Feeling Thirsty??

June 12, 2013 By Jay Brooks

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Today’s infographic is an interactive one, meaning if you’re Feeling Thirsty, you should visit the interactive infographic. It was created at Stanford University, using the Stanford Network Analysis Platform (SNAP), which put more than 1.5 million Beer Advocate reviews into a dataset to create the infographic. I’m not sure why they used color (light, medium and dark) as one of the ways to slice the data, but otherwise it’s pretty interesting to see. Below are a couple of examples, but you really need to look at it on the original website.

Here, for example is what Westvleteran 8 look like:
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And here’s Coniston’s Blue Bitter
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Also, be sure to check out the About the Data graphs at the bottom.

Beck’s Music-Playing Edison Bottle

June 12, 2013 By Jay Brooks

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For their New Zealand market, Beck’s hired an ad agency, Shine, to create some buzz for their brand, and they came up with The Beck’s Edison Bottle, the world’s first beer bottle you can play like a record.

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Here’s the description from Vimeo:

The first playable beer.
19th Century technology meets 21st Century music over a bottle of beer in the latest extension to the Beck’s Record Label project.
This time, the art label has evolved, and been replaced by the grooves of Auckland band Ghost Wave. Their new single was inscribed into the surface of a Beck’s beer bottle which could then be played on a specially-built device based on Thomas Edison’s original cylindrical phonograph.
Making the world’s first playable beer bottle was a formidable technical challenge. The clever people at Auckland firm Gyro Constructivists first had to design and build a record-cutting lathe, driven by a hard drive recording head. Then they reinvented Edison’s original cylinder player, using modern materials and electronics and built to very fine tolerances.
The Edison Bottle made its public debut at SemiPermanent in Auckland in May to a standing ovation from the assembled media and design community.
Beck’s has had a long association with music and art. In fact, at about the same time Heinrich Beck was brewing his first beer in the 1870s, Tom Edison was tinkering away on designs for the first phonograph.
Considering how beer has influenced recorded music since then, this physical collaboration was very appropriate and long overdue.

And below is a video showing the design and manufacturing process, along with a short demonstration of the bottle being played.

These close-ups show what the grooves on the bottle look like.
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Beer In Ads #907: Because We’re All In This Together

June 11, 2013 By Jay Brooks

Tuesday’s ad is for Falstaff, from the 1970s. It’s part of Falstaff’s Gabe and Walker ads, this one a cartoonized version of a photo ad. The two spokesmen stopped to help a pair of gals change a flat tire, though only one of the does the work while the other merely puts the moves on the women. I’m sure drinking the cans of beer is helping.

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Everything You Need To Know About Beer

June 11, 2013 By Jay Brooks

Today’s infographic is titled, somewhat loftily, Everything You Need To Know About Beer. I don’t think it comes anywhere near satisfying that goal, but it’s still a fun one.

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Click here to see the infographic full size.

Beer In Ads #906: Barbecue-In

June 10, 2013 By Jay Brooks

Monday’s ad is for Falstaff, from 1960. With the curious tagline “Barbecue-In,” I guess the idea is that they’re grilling the meat inside, rather than having a backyard barbecue. I can’t tell of the snowy background is the actual outdoors behind them or if that’s a faux wallpaper meant to look like it.

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Anchor Brewing Announces Zymaster #4: Fort Ross Farmhouse Ale

June 10, 2013 By Jay Brooks

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Anchor Brewing announced today the 4th beer in heir Zymaster series. This latest offering — Fort Ross Farmhouse Ale — is a beer made with local herbs from nearby Fort Ross, which is located along the coast in Sonoma County. This sounds like an interesting beer. I can’t wait to try it.
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Here’s the full story, from the press release:

Over 200 years ago, ninety miles up the coast from San Francisco, the Russian American Company built a stockade that became known as Fort Ross. It was home base for Russia’s fur trade and, in the 1820s and ’30s, supplied the Russian colony of New Archangel (now Sitka) with grain from “bread plants” like wheat and barley. The farms were small and the harvesting primitive. Reaping was done with sickles and threshing by driving horses over the sheaves.
Among the native plants at Fort Ross is a perennial evergreen shrub, prized by the local Indians for its healing powers, whose purple flowers bloom from May to early July. The Spanish missionaries called it Yerba Santa or Holy Herb. Our Zymaster® Series No. 4: Fort Ross Farmhouse Ale is inspired by the wheat, barley, and Yerba Santa at Fort Ross and the hardy souls who harvested them. Fermented with a local saison-style yeast, this unique brew celebrates the history and flora of Northern California like no other.
Our Fort Ross Farmhouse Ale (7.2% ABV) is a Belgian-style farmhouse ale with a California twist. The unique bitterness and earthy spiciness of Yerba Santa, a native California herb, perfectly complement the fruitiness and clove-like flavors created by a local saison-style yeast. And in addition to hops, barley malt, and wheat malt, we used toasted Belgian wheat malt, which gives our Fort Ross Farmhouse Ale its distinctive maltiness and burnished bronze color.
Zymaster Series No. 4: Fort Ross Farmhouse Ale will be available in draught and 22-ounce bottles and will be poured in select bars and restaurants throughout the United States, as well as the Anchor Taproom, starting June 2013.

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Mateveza/Samuel Adams Collaboration Beer Being Released Tonight

June 10, 2013 By Jay Brooks

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Tonight from 6-9:00 p.m. at Cervecería de MateVeza, located at 3801 18th Street in San Francisco, there will be a beer-tasting of a new collaboration beer. Here’s the story:

Samuel Adams and MateVeza will come together to celebrate and introduce their limited-release collaboration beer, Boston Tea Party Saison. The unique brew combines MateVeza’s signature ingredient — yerba mate tea — and Samuel Adams’ one-of-a-kind Kosmic Mother Funk (KMF).
After completing a Brewing and Business Experienceship, an extended craft brewing mentoring program offered by Samuel Adams, MateVeza founder Jim Woods teamed up with his mentor to create a unique collaboration beer. The Experienceship is offered to craft brewers as part of Samuel Adams Brewing the American Dream, a micro lending and coaching program available to food, beverage and hospitality small business owners as well as craft brewers.

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Jim Woods and Samuel Adams brewer Dean Gianocostas in Boston on the day they brewed the collaboration beer, Boston Tea Party Saison.

Here’s their description of the beer itself:

Samuel Adams and MateVeza came together to brew a Saison, which is a farmhouse beer traditionally brewed in the autumn or winter for consumption during the summer for the farm workers. The final recipe combines MateVeza’s signature ingredient — yerba mate tea — and Samuel Adams’ one-of-a-kind Kosmic Mother Funk (KMF), a blend of wild yeasts and bacteria designed to give beers unique flavors. The bright and satisfying brew has a slightly earthy and deliciously fruity character with a hint of spice and a long dry finish.

If you’re in the city tonight, stop by and give the beer a try. See you there.

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Chris Spinelli and Jon Mervine from Roc Brewing (who also did a similar collaboration beer, though their beer is ThreeNinety Bock), and in the middle Jim Woods, MateVeza, and Jim Koch, from Boston Beer.