Here are the results from the 2009 Toronado Barley Wine Festival in San Francisco:
Congratulations to all the winners.
Thursday night, the Toronado and the Homebrew Chef put on a beer dinner entitled “A Night of Ales” featuring the beers of Firestone Walker. It was a seven-course dinner, including the Intermezzo. It was an amazing evening and the packed house all appeared to be equally impressed by both the meal and the pairings.
Matt Brynildson and Sean Paxton; the beer and the food at the “A Night of Ales” beer dinner.
For many more photos from Sean Paxton’s A Night of Ales beer dinner, visit the photo gallery.
I ran into Tom Dalldorf at the Magnolia vertical barley wine tasting, and we drove over to Zeitgeist, where Rich Norgrove, brewmaster at Bear Republic Brewing, was on hand for a meet the brewer event. We slipped in and out long enough to shake hands, take a photo, and slink away so we could get to our beer dinner on time.
Part of the Bear Republic brew crew (on left) with Rich and his wife Tami.
I made a brief stop on my way to last night’s “A Night of Ales” Beer Dinner at Magnolia, who was hosting a “Vintage Barleywine Tasting Event.” On tap was their Old Thunderpussy barley wine from 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008 (aged in a bourbon barrel), and 2009 four ways; cask-conditioned, cask-conditioned aged in a bourbon barrel, draught and draught aged in a bourbon barrel. All were available with a special menu of cheeses and a homemade rabbit terrine. The new Old Thunderpussy is also made each year for Strong Beer Month, but it was a real treat to compare the current version with the previous three years. I’d say the cask 2009 is probably my favorite, actually, but the 2008 from a bourbon barrel was a close second.
2005-09 Old Thunderpussy.
A satisfied brewer Ben Spencer and Magnolia owner/brewmaster Dave McLean.
As promised, here are many, many more photos and vidoes of the fabulous Lagunitas Beer Circus, an event I hope becomes a permanent fixture of SF Beer Week.
Just a few of the clowns at the Beer Circus.
Peepshow Mini Golf, just one of dozens of acts going on Under the Big Top.
One of the performers from the Boil Theatre.
The Extra Action Marching Band closed down the circus.
For more photos from Lagunitas Beer Circus, visit the various galleries of photos and video from the event:
One of the most fun things so far about SF Beer Week is the participation of some high end local restaurants that one doesn’t normally think of as beer-friendly places, such as Chez Panisse and Oliveto. Last night, Oliveto did their first beer dinner ever with the beers of Russian River Brewing. It was a six course affair and in addition to the beer paired with each course, they also used each beer in some aspect of cooking the dish.
The dinner took place upstairs in a small room toward the back of the restaurant, making it a nice, intimate setting.
After some Miyagi oysters with Beatification mignonette, paired with Beatification, the second course was one of my favorites of the evening. It was a Fritto of Willis Farm pork trotter and sweet onions with Consecration mayonnaise, paired with Consecration.
The U-shaped table allowed for easy conversation and a lively dialogue throughout the evening.
The third course was seared Maine sea scallop with ancho cress and Damnation sauce. It was tasty, but I really loved the next course, which was a Risotto of roasted Delicata squash, wild mushrooms and Russian River Porter. The earthy mushrooms and the porter were a terrific match for one another.
Beer chef Bruce Paton, who helped with the dinner, and Russian River owners Vinnie and Natalie Cilurzo.
The main entree consisted of Carbonades of spit-roasted Magruder Ranch beef striploin with Pliny the Elder. The dessert was a delicious Cocoa nib panna cotta made with and paired with Salvation, pictured above.
For a first tie beer dinner, they really hit this one out of the park. And listening to the chef describe how they went about putting it together, it was obvious they had as much fun creating it as we had enjoying it. I hope this means we’ll see more beer dinners at Oliveto.
Trumer Brauerei in Berkeley, California, had scheduled tours throughout SF Beer Week every day at 4:00 p.m. On my way over to a beer dinner last night, I stopped by to see how the tours were going and inquire if they were seeing people for each day’s tours so far. I didn’t necessarily need the tour myself, as when the brewery was Golden Pacific Brewing before Gambrinus bought it, it’s where I made a number of private label beers for BevMo, including Coastal Fog, Brandenburg Gate and Truman’s True Blue. But it’s always a fun little brewery to be around, and the folks there told me they’d had a handful of people for every tour so far, which I’d say is a good result. So far, we’ve been hearing good attendance for all if the events, I’m happy to say.
A modest group on the Trumer tour, but pretty good considering it’s a Wednesday afternoon.
I just couldn’t resist this image of the sun behind the logo on Trumer’s front door.
