Ontario: Headstock IPA, Nickel Brook, Burlington

I suppose I should write from time to time about what is actually in my fridge. I suppose I should also check out what is in that brown paper bag back there.

Nickel Brook’s Headstock IPA has become my “go to” beer which, to be fair, is because that can of Narragansett Porter back there is the only one I have and maybe one of a handful in Canada. Why do I like this so much? Well, it is big but not insane at 7% but has as much wallop as any number of stronger DIPAs I have had from the states. Then you have to simply like the price, $2.65 for a 473 ml can. No, I am not able to explain how it is we have 473 ml cans and not 500 ml cans but it is what it is. I can get almost three litres for just over fifteen bucks and it is the backbone of the weekend. It pours a slightly less than clear orange amber with a rich foamy white head. The aroma is pungent Seville marmalade. Sweet bitterness in the mouth. More orange flavours including bitter pith, pink grapefruit juice, prickly spicy green weedy hop, white pepper burn in the finish all in a satisfyingly rich even thick brew.

BAer respect. I like it way more than their average suggests.

The Greatest Cease And Desist Letter Ever!!!

And just in time for Christmas…

Normally, one would not like a cease and desist letter claiming that one had breached someones intellectual property rights. I mean we as bloggers are supposed to get all hot and bothered about these things, right? We’re living in the post-legal mash up paradise promised by the Boingsters back when blogs were new, right?? Well, that all came crumbling down yesterday when the following love letter popped into my inbox:

The undersigned declares under penalty of perjury that I am authorized to act on behalf of the above referenced author, the owner of copyright in the Intellectual Property, and Hachette Book Group, Inc., the exclusive US publisher of the Intellectual Property, including without limitation, the cover and other art incorporated therein (collectively, the “IP Owner”). I have a good faith belief that the materials identified below are not authorized by the IP Owner, her agent, or the law and therefore infringe the IP Owner’s rights according to federal and state law. Accordingly, we hereby demand that you immediately remove and/or disable access of the infringing material identified below.

Frig, said I. I am a lawyer. I know when the jig is up. For a second, it was like the ending of “The Public Enemy” and I was Jimmy Cagney. But when I looked at the link I knew what was going on. See, six years ago, I posted about how great it was that I had found the text to a 1987 article in The Atlantic magazine called “A Glass of Handmade” by William Least Heat Moon, a bit of writing that was my introduction to thinking about good beer. And I tucked away a copy of the text in the articles section of this blog because I was sure it was fluke that I had found it and that I would never find it again, assuming all copies of that issue had long been sent to the dump or lodged in the back of a barbershop I would never visit. Flash forward six years and, once I realized what was going on, I removed the article from public view and, just like that, me and the lawyers at Hachette Book Group were at peace. In fact, they were quite nice about it and let me know what is going on and it is good news:

Thanks for removing the essay from your site. We appreciate it! And, yes, it is included in Here, There, Elsewhere which comes out on January 8th.

So, now no need to have the article squirreled away from fear it would disappear from knowledge. You can get your own copy of Here, There, Elsewhere: Stories from the Road by William Least Heat-Moon on discounted pre-order from Amazon right now. A little late for Christmas but as important an essay on early US craft beer as there is. I can’t encourage you to get your own copy enough.

And I can confirm that this endorsement is not part of any legal settlement!

This Is How US Craft Beer Will Kill Itself

An odd, coordinated set of press releases today from the US Brewers Association (BA) and its leading members via any number of media can be summed up in the final section of the statement:

The large, multinational brewers appear to be deliberately attempting to blur the lines between their crafty, craft-like beers and true craft beers from today’s small and independent brewers. We call for transparency in brand ownership and for information to be clearly presented in a way that allows beer drinkers to make an informed choice about who brewed the beer they are drinking. And for those passionate beer lovers out there, we ask that you take the time to familiarize yourself with who is brewing the beer you are drinking. Is it a product of a small and independent brewer? Or is it from a crafty large brewer, seeking to capitalize on the mounting success of small and independent craft brewers?

The first sensible reaction is, of course, who cares. But then you read the variation on the theme by Papazian with its needy and slightly offensive reference to Founding Fathers and blindness to the good jobs offered by the 94% of the beer market served by big beer, well, you just shake your head. Never mind that some US craft brewers are big enough to have multiple breweries and large ad budgets. Never mind that many US craft brewers use much the same processes slammed by their trade association as marks of falsity if not signs of the end times. What is most annoying is that the whole construct is based on the faulty definition of what is craft – therefore good – by the BA itself.

