Category: Scotland

Your Thursday Beery News Notes For The First Thaw

Not the big thaw, the ice jam busting thaw. Just the small thaw that tells you a big thaw is not that far off. The thaw that tells you you probably don’t need to buy more bird feed for, basically, the squirrels. The bastardly squirrels. You can sit out now. In the sun. With your Bobo and you Eephus. Yup, it’s a time when your mind starts to look forward to spring. And outdoor unpaid labour followed by a nice cold beer. That’s where it all started, right? As the old Temperance Society hymn told us, yardwork is the root of all evil. Soon coming. Get ready.

But for now, first up is The Beer Nut who found a bit of an expensive dud this week and it does make one wonder how much silent regret there is out there for this sort of thing:

Clearly this has been designed, and priced, for the special-occasion market. Anyone new to big barrel-aged stout and apprehensive about what it brings may find themselves enjoying how accessible it is. I couldn’t shake the feeling that it’s rather bland given the specs. I don’t want a sickly bourbon bomb but I do want more substance and more character than this displays. Perhaps releasing it fresh would have been the better move.

So not a drain pour but, still, not necessarily a beer you want to share with pals who know what’s what – or the price with thems who might not. Is there a word for that? There has to be a word. And what would our man in the EU think of this: blue beer in France: “Question?” “Yes, is it a shitty beer? “Quoi?” “Votre bier… c’est un biere du merde bleu, monsieur?” Peut etre.

Elsewhere, on a day out in Kent (are there ever days not out for Martin?) we gained another bit of knowledge on the rules of pub snacks as they relate to the odd hairy bits:

The Larkins was a lovely cool pint; that ramekin of scratchings a tad let down by the inclusion of pork crackling, which really ought to be outlawed. Unless scratchings have hairs on them, they have no right to that name.

There was a bit of a bittersweet tale posted by Boak and Bailey this week, a story of something found in a pub which starts:

On Saturday 8 March 1975, a 16-year-old boy wrote an autobiographical note on a piece of thin chipboard and concealed it in the skittle alley at The Lord Nelson pub in Barton Hill, Bristol.

Hey look! It’s Ren Navarro appearing on CTV discussing dessert beers nationally. A great public education public service.

Jeff wrote about what he called “malt consciousness” this week and I think he is partially, almost entirely quite right:

I had to spent eight days in Bavaria before something magical happened in my appreciation of beer. Because the main difference among the beers I drank (and drank and drank) came from the malt, I was able to tune into that wavelength. For the first time, I developed “malt consciousness.” I understood the role malt played—something many American brewers and most American drinkers still lack. Brewers are a lot more sophisticated now, and they understand that you’re not going to make a very interesting helles from generic two-row pale. Yet I’m not sure we’ve quite arrived at full malt consciousness.

If you go back to the brewing recipe books of twenty years ago, you will see much more interest in a range of malts that you do today. One of my first posted beer reviews eighteen years ago included the faded but one time most important US micro, Pete’s Wicked Ale. Before the new millennium, ales were malt and lagers hop focused. They really weren’t so binary but that was the story, as we see in this 1991 article about the Buffalo brewing scene or this one from 1987. Full bodied dark ales. Malt was the main event before craft appropriated and reframed micro in the early 2000s preparing us for the everything is IPA world we now want to leave behind. The present malt revival is great and adds another dimension to local brewing for sure. But it’s not new. We are remembering.

The big theme went off in another direction this week, a few more indications of the continuing death… or perhaps these are the zombie years… of craft like this:

Observation: There’s a LOT of confusion right now among wholesalers, trying to get a bead on the current direction of the craft beer industry. A general feeling of “something has fundamentally changed, but we aren’t quite sure what” going around. It’s creating some paralysis.

And Chris Loring of Massachusetts’ Notch Brewing shared this thought:

US brewers can take anything of value and tradition and make it a gimmick before beer drinkers experience the real thing. When was it decided we’d be clowns instead of professionals? I’m done, this is embarrassing.

Then… we learn again that a portion of CAMRA is populated by pigs. Then there was the end-timsey news about contract brewing no alcohol beer being a thing with the unskilled… and, of course, the Flagship February dead cat bounce. It is all flounder or founder? Whatever, I presume it all is the sort of cleansing we would expect after a pandemic… or a recession… or a competing innovation that draws attention elsewhere. Sorta facing all three makes for a guaranteed shift. M. Lawrenson had some interesting thoughts about the perhaps associated irritability of drinking establishments with social media observations:

Unfortunately, some places don’t see it this way.  Apparently, they live and die by their Google rating.  I gave 4/5 to somewhere last week.  On Sunday afternoon, they sent me a message saying “Hi, is there we can do to get you to change your rating to a 5?”  I struggled to think of a reply, as I’ve been to this place twice a week for the last 6 months and it’s been pretty much the same every time.  They could make it perfect for ME, I suppose.  But what’s perfect for me ain’t gonna be perfect for everyone.   Perhaps they recognised my name and imagined I’m some kind of “influencer” in the pub world.

Also, relatedly, I think this is one opinion that is about 180 degrees wrong about the nature of change we are seeing:

As someone who’s covered the seething angst and vexing contradictions of America’s craft beer industry and culture for over a decade, I find this a remarkable development. Where have all the hate tourists gone? Or, to put it another way: How did a craft beer industry and community so opposed to selling out become so inert in the face of their beloved breweries getting sold off?

Umm… maybe the development of small local breweries with no chance of ever being in a buyout maybe? The hate stop hating big craft and just moved on to a more interesting experience. That’s only the main story in history of good beer circa 2015-2022. Sweet status-based self-citation, however.

Note: “not Britain’s oldest boozer.”

I really dislike most beer culture cartoons as they are… umm… not all that likeable* but I do like the more deftly drawn ones by Emily Thee Cannibal, possibly a proctologist, like this one about a pairing of Allagash White with a soft cheese… except I can’t stop feeling that the cheese looks like a dying PacMan. It’s a slower more dignified death for sure… but still.

Finally and weirdly, odd news from (i) the folks fighting against the bad actors and powers of BrewDog and (ii) the folk rooting for Mikkeller despite the bad actors and powers. Both groups seem to have engaged the same consultants to deal with their respective complaints. I hadn’t appreciated that in January there was an announcement that@PunksWPurpose had acquired a “platform to affected Brewdog workers to assist [them]… in their core mission of tackling Brewdog’s cultural issues” but saw today that the same consultancy was hired by Mikkeller to provide provide  a “Workplace Reconciliation Program.” This is a little confusing for me, being a lawyer who dabbles in areas of owner v. contractor, employer v employee issues, as you are either on one side or the other in my profession. Do you really want to share your experience to be used against an allegedly overbearing employer with someone hired by another allegedly overbearing employer to smooth the waters?**

Perhaps it is just as one correspondent wrote privately, “folks might be more interested in catharsis than anything else” regardless of the outcome in terms of justice. The display may be enough. Me, I’d say don’t rely on a consultant, get your own legal advice (especially when the consultant does not seem to understand independent legal advice means) or go to a tribunal (usually free). Whatever you do, be especially careful to not create a record of any complaint that ends up owned by the party against which you are making a complaint. You will see it next in your cross-examination when you do end up making that legal complaint: “… but didn’t you say in Feb 2022 the following…“***.

There. Done. For more 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 irregular newsletter, The Gulp, too (… back this week!) 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 I hope is  revived soon…)  And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

*rahrah, craft is great, comes in brown and other colours…kittens!
**Then the odd news turned into an odd thread when the consultancy lead jumped at the tail end of a chat I was having with DSL, wanting a discussion with me about Mikkeller, then suggested I was aggressive (no), directed me to the FAQs (no thanks) and sought to get me off Twitter and speak on the phone (really, no thanks). Crisis management deflection stuff. Frankly, I think I find most offensive thing is the use of “reconciliation” which is appropriate when talking about bringing a fundamentally divided nation together, not helping a frigging contract brewer cope with its self-inflicted crisis.
***But, then again, I pretty much did the same thing spilling my beans such as they are, a bearing of witness to a hired investigator about my tangential involvement in a similar issue… which was where the discussion with DSL started – and should have ended. Go figure.

