train or a bus somewhere to go on a long walk in nature, with a brewery as destination. 

Sadly but interestingly so, the car crash within the wider sexism in craft car crash that is the Brewdog story keeps on giving and it is always wonderful when a beery bit of news gets the attention of someone in journalism** like this excellent balanced opinion piece by Camilla Long in The Sunday Times:

Will anyone now work for Brewdog? Thirty years ago the answer would probably have been a grudging yes. For people over 40, a cut-throat, stressful working environment — or as Brewdog’s founder put it, “a fast-paced culture” — is still closely associated with good results… But if you are under 40, the idea of working for somewhere that isn’t calm and friendly is horrifying. Young people simply won’t work for places that don’t offer good vibes. In America, where companies these days can’t hire people fast enough, hotels are offering free holidays and stays to attract good staff. Jobs are competing for people, rather than the other way round.

People still looking for a better placement within the beer industry don’t get that direct in their writing. As usual, Matty C comes closest but still hedged the best with the unfortunate use of “snafus” and describing Brewdog’s investors as “wolfish” even though it was the owners of Brewdog who took the cash. As noted these hesitancies jar the reader, leave doubts. Charlotte Cook in Beer 52 also added to the story with her personal experiences as relatively early BrewDog staff:

The inability to read the room also astounded me, women are finally speaking up for the horrible treatment they have endured in the craft beer industry. The lack of an apology from James, or any assurance of the steps being taken to improve things, suggests to me that BrewDog has not yet understood the moment of change we are going through. 

Who? indeed, would work there? Or buy the beer. Not even me and I used to take from them when they were wee needy advertising sponsors of this blog. Relatedly, Jemma Wilson succinctly shared her suspicions as to the Cicerone sexism situation. Gotta love an an independent investigation report that states “…Cicerone will be more responsive…” That’s not an investigative finding or even a recommendation.

Finally, Eoghan Walsh published the story of how and why Brussels’ grand new beer museum came to be:

Krishan Maudgal has worked in Belgian beer for over a decade, for the likes of Alken Maes and its well-known Abbey brand Affligem. In 2021 Maudgal was appointed to Gatz’s old position as director of the Belgian Brewers Federation, and he’s worked for the brewers on the museum concept almost from the beginning, helping to shape what the project will be – and what it won’t. “It’s not a showroom for only the international major brewers of our country,” Maudgal says. “It’s to promote the Belgian way of living. Eating, drinking, beer and food.”

There. All positively interesting. Don’t forget to check out those weekly updates from Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday, plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast, at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday  and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. There’s the AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword – when he isn’t in hiatus as at the mo, more like timeout for rudeness. And remember BeerEdge, too. Plus a newcomer located by B+B: The Moon Under Water.

*Helliwell would likely have called himself “British” or “English” but unlikely “Canadian” as there was no unified Canada of the British sort at the time. Canada then was still the name for French Canadians given they had lived in what they called Canada since the early 1600s. There was an Upper Canada which Helliwell did live in. In Nova Scotia, Ontarians are still called Upper Canadians even though the jurisdiction ceased to exist in 1841. This is all unpacked here to another degree or so…
**meaning having qualifications which do not include being on a first name basis with the subject of the beery news story.  H/T to the Tand.

 

Your Thursday Beery News Notes Welcoming The Second Third Of June 2021

I keep telling myself it will be a short update this week because not much happened but then (i) something happens and/or (ii) I get into my notes and I see that more happened than I thought. That’s the way of the world, folks. Speaking of which, robsterowski guided my eye to the jokey image to the right which is a helpful guide to the clans of beer writers today. Or is it? Sad commentary, that’s what it is. But what do you expect when there’s seltzer scriveners about?

But this is the way it is going for beer these days, not just those writing about beer. It’s all so uninteresting all of a sudden – which, if you think about it, is somewhat interesting.  Consider this extraordinary open letter to BrewDog published by Punks with Purpose. There are over 100 named and anonymous co-signers who say they are former BrewDog employees making extremely pointed accusations about the workplace environment:

Put bluntly, the single biggest shared experience of former staff is a residual feeling of fear. Fear to speak out about the atmosphere we were immersed in, and fear of repercussions even after we have left.

What an extraordinary statement about something as banal as a brewing outfit.  Who needs to impose a culture of fear to make beer? Update: James, corporate head of the brewery, attempted a response and made it pretty much worse.

You could as easily ask who needs to be a sexist pig to make but but Ruvani de Silva of Craft Beer Amethyst came across another craft brewery with bigotry based branding. WTAF indeed.  I used to write posts with titles like “This Is How US Craft Beer Will Kill Itself” on the silly independent beer campaign on 2012 or 2014’s “Yet Another Way Craft Will Kill Itself?” in which we considered the beginnings of craft as gimmick, the foundations of today’s bewildering non-beer beer market. Interesting to see that it may well be the capitalist pigs who kill of craft through simply being found out. Who told you otherwise?

