Brookston Beer Bulletin

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California State Fair Beer Competition Winners

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cal-state-fair
On Monday, the results of this year’s California State Fair competition for “Commercial Craft Beer” were released. As usual, the winners are listed confusingly by county, with no overall list. Why they do this is beyond me. Also, the commercial competition is judged using the 23 BJCP categories, plus three for mead and two for hard cider. I have nothing against the BJCP guidelines, though they were developed primarily for homebrewing and often don’t fit commercial standards as well. The only standard that commercial beers need to satisfy is that of their customers, who could often care less what style a beer is as long as they like it.

At any rate, the top honors went to:

  • Best of Show: Sudwerk Marzen
  • Best of Show 1st Honorable Mention: Triple Rock IPAX
  • Best of Show 2nd Honorable Mention: Lightning Brewery Elemental Pilsner
  • Best of Show 3rd Honorable Mention: Fox Barrel Mulled Cider
  • Best of Show 4th Honorable Mention: Sudwerk Dunkelweizen

And the “1st Gold” Awards in each category were as follows:

  • 1A,B. Lite American Lager & Standard American Lager: Michelob Ultra
  • 1C. Premium American Lager: Michelob
  • 1D,E. Helles & Export: San Pedro Longshoreman Lager
  • 2A. German Pilsner: Lightning Brewery Elemental Pilsner
  • 2B,C. Bohemian & Classic American Pilsner: Sierra Nevada Summerfest
  • 4. Dark Lager: Sudwerk Marzen
  • 5A. Maibock/Helles Bock: San Pedro Welke Bock
  • 5C,D. Doppelbock & Eisbock: Lodi Eisbock
  • 6A,C: Cream Ale & Kolsch: River City Kolsch
  • 6B. Blonde Ale: Eel River California Blonde
  • 6D. American Wheat or Rye: Santa Cruz Ale Works Hefeweizen
  • 7. Amber Hybrid Beer: Jack’s Gridiron Amber
  • 8A,B. Bitter Ordinary/Special/Best: Faultline Pale Ale
  • 8C. Extra Special/Strong Bitter (English Pale Ale): Anderson Valley Boont Extra Special Beer
  • 9A,B,C. Scottish Ale: Devil’s Canyon Full Boar Scotch Ale
  • 9D. Irish Red Ale: Taps Irish Red
  • 10A. American Pale Ale: Auburn Alehouse American River Pale Ale
  • 10B. American Amber Ale: Mad River Jamaica Red Ale
  • 10C. American Brown Ale: Omaha Jack’s Up Town Rancho Brown
  • 11. English Brown Ale: Tied House Ironwood Dark
  • 12A. Brown Porter: Mammoth Lakes Double Nut Brown
  • 12B,C. Robust & Baltic Porter: Uncommon Brewers Baltic Porter
  • 13A,D,E. Dry, American & Foreign Stouts: Mad River Steelhead Extra Stout
  • 13B,C. Sweet & Oatmeal Stout: Etna Brewing Grubstake Oatmeal Stout
  • 13F. Russian Imperial Stout: Fifty-Fifty Brewing Totality Imperial Stout
  • 14A. Engllish IPA: Eel River Organic IPA
  • 14B. American IPA: Triple Rock IPAX
  • 14C. Imperial IPA: Moylan’s Hopsickle Imperial XXX IPA
  • 15A. Weizen: Sierra Nevada Kellerwiess
  • 15B,C. Dunkleweizen & Weizenbock: Sudwerk Dunkelweizen
  • 16A,C. Witbier & Saison: The Brewhouse Baseball Saison
  • 16B,D,E. Belgian Pale Ale, Biere de Garde & Belgian Specialty Ale: River City Cap City Pale Ale
  • 17. Sour Ale: Valley Brew “Bill Brand-Bic”
  • 18A. Belgian Blonde Ale: Uncommon Brewers Siamese Twin Ale
  • 18B. Belgian Dubbel: Anderson Valley Brother David’s Double Abbey Style Ale
  • 18C. Belgian Tripel: Main Street Bishops Tipple Trippel
  • 19A. Old Ale: Lightning Brewery Old Tempest Ale
  • 19B. English Barleywine: Schooner’s Old Diablo Barleywine
  • 19C. American Barleywine: The Brewhouse Big Johnson Barley Wine
  • 20. Fruit Beer: Lost Coast Tangerine Wheat
  • 21. Spice, Herb Vegetable & Winter Beers: Marin Hoppy Holidaze
  • 22C. Wood-Aged Beer: Mayfield Iconoclast Nocturna
  • 23. Specialty Beer: Drake’s Impinoir Stout
  • 27. Apple Cider: Crispin Cider Crispin Light
  • 28. Specialty Cider: Fox Barrel Mulled Cider