The Beery News Notes For The End Of January And Perhaps Of BrewDog

What an odd week. Very bad stuff about craft beer in the UK then more about very bad things in Ontario craft beer. Didn’t help that I was reading Motherwell, a recent memoir about someone about my age whose family didn’t emigrate from the same bit of Scotland mine left behind for Canada in 1956. Grim pain and judgemental negativity pulsing through a hardscrabble family living through hard times in an industrial town near Glasgow. We dodged. Just a few phrases I heard growing up echoed. I hated “know your place” the most, especially as I didn’t have to. Why bother? Why should anyone? Why in craft beer now? Who are these assholes?

MindbogglIng. Let’s start somewhere else. Stan’s latest edition of Hop Queries came out this week with good news from the Czech Republic:

Czech farmers harvested 18.2 million pounds of hops (for perspective, that’s about as much as Americans grow of Citra alone), 40 percent more than 2020 and 34 percent more than the 10-year average. Average yield of 1,467 pounds per acre was an all-time high. (American farmers average 1,900.)

Gary updated a series of posts that he began in 2020 – who hasn’t been up to that sort of thing? – and included the image to the left. It’s not a super huge .jpg but worth a click. I love the name of the beer – PICNIC BEER. It needs an exclamation mark. It needs to be on every brewery’s list of brands. Anyway, Gary was actually not writing so much about PICNIC BEER out of Minnesota as the use of the term “sand porter” in Montreal brewing in days of yore – by which I mean the late 1800s aka The Gilded Era:

Until recently I felt the sand-topped lid idea made the most sense (some English brewers still practiced it into the next centuries, using “marl”, a similar idea). However, in studying recently the history of a Minnesota brewery, Fleckenstein, I now have a further idea what sand porter meant.

Speaking of yore, the free web service known as A London Inheritance included a post on the George Inn in Southwark which was, as we all recall, the subject of Pete Brown’s book Shakespear’s Local. Lots of unconventional photographic views and mapping, like this one to the right giving a very unromantic vision of what you actually see from across the street. It is actually a massive post. A data fest. Well worth reading. The post includes this astute observations about the value of certain second hand books:

Old books help as they provide information closer to the time they are recording. Some care must be taken to double check, but they are a good source of information. These books also have their own history as they pass from owner to owner over the years, accumulating a memory of their time with some of the owners of the book.

The post then goes on to highlight photos and even a letter relevant to the subject that had only been stuck in copies of books that he had found over the years. All fabulously illustrating the unique archival value blogs. Much praise to the author… whose name is not particularly highlighted on the site. Freddie?

On a similar theme but in a colonial context, I saw a reference on Facebook to Ten Mile House in Halifax, NS (my old home town) this week and wondered what shape that was in:

The house was located ten miles from Halifax on the Bedford Highway. It was built in the late 1700s for Colonel Joseph Scott on land granted to him in the 1760s. In 1798 it was called Scott’s Inn, and opened as a House of Entertainment by John Maddock. Joseph Scott died in 1800 and his widow Margaret conveyed property to John Lawlor. Who opened and operated Lawlor’s Inn from 1802- 1809, possibility later.

Nice image at the Nova Scotia Archives website. As you can see from the thumbnail it is now sitting well back of the main road, the Bedford Highway, but looks from photos on Google to be in very good shape right by The Chickenburger. There are plenty of these colonial taverns and inns out there if you know what you are looking for. Like a favourite of mine, the Fryfogle. Interesting note: at the time Ten Mile House was in operation as Scott’s Inn in the late 1790s, it was just down the road from the estate of Queen Victoria’s father, the Duke of Kent. The tavern not the Chickenburger. The Chickenburger is old but not that old. I will pay it a visit when I am back there in early March.

And in one last note about built heritage of pubs, taverns and inns this piece in Eater Chicago was interesting in terms of how one preservation project was undertaken:

While Lincoln Square reconfigures during the pandemic — across the street from the Brauhaus space, the Huettenbar has quietly closed (owners hold to hope that it could eventually reopen) — fans can take solace that the Brauhaus has returned in a slightly different format. The bar, at least in spirit, is now located on the second floor of the DANK Haus German American Cultural Center.

In a less physical form of preservation, Edd Mather posted this bit of video on facebook, a fabulous step back into the near past of Ireland and the question of corks v. crown caps which relies on any number of associated technologies:

 

OK – the bad news. I have mentioned this before so let’s be upfront. Once upon a time, BrewDog sponsored this blog. When they were tiny, not the £2 billion international corporation they are now. I still have that label from a sample they sent at the time and it was put on with Scotch Tape. Well before the stupid squirrel and certainly well before BBC Scotland News detailed what apparently everyone in the trade knew but too often was not willing to put into print. The main allegations so far:

a. James Watt owns a massive amount of shares in the global beer brand Heineken hypocritically contrary to his “big beer is bad” stance.
b. James Watt is accused of being a pervy boss;
c. BrewDog falsified paperwork submitted to allow it to import into the United States; and
d. BrewDog carefully structured the Equity for Pinks fundraising to benefit the brewery and not the investors.

This reaction to the first bit of news is gold. Deals between breweries started to come apart. Punks with Purpose said the fight goes on. There were also calls for a resignation. Also questions: “why the obsession?” I will leave it there* as you all know this – and my job is to root out the unknown and beery for your reading delight.** BrewDog has not been delightful for many many years. But we need to remind ourselves, while they are big they are just one of many – as @esbroadfoot helped remind us by inviting  and sharing stories of rotten treatment, largely in the Canadian craft scene.

Still, by Wednesday, it all seems to have put JJB/Stonch in a reflective mood:

Placing orders to fill an empty pub cellar has made me realise what an amazing choice of absolutely superb beer from independents I have. Yes, the craft beer industry has its bad sides, and faces daunting challenges this year, but let’s not forget how brilliant it is.

He’s always hated BrewDog pubs (“…Awful aesthetic, odd places….”) but appreciates how others feel cheated. He also reminds us to be kind to the good folk who distribute our beer. He also posted a link to a 15 year old post about the horrors of a pub crawl in St. Albans, home of CAMRA, for a fair and balanced set of thoughts.

Elsewhere in space and time, Ron has been exploring the colour of milds and has come across a new unit of measurement – tint!

The biggest problem is the lack of hard data. It’s tricky calculating the colour from the ingredients, especially when sugar is involved. As this is mostly only described very vaguely. There are very few records of beer colour before WW I. Occasionally chemical analyses will include a number for the colour, mostly in some weird scale that died out 100 plus years ago. Only a handful of Barclay Perkins records from the Edwardian period include the beer’s colour. At least that’s what I thought. Until I happened to notice that line in a Fullers brewing record. That “Tint” number looked like it was in an understandable scale. The type of Lovibond used before WW II.

Even further afield, does Syracuse have a low estimation of its own worth in the beer world? Like Toronto?  As bad as that? I spent a lot of time in Syracuse up to a certain point… the point at which the Canadian dollar collapsed from parity to 75 cents frankly. For AAA baseball. For the beer shopping day trips. For bars now long gone like The Blue Tusk and Clark’s Ale House. For Wegman’s. I love Syracuse. I used to cross sometimes just for the white hots. Je me souviens… but more to the south…

Finally, note: union made. Nova Scotian beer cases always said that too. Plus health tax included. So by drinking beer you knew were doing your part. I might do a bit of that when I head out east in March, too.

That’s it for now. Too much. For more 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 irregular newsletter, The Gulp, too (… back this week!) 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 I hope is  revived soon…)  And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

*But if this is correct and such acts are common in craft beer, well, we can all agree that anyone who knew this and is claiming to be reporting on the beer trade… is pretty much a fail, right? If not complicit… right?
**Plus I am aware of my own little realistic chance of not ending up in HELL!!!

The Thursday Beery News Notes For When Winter Actually Showed Up

While we didn’t break the record of most snow in a century like Ottawa to our north did, I has to shovel snow five times on Monday to clear and keep the driveway clear. Not sure I would find, as a result, the idea of a pub with an outside men’s room would be wonderful. I mean I have heard of such things… but here? That doorless door there? It’d be filled with drift. Snow drift. Right up to that bracket to the left of the door frame there. Don’t fancy that. Chilly. Something something rhymes with chilly.

Well, perhaps speaking of which, the big news broke on Wednesday that Brewdog has apparently been falsifying documents submitted to the US government. As BBC Scotland found out:

Scottish beer giant Brewdog sent multiple shipments of beer to the US, in contravention of US federal laws, a BBC investigation has found. Staff at its Ellon brewery told the BBC they were put under pressure in 2016 and 2017 to ship beer with ingredients that had not been legally approved. One US-based importer said they had been deceived by Brewdog. In a social media post on Wednesday, Brewdog CEO James Watt admitted to “taking shortcuts” with the process.