It does seem to be all collapsing slowly, doesn’t it. Former darling NC craft brewery destination of the ticking traveling set and the tourism associations providing the related funding, the venerable Weeping Radish which was established in 1986, has gone up for sale:

North Carolina’s oldest microbrewery, which originally opened its doors in Manteo next to the Christmas Shop, is now located 35 miles north on a 25-acre farm at 6810 Caratoke Highway in Grandy in Currituck County. The sale includes the building, land and the entire business, according to a listing. The asking price is $2.6 million.

No questions about the sale are being answered. That’s a great way to stoke up a market for your properties, isn’t it.

Perhaps (taking in all the above) whistling past the graveyard, Jeff takes on a very apolitical question in this a very political time – the question of the middle market in craft beer:

In many ways, there is no single beer market. I stopped in at Culmination last night and found a brewery thrumming with activity. I had three beers: an expensive hazy, a rum-barrel Baltic (or Polish) Porter, and a Grodziskie. Not a one of those beers could ever enter the middle market. The people at the brewery weren’t there for “normal” beers, either. They wanted a unique local experience. In this sense, craft breweries are like restaurants.

Many questioned the fundamental premise but, me, I think of this as a just happy illusion. Once, I remember a middle aged, middle class radio host saying his favorite thing to do on a summer afternoon was lay upon a lawn chair, have a beer and daydream of former girlfriends. And not for any spicy reason. Just that they never asked in his dreamy mood for him to do any chores. Worrying about the middle class of the beer market is like that these days. We avoid troubles. We have a nap. The actual answer is the middle class of beer sits there before you there on grocery store shelves and in gas station  coolers. There is always something moderately interesting at a modest price, isn’t there. Brands may come and go but there’s always something.

Beer has always found a way to make it easy. Further back in time (when things were perhaps similar to today during the Gilded Age of the Capitalist Pig), we learn (as an image posted by Lost Lagers tells us) of 1890 global lager brewing capacity – which is interesting and especially compared to some of the numbers floating around Albany Ale, including Taylor’s Ale brewery in the 1880s having a capacity of 250,000 barrels, at a point in time well past its own heyday. (Note in the comments under that second link, the first time I came into contact with Craig, my partner in crime of over a decade now. Heavens!) Scale.

And certainly relatedly, I had a very good set of chats with Edd Mather this week of the Old Beers and Brewing blog. I was happy to share with him the 1811ish and 1830s era brewing books from Vassar in New York’s Hudson Valley and he immediately went to work unpacking the notes to provide instruction how to clone Vassar’s  single ale as brewed on the 13th of August 1833. Excellent stuff.

Another way beer has found a way to find its way was spotted in Afghanistan this week according to The Times of India:

Defence Ministry spokeswoman Christina Routsi said on Monday that a recent decision by the German commander in Afghanistan to ban the consumption of alcohol for security reasons had resulted in a pileup of beer, wine and mixed drinks at Camp Marmal in Mazar-e-Sharif. German soldiers are usually entitled to two cans of beer or equivalent per day. Routsi said the military had found a civilian contractor who will take the alcohol back out of the country ahead of the German troops’ withdrawal from Afghanistan as the NATO mission in the country ends in the coming months.

Note: Calamity Jane drinking at a saloon at Gilt Edge Montana in 1897. Perhaps related, happy to get a Halley Marlor update. You will recall her three months ago brewing this year’s Vintage Ale at Fullers. Now she has started in a new position with  Siren Craft Brew. Good luck! Avoid the fear.

Finally, I like this statement which I read this week in relation to some of the horrible news coming out in Canada but it seems to be fairly universal:

Gatekeeping is the way of the white man. Whether it be knowledge, resources, queerness or culture it’s rooted in the colonial and capital imperialistic fallacies of scarcity. That there is a somehow a limited resource and we should obstruct others and assert control and access.

I keep wondering who it was that for so long told us craft was special and how it was related to this sort of gatekeeping. This week, I also heard the acronym WEIRD for the first time: western, educated, industrialized, rich, democratic which also goes a long way and has likely been around a long time and known by others – at least before since I entered my bubble. This is also jangling about my head in relation to brewing… don’t know how but it is.

There. I hope beer gets back to being about beer once day. Meantime, don’t forget to check out those weekly updates from Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday, plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast, at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday  and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. There’s the AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword – when he isn’t in hiatus as at the mo, more like timeout for rudeness. And remember BeerEdge, too. Plus a newcomer located by B+B: The Moon Under Water.

