Today’s beer video is, of all things, an episode of an old television show, The Streets of San Francisco, which was on the air for five seasons, from 1972 to 1977. Tonight’s shows, as always “a Quinn-Martin Production,” was from the last season — Season 5, Episode 20 — and is entitled “Dead Lift.” During its run, many guests stars appeared on the show, including Arnold Schwarzenegger, who’s in tonight’s episode, playing a body builder whose bad temper leads to …. wait for it murder. But he’s not the reason I posted it. What’s cool about this episode is that Schwarzenegger’s character, Josef Schmidt, works at Anchor Brewery, and the brewery can be seen in one of the scenes. At 9:43 we see a close-up of the bottling line, which pulls back to a wider shot where we see Schwarzenegger walking through the brewery with a keg on his shoulder. But after being told he’s working too hard, he goes a little crazy and starts throwing kegs around, and they fire him. Unfortunately, that’s the only scene in the brewery, and there’s no Michael Douglas either, as this was near the end of the show’s run and he’d already left for greener pastures.
Pirate Parade To Feature Float Of Recycled Beer Cans
The annual Gasparilla Pirate Festival in Tampa, Florida also includes a parade as part of the festivities. The parade takes place this afternoon, and usually features the Budweiser Clydesdales. But this year, instead they had local artist Terry Klaaren create a float using nothing by recycled beer cans. Klaaren called his work “re-cycle-dales” and it’s a sculpture of two life-size Clydesdale head figures that took him about six weeks and 3,000 beer cans to construct. According to a local news story:
“Every beer can was hand flattened with a wooden mallet,” Klaaren said. “We punched a couple of holes in it and then sewed it onto the mesh with stainless steel wire. I found beer cans to be a great sculpture medium.”
Gieseking said the vision for the float was Clydesdales emerging from a wave of water collecting recyclables in the wake.
“Just a nice image of taking the garbage out of the water,” Klaaren said.
Unfortunately, this is the only photo of it I can find. Perhaps there will be more views after the parade takes place later today.
Jane Austen, Brewer
I suspect I’m not the only man in the world whose wife loves Jane Austen. And I further would not be surprised to learn that I’m not alone in not feeling quite the same level of joy at every new film or television adaptation of one of her works. (Is that enough “nots” in one sentence?) Oh, I’ve enjoyed a few of the costume dramas, I confess. I thought “Clueless” was quite enjoyable. So I don’t want you to think I’m an irredeemable boor. I’ve suffered through — ahem, I mean seen — most of them, and it’s not been as horrible as, say, “Dallas” or “Knot’s Landing” or any of a number of similar dreck.
But my interest in Jane Austen just shot up 99%, thanks to an article posted by BBC Magazine yesterday, Beer: The Women Taking Over the World of Brewing. It’s a great article all on it’s own, one of the few to treat the subject of women in beer with a decent amount of respect, for a change. But what caught my attention was a sidebar about Jane Austen by alcohol historian Jane Peyton.
It is a truth that should be universally acknowledged — Jane Austen not only drank beer but brewed it too.
As a teenager she would have learned how to make beer by helping her mother in the Hampshire vicarage where she grew up.
Brewing was part of household duties and even the women of genteel 18th Century families such as the Austens would know how to do it, even if the chores were sometimes delegated to domestic staff.
In a letter to her sister Cassandra, Jane wrote “and I that have the great cask, for we are brewing spruce beer again….”
As in most houses small beer (low alcohol) was served at the Austen dining table as a safe source of drinking water for all members of the family — children too — so Jane would certainly have tasted the results of her labour.
It certainly makes sense, though I’d never really stopped to think about it before. Austen apparently mentioned her brewing efforts in letters to her sister Cassandra. In one of them she mentions small beer while in two others she talks about her spruce beer.
Austen also mentions spruce beer in her 1815 novel, “Emma.”
“But one morning — I forget exactly the day — but perhaps it was the Tuesday or Wednesday before that evening, he wanted to make a memorandum in his pocket-book: it was about spruce-beer. Mr. Knightley had been telling him something about brewing spruce-beer, and he wanted to put it down….”
And according to “Cooking with Jane Austen,” when the Austen family lived at Stoneleigh, her mother wrote about the “mansions ‘strong beer’ and ‘small beer’ cellars.” And Mrs. Austen also “brewed beer at Steventon in the last years of the eighteenth century and at Chawton cottage many years later.”
It almost makes me want to read her again … nah. Still, she’s now a bit more interesting.
Beer In Film #24: ElbowSkin’s Beer Song
Today’s beer video is a wonderful song created for Melbourne’s beer week, Good Beer Week. It was written and performed by Dave Elbow and Ernie Skin of the duo ElbowSkin. I’m sure some people will find something to be offended by in the song, but it’s pretty damn funny. It’s also very catchy with some great quotes like “unleash the beast” and “it’s like drinking god’s tears.”
Beer Song by ElbowSkin from The Post Project on Vimeo.