Having practiced low level criminal defense law for about a decade, it is always great to see a suspect get chatty like that. What makes it really quite amazing is how §70.331 of the Fed Reg Title 27, Chapter 1* related to the Alcohol Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau of the US Treasury Department provides that:

Any person who willfully delivers or discloses to any officer or employee of the Bureau any list, return, account, statement, or other document, known by him to be fraudulent or to be false as to any material matter, shall be fined not more than $10,000 ($50,000 in the case of a corporation) or imprisoned not more than 1 year, or both.

But that right up there, as a pal says when I point to a by-law at work… “that’s a law!” Which it is. Which allows for a year in jail. Yikes. Dumbasses. No wonder Dan Shelton, former US importer and man whose name became a new verb, stated that he had been deceived: “They did lead somebody in my company to falsify documents.” Wow.  To think Brewdog once sponsored this blog… I am so embarrassed. I would have thought Prince Andrew’s situation might have been a warning to Brits who are a bit deluded about their proper place. No, apparently not. Perhaps it was a plan to distract folk from their incredibly retrograde insensitive and perhaps even Neanderthal-esque approach to promoting better mental health… you know, when they weren’t, what did the BBC write in that article… running a model workplace… what was it?

One former worker told the investigation: “The pressure was enormous. ‘Just make it happen’, that was the culture. It was clear to us this was coming from the top – from James [Watt].”

Elsewhere and hardly at all as suspect, Stan has been on a bit of a roll, posting five times at his space. He may be making a point of some sort. He wrote this under the heading “#nottwitter 04“:

Can somebody point me to a blog post, an academic paper, something from the New York Times, wherever, that provides insight into what might be called unhealthy nostaglia and the ramifications? And how might it relate tradition as a trap?

I am not sure what is up. Is there a pattern?  Whatever it is, it may be that this post’s point is found in the next post, the Monday beer links: “when we buy into that nostalgia, it might be best to stop and consider what we are longing for.” Isn’t what nostalgia what beer is for? Remembering? Daydreaming? Hmm. Then – get this – then Stan hid a clue in the title of his next post: ethyl octanoate. Ethyl. Octanoate. Think about it. Anyway, it terms of the speed of nostalgia, it moves fast with craft beer. Four Pure and Magic Rock are in a “process“:

We want to update you on some news. As we go through this process, our priority remains our superb team and brewing great beers.

Better a process than a legal process, eh? The Grocer has deets:

“While no decisions have been made, we need to determine how to best set Magic Rock and Fourpure up for success in the coming years. Our team have been informed of the review and we are committed to supporting them through this time.” Fourpure has struggled to make headway in the supermarkets, despite the huge surge in alcohol sales over the course of the pandemic…. In contrast, Magic Rock’s off-trade volumes rose 125.4%…

Well! As with the news last week about the Aussie wine guys buying up US craft, the news about the Aussie beer guys going wobbly on UK craft is par for the course. Dust in the wind. Chose your pop prog song title from the mid to late 1970s. That is what it is.

Thinking about thinking, Ron reflected on the year ahead this week in terms of his own mobility:

Plague permitting, I’ve a few trips planned and a couple of others pencilled in. Corona is a real blessing to travellers. The internet had made travels far too simple. The virus adds a delightful randomness to the proceedings. Like planning a European tour in the summer of 1918. Every time I book a flight I wonder: “What are the chance of me actually taking it?” Nothing is more thrilling than checking the internet until the second before you leave for the airport that the flight hasn’t been cancelled. Or wondering if you’ll be let out of the country once you reach your destination. I love the Phineas Fogg feeling the uncertainty brings.

All this uncertainty. Is that the word of the month? I bought a ticket to a CNY beerfest this week at Craig’s urging. Not sure I see how I could ever go to it but it is at least four months off and I suppose I could rent a camper van and look at people out the window. Now he tells me it’s Mothers Day weekend.  Great.

Conversely to that fest, there is as much to learn from a poorly made or poorly thought out beer. Matt is right. Don’t be a jerk. But also don’t be fooled twice. That’s what got us in this mess.

The Beer Nut found perhaps the dullest beer ever.

Retired Martin found a micropub based the theme of the group The Jam. I was their only fan in high school. Until my pals listened to my records. Not sure even I would stay long.

A few reviews of the ABInBev TV promotional show, Beer Masters, have come in. Boak and Bailey added to Ed‘s observations this week:

Perhaps, however, they could have spent less time on the somewhat laboured descriptions of what makes an Abbey beer, or a pilsner, and told us a bit more about the contestants’ kits. We could see some interesting gadgets and arrangements that were never really discussed. If the aim is to spark a home-brewing revolution, as was suggested at a couple of points, then this probably won’t do it.

Good point. This is the sort of TV that does not interest me but at least it appears that a bit of big brewery money has made for a show that is actually not dreadful. Remember that horrible show produced as an advertising vehicle for Dogfish Head twelve and a half years ago? Of course you don’t as most of you were still in elementary school back then. That show was absolutely dreadful. Note: it was also called Beer Masters.

Somewhat related in the sense of horrible US craft beer messaging. Jeff considered the limits of independence this week with yet another tale of yet another takeover:

This isn’t a problem of the Brewers Associations’ making. It’s a structural feature of the beer industry in the US. It is also a worrying development, an echo of an earlier era when consolidation blighted the industry. What does it say about how we regulate the sale of beer in the US that the most successful start-up breweries eventually have to sell out to giants to survive? Is this the world we want to live in and, critically, what changes would allow those larger regional breweries to compete?

I can’t really agree that this is worrying. I mean if you are worrying about this you must have a pretty worry-free life.  The idea of the “independence” of craft beer was dumb in 2009, in 2012, in 2015, in 2016 and still is today. See what I wrote in six years ago under that 2016 link?

Recently, the Boston Globe profiled private equity firm Fireman Capital Partners, the investment folk behind the expansion of Oskar Blues and the cash injection into Florida’s Cigar City Brewing. You think those guys are shaking in their boots over the prospect of a rival fund based on Stone’s ethos? Hardly. The experienced private equity players will out bid and out run their deals. It’s their business, not a hobby or a faith-based act of grace.

Money knows what money is about. Craft beer is about making money. Ask the Aussie wine guys. Unless it is about Berlin. Then craft beer is not about making money. Elsewhere and far more pure of heart, Lars came to a realization this week:

That feeling when you sit down to summarize the development of Norwegian brewing processes and the process of explaining forces you to realize that for 3/4 of the time people have brewed beer in Norway there is zero knowledge of how they did it. No evidence, no theories, nothing.

I might add that we should always be alive to the other 1/4 being 3/4s correct, too. That is the issue with all histories which is why it comes in a plural. But I expect this to spur on even more of his excellent and single-handed research.

There was a good question put to the chattering classes about the most influential European breweries on the US beer industry but I couldn’t muster the energy to decode influential so only watched the ticker tape pass through my hands. Gary went with Chimay and then wrote a follow up:

My history with Chimay started long before this blog inaugurated in 2015. My first Chimay was in a stone-flagged bar in Montreal, Quebec around 1980, served in the stemmed “chalice” long associated with the brand. I was in Vieux Montréal, the oldest part of the city whose mix of old French and Victorian British architecture contrived to offer a “European” atmosphere (still does)…

The Tand picked up a very similar ball – round and bouncy – and gave it a swift kick himself and wrote this about TT’s Landlord:

Me and Taylor’s Landlord have a bit of history. When I first came to this neck of the woods, a local free house used to sell it. It was on the way to Tesco when we did our weekly shop, and we always stopped on the way back for a couple.  It was a rich, balance of malt and hops, with a distinctive floral touch. The term multi layered really did apply to it.  Alas, the free house was sold to Robinsons and the then landlord presented me with the Landlord pumpclip as a farewell gift. I still have it. And that was that. No more readily available Taylor’s. I have supped it in Keighley too over the years and when I saw it on a bar, I always tried it. E loved it too. Of course, there is a but. Over the years, it just hasn’t retained its appeal somehow. It isn’t the same.

Question: “What makes the Golden Ball special?”

As I am wont to do, when I compare this review of good wines by Eric Asimov in the NYT with what would happen if anyone tried such a thing in a publication about beer I once again am between saddened and confused. Imagine if wine writers wrote “for the trade by the trade” as is often the brand with this sort of beer. No one would take the opinions offered seriously. It’s the neighbour of scandal.

