Peter Hoey Returns To His Urban Roots With New Brewery

March 31, 2017 By Jay Brooks

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I got a heads up from my friend Peter Hoey a few days ago that he’s leaving Brewer’s Supply Group and embarking on a new venture in Sacramento. I’ve known Peter since he was brewing at Bison Brewing, and he’s been brewing and consulting around the Bay Area for many years, including at Sierra Nevada and Sacramento Brewing. He announced today that coming this fall, he’ll be brewing again at his own place in downtown Sacramento, which will be called Urban Roots Brewing. Their Facebook page went live this morning, too. Peter’s partnering with Rob Archie, who also owns the Pangaea Bier Cafe. I’ve met Rob at several beer events over the years, and I think he’ll be a great partner in this, and will appreciate how talented a brewer Peter is. The lease is already signed and they’re fairly well along in the process. Fall seems reasonable, actually, even though most such predictions, in my experience, tend to be twice as long as originally thought. But Peter has opened breweries before, and knows what he’s up against, so I think we’ll be able to sample his new beer before the end of the year, which is terrific news.

Here’s the press release that came out today:

Urban Roots Brewery & Smokehouse announces plans to open a 15,600 sq. ft. facility incorporating a 15-barrel craft beer production brewery, tasting bar and a 300-seat smokehouse restaurant, including a 2,400 sq. ft. outdoor patio in the Downtown Sacramento/Southside Park area at 1322 V Street.
A joint venture between Sacramento area natives and co-owners, Brewmaster Peter Hoey and Rob Archie, owner of regional favorite Pangaea Bier Café, Urban Roots Brewery & Smokehouse plans to open fall 2017 and estimates to employ approximately 50 people.
Peter Hoey has worked toward this moment for over two decades. He has practiced his craft alongside the legends at Sierra Nevada, led the charge at Sacramento Brewing Company, and currently consults with the top beer brands in the country for BSG CraftBrewing, an industry supplier of brewing ingredients. Recent production collaborations include the highly sought after Hoeybeer with Santé Adairius Rustic Ales.
After a decade of collaborating together in the industry, partnering with Rob Archie on Urban Roots will fulfill Hoey’s life-long dream of producing some of the finest beers in the world, pairing them with simple, clean and delicious food, and showcasing Sacramento’s regional farm-to-fork ingredients.
A pioneer of national and international craft beer promotion in Sacramento, Rob Archie’s concept, Pangaea Bier Café, has earned the respect of top brewers in the country and a fiercely devoted clientele—not to mention being the culinary critics’ darling with back-to-back Sacramento Burger Battle judges’ choice wins, being named a Top Beer Destination every year since its opening in 2008, and receiving numerous accolades from both print and broadcast media.
Bringing their combined national and international beer travel experience and expertise home, Urban Roots will produce a myriad of beer varieties, with a focus on farmhouse style ales, oak aged beers and collaborative releases. The smokehouse will continue the culinary excellence practiced at Pangaea Bier Café focusing on regional ingredients and smoked meats. The Urban Roots name is intended to represent its location in the city’s center and its proud roots in both the Sacramento urban and farming communities.
Hoey and Archie believe that the V Street location is a key ingredient in creating their vision for Urban Roots—and their vision for Sacramento. Investing in the Downtown Sacramento/Southside Park neighborhood, and in Sacramento in general, is a reflection of both partners’ beliefs and passion for their community. Both Hoey and Archie have individual and shared histories of uniting Curtis Park and Oak Park through a successful neighborhood business, hosting sold-out beer dinners to support local philanthropy, as well as taking and sharing the Sacramento region’s talents and tastes with a global audience.
1322 V Street is exactly where Hoey and Archie want to build Urban Roots Brewery & Smokehouse, an immersive craft-beer brewery experience that doesn’t currently exist in the Capital City. In doing so, they will offer a one-of-a-kind destination for Sacramentans to come together and create a bevy of food and beer tastes for the world to enjoy.

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Rob Archie and Peter Hoey, owners of the new Urban Roots Brewery.

Linden Street Brewery Becomes Oakland United Beerworks

March 27, 2017 By Jay Brooks

When Adam Lamoreaux opened the Linden Street Brewery in 2009, it was the first production brewery in the city since 1959. But it proved to be quite popular, and successful, but closed late last summer due to management changes to the company. Lamoreaux has moved on to a new venture, and the brewery has been rebranded starting today as Oakland United Beerworks.

Current owner John Karnay, a longtime Oakland resident and businessman and award-winning brewmaster Shane Aldrich revealed today their new website, core brews and plans for the future.

“Oakland United Beerworks is born and bred in Oakland,” said Karnay. “From the beginning, our mission has been to bring Oaklanders — old and new — together with great brews. Oakland has evolved and grown, and so have we.”

Brewmaster Shane Aldrich originally joined Linden Street in 2016. He learned the brewing craft from Tony Lawrence of Boneyard Beer and Tim Gossack of Bell’s Brewing. He’s brewed at some of the Bay Area’s most popular and enduring brands, including Lagunitas, Moylan’s, Half Moon Bay Brewing, and Marin Brewing Company, where he won a prestigious World Beer Cup award.

“Oakland’s diversity, artistry and authenticity inspires me and our recipes,” says Aldrich. “We love this town – and we’re excited about growing an Oakland community of beer drinkers and beer makers.”

Aldrich brews Oakland United’s beer in small batches, and is currently offering four core beers, and will also offer seasonal ales in the coming months. The inaugural line-up of core beers includes:

Black Lager: A flavorful and surprisingly light tribute to the classic German Schwarzbier with notes of coffee and toast.
Pilsner: The best floor-malted German Bohemian Pilsner malt creates a crisp, well-balanced lager that pairs with everything from pizza to pate.
Common Lager: The original Bay Area Beer, California Common Lagers were invented following the Gold Rush by homesick Germans looking to replicate the lagers of Germany and the East Coast. This robust, amber beer adapts well to its surroundings – perfect for any time and