cal-state-fair-2010

Beer In Ads #131: IBI’s Full Case Test

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Wednesday’s ad is for IBI, or International Breweries Incorporation, a group of breweries that merged or were bought out in the Midwest beginning around 1955. The ad is from 1960, and shows the crowns, or bottle caps, for a number of their brands. I really like the ad visually, with the case of empty bottles suspended at the top of the ad and the crowns at the bottom. For the time, there’s an awful lot of white space in the middle, something that was fairly rare in 1950s advertising.

IBI-1960

While there’s not much information on the web about IBI, I did find this very old beer can collecting website, that doesn’t appear to be currently maintained, that had the following information:

In 1955 a group of businessmen from Detroit bought out Iroquois Beverage Corporation to help form the International Breweries Incorporation, with combining plants in Frankenmuth, Findaly, Tampa and Covington. International continued the Iroquois “arrowhead” label from the Iroquois Beverage Corp., however, they did change the Frankenmuth label from the Black Label to the oval label that came in beer, ale, and bock, from the Buffalo, NY plant.

IBI quickly created their own look, some collectors call these the “TV Screen” cans, the IBI cans came in Iroquois, Frankenmuth, Silver Bar in matching red beer and green ale cans, the IBI Frankenmuth Bock, and the IBI Old Dutch Beer. While the Buffalo plant was the only IBI brewer to produce all the cans, Iroquois remained solely in Buffalo. All the cans came as flattops, the IBI Iroquois beer has been found as a zip top. The Buffalo plant, also used 2 can companies, Continental Can Co., and Kegline, this produced a color variation with the red Beers.

The IBI logo eventually was removed, as some of the other plants closed or were sold, and a similar looking “TV Screen” can was produced. Buffalo kept filling Frankenmuth in Beer and Ale and shipping to the Midwest and the southeast in flattop cans. There are 2 different designs with the Frankenmuths, a single label with a yellowish background, and a 2 label white background can, however, not sure which came first. And similar to the single label Frankenmuth came an Iroquois Beer, but in a white background. Those were the final flattop cans from IBI of Buffalo. The Ponce DeLeon Silver Bar beer and ales that are identical labels were only canned in Tampa The odd thing is that they had matching beer and ales for Frankenmuth, but only the beer for Iroquois on the post IBI label.

Now there is a post IBI Iroquois Ale, but this is the identical label to the IBI’s, the Indian head replaces the IBI logo.This can has only been found in a zip top, no flats as indicated by the BCU and came out around 62 or 63, and is a very tough can to find. IBI of Buffalo only would last a few more years and canned their Iroquois Indian Head beer and Tomahawk Ale in zip tops.

Along the way International of Buffalo bought some existing labels that many collectors might not be aware of. In 1958 or 59, International canned the Blackhawk Beer for only a year or so before being sold to a Cumberland plant. They also picked up the Stolz label from Tampa, and a few tough variations came from Buffalo. In 1962 the Buffalo plant bought a few labels from Cleveland-Sandusky Brewers, and bear the International of Buffalo d/b/a. Canned in Buffalo were Old Timers and Crystal Rock. G & B was also purchased, and collectors have bottle labels from Buffalo, but haven’t seen a can yet.