Finally, Jordan took one for the team and drank a bunch of no-alc beer samples he got in the mail. While I would approach that opportunity with the sort of anticipation I might feel just before… what… anyway, Jordan found some good in doing it by suggesting not doing it:

I struggle with Non-Alcoholic products. By my lights, I’d prefer to have beer with alcohol or something that’s not beer. I probably get through three litres of fizzy water a day. While I understand that there’s a question of inclusivity in gatherings and that people want to hold something that looks like a beer so that they feel included, I feel that things are slightly different if you’re… you’re a… [Ed.: hmm he spelled “grown up” wrong…].

And I have been playing with the Patreon thing a bit more. Notes on beers I have tried, thoughts on books and beer culture as well as my war on squirrels at the feeder. I do like how it provide a low barrier to easy access. I can be ruder there. Like cable TV as opposed to broadcast.

That’s it for now. That’s a lot. For more 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 irregular newsletter, The Gulp, too (… back this week!) 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 I hope is  revived soon…)  And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

*Feel free to correct my US citation style. I took and oath to the Crown so you can just consider it payback for the whole “War of Independence” thing.

These Be The Beery News Notes For Mid-January 2022

We are already at a mid-point. But there are plenty of them to do around. Pick one point and then another? You’ve created a mid-point. I saw this image from a late 1960s airport or train station waiting area. I remember these at the Halifax airport, coin operated TV chairs. Some sort of mid-point going on. With ashtrays. We are at another now. Mid-January.

This bit of beer business news has every member of the semi-pro beer chattering class without experience in business* scratching their heads:

Molson Coors Beverage Company said today it will stop production of its Saint Archer brand and sell its San Diego-based brewery and taproom to Kings & Convicts Brewing Co., which owns the Ballast Point brand.  

As I reported… relayed… poached from Josh Noel in the Chicago Tribune, back in December 2019 Kings & Convicts, an apparently tiny craft brewery in Illinois bought one time mega-brand Ballast Point. The purchase was made with a bucket of moolah earned from a hospitality asset sale by K&C principal Brendan Watters in 2015  along with input from other friendly and wealthy investors including wine magnate Richard Mahoney. These brewery buys at pennies on the dollar are no doubt a doddle for folk at that level.

In another sector aimed at making the moolah, the sad news has been reported by Jaime Jurado that something called the Adult Non-Alcoholic Beverage Association has been created. A concept which seems to put the moron in oxymoron. As it is not about beer, it shall never be referenced again – except when someone mentions “neo-prohibitionists” again. Then I can say:

What? You mean the ANBA?

Best NA-NF quote of the week? This:

Price is an issue. Not sure how I’ll feel about that once work isn’t paying for the beers.

What? Govern the opening of your wallet accordingly, I suppose. Spare a measure of salt when reading review by those who get the freebies. Next fad to return? Temperance bars. As noted by Martin, the mastheadless blog Evo Boozy Scribbler discussed a variation on that theme:

I have nothing but disdain for booze free curry houses. Having a pint of Cobra is part of the experience. I don’t take my own roast potatoes to a carvery.

Well, it’s part of your experience. Why can’t people on the beer imagine that there is a world where being people on the beer is not considered the height of civilization’s progress? I rarely have been with my curry but, then again, I equate it with family meals, not piss ups.

Speaking of food and beer, this is an interesting argument from Zambia related to food security:

Well, if we are talking about food security, perhaps we could start by checking the quantity of maize going into beer before we think of suspending meagre exports of less than a million tonnes because if this info could be true, it could mean us who drink chibuku, ‘eat’ more mealie meal in three months than what the whole country uses in a year! Mwaimvela kanongobilitina skopodicious, ka? But not everything is bad about opaque beer, “…it gives you 13.1% of body energy when you drink,” my friend told me.

Changing course, a high honour and one I agree with entirely was bestowed by Garrett Oliver this week after listening to Matt Curtis interviewed by the two folk at BeerEdge recently:

I don’t really follow the beer press; as a producer it sometimes feels grubby and unseemly to do so. But I will say that this interview put a lump in my throat more than once and made me switch my mental hat to “writer/journo”. We do need actual journalists. Glad of these folks.

Through this troubled world of everything from PR puff to academic research, it is good to note how much quality there actually is – as I get to do each week. While a sort of drinks writing is a narrative with no greater arc, writing attracted to novelty (or even whatever it is that has briefly twitched… right over there, do you see it?) we see another relatively recent aspect of this is how good beer writing is developing and unfolding is the phenomenon of people writing about serious issues faced in life – from humanity’s injustices to the  deeply personal – seen through the lens of something somehow related to beer. On excellent example this week was provided by Jonathon Hamilton in Pellicle:

This time last year I wrote my first essay for Pellicle. It was, like this, a self-reflective piece about the beginnings of the magazine, alongside my own struggles with mental health, imposter syndrome and a sense of belonging. Putting myself out there in such a way was one of the most difficult things I’d ever had to do, and I would love to tell you all how it immediately changed me for the better. Unfortunately, it did not.

Similarly, note bene the bene noted:

It’s true that the total number of blogs has declined over the past decade, but the number of good blogs has never been higher. Moreover, they fill a role that would otherwise be left vacant. Beer is little-covered by newspapers and magazines, and often merely superficially. No one is going to print one of Ron Pattinson’s lists of 19th century grists in the Wall Street Journal. Social media is great for opinion and linking, but not much else. Imagine Lars trying to present one of his enthnographies on Twitter. Larger, more ambitious projects like Craft Beer & Brewing and Good Beer Hunting are doing fantastic work and I don’t want to diminish their effort. But blogs are still critical in the media ecosystem—and, given the anemic state of print journalism and the increasingly toxic nature of social media, more important than ever.

Hooray and happy sixteenth beer bloggaversary, Jeff!

There was a sad sighting of another of a bit of a failed PR initiatives this week: Tryannuary. How 2015. How could they have known that a global pandemic would raise general concerns about personal health?

In Scotland a wonderful protest was seen this week in Dundee, where the King of Islington, a Dundee pub was suddenly closed without warning and then suddenly reopened without warning:

Staff at a Dundee bar at the centre of Covid-19 cover-up claims have been told to return to work this week following a sudden closure. The King of Islington pub shut on Saturday with upper management blaming “massively reduced trade levels” due to the “promotion of unsubstantiated claims” in a union-backed grievance letter from staff. Kieron Kelleher, assistant manager at the Union Street venue, accused pub chain operators Macmerry300 of victimising staff who spoke out.

Protests had also been held at pubs owned by the same chain in Glasgow as events unfolded. As a child of a child of the Red Clyde, I got all verklempt.

This week’s Tufte Award for Best Visual Display of Quantitative Information goes to… a chart that explains what we know as “hard liquor” in Canada but described as spirits in the Old Country. It is from Colin Angus using data from Public Health Scotland who first ran a poll, most people guessing gin would be #1 rather than the bronze medal winner. Well down the list but still – who is drinking all that brandy?

The Canadian Beer Cup is off. Now… calm down. Breathe. I am sure it was a big deal in your household, too, but the reason  for the cancellation is… singular and real:

…guidelines announced last week by the Ontario Government in response to the rapid surge in cases of the Omicron variant limit indoor gatherings to a maximum of five people, making it impossible for in-person judging to take place at this time. “One of the goals of The Canada Beer Cup is to showcase the greatness of Canadian breweries to the world,” said Rick Dalmazzi, Executive Director of the Canadian Craft Brewing Association, in a statement. “With all due respect to the many fine Toronto and Southern Ontario judges who will be involved, we want to do everything in our power to also include the many international and cross-Canada judges who have committed to our event.”

In plain language, there was clearly a large aspect of this that was a Toronto tourism event bringing in judges who were also newspaper columnists and consultants to retailer, etc.** (One need not take that statement above in the cancellation notice to suggest that while Canadian beer may be underrated, well, our own Ontarian beer judges are somehow overrated.) Now… how to transition and stay within the overall goals. As happened in the World Beer Cup (whatever that is when it is not the World Beer Awards), beer submissions will be poured. What does a next step look like? Apparently the Greek Cup of Beer or the Greek Beer Cup or the Greek Beer Awards was not so needy of auslander praise as they also just mailed out the samples to the usuals. As did the World Beer Awards. Something will occur. I just hope that there are government grants that buffer all this, that cover the unexpected stranded costs that demobilization and remobilization incurs. Stranded costs are a killer.