Your Mid-May Beery News Notes For The UK Pubs And Other Floodgates Opening

What a week. We hit 50% first vaccine coverage locally and folk over 18 are able to try to book appointments. Our two eldest must head to two town over in three weeks for their. But as for me, the provincial government has gotten very cold feet over the AZ jab just as I await word on my where and what and when my second jab will be. Oooo… sole mio. Oh, to be the happy man that Tim Holt found reference to in an unnamed book: “[h]is hobby was chaffinches… on a Sunday he would lie nearly through the day sucking up the treacle beer through the tube… thinking of nothing at all…” Magic.

Of course I am not that man and, like all you all, must face the realities. This includes the biggest news in US craft beer circles is the news which isn’t really news at all.  Sexism is wide ranging within the culture and this week, led last weekend by Notch Brewing’s Brienne Allan, names were named.  Beth Demmons provided the best summary of the situation as of Monday afternoon through another well documented article at VinePair, setting out the background:

Allan, production manager at Notch Brewing in Salem, Mass. and a former leader of the Pink Boots Society’s Boston chapter, was on-site at Notch’s forthcoming Boston area brewery to help assemble the new brewhouse. After being in Covid-19 quarantine for a year, she says, she’d gotten used to not having to deal with sexism, but it didn’t take long for it to rear its head once — then twice — more.

In response, Allen went on line. She received over 800 response to her exasperated question “what sexist comments have you experienced?” The responses range from the crude to the horrific as Demmons writes. There have been initial consequences including a staff uprising at Tired Hands Brewing of Ardmore, Pennsylvania by Tuesday afternoon as reported upon by the Philadelphia Inquirer. And firings and resignations at this and other breweries and organizations followed and may continue to follow. Libby Crider of St. Louis’s 2nd Shift also shared experiences of what she has to put up with from pigs but also welcomed the wave of support. David Sun Lee shared the statement above from my local and beloved Matron Fine Beer. Also read Jessica Infante’s piece on the story from Tuesday as well. In addition to these grim allegations, one of the more interesting bits of information was this:

Let’s say hypothetically I run a for profit marketing business, that doubles as a publication, and am on record/screen shotted, warning clients to pull certain SM accounts before a hypothetical article dropped… am I contributing to the toxic male presence in beer while posting articles of the toxic male presence in beer? Asking for a “friend”.

Hardly independent publishing if that is the case.  Interestingly, GBH ran a story that consisted on interview notes with Brienne Allan along with commentary from two lawyers on the challenges whistleblowers may face in the form of defamation lawsuits. It was odd as it seemed to give both slightly false hope as well as a warning to whistleblowers. As a lawyer, I also found it a particularly odd approach what with the legal conclusions drawn like:

…users and providers of internet services are generally protected from defamation claims when they post or share content that was created by a third party…

Not to mention the categorization of brewery owners and employees as “public figures” which would require acceptance of the phony rock star narrative which is also part of the problem with depictions of craft beer culture. As always – as with pro/am beer writers offering medical advice – get actual professional advice if you are in any way involved with a situation like this.

My own two cents in all of this was to remind people – again – that the whole shift from “micro” to “craft” brewing was an intentional rebranding specifically in response to a sex scandal that led to criminal charges. You can read about the 2002 “Sex for Sam” promotion fiasco here and, if you doubt the primary sources I cited, you can read about it also in  Barrel-Aged Stout and Selling Out: Goose Island, Anheuser-Busch, and How Craft Beer Became Big Business by Josh Noel as reviewed here.

Katie questions the political economics behind the low ethical standards in what was supposed to be craft’s brave new world – what she calls “social justice paint jobs”:

I have worked in marketing for over a decade, and in that time I’ve developed a talent for sniffing out social justice paint jobs. This in turn has allowed cynicism to grow where it’s not welcome — I desperately want to see beer businesses working to bring good into the industry, and to banish what’s rotten, and to believe that this is being done for the benefit of everyone who interacts with the industry. It’s difficult to see how anything that operates within a capitalist society could survive without adopting capitalist goals…

Me, I am not one to think that “it’s the same everywhere” as I think craft has built for itself its own particular variant of the problem:

If you were wanting to create a cover story for anti-social behaviour why not create an alcohol laced drinkers’ loyalty culture controlled top down by the clique of brewery owners, cleverly labelled as a community driven by passion?

It’s that dream of a consequence-free experience under which it provides a particular cover for some pretty bad behaviour, the thing that still allows someone known to be a creep at work to claim it’s his personal matter.* Sorry. Nope.

Somewhat related, while these matters may raise many points of view, I am not sure this is exactly how one should put this, inclusion-wise. Seems itself to be pretty whitely-dudely:

…I want to balance my interview list a bit, so if you make or sell these beers and you’re not a white dude then I’d love to talk to you…

So… if this is all true, then are we facing a reality that unless you are a tiny family operation or a big brewery with all the controls a proper independent and empowered HR department that there is a risk the pigs are in charge? Maybe. Maybe not. As Jeff recommends, we can at least start by remembering that all humans deserve respect, kindness, and equity.