Whether it is the BA-named Shock Top or its step-cousin the BA-silent Matilda, each ultimately produced under the Anheuser-Bush InBev corporate umbrella, there are plenty of examples of perfectly good well priced beer made by brewers who do not qualify for BA membership. There are also plenty of duds and plenty of highly questionable value propositions placed on beer store shelves by BA members. Again, few are special, most are solid work-a-day folk and some suck. Given that, launching on another David v Goliath fight based on a questionable self-generated definition of “craft” without reference to the sort of quality and price determinations the consumer has to make when out buying beer is a dead end. It is thin stuff that most can spot. All that I can see is that I have been reminded that the bigs are making some tasty beer now at a pretty good price.

As I said, odd. But these are instructive moments. Look to see who lines up behind the press release, repeating the arguments. Ask yourself why. As long as the view of the consumer is not the focal point for the discourse, one has to be very careful about such things, sifting what is independent opinion from what is generated due to one’s job description.

Is There Anyone More Interesting Than Simon H Johnson?

simon1I like helping people. Say what you like, I am a people person at heart. I helped people today. I have been helping people so much this week, I have snapped at an old pal in my business life and been living on five hour sleeps. I made a lamb sausage curry tonight, too. So it is with some discomfort but for more giggles that I read Simon’s post today entitled “Reluctant Scooper regrets that…” about his regrets over not being able to respond to all the demands made of him including regrets that he can’t:

– read your blog just because you tweeted me to do so in BLOCK CAPITALS
– write 500 words for free in the next two hours for your magazine because the writer you usually pay to do it has got delayed at an airport with no wifi / is face-down in a vat of custard / has caught VD
– recycle your press release into an “innovative yet commanding” blogpost
– do any kind of RT / Like / +1. Even if you say ‘please’. Even if you didn’t ask in Comic Sans. Because you asked for it
– attend your bar opening which is three hundred miles away. On a Tuesday night. With 24 hours notice. Because all the proper beer journos have got gastroenteritis. Or a better offer…

It does remind me of my latest policy update. It appears that Simon has a lawn, too, but he is able to sum up the point of beer blogging succinctly with a “[i]f it isn’t for shits & giggles, what to we do it for?” Perfect. Exactly. This week I have been working through Shakespeare’s Local by Pete, perhaps his real breakthrough book. I have assisted with comments on the draft of another book. I got 16 beers worth of samples dropped off. I helped a household of seven stay sane. I thought a lot about Albany, NY in the 1600’s and how it is just possible they were exporting beer out into the larger Dutch West Indies colonies. I drove to Ottawa and back Thursday night. I worked at my job, too. I was told there was “a bunch of young beer people who follow you questioning your relevance to your face” and knew how important it was to not give a rat’s ass in any way whatsoever.

There is so much fun in all of this. So many shits and giggles. Why bother with the rest?

An Apology And Thoughts About My Lawn

It was with relief and pleasure that I was able to share emails with Jason Fisher of Indie Alehouse in Toronto today after our strong disagreement over the weekend. Others have suggested that, on one hand, I was well out of line and, conversely, entirely in the right but it still was not a good thing for me to do… calling him a jerk. So, I am sorry. I told him so in an email last night and slipped a note in the comments this morning. An apology is a good short cut to getting to where you want to be – especially if you have never met someone you owe an apology.

That being said, and as I told Jason, I am not sure that resolves our disagreement even if it civilizes it. See, there was enough brain imploding stuff in the message for me that I not only disagree with where he was going but was also left wondering if someone gave out a vital message about my blog and blogging in general that I missed. It comes from these lines of Jason’s:

I’m not sure why bloggers at the same time feel like journalists but also refuse to do any basic fact checking or follow up. Did you contact anyone to clarify anything before writing? It appears you didn’t even fully read the article… .. Keep the standards high and please feel free to reach out with questions to the subjects you write about. You would be surprised how much help you will get if you are open about your intentions and honest in your writings. Thoughtful criticism is amazing, but get’s muted when others just spew hate or nonsense.

You will note the potential to read this statement to suggest that I am like a journalist – not to mention a spewer of hate or nonsense. I am not a journalist. True, I like to write about good beer and journalism and enjoy my many conversations that follow posts about that such as this recent one. But asking questions about journalism as applied to good beer doesn’t make me a journalist. I have written and sold articles but, frankly, being shocked at the pittance the path offered by way of reward have since declined further offers. You poor bastards, I think whenever I read an article.