Serious Eats: 50 States, 50 Beers They Like
Everytime someone creates a list of the top anything, there’s always a bit of a backlash over the choices, or methodology, or something. It’s hard — strike, that — impossible to please everybody in these sort of things. People love lists (I know I do) but picking the “best” is a fool’s errand. So I appreciate that Serious Eats didn’t even try. Instead, when they chose one beer from each state, they didn’t declare them to be the top, or the best or even the most popular. For their 50 States, 50 Beers We Love, they just chose ones that they … well, loved. They may not all have even been their favorites, though I think we can infer that some of them may be a favorite. It’s a list you can’t argue with, because there’s no aggrandizing or sweeping pronouncements. It’s just what they like, pure and simple. As such, I think it has a great chance of provoking discussion, because if you love a different beer you’re not saying I disagree, you’re saying I also love this beer, too.
Take my home state of California. They chose Russian River’s Pliny the Elder. And it’s hard to argue with that. I love that beer, too. Is it the best beer in California? Who cares? It’s a great beer among probably hundreds of other California beers that I also love and could easily have made the list.
So check out their choices. Or as they put it. “This map celebrates beers we love in every state—a beer we’d be certain to pick up at every stop on that road trip of our dreams. Some are cultworthy favorites that require camping out at the release party, while others are really well made porch sippers that you can pick up at your local store. Some evoke happy memories, while others are showstoppers that grab your whole attention.”
And start working on your list of beers you love. That’s a list I can get behind. Plus, I love this flag that Robyn Lee created for the article. This is a flag I’d run up the flagpole and although I probably wouldn’t salute it, I would drink a toast to it.
Beer In Film #23: SABMiller Brewing Process
Today’s beer video is a great little isometric motion graphic animated film of the SABMiller Brewing Process, told in about three and a half minutes.
Jelly Belly Debuts Beer-Flavored Jelly Bean
The local Fairfield company Jelly Belly has made hundreds, perhaps thousands, of jelly bean flavors since they debuted in the summer of 1976. But their newest one, draft beer, really got my attention.
Apparently, for decades, a beer-flavored jelly bean has been one of their most highly-requested flavors. But their “research and development team wanted to get it just right before announcing the new flavor to the world.”
“This took about three years to perfect,” says Ambrose Lee, research and development manager for Jelly Belly Candy Company. “The recipe includes top secret ingredients, but I can tell you it contains no alcohol.” The biggest question they first had to answer was what type of beer to make into a jelly bean. “Ale or Lager? Stout? Lambic? Pilsner? In the end, the company opted to pay homage to its German ancestry with a Hefeweizen-inspired ale flavor, and Draft Beer Jelly Belly® jelly beans took shape.”
According to Jelly Belly:
The effervescent and crisp flavor is packed in a golden jelly bean with an iridescent finish. Beer connoisseurs will find the flavor profile to be clean with notes of wheat and a touch of sweetness. The aroma is mildly bready. While Draft Beer packs a flavor punch, it is alcohol free.
The new flavor will debut at this week’s Winter Fancy Food Show in San Francisco and ISM in Cologne, Germany, and will be released on store shelves shortly thereafter, in early 2014.
Last night they had an event at the 21st Amendment Brewery in San Francisco, where they handed out small packages of the new flavor. At first, I thought I could only get some banana flavors with a hint of clove in the background, but not much else, and little in the way of what I’d call “beer” flavor. But in conversations with other there at the event, what emerged was that the flavors I’d been searching for disappeared if you drank an actual beer beforehand. Several people I talked to recounted the same experience, but those who resisted the temptation to order a beer first had a very different experience with the jelly beans.
Happily, I took a few packets home with me, and tried them again this morning before my usual cup of breakfast beer (kidding). Anyway, the theory of the night before proved true. They do actually have a subtle beery flavor with wheat and the banana and clove notes you’d expect in a hefeweizen. It’s not a strong taste, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I assume when you have actual beer in your mouth that it kills the subtler flavors in the candy.
Last night, I also spend some time talking with Rob, one of the Jelly Belly R&D guys who worked on creating the new beer flavored jelly bean. He mentioned that they’d originally considered doing a craft beer assortment but getting the first one right took so long that they abandoned that idea. I offered some suggestions, and who knows, maybe we’ll see some more types of beer turned into jelly beans in the future. I suspect many people will think of it as just a gimmick, but the company has a long history of creating original flavors that you wouldn’t ordinarily expect. So why not. They’ve done a cocktail line of jelly beans, so beer frankly only makes sense. If you see some, give them a try. Just don’t have a beer first.
Beer In Film #22: Beer: A Beautiful Artistic Symphony
Today’s beer video is a short film of Charlie Bamforth, professor at UC Davis, waxing rhapsodic about how wonderful beer can be. So many great quotes packed into just under two and half minutes. Beautiful. Artistic. Symphony.
Beer In Film #21: Prohibition: The Forgotten Crusade
Today’s beer video is a short film about prohibition and its effects. Entitled Prohibition: The Forgotten Crusade, it was created by Jared K. Productions. They originally uploaded it in 2007 but because it uses old footage, it looks much older than that, so when it was actually produced I can’t say.
Beer In Film #20: Is Beer In Your Career?
Today’s beer video is an hour long panel discussion at UC San Diego last April, part of their Career Channel programming for UCTV, University of California Television. Entitled Is Beer In Your Career?, and panelists include Stone Brewing’s Greg Koch, Lost Abbey’s Tomme Arthur, Ballast Point’s Yuseff Cherney, and White Lab’s Chris White. They talk about “why San Diego has become such a nationally renowned region for craft beer production, and where the professional brewing industry is headed” during the hour-long discussion.