Locally, in 1959, International bought out the Phoenix Brewery of Buffalo. Phoenix had just put their beer in cans a year earlier, and a very short run of Phoenix Beer bearing the Phoenix Brewing mandatory was run, this is a tougher variation than the Phoenix from International of Buffalo. The Phoenix Brewery eventually became the Ale plant for International. International eventually went bankrupt in 1966 and a Terry Fox from New Jersey bought the plant and renamed it Iroquois Brewing Company. They continued to produce the Indian Head Beer and replacing the Tomahawk Ale was the Iroquois Draft Ale. Bavarians Select had a short stay and was canned in Buffalo. In 1969, Fox sold the plant to a group from Buffalo, and the name changed to Iroquois Brewery. They discontinued the Draft Ale, and the famous white Draft Beer was canned during this time. With the invasion of Cheaper Canadien Beers, and the growth of the big boys, Iroquois could no not keep up, and on May 5, 1971, Iroquois the once proud brewer of Buffalo shut its doors.

Another website, Kentucky Beer Cans, also shows a few of the IBI cans.

BrewDog In San Francisco

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brew-dog
Last night Monk’s Kettle in San Francisco hosted a little meet and greet with co-founder James Watt of BrewDog in Scotland. Having just enjoyed a cheesesteak together at Jim’s Steaks with James (and Greg Koch and Bill Covaleski) in Philadelphia the week before, I felt duty-bound to find out how he enjoyed the state sandwich of Pennsylvania.

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Dana Blum, from Anchor Brewing, James Watt, from BrewDog, and me at Monk’s Kettle.

I was handed a 5 a.m. Saint when I walked in joined the conversation already in progress. Apparently, cheesesteaks don’t compare favorably to haggis, but I think it’s all about what you grew up with, so I take no offense. We talked World Cup, Philly and beer, of course. John Dannerbeck and Dana Blum, both from Anchor Brewing, added golf to the discussion, and it turns out James is a big fan. I then moved on to the Hardcore IPA, brewed with American hops like Simcoe. At 9.2% a.b.v. and the Simcoe, it’s more like an American version, which is what they were going for.

James Pours Sink the Bismarck
James pouring samples of Sink the Bismarck.

I was going to leave early, but James opened bottles of both Sink the Bismarck and Tactical Nuclear Penguin so I stuck around, not wanting to miss another opportunity to try them both. This version of Bismarck had far more peaty aromas than the last one I had — a plus, I think — and the Penguin had a thinner mouthfeel and more spirity flavors, with less roasted malt character.

Update On Steve Altimari

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mountain
I spoke to Steve Altimari, former brewer with Valley Brewing in Stockton, who’s vacationing in his home town near Ithaca, New York, with his family. Naturally, I asked about what went down at the brewery and why he was out of a job. Having known Steve for a number of years, I was well aware that the family-owned company had its share of drama and that they hardly knew what a talented brewer they had in Steve. Here’s what he was able to tell me.

About a month ago, he heard from the owner, Kelly Jacobs, that she wanted to sell the brewery and gave Steve a price if he was interested. So Steve went to work, found partners and investors in short order and made an offer based on his earlier conversation with Jacobs. No dice. The price was now inexplicably higher. They tried again with higher offers, but each time the owners kept raising the price. Then they fired John, their only salesman. Last Thursday, they tried one last offer, which met with the same frustrating negative response. On Friday, the day before Steve was scheduled to take a family vacation, he asked for explanation. He was told they “decided on another offer, and they don’t need you. Thanks, but get out.” In less than two hours he was locked out of the brewery that he helped build for the past fourteen years.

I never expected that the owners were warm and fuzzy people, but that takes ingratitude to a whole new level. None of the family members know the slightest thing about brewing and if not for the Herculean efforts of Steve, no one would have ever heard of their brewery. I realize it’s unfair to place any of the blame on the new owners — whoever they may be — but it’s going to be difficult for anybody to come in and fill his shoes.