In my 2008 review of Michael Jackson’s last edition of Great Beers Of Belgium, I got as close to where I think I have ever got to expressing how many different sorts of writing can be applied to good beer. And of those sorts of writing I’ve decided that what I do is write personal essays about my relationship with beer presented to the public through this medium. The post I wrote that triggered Jason’s strong response was no different. And I even considered it supportive. Still do. Not boot-licky but certainly supportive. I was in particular interested in the complex environment of microbes sitting on a grape monoculture and discussed that quite briefly in a very brief post. I did also reiterate that I hoped the resulting beer from the wild yeast project was not sold for twenty bucks a glass and continue to have that strong hope even if it was a source of unhappiness. What was most missed, however, in that welling up of emotion were three statements that I also continue to keep close to my heart. The project in question is a great idea, I hope the beer will be yummy and also, just to drive home the point, I hope it is tasty, too. Hardly, Mr. Hate-y McHate-ster.

So? Why is this continuing post of confession of iniquities worthy or at least driving into another paragraph? Because some anonymous wit tweeted “Wow… talk about get off my lawn syndrome” which is odd because this is, in fact, my lawn. I write my own stuff here, don’t expect anyone takes much from it, like having interesting conversations but do pretty much what I want. See, this is also my lawn. I explore suburban food gardening out there. Here I explore ideas about beer in here. I don’t write with ambition. I don’t write for readers. I don’t certainly write articles. And I really don’t care much for anyone’s opinion as I don’t owe strangers, even you reading this now, anything through my writing any more than I owe the neighbours lettuce because it falls within their view. Don’t confuse me for a booster. Or a ready or implicit PR source for your interests of business. Or someone needy for a relationship with a brewer. Or a ready object for your judgement. Or someone with an agenda that needs to be parsed from tone when the express words don’t suit yours. Or even part of your scene or community or industry. I am just a guy writing. Because I like writing. Like I like green beans and raspberry plants.

Where does that leave us? Stan put it well when he set the rule that it is only beer. But another person I have never met even on -line may have put it better when he interjected in the flow that the best beer is a shared buddy beer, a great reminder of the proper point of the entire hobby – because this is all a big hobby, right. Assuming someone is needing pointed interjection is a pastime of the congenitally misguided as well as the nicest sort of folk you may encounter. Finding malice where none exists is such a waste. Don’t bother. Not on my lawn at least. So you can believe me when I repeat that I am sorry, Jason. But believe me also when I write I think the project of wild yeast inoculation is a good idea. Because I do.

But Which Spenser Would Not Be The Fool?

Jordan posted an excellent taking up of the exploration of ideas around junkets last evening. Earlier in the day he and I had a very good exchange on the topic and I assured him that the point was that this was very much that – an exploration. It interests me because in my other areas of life, there is no question that accepting side b$enefits from those I am dealing with would be greatly challenging to say the least. But Jordan’s review captures many of the differences that may make the situation distinct. He concludes his piece with this:

I suspect that the fact that Alan’s blog post needled at me at 6:30 AM in an environment where most people would be content to listen to a light jazz soundtrack and punish the continental breakfast buffet speaks to the fact that I have an active moral compass when it comes to representing my activities as they relate to writing about beer. There is also the other fact, which some folks might not be willing to admit to. While I’m certainly compensated well for writing (be it books or newspaper columns), a trip like this would typically be beyond my financial means. Given the circumstance, if someone invites you to go to Boston, meet Jim Koch and eat a bunch of really good seafood while drinking a selection of beer on their dime, the response is predictable. As Spenser would say, “We’d be fools not to.”

Being the proud holder of a degree in English Lit before the LLB and LLM, I immediately assumed we were talking about the author of The Faerie Queene, itself an exploration of virtue – but I was unclear how that would attach to a beery jaunt in Massachusetts, to Winthrop’s very City upon the Hill. Then I thought it might be reference to the Victorian thinker Herbert Spencer who was, perhaps like Jordan, a utilitarian in matters such as these. But this Spenser’s ethics are a distasteful pre-Randian whackjob un-virtuous sort of utilitarianism, the sort that allows wikipedia to summarize his thoughts as including “anything that interfered with the ‘natural’ relationship of conduct and consequence was to be resisted and this included the use of the coercive power of the state to relieve poverty, to provide public education, or to require compulsory vaccination.” Screw you, too, Herb. Turns out Jordan was actually referring to the character Spenser in the novels of Robert B. Parker. This Spenser is also Bostonian so a junket there would make no sense. Not sure how his ethics play out but seeing as he is a detective one assumes they are somewhat reality-based.