Non-beer recommendation of the week:  follow AndyBTravels. He’s train fan who runs a Travel Architect Service. He also wanders around remote parts of places like rural Romania where this week he captured some desolate spots and also some gorgeous moments.

That’s it for now. For more 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 irregular newsletter, The Gulp, too (… back this week!) 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 I hope is  revived soon…)  And remember BeerEdge, too, and The Moon Under Water.

*pretty much all of them.
**we should be honest about how these things really work.

Your Mid-December 2021 Edition Of The Thursday Beery News Notes

Just two weeks and a bit to go. Remember how 2020 dragged on and on? 2021 seems like it was less than a month long. Got my third jab. Thanks for asking, the only side effect has been just a bit of a lingering cold. Are you Christmassy? Me, not like in 2015 when Boak and Bailey won the last Christmas Yuletide Hogmanay Kwanza Beery Photo Contest with the entry above. Why? Just nine days to go but we are having a big big wave* of da-‘Vid around here so joining last minute shopping crowds might not be wise. Good to substitute:

Look, kid – mustard is a perfectly good stocking stuffer. Stop crying… please… have a Brazil nut… no, that’s all there was left at the gas station… check at the bottom of that stocking… yup… handkerchiefs… what, again with the crying?

Ho ho… ho. First up, if you yourself in need a bit of a Christmas gift, The Lars himself is speaking on line next Tuesday at 3 pm Eastern (my time zone is the best!) as he is set to speak at the Chicago Brewseum’s latest event:

Yule, the multi day festival celebrated by pre-Christian Germanic peoples, begins every December 21st. The modern Christmas celebration is very different from the old celebration of Yule as Norwegian farmers knew it, yet at the heart of both sits the feast with the Christmas beer. On this Winter Solstice, Lars Marius Garshol joins us from Norway to take a long look back to the origins of the Christmas feast, and why beer was so central to it. At the center of the mystery we find not Santa Claus, but his forgotten cousin.

Also, just in time for the holiday joy, Dr. Wade at braciatrix reached back 400 years or so to the early 1600s offered some top advice on how to get through this challenging holiday season – butter beer!

Butter beer, or buttered beer, has a long and storied history. There are many recipes all containing at least the butter, sugar, beer and eggs, though the variety of spices seems to vary greatly with some including nutmeg, cloves and ginger, whilst others opt for aniseed and licorice.

That might be worth a try. My go to mulled ale is usually just Chimay Red in a pot warmed with a cinnamon stick. Speaking of fun, there was lots of follow up from last week’s post on the problem of style. I understand it is referred to in Finland as se in certain circles. And this week, we learned that there is another convoluted BJCP style update coming and I also read the words “spicy-guava Lithuanian-influenced Meadow Land IPA” written by Ruvani de Silva.  I am inclined to consider that hard to the one end of the newly christened “style<->fun” continuum. Ron also contributed to the question when he questioned the relevance of the construct when considering Edwardian ales:

Whitbread’s Edwardian beers are bound to get a style Nazi in tizzy. Because they certainly don’t fit with the modern hierarchy of Pale Ales.  With their IPA being significantly weaker than their Pale Ale. Whitbread IPA was a latecomer to the party, first brewed in October 1899. They’d been in the Pale Ale game since the 1860s and already brewed three different ones – PA, 2PA and FA, in descending order of strength. With IPA slotting in just above FA. So, what made this beer an IPA? The fact that the brewery called it that. I can’t work on any other basis. Were British breweries consistent in their use of the term IPA? Like hell they were. And particularly liable to use PA and IPA pretty much randomly. There’s no point searching for a pattern, because there isn’t one.

Noticing things as they were and are can get a bit sticky. The Tand himself captured this idea in a post yesterday about stout:

It isn’t that I’m against such stuff, and I agree and recognize that there are plenty out there that like these additions, but what I do dislike is that a bit too often, there isn’t just a straightforward stout that tastes of, well, stout.  There are exceptions of course, and maybe too many brewers feel that a “normal” stout doesn’t get them sales in a crowded market. Well that’s fine, but let’s at least have an unmucked about version as the default, with the additions as specials.

Where does that sit on the “style<->fun” continuum? Interesting and perhaps somewhat related observations from Boak and Bailey on the role craft beer can play as harbinger of change in gentrification of neighbourhoods, whether those living there like it or not:

Bedminster is made up of multiple neighbourhoods, from the theatre and coffee shop gentrification of Southville to the betting shops and greasy spoon caffs of East Street. The pubs there tend to be either (a) busy and down-to-earth, with stern warnings to shoplifters in the windows; or (b) shut. The borders, though, have fuzzy edges and are porous and, as you might expect, the gentrification is leaking. There are now vegan delicatessens and houseplant emporiums alongside branches of Gregg’s and Poundland. Alpha occupies a retail unit in a 1980s red-brick shopping arcade, across from a kebab house and next door to a charity shop. It feels out of place, for now – but probably won’t in five years’ time.

Change is odd. You can spot it in liminal spaces. Or does it sometimes create the liminal space, the bit that gets abandoned to become a space between before it gets repurposed? Craft beer is probably a follower as often as not in  these things even if it sounds like may receive undo attention compared to the fifth column of big houseplant in these matters. Fern pushers. No good comes of ferns.

Elsewhere… good news in another remote pub story from Britain!

A community on the Isle of Bute has raised more than £92,000 to put towards the purchase and refurbishment of their 200-year-old pub. The Anchor Tavern in Port Bannatyne was put up for sale after it was shut due to a downturn in business caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. It was the last pub in the village following the closures of other licenced premises.

Among the things I wrote these last few days that caused upset for some poorly enunciated reason or another** was the idea that best of lists sorta suck. While Robyn and Jordan make good case for properly run awards in this week’s podcast (while rejecting guava – are they really that fun?)… like the minor league golf tour of weekly sponsored events that beer awards have become (no doubt to give all those vitally important awarding people enough opportunity to prove their really important judging powers by awarding awards) I’ve long wondered whether there any other part of pop culture where the “best of” lists are filled with generally inaccessible items like we see with beer? Eric Asimov in the NYTs shared his best of 2021 wines and I was immediately struck by this first item in his list:

This bottle is a thirst quencher, an uncomplicated $19 liter of red from the Bío Bío region of Chile. So what’s memorable about it? For me, it epitomized how wine is evolving.

Modest price, an over-sized bottle and contextualized to make a greater point. Beer reviews rarely even mention price let alone distribution. We deserve better. Now consider NPR’s Sound Opinion‘s best albums of 2021. In their newsletter they asked “What We Mean By Best Albums”:

…let’s call our Sound Opinions best-of lists what they really are: idiosyncratic, no-two-exactly-alike rankings of personal favorites. We’re not looking for consensus, we’re aiming for let-it-all-hang out personality as reflected by the music each of us love the most. That’s why we devote an entire show to this imperfect exercise every year. It’s fun to reflect on the recordings that sustained or inspired us when we were running errands, washing dishes, hosting a party, recovering from a long work day or just getting lost between the headphones on the couch.

Self-deprecating, accurate and personal. An imperfect exercise. Look for these sorts of qualities in any recommendations before you fall in behind the fog offered otherwise.*** Look for price, actual personal comment and not just the PR notes – plus whether there was actually any sort of possibility anyone (aka you) beyond the sample receiving set was ever going to have a taste.

Very related, sometimes you read things that make you think “hmmm, interesting” and sometimes you read things that make you think “is anything in this actually true?” Oh dear. “Style”? Not in 1977. “Juicy”? More like 2007. Still, expect a NAGBW award for that one. For sure. Meets the club house requirements.

Conversely, speaking of context and reality, I heard a great show on one of CBC Radio’s schedule challenged broadcasts, Now or Never, Saturday aft. It was all about the relationship people have with alcohol. The episode has not popped up on the podcast page yet but keep an eye out for it. There’s a great interview with one Winnipeg craft brewer on the conflict of producing something that harms some while is fun for most. [Update: here it is!]

Want a bit more reality, I hope you are taking a moment to see the green dot in the sky these days. Not a lot of green dots in the sky. Green dot? Yup:

Your once-in-a-lifetime chance to see a green comet named C/2021 A1 — a.k.a. Leonard — is here. Astronomy experts, including the comet’s discoverer, offer tips on when and how to see the comet. Like other comets, Leonard is a ball of frozen gas, rocks and dust. When its orbit brings it close to the sun, the heat causes some of that material to vapourize, which makes it glow and sprout a tail of gas and dust.