If you’ve ever visited Marin Brewing in Larkspur, California, then you know how tiny their brewery really is, squeezed into nooks and crannies throughout the brewpub. So it was pretty cool that brewmaster Arne Johnson wanted to do an extended, intimate and very personal tour that most breweries just couldn’t take the time to do. Here’s how they described the plan.
For those of you interested in learning more about how a small craft brewery works, we are offering an opportunity to hang out with our brewers during a brew day, get an extensive tour of our plant, and an in depth explanation of our brewing equipment, techniques, and procedures. This unique event also includes a sit down lunch and beer tasting with Brewmaster Arne Johnson, Marin’s award-winning brewer. Limited to 8 attendees.
The tour filled up fast, and so I stopped by Wednesday morning just to see how it was going.
Marin’s assistant brewer Shane Aldridge keeping an eye on the boil.
Shane scooped out a pitcher of wort for people to taste.
Brewmaster Arne John led a tour around all of the stages of their brewing and bottling.
Hand labeling Marin bottles. It’s pretty labor intensive, but the machine looks pretty cool in operation, which you can see below.
Henry’s Gastropub is a Berkeley fixture, located across the street from Boalt Hall, Berkeley’s law school. For years they’ve had a decent selection of beer, but until recently, the food was rather wanting, not bad, but nothing special. But all that’s changed recently with a remodel, both cosmetically and in attitude. The biggest reason for the change is Eddie Blyden, Henry’s new chef. Blyden knows beer. He was formerly the chef at 21st Amendment Brewery & Restaurant and also later designed the food menus for Magnolia and Alembic, all three in San Francisco. Monday night he did a beer dinner during SF Beer Week with the beers of Triple Rock Brewery and Iron Springs. I was unable to attend, having accepted an invitation for another beer dinner, but Celebrator Beer News publisher Tom Dalldorf did and declared the dinner to be a great success. He was also kind enough to pass along a photo from the event.
That’s chef Eddie Blyden in the center, wearing red, flanked by Rodger David, Triple Rock’s brewer (far left) and Christian Kazakoff, Iron Springs’ brewer (far right). In between, on the left, is Brad Robbins and Brian Thorson, both from Drake’s on the right, Josh Miner, also from Drake’s.
Tuesday night the Bistro in Hayward, California, held one of the most unique and fun cheese pairing events I’ve ever attended. It was called The Bistro’s North County Cheese-Off. What owner Vic Krajl did was pick five cheeses and then asked five breweries from north of San Francisco — Bear Republic, Lagunitas, Marin, North Coast and Russian River — to pick the beer they made that they felt was the best pairing with each cheese.
So it was essentially five flights. At our table we’d get a generous portion of a cheese and then five beer samples, one from each brewery. They were unmarked so we did not know which beers we were being served, only the cheese. So, in turn, you’d take a bit of cheese and then try a beer. Then another nibble and the next beer, and so on. So our job was not to find the best beer, but which one complemented or contrasted the cheese best. It’s good they gave us a lot of each cheese, because you’d keep going back and forth, eliminating here and there, but then often struggling with your two favorites trying to determine which one you liked the most. It was a very illuminating and educational way to approach pairing cheese and beer. Someone from each brewery was also there, and it was interesting to get their thoughts after the event. I’d definitely try this again, as it made the experience much richer and you left feeling not only satiated, but like you learned something, too.
Bistro proprietor Vic Krajl cutting the cheese.
The North County Cheese-Off was a sold-out event and even filled up the bar, too.
Our third cheese, Tomme De Brebis, a sheep cheese.
Rich Norgrove, from bear Republic.
The final cheese, Humboldt Fog, a goat cheese.
After choosing our favorite from each round, we handed in our scorecards and they tallied up the results to determine which pairings were the most popular. A prize was awarded to whoever correctly predicted the most popular choices. Only one person, this gentlemen, chose all five most popular. While I’d argue that most popular doesn’t necessarily mean best, especially since people’s tastes and palates vary widely, it was still a fund way to wrap up the evening and determine at least what a majority of people thought about the choices. Below is a list of each of the cheeses along with the beer pairings chosen by each brewery and then what was determined to be the most popular. The beer in bold was chosen as most popular and italics indicates my personal choice, in case you’re interested.
Cheese No. 1: Manchego (sheep)
Cheese No. 2: Fromager D’Affinois (cow)
Cheese No. 3: Tomme De Brebis (sheep)
Cheese No. 4: Cahill Porter (cow) [Tie]
Cheese No. 5: Humboldt Fog (goat)
Hat’s off to Vic for coming up with such a simple yet effective new way to approach cheese and beer pairings. What fun. I hope to see more of this type of event in the future.