Brookston Beer Bulletin

Jay R. Brooks on Beer

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Auditing the Next Session

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For our 73rd Session, our host is Adam W., who writes Pints and Pubs (from beer to eternity). His topic is all about something he does once a year, which he calls a “beer audit” and asking people to blog about their own efforts at managing their beer. Here’s what he means by a Beer Audit:

Once or twice a year I take a beer audit. I open cupboards and boxes and just have a good look at what’s there. Some beers get moved about, some make it from a box into the fridge, others get pushed further to the back of the cupboard for another day. Often I just stare at the bottles for a while and think about when I’ll drink them. Apart from the enjoyment of just looking at a hoard of beer, It tells me something about my drinking habits.

  • I store too many bottles – over 150 at the last count, which would keep me in beer for over a month, compared to less than a week’s worth of food – but evidently that’s still not enough bottles as I return with more every time I leave the house.
  • I have a tendency to hoard strong, dark beers – great for a winter evening, not so great when a lazy sunny afternoon starts with a 9% imperial stout and then gets stronger
  • My cellaring could be improved. I found three beers from breweries that closed last year. I found these, not hidden away in a box under the stairs, but in the fridge. The fridge!!!
  • My attempts to age beer usually just result in beer that’s past its best
  • The oldest beer in my cupboard is probably an infant compared to the aged beers people must have in their cellars

So, I’m interested to know if you take stock of the beers you have, what’s in your cellar, and what does it tell you about your drinking habits. This could include a mention of the oldest, strongest, wildest beers you have stored away, the ratio of dark to light, strong to sessionable, or musings on your beer buying habits and the results of your cellaring. I look forward to reading your posts on Friday March 1st, leave a comment here when you do.

So this Friday, March 1, take stock of your own inventory, and take stock of taking stock.

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So open up your beer cellar, or refrigerator, or closet, or wherever you store your beer, and let us know how you manage it by this Friday.

Odonata Beer Returning

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I just heard from Tracy Bethune, one of the original investors in Odonata Beer, that she’s re-launching the brand, which was founded in 2009, but shut down in 2011. Peter Hoey, the original brewer, and co-founder, is not involved with the new company, nor is Rick Sellers, who was formerly married to Bethune. A new version of their Saison will be available in limited supply at events during this year’s Sacramento Beer Week, which began yesterday. Here’s what I know so far:

Odonata Beer Company’s limited reserve Cellar Aged Saison is a special release of our flagship Saison that has been conditioned in perfect Wine Cellar conditions. Like a fine wine, our Saison is traditionally designed to be aged and the bottle conditioning has allowed the live yeast to provide a very dry exquisitely herbal finish along with the refined tropical fruit notes which define our outstanding Saison. Drinkable and refreshing, this beer scored an impeccable 98/100 points before we laid it aside for cellar conditioning – and industry experts are calling our reserve inventory better than the original!

After a short hiatus, Odonata Beer is thrilled to announce it’s resurrection and our Reserve Saison is being made available only by arrangement as a celebration of our local establishments and the fine beer enthusiasts of Northern California!

Tracy also informs me that she’s working on getting a new facility open in the Sacramento area later this year.
Odonata

Beer In Ads #808: Beer On The Fishing Trip

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Friday’s ad is still another one for Schlitz, this one also from 1949. It, too, is part of their “I was curious” series that always features three panels. This one features a group of people on a fishing trip, with all of the men in flannel and two in hats — one a cap but the other is a fedora?!? I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone wearing a fedora camping before. There are five beer bottles on the tray, but only four people. Who’s that fifth bottle for?

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George Washington’s Small Beer

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Today is the day we celebrate the birthday of George Washington, though he probably celebrated it on the 11th, because that’s what day the calendar read when he was born. That’s because when Washington was born in 1731, the British government still used the Julian calendar, but the British Calendar (New Style) Act of 1750, implemented the Gregorian calendar in 1752, and that’s the calendar system we still use today in the U.S. When it was adjusted, eleven days were added, and George went from having a birthday of February 11, 1731 to February 22, 1732, which is the one we use today.

I did a column several years ago for the San Francisco Chronicle, before I started working for rival Bay Area Newsgroup, about Washington’s love of Porter and his efforts making small beer. Washington’s handwritten recipe has famously survived and can be seen at the New York Public Library. It was in his “Notebook as a Virginia Colonel,” from 1757. And below it what it looks like.

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Luckily, his penmanship has been translated:

To make Small Beer

Take a large Sifter full of Bran Hops to your Taste. “” Boil these 3 hours. Then strain out 30 Gallons into a Cooler, put in 3 Gallons Molasses while the Beer is scalding hot or rather drain the molasses into the Cooler & strain the Beer on it while boiling Hot. Let this stand till it is little more than Blood warm. Then put in a quart of Yeast if the weather is very cold, cover it over with a Blanket & let it work in the Cooler 24 hours. Then put it into the Cask “” leave the Bung[hole] open till it is almost done working “” Bottle it that day Week it was Brewed.

Most people agree it probably wasn’t the best tasting beer, and I believe that there were efforts a few years ago to recreate it faithfully, but I don’t recall hearing those experiments turned out. Still, it’s nice to remember that our founding fathers were beer drinkers and, in some cases, brewers, as well.

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I love this illustration of Washington throwing back a cold one, by Canadian artist Scott McKowen, which he did for a Wired article about Tom Kehoe, at Yards Brewing in Philadelphia, recreating some colonial beer recipes.

Two Beer Companies, 210 Beer Brands

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Today’s infographic is an interesting one, created by NPR. Entitled Two Beer Companies, 210 Brands, it shows all of the beer brands owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev and SABMiller across the globe. Below the map, there’s also a list of brands by country, color-coded by which beer giant owns or controls them. How accurate is it? Hard to say. It doesn’t appear to include line extensions, which would balloon the chart to many times its current size, but glancing at the list for the United states, it looks like it may be missing some, though to be fair I didn’t do a line by line comparison.

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Click here to see the chart full size.

Beer In Ads #807: Beer By The Swimming Pool

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Thursday’s ad is yet another one for Schlitz, this one from 1949. It, too, is part of their “I was curious” series that always features three panels. This one features two couples around a swimming pool. Despite the fact that at least one of them has been in the pool, all of their hair remains perfect. And I always thought that one of the advantages of cans was so that you wouldn’t accidentally break them in a place where people might be barefoot, like a swimming pool. But there folks got the cans, but are pouring them into what looks like glass, though perhaps they’re plastic glassware.

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A Bud Is A Bud Is A Bud

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Oh, I hate to pick on the mainstream media as they cover the world of beer, but this is too delicious not to point out. In a story about the proposed buyout of Grupo Modelo by Anheuser-Busch InBev, entitled The Great Beer Monopoly Deal May Be Back On, the Atlantic features the following photo, which I downloaded in case somebody gets wise and replaces it. And a hat tip to Tom Dalldorf for sending me the link. I guess one Bud’s as good as another. Can I assume I don’t have to draw a diagram?

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