Leonard? Hallelujah! Because when the world is a bit too grim and people are just too much face, why no climb way up to the top of the stairs where your cares might just drift right into space. Because you are gawking at a green dot. And you can take a drink up there with you. Something festive.

There. I tried to keep it short. Can you believe it? No? Well, the holidays are here. Be happy – and while you are being happy 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.

*Sadly, the recent events in Kingston around anti-vaxx also caught up a neighbouring craft brewery, Signal. The owner died of Covid-19 Wednesday. It might have triggered further outbreaks.
**Huh?
***Co-opting a crisis is one of the more distasteful things you can do so it was sad to see one of the worst examples of appropriating aggrandizement in a headline I read this week: “Kentucky Breweries Lead Relief Efforts Following Deadly Storms.” What they meant to say, as the story does, is some brewery owners are pitching in as they would and should but pretty sure the normal authorities and charities are leading relief efforts.

 

The Panicky Two Weeks Left In Summer Edition Of Thursday Beery News Notes

“Of course, you know there are more weeks in summer than that” say all the really boring people. No, that’s it. Soon it is corduroy and scarf season. And you will ask yourself what it was you did with those two last weeks of summer. You know you will. Here in Canada, we are having a national election all of a sudden – or at least now that the coming fourth wave is leaving a very small window for these sorts of things. As the photo above from the PM’s campaign shows once again, you can’t campaign for election in Canada without being seen with a beer. The choice of the can is clever – can’t see how little he’s had.

First up, Jeffery John linked to a story in The Observer this week asking the question “Can hospitality’s recruitment crisis ever be fixed?” which mentions the twin issues faced by the UK: (i) pulling the visas on much of your hospitality working cohort right before (ii) bumbling and stumbling with the regulation of the hospitality trade all through the biggest pandemic in a century. So people move on and likely should:

In March, former London restaurant manager Sam Orbaum decided that, after three years, he was done with regular restaurant shifts. Previously, he sailed through weeks of long hours but the freedom of furlough prompted the 30-year-old to question that lifestyle and, particularly, the “strain” of stop-start Covid-era reopenings. A lot of the pressure, insists Orbaum, was “self-inflicted. The team [at my employer] were always very, very supportive.” Rather than owners or managers cracking the whip, he observed a tendency among young, ambitious staff to “take on burdens voluntarily”.

Yeah, that sucks. Jeff noted that he “…mothballed the kitchen at my pub and just do drinks and snacks partly because of the chef shortage, but also because as a publican providing a ‘gastropub’ (hate the word) offer is more trouble than it’s worth.” Could it also be that the public has also revisited, reviewed and revised its own needs… and gastropubs didn’t make the list?

What do we need? In Scotland, apparently pubs need beer according to the BBC but they can’t get it because something has run short:

Scottish Hospitality Group spokesman Stephen Montgomery said a broken supply chain for an industry already under pressure following lockdown restrictions was “an utter disaster”. “Piling this stress onto the already existing anxiety of recruitment, the pingdemic, debt and HMRC starting to knock on business owners’ doors, this is beginning to push people over the edge,” he said. The SLTA has raised concerns over a potential shortage of carbon dioxide supplies, three years after the industry – along with others – was hit by a previous CO2 shortage.

[What’s a pingdemic?] While we are at it… you know, it might be good if some brewers could get behind promoting another type of CO2 shortage:

During a routine quality control panel, we identified that some cans have undergone secondary fermentation, causing higher levels of CO2 in the cans which has resulted in higher than normal internal pressure inside the cans. With this increased internal can pressure there is the risk of these cans leaking, coming apart at the seal, or potentially bursting at higher temperatures.

Matty C. asked the question “why add CO2 when cask make the stuff itself?” OK, he didn’t ask this question but recently he went in search of cask in pub and found other questions:

Personally, I’ve really taken a shine to table service and the more relaxed, dare I say more continental approach to service we’re currently being treated to. The reality is however, that many British establishments simply aren’t equipped to operate this way, and will continue to lose revenue until they can trade as normal.

Normal? Nice try. Jordan’s all over you when it comes the coming endy times:

Day 521: Say, listen: Import beer sales were down 39.4% in June. Supply chain on grain from Europe is looking real dodgy. One of the threads I follow suggests that China’s ports are temporarily closed and shortages of goods are likely to be a thing. If you think you’ll need items six months from now? Stuff you know you need? Maybe start thinking ahead in a non-panic kind of way. They may be more expensive later. To quote a deep voiced fellow: things are going to slide in all directions.

That is a strong statement. Perhaps to save the day, locally our prog heroes Rush are making a beer. Perhaps that will save the day… Perhaps…

Interesting trend. Two weeks ago it was InbevABBigThingie saying the money is coming in just fine and now Carlsberg is doing the happy dance:

The world’s third-biggest brewer said beer volumes in key markets China and Russia had risen to “well above” pre-pandemic levels while European markets such as France, Switzerland and Sweden remained below levels achieved before the coronavirus crisis. “While the uncertainty about the remainder of the year continues, we’re satisfied with the strength of the first-half results and the good start to the third quarter,” Chief Executive Cees ’t Hart said in a statement.

Wow. So… is macro winning?

Jeff wrote an ever so slightly hyperventilated piece about the beer known as  Pliny the Elder – but perhaps I feel that way as I have never had one. There are two sightings of “important” as well as a “more important” and a “very important” in there but I will defer to Stan who says it is so that is fine.* And at least there is something being written. Even unending newbie identi-guides like this are sorta something. But you know how it is. You point out how little actual writing is going on and people get all uncomfortable and weirded out. Weirded. Out. Don’t be doing that. It is just beer.**

Speaking of which… Stan was active again Monday. I think he is getting almost regularly active on almost every Monday. I hope he is OK. I do like how he was clear on this point about the former brewery known as Sam Adams:

…not caring about Truly, robot waiters and beers from a brewery I don’t patronize is perfectly OK. Climate change is something to pay attention to. Hard seltzer is not a threat to the world our grandchildren will live in.

What I find most amazing in the whole conversation related to the brewery is how Sam Adams continues to get a pass despite its pervy past. But folk don’t care about that either.**

Much more open and honest, Ron published an ever so slightly concerning account of his weekend in that place in Germany where those things fly over the river taking you from this place to that place and back again:

Just around the corner, there’s a little pub. Im Kipchen. Quite a few football fans, but also quite a bot of space right at the back. Mikey goes in search of beer. Weissbier and Alt, as usual. When he gets back, he asks: “Do you fancy a shot?” “No. I’m stopping all of that. It’s unhealthy.” “What? You were knocking back the rum merrily enough this morning.” “Just kidding. Of course I want a shot. Several, in fact.” “You had me worried there for a minute.”

It all gives pause, doesn’t it. Still, things could be worse, as the image to the right reminded me as it slipped by on the river of social media this week. As the all the grim news this week seems to remind us. Hmm. Best go out and see if there is a tomato or two lurking out there waiting to be found under a lower leaf. As I do, remember there are always 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. 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.

*Unlike this very ungentlemanly comment in, you know, the comments: “Just reading about this swill gives me a headache. Ugh… When will the IPA trend end?” That’s a bit much.
**“But these are my friends on the internets you speak of?!?! My internet friends?!?!??!” BTW good luck with the quality of the entries this year. I’d have more confidence if the word “prorated” was used correctly. And, yes, I meant to drive two **’s to the one footnote…

The End Of July Heralds These Thursday Beery News Notes

August. It’s coming. Even though it’s the month of my road trip holiday, the first in two years, no one says “Yay! August!!” do they. It’s the last gasp, the slipping away of the sands of summer. The first hint of sweater weather. Darker beers to suit darker days. The crops are coming in, as the scene in Norfolk, England shows.

How is that barley crop doing… for those of you still drinking grain based beverages. Not well. Bryan R. tweeted a very graphic graphic, shown to the right. The US barley crop is collapsing under the heat. Canadian farmers planted 8.3 million acres of barley in 2021, up 9.7% encouraged by last year’s crop but it’s been dry and hot here, too. Northern Ireland looks to be in better shape. France looks fine, too. The rest of the western EU may be dealing with too much rain.