Speaking of tiny family operations, Joe Stange has written a profile of Virginia’s Wheatland Spring Farm and Brewery run by  Bonnie and John Branding. It is published in what is either Craft Beer & Brewing or Beer & Brewing depending on which web page upper left logo you are looking at. Warning: there may be pigs but they are the proper sort so it’s OK. The Brandings make land beer:

That experience in Germany also inspired the brewing of what the Brandings call “land beer.” To them, all Wheatland Spring beer is land beer. The Germans use the word landbier—it simply means “country beer,” and breweries use it to evoke images of local, traditional lagers. To the Brandings, it reflects the farm and its surroundings….  Land beer “has to do with culture and a mindset,” John says. “It’s this connection to agriculture and to artisans, and to this more tightly knit community of craft maltsters, small hop growers, and small family breweries.” In Germany, he says, those small village breweries aren’t trying to compete with the bigger ones. “They’re happy and content with their market, just as it is…. 

History lesson time. The T-feed presence known as “Intoxicating Spaces” posted this message and accompanying image to the right (my left):

A charming C18th view of St Pancras Wells, a spa and pleasure garden on the site of the present-day station. As well as healing waters, it offered ‘the best of tea, coffee, neat wines, curious punch, beers, other fine ales, and cyder’.

I have writing a bit about pleasure gardens, such as Vauxhall Gardens in the last third of the 1660s at Lambeth, England as well as, note bene, Vauxhall Gardens in NYC in around the 1760s. I would absolutely love access to a pleasure garden. Why have you not provided that to me, world?

Courtesy of TBN, I saw that Ron wrote about British military brewing in WWII including in the jungles of Burma:

In Burma they took the concept of mobile brewing one step further than a brewing ship. They stuck breweries on the back of lorries. Quite a clever way of getting beer production as close as possible to the front line. Given the conditions under which it was brewed, I doubt it tasted that great. The soldiers must have been glad to get any beer at all, out in the jungle. 

Look! A “curate” sighting care of the Mudge. So 2018. I thought we were done with that once it came to mean “stuff I own” but there you go.

Marverine Cole directed my eyes to this piece in The Guardian about troubles facing the only Belgian brewery that really really matters, Rochefort:

The monks have doggedly claimed that plans by Lhoist, an international company run by one of Belgium’s richest families, to deepen its chalk quarry and redirect the Tridaine spring risked altering the unique taste of their celebrated drink. Now, thanks to a deed dating back to 1833, it appears that makers and drinkers alike need no longer worry. A court of appeal in Liège has confirmed that while the quarry owner also owns the spring, it does not have the right to “remove or divert all or part of the water which supply the abbey”.

Holy subsurface riparian rights ruling, Batman! Excellent outcome.

Boak and Bailey educated us all on the history of pale’n’hoppy ale. As did Ed. They wrote in response to a post from Jeff on Thornbridge Jaipur. The point of pointing this out is not the appearance of corrections and disagreement. No, it was the appearance of a collective exploration that helped everyone and build understanding. Certainly helped me. Excellent. Good stuff indeed!

Finally, the pubs have opened in the UK for indoors pints and, just like that, the arseholes are back:

To the group of lads who ran up a £200+ drinks bill outside a #bristol pub yesterday, were abusive staff & fabricated complaints, only to then do a runner. You are the very worst of the worst sort of people, and we sincerely hope the police can track you down #unbelievable

In happier pub opening news, Jeff only had to move the sofa and TV to get the place fit for human company.

That’s a lot. Take the time to take it in. And please don’t forget to check out the weekly updates from Boak and Bailey mostly every Saturday, plus more with the weekly Beer Ladies Podcast, at the weekly OCBG Podcast on Tuesday  and sometimes on a Friday posts at The Fizz as well. There is a monthly sort of round up at The Glass. There is more from the DaftAboutCraft podcast, too. And the Beervana podcast. And sign up for Katie’s weekly newsletter, The Gulp, too. And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And Fermentation Radio with Emma Inch. There’s the AfroBeerChick podcast as well! And also look at Brewsround and Cabin Fever. And Ben has his own podcast, Beer and Badword – when he isn’t in hiatus as at the mo, more like timeout for rudeness. And remember BeerEdge, too. Plus a newcomer located by B+B: The Moon Under Water.

*Just had to note what a sad exercise this sort of statement is: “While this was all my PERSONAL life, I am so very sorry that these poor choices are now reflecting on the excellent people and products at Grains of Wrath. I emplore those who have any questions or concerns to ask me personally. I’m happy to talk to you and answer any questions you may have because open and honest dialogue is the only way to move forward.” No, bringing bad behaviours out into public with real consequences is how to move forward.