On the plus side, the partners and investors are sticking with Steve and the plans now have shifted to acquiring or building a brewery somewhere in the Bay Area. Apparently, the financing is already in place, so we may not be without beer brewed by Steve Altimari for long.

Steve will be hard at it when he returns from vacation next week, and the first order of business is coming up with a new brewery name. I suggested something that’s the opposite of a valley, like a mountain peak, which is why the icon above is of Mt. Everest. Then perhaps Altimari Brewery could work; it means “high water.” Let’s wish him the best of luck. What brewery name suggestions do you have for Steve’s new venture?

Peace Or 2 Medals: Steve Altimari, from Valley Brewing
A very happy Steve at the Falling Rock Taphouse in Denver, after winning two medals at the 2009 Great American Beer Festival.

Bavaria Beer Marketing Terrorists Strike Again

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bavaria
You may recall that during the last World Cup in 2006, The Dutch brewery brand Bavaria got themselves in hot wort by stealth marketing their brand during a match where fans wore orange lederhosen with the brewery’s logo on them, an item they sold online at the brewery’s website. I wrote about it then under the title Beer Marketing In Your Underwear? The official beer sponsor, Anheuser-Busch, got their lederhosen in a bunch because they were the “official” beer of the World Cup, ruffling more than a few feathers in Germany with it’s own rich beer history.

Fast forward four years to the World Cup in South Africa and nobody seems to have learned a damn thing from history, except perhaps the Bavaria Brewery. This year, during the match between the Netherlands and Denmark, 36 women were arrested for wearing plain orange dresses in a block of seats. I’m fairly certain it was indeed stealth marketing on the part of the brewery, but they broke no laws. There was no branding on the dresses and orange is the national color of Holland. Bavaria Beer has an entire Flickr gallery devoted to pictures of women wearing their plain orange dresses.

women-in-orange-dresses

But FIFA stepped in to protect its revenue stream for the millions paid by Anheuser-Busch InBev to be the “official,” and more importantly exclusive, beer of the World Cup. The women were ejected from the game and “arrested under the Contravention of Merchandise Marks Act, which prevents companies benefiting from an event without paying for advertising.” FIFA in a statement said they “view ambush marketing in a very serious light” and called the act of wearing an orange dress an “illicit activity.” The police in South Africa have opened a “criminal investigation,” according to the UK’s newspaper, the Guardian.

But despite the rhetoric, they’re not exactly terrorists. They were all wearing plain orange dresses. Period. Arresting them gave the Bavaria beer brand more publicity than leaving them alone would have. And it does nothing to dispel the image of FIFA and ABIB as thugs who’ll do whatever they like to protect revenue streams above all else, human rights be damned.

As Pete Brown concludes in his own rant over this incident:

Let’s be realistic: even though Bavaria have denied involvement, of course it was a marketing stunt: why else would forty identically dressed women turn up in one block? But it’s a brilliant stunt: once again, Bavaria has had acres of free press coverage, and Fifa and Bud have been made to look really quite sinister and scary.

But that’s because they are. We all know it’s a marketing stunt, but it doesn’t break any rules. The rules prohibit competitive beer branding around the stadium. There was no branding. End of.

As the Bavaria spokesperson says, Fifa don’t have a trade mark on the colour orange. This is an astonishing abuse of human rights — admittedly a trivial one in the context of South Africa’s recent history, but still deeply disturbing, because it’s all about protecting the commercial rights of a beer brand. No brand should have the power to do something like this. If Fifa and Bud are to remain consistent in this policy, we should expect them to eject and detain any England fan with a St George’s cross flag, T-shirt or face paint, because this is a device used extensively in marketing by Bombardier, a competitive beer brand to Budweiser. That would be utterly absurd, outrageous and unacceptable of course. But then so is this.