How’s the hops? Stan has issued his latest update on the hops markets, Hop Queries. And it contains an interest discussion on the effect of heat waves on the NW US crop this year:

“One variety that could cause issues is Cascade, as other growers have seen it hit hard.” This comes at a time that farmers have reduced Cascade acres because brewers cut back contracts. Brewers who are counting on buying fresh Cascade at below contract prices on the spot market, which has become standard operating procedure for many smaller breweries, maybe be unpleasantly surprised. (There will still be older Cascade around, but perhaps available for a good reason.) As is to be expected, the heat was hardest on “babies” (first-year plants) because they aren’t yet established. And, of course, the babies tend to be in-demand varieties, because growers are going to plant what brewers want. For instance, a field with Chinook will include only a few babies (replacing plants that grew old or became diseased), and Chinook stood up well to the heat.

Expected result? Less supply of the most desired varieties.

Lingering or revived pandemic blues got you down? Missing the many still delayed fests? Head east!

The 31st Qingdao International Beer Festival, one of the largest beer festivals in China, opened on Friday evening in the coastal city of Qingdao, East China’s Shandong province. The 24-day carnival has gathered more than 1,600 beers from over 40 countries and regions, according to the tourism commission of the Xihai’an (West Coast) New Area, where the festival is taking place. There will be over 400 activities covering international exchanges, economic and trade exhibitions, fashion shows, parades and performances during the festival.

These things are apparently a thing. Room to grow, too. Ten tents in 2022, I say!

Martyn wrote about the development of the water supply for brewing in the City of London in one of those pieces on history that does not make you yearn for the earliest of the good old days:

…despite the mythology that surrounds the river’s historic alleged unwholesomeness, brewers made use of its water to brew their beer for centuries: In 1509 the Bishop of Winchester (who owned considerable land alongside the river in Southwark – much of it occupied by brothels) and the Priory of St Mary Overies granted a license to the brewers of Southwark to have passage with their carts “from ye Borough of Southwark until the Themmys … to fetch water … to brew with,” so long as the brewers did not try to claim the passage as a highway, a license renewed by later bishops. (The Thames at Southwark is surprisingly shallow at low tide, and horse-drawn carts could be driven some way out into the stream to collect water in casks.)

Speaking of water, here as link to an interesting piece by BBC Scotland on the changing attitudes younger folk have towards alcohol. Apparently, 29% of youff are dry, up 10% over the last 15 years. If you can’t access the BBC Scotland site, here’s a brief intro. Bottom line – don’t be planning your business on an expanding beer market over the next few decades.

Elsewhere, the young folk are being less sensible as this report from France of the situation in Mexico explains:

Like all businesses in the capital — home to around nine million people — customers in the bars of Zona Rosa have their temperatures checked and are asked to use hand sanitizer. “People want to drink,” said bar owner Ernesto Castro. “The truth is that young people don’t care if they’re going to be infected or not. They want to party,” the 55-year-old said. “They feel that they’re not going to be infected and it’s a problem because the pandemic is still there and getting worse.” Last Friday the authorities raised the pandemic alert level in the capital, but did not impose new restrictions on economic or social activities.

Jenny Pfäfflin drew my attention to claims made about “natural beer“:

I’m not against alternative beers, but marketing it as more “natural” or “wholesome” than barley beer is a lot to unpack.

Seems similar to the idea of “sustainable” beer in Australia. The natural stuff is based on banana and honey and seems to be yet another weird beverage that flies the banner de jour, including the “heritage” banner. Note: “heritage” is the word for history where you leave out the bits you don’t like and rearrange what’s left to maximize comfort levels. In this case, it seems to be a tribute to craft’s heritage of banging things in to a pot and making up a back story to sell the stuff.

By the way, I never know how to react to a majoritarian/ privileged voices presenting a selection of minority/ under privileged voices. Curated protest? Appropriation of anti-appropriation? Seeing it a lot this year. But conversely, at least it is better than the bizarre branding we see in Poland: “White IPA Matters”!

The company has not responded to the allegations and complaints yet. Mr Mentzen, the owner of the brand, is a member of Poland’s right-wing Confederation party and has contested two elections – local elections in Poland’s Torun city in 2018 and for the European parliament in 2019 – both of which he lost, according to the Daily Mail.

Finally and perhaps related, a fairly sad observation to read:

I miss what my life was before beer.

Probably more common a thought that folk would admit. As you contemplate that, 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, and The Moon Under Water.

The Thursday Beery News Notes For A Somber Canada Day

You will recall that Canada Day happens at each year’s mid-point and that in the past we’ve mentioned the role beer lover Sir John A. Macdonald in creating the confederation of colonies which formed into the current constitutional construct. Well, this year his statues are coming down and the news of hundreds and hundreds of graves of Indigenous children at forced residential schools started during his era is now coming out that has the nation reeling and reflecting. This will be, accordingly, a briefer edition of the news notes.

First and as I have mentioned before, mini-multinational BrewDog is a story that keeps giving and giving. We saw how they promoted the prize of a solid gold beer can as winnings in a contest and how it only turned out to be just gold plate. Stupid and a massive self-inflicted injury. Again. But the story that caught my eye was actually from a few months ago when BrewDog bought a Scottish estate as part of a carbon set-off scheme:

If BrewDog has bought Kinrara, it could be an interesting purchase, bringing a different type of landowner into the market, one apparently wanting to offset their carbon emissions rather than shoot and kill wildlife.  If they, or any other owner, intend to end muirburn and reduce deer numbers to allow woodland to regenerate, that would be a good thing.  Equally, however,  a “productive grouse moor with 10 year average of 476 brace”, the “challenging, high bird pheasant shoot” and salmon fishing on the river Dulnain might prove very attractive for the purposes of entertaining corporate clients. The problem is neither the public nor the Cairngorms National Park Authority would appear to have any idea of the new owners’ intentions

What appears a bit distasteful to me is (i) offsets are just a way to do one thing to offset another, (ii) the other thing remains carbon-related bad behaviour, (iii) the funds for the purchase appear to be from the crowd sourcing and not overall business revenue so there is no imposition to serve as a deterrence for more carbon-related bad behaviour and (iv) they have bought themselves an estate for future corporate playboy playground fun. What in all this is particularly eco-friendly? Punk as croquet.

Again, the Toronto Maple Leafs are watching the Stanley Cup finals from the sidelines or the golf course but at least if their goalie George Hainsworth from 1933-37 is watching from heaven he will have poured himself a beer as the great rival, the Montreal Canadiens play for glory. Oh, and he also played for Montreal… and won the cup with them… twice. So he’s probably quite happy. Except he’s dead.

“Juice Lord” is a stupid name for a beer but apparently two breweries think it’s important enough to go to court over.

Dr Christina Wade continued sharing her good work, this week discussing 155 cuneiform tablets from Mesopotamia and the brewing related legal information they hold:

…here we see a law regarding perhaps cheating or fraud. There are quite a few different translations for this law code (108), with various phrasing that changes the meaning somewhat. Paraphrasing this particular translation another way, it perhaps means that if the alewife accepts money by the large stone, but not barley, for the price of ale; and the price of ale is less than the price of barley, she is cheating, and therefore shall be killed. This anxiety about cheating alewives is something often repeated throughout history.

Barry in Germany introduced me to the concept of a bierwagen. It appears to be a traveling beer bar / trailer that shows up when he prays fervently enough. Seems like a very good idea that I need in my neighbourhood.

Irish beer prices in the late 1980s and again what was available in 1972.

As the pandemic takes a break or has its back broken, depending on who you listen to, it appears the great new world order is regressing back into the old world order… at least in NYC:

Over the past year, the drinks were allowed under a new “off-premises privileges” rule, designed by the New York State Liquor Authority to help failing restaurants during a time of uncertainty for the food and beverage industry. With vaccinations topping 70 percent in New York and coronavirus cases on the decline, the governor rescinded the state of emergency on Wednesday, leaving many businesses that have not yet fully recovered economically with a surplus of supplies for the to-go drinks, as well as the drinks themselves. “They’re sitting on thousands and thousands of to-go cocktails that will be illegal to sell tomorrow,” wrote St. John Frizell, a restaurateur in Brooklyn, in an Instagram post.

That’s all for this week. For more, 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 Thursday Beery News Notes For The First Of Summer

Above, is an image from a conference posted by Ed Wray, which he dubbed “Ten Years of Barley Varieties.” It is lovely. And not unlike the chicken wings crisis chart, that. It is quite the thing to see how rapidly varieties come and go. When I worked in Holland in 1986 in the big cut flower auctions, I had a favorite rose –  Mercedes – which had a particular balance between its soft scarlet bloom and the pea green of the stem. But like all things, it fell out of fashion or the hybridization isn’t that stable and when back in Canada it only lasted a few years before it was no longer available in the market. Nice to see the constancy of Maris Otter. Something like myself.