Some years ago now, there were bloggy posts about the ethics of beer writing that went in circles before settling neatly on a high shelf where it sits well within reach, getting brushed off now and again. The Junket Registry is nothing more than the same ideas turned around, like looking at another side of an unsorted Rubik’s cube. I never gained the obsession that others did when it first came out so I don’t know how many paths it offers towards its own resolution. Within Spencers and Spensers alone the range of options is quite remarkable, too.

Can You Make Wild Beer In A Vineous Mono-culture?

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Like most things, Canadians are about half a decade behind so it is no surprise that a group of Ontario brewers have decided to take a kick at wild beer or that some in the Canadian media reacted to the invitation as if they had no idea what was going on in the wider world of good beer. Which is nothing against those directly involved. It’s a great idea. Hope it is yummy and not sold for twenty bucks a glass. Experiment on your own dime, brewers.

Wild indigenous wine yeasts are one of the current things. Like Citra hops. Craze that might be a fad. Here today and gone tomorrow. Yet the yeast is itself. From the photo up top from the Macleans magazine article, you can see the brewing is done in a vineyard, an agricultural monoculture. But is it a monoculture of yeast even if the plants are all clones? Apparently not. We learn that our mutual friend Saccharomyces cerevisiae is certainly on the grapes but only on about 1 in 1,000 berries. What else is in there? The beer will tell. Could be tasty. Hopefully.

PS: get a coolship, wouldja? Wild inoculation via narrow topped vessels might be less than optimum if the history of beer before a hundred or so years ago is anything to go by.

Maybe A Junket, Payment, Sample, Freebie, Pal Registry?

Having the odd combination today of a chorus of the “I Can’t Quite Follow You” Blues contrasted with being offered an actual beer junket itinerary, it popped into my head that an independent registry of potential conflicts for good beer opinion makers might be in order. Sort of a confessional. Sort of a preventative. Yet also likely an interesting aggregate effect if, you know, aggregated. What would be some categories of information that might be included for the junket category:

♦ Name (optional)
♦ Destination and name of brewery or breweries.
♦ Price of junket and portion you paid.
♦ Who organized the junket?
♦ Why were you selected to go on this junket?
♦ Will you disclose the junket in any resulting articles?
♦ Will you refer the junket as “research” in any resulting articles?
♦ Do you intend to call people on junket “friends” in any resulting articles?
♦ Will you disclose to your actual friends that you intend to call people on junket “friends” too?

There. That’s a start. Please use the comments section for your junket disclosures. I am sure that will be helpful way to handle this.

Election 2012: While I Still Have The Power To Blog….

I better make some comment on this election, make some statement given the history around here even if the digital world has deemed blogs to commentary what 8-tracks are to fine audio media.

I was over in the states yesterday and found an active economy. My favorite lunch spot, the Fairgrounds Inn where I have been going for at least six years now was hopping on a Friday lunch. I had the Italian Combo, thanks for asking. And I got my hair cut. The guy getting sheered next to me went on about the Biden debate. Unhappy but a bit shallow. Was there really cause to gripe? Businesses were expanding. On the way out of town, my rear passenger side wheel just about seized and we were lucky to come over the hill on #37 and see Frenchy’s Auto Repair right there. An hour was all it took to get a part delivered and see us back heading to the border. We lapped up the warm late late summer air on a gorgeous rural vista out back of the repair ship. Everyone in the place was happy and busy and working. Some were having a beer. One of my favorite things about the slice of the USA I get to see is how it is both so similar to the Maritimes as a bit of a hard luck corner of the nation but also how frankly cheerful and confident folk are. The restaurant was at a dull roar of conversation the whole time we were there. It was hard to tell if the auto repair was a place of work or a fairly hearty social club given all the people coming and going while we were there.

What will America do on 6 November? My take is that Obama has not been passed, the Federal Senate will not budge and a number of member of the House will move to the left, not the right. There will not be a throw the bums out movement. I don’t think Mitt Romney would be a catastrophe any more than four more years would. No wave of nuttin’. But the next four years one way or another will be about managing recovery. Whammo. Not sure the will be a WHAMMO!!! but there will be a Whammo.

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