How A-B InBev think this ugly, bullying behaviour helps enhance Budweiser’s reputation is beyond me.

I know it’s naive to think that any international sporting event should be just about the game, but I continue to hold out hope. But this is one more potent reminder of how the world really works. What Bavaria did may be technically against FIFA’s “policy” (which is very different from a “law”) yet they treated the policy-breakers like terrorists and used police powers essentially to carry out and punish people for breaking the rules of a corporation, reminding me chillingly of the way the military and police have been used to break up strikers. Money and power increasingly call the shots while human beings and small enterprise get trampled. I, for one, am going to start wearing a lot more orange.

women-in-orange-dresses-detail

UPDATE: A few more worthwhile articles about the incident have popped up. These include another Guardian piece, Another triumph for Fifa’s chillingly efficient rights protection team, by Marina Hyde, and Central State Asylum has a nice post from a legal standpoint. But perhaps most hilarious, someone has set up a Facebook page, I’ll buy Bavaria for the match to annoy FIFA.

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UPDATE 6.19: Apparently the gals in orange did show up for the game versus Japan on June 19.

Beer Pioneer Jack McAuliffe Initerviewed

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The Brewers Association’s new website, CraftBeer.com, has a great article and interview up today with Jack McAuliffe. If you don’t know who Jack McAuliffe is, you should. McAuliife founded the New Albion Brewery in Sonoma, California in October of 1976. New Albion was the very first modern microbrewery in the country, and along with Anchor and several early brewpubs, is the reason that the San Francisco Bay Area is the birthplace of craft beer in America.

McAuliffe
Jack in his new brewery back in the day.

Check out The Rise and Fall of New Albion Brewing led the way for the American Craft Beer Revolution by John Holl.

Sierra Nevada is also doing a collaboration beer, Jack & Ken’s Ale (a barley wine) with Jack McAuliffe as a part of their Sierra 30 Series, celebrating their 30th anniversary this year.

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A New Albion label.

Beer In Ads #129: Lowenbrau Try The Dark

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Monday’s ad is for Lowenbrau, a Munich brewery. Today is the day Munich was founded in 1158. It could be from the 1960s or 70s, but my money’s on the Seventies. Showing both kinds — country and western, alright light and dark — the ad features the tagline. “Now that you’ve seen the light …. try the dark.” But really, they’re actually trying to sell the glasses.

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Valley Brewing Loses Brewer Steve Altimari

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I just heard that Valley Brewing in Stockton is being sold and their long-time (and quite talented) brewer Steve Altimari will not continue on with the new owners. Steve posted the following on his blog:

As of 6/12/10 I am no longer working for Valley Brewing Company, my employer for the last 13 years. The brewery is being sold and I am not a part of the new owners plans, so I bid everyone a fond goodbye and see you on the flip side.

Unless the new owners are kick-ass brewers themselves, I don’t see how that’s a positive for the brewery. Hopefully, there will be more details soon.

Beer In Art #80: David Teniers’ Peasants Celebrating Twelfth Night

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Today’s work of art is another piece I saw last week wandering around the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C, the day after SAVOR. It was painted in 1635 by David Teniers the Younger, a Flemish artist born in Antwerp. The painting is known as Peasants Celebrating Twelfth Night.

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Teniers was known for his depictions of everyday life, usually showing peasants in a variety of settings. The Twelfth Night revelry shown here also include, of course, drinking beer.

Online, the National Gallery has several detail views available, including this one below of the drinking going on at the table.

David_Teniers-12th_Night-detail-1

He also painted a similar scene about Twelfth Night a few years later entitled Twelfth Night, The King Drinks.

Teniers-12th_Night_The_King_Drinks

To learn more about David Teniers, Wikipedia has a good overview and there’s also a more detailed biography at the National Gallery. You can see more of his work at the Web Museum, Olga’s Gallery and the National Gallery. There are also additional links at ArtCyclopedia.