Update: apparently, the G7 event at Cornwall England reported upon last week due to Trudeau’s pint has become a super spreader event that “…is closing down pubs, bars and hotels at a frightening rate.” I have moved forward my second jab to the end of tomorrow afternoon. There is some disagreement as to the cause, however.

Also from the UK, perhaps a different sort of political statement from Stephen McGowan on the issue of sticking with the process for evaluating the effect of minimum pricing in Scotland:

I would remind all stakeholders that the Scottish Parliament is under a legal obligation to consider the impact of MUP on licence holders and producers; as well as the impact on the licensing objectives, as well as the impacts on individuals and groups in society. “Success” is therefore a nuanced, complex pattern. Parliamentarians, like the rest of us, will always welcome news of falling health harms – but I urge us all to remain circumspect about whether MUP is a “success” for if we allow ourselves to view success through the sole prism of consumption levels, that is to ignore what the 2012 Act actually requires.

Like self declaration of importance, “nuance” is one of those proclamation that usually hides a combination of motive and the incapacity to actual state an idea. In this case, it’s really not nuanced at all. Just a call for balance. But we need to remember what is being balanced is the health of one person as opposed to the income of another. Such is the reality of a regulated trade in compromising pleasure products.

Note: “…allegations of widespread misconduct in America’s craft beer industry…” is how it is described in the journalistic part of the world. Misconduct is a great word for is as, like bigotry, it is an umbrella word avoiding the need to distinguish between the different forms of grasping that we are learning more and more about. Craft beer seems particularly fertile ground for this sort of bad behaviour, being not quite consequence free as its hymnals promise. BrewDog seems to be the gift that keeps giving in relation to now a number of aspects of this stuff. The Press and Journal of Aberdeen, Scotland shared information about the brewery’s (literally) dodgy habits when it comes to business partners:

Alex Cobham, chief executive of the Tax Justice Network, the advocacy group that campaigns for a fairer tax system, said: “This is a disappointing, but sadly common story – companies whose approach to tax havens is entirely at odds with their projected image. “Having major investors using Cayman as a conduit is certainly antisocial, but it’s about as punk as croquet… Asked how the company could reconcile its ethos with the fact such a large proportion of its stock was held by the Cayman entities, a Brewdog spokeswoman said she “can only comment about BrewDog’s own tax obligations and activity”.

But see, unlike those who look at this things as “snafus“, the relationship between investors having spare change from not paying proper taxes and investment recipients then receiving cash from the same the resulting pool of investment funds is entirely direct and, frankly, obvious. BrewDog receives a benefit because the UK Treasury does not. And the UK taxpayer is asked to make up the difference. Now, their brand’s health is dropping in the standings and, as Brewbound reports, BrewDog’s good housekeeping seal of advanced ethical status is now at risk. Are they a ponzi? Punk as croquet. Gold.

We have to recall that there was a before times, that the “craft” brand is recent and has never been better than wobbly if not simply needy. Ed the actual brewer shared his thoughts:

As to actual craft beers many of them sound more like alcopops now anyway, and certainly some craft brewers have embraced exogenous enzymes, bollocks ingredients including actual bollocks, and genetically modified yeasts (something multi-national brewers have never dared use). I’m not going to make any moral judgement but I can’t see where the craft is.  The standard bearers of craft beer in Britain have always been Brewdog and it’s been obvious for years that they’re tossers. Recently their ten year plan was revealed and they’re going to focus on producing lager because they want to be bigger than Heineken. Can anyone tell me how becoming a giant lager selling multi-national is craft?

We have to remember that “craft” arose to prominence only around 2003 after (1) the stalling of the markets in the late 1990s, (2) the formation of the BA and (3) the “Sex for Sam” scandal. Micro needed rebranding. Then it starts to die a slow death starting in 2015-16 with the sell off which continues today with the trade abuse scandals.

Entirely conversely, Max continued his purifying walk to Litoměřice – and his story gets even better with this bit below proceeding an ending of this middle of the tale drawn surely from the early pages of Wind in the Willows:

The walk was as brutal as I expected given my shape, and there were several moments when I questioned the wisdom of the endeavour, but the sights and the utter peace that surrounded me more than made up for it. When I reached the highest point, I found a resting site and I spent a good while just admiring the view of the České Středohoří and feeling very well about myself. From then on, the way will be mostly downhill and I had already cover about two thirds of the distance.  The trail took me to the village of Hlinná, a few kilometres outside Litoměřice. It was not in my plans, but I saw a pub and couldn’t resist it. There was nothing in this world that I wanted more than a beer at that moment…

Somewhat similarly, Martin celebrates a stroll but one through less green, more hardened lands to reach the wonders of the Elton Liberal Club:

A succession of Old Boys come in and report difficulties renewing their membership, skilfully resolved by the young barman. Old learning from young, and vice versa. “There’s a wake later” the barman tells us. For the Liberals, I assume*. But not for the Elton Social Club, which seems in splendid health as I leave to the “Push the Button” by the Sugababes.

The BBC has one of those stories about beer bottled yeast in the holds of shipwrecks:

Scientists at Brewlab, a spin-out from the University of Sunderland, have studied yeast strains and brewing techniques for years. The firm’s founder, Keith Thomas, says that once beer from the Wallachia was in his lab, it was treated with the utmost caution. “We opened it in containment level two laboratory conditions,” he says. This involved unsealing the bottles in a special cabinet filled with sterile air, in order to protect the scientists from any possible pathogens in the beer. This measure also ensured that the samples did not become contaminated with any modern-day yeast strains.

I’d be sending the submarines to the Black Sea, myself. Home of ancient wrecks in deep cold oxygen-less waters. Imagine finding sealed beers from Hanseatic League in the Baltic. That would be neato.

Hints of things ending. A great brewery’s trappings being auctioned off. Maureen‘s recollection of her rejection of an otherwise beloved beer bar in Colorado. And Boak and Bailey’s call in their newsletter to save The Rhubarb:

This time, though, it feels different. The Rhubarb is the last pub in the neighbourhood. When it’s gone, it will be gone, and a great swathe of Bristol will be totally publess. They say you need to pick your battles. It feels as if this might be ours although we’re worried we don’t have the time to commit to a long campaign. The difficulty is at the moment there doesn’t seem to be an organised campaign to save it.

I am too Scots Presbyterian to accept the oneness of intoxicating substances even while I entirely acknowledge them. In Ohio, there is the 350ness of it all apparently. Still, not sure if this is correct as we have gone over the “unmalted grain becomes beer” scenario* a number of times over the years:

“Primitive beer is [as simple as] ripping grains out of the ground, taking them in your hand, and throwing that grain into water,” Muraresku says, wisdom imparted to him by a prominent beer scientist. “The microbiome on the hand could have been responsible for those early yeasts. Aside from not having to dehusk it or heat it, you’re creating a beverage that … is safer than water. And if the right grain was sitting in the right water over time, it would have naturally started to ferment with whatever yeast and fungi were on the grains.” 

Sir Geoff Palmer, surely one of the most interesting users of Twitter, shared a very interesting set of images illustrating the intersection of racist bigotry and brewing science at an early point in his career:

Our History: Truth-battle did not start with me calling Dundas a slaver, it started in the 1960s when my research said the Aleurone produced the digestive enzymes in the grain, not the Scutellum. Maths and more recent publications say I was correct. Lucky…l nearly got the sack.

Note: if anyone suggests they are a beer expert immediately ask them to describe the difference between the aleurone and the scutellum. Email me the response.

And Barry Masterson wrote about “Perry, Pomonas and Pomology” for Cider Review:

…the earliest developments of British pomology (the study of fruit and its cultivation) were tightly bound with the making of cider and perry, an industry that developed with great intensity during the latter half of the 17th century. With the end of the English civil wars, farming life was returning to normal, perhaps with renewed energy. At the same time, conflicts on the Continent meant that foreign wines were maybe not so easily imported, so the production of local wines became an important topic that exercised the brightest minds of Britain…

Finally, amongst the greatest bar tabs of all time we give you the Boston Bruins of 18 June 2011.

That’s a good bit of reading for you. Once that’s done, 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.

*Are beer writing editors no longer a thing? 2018 seems so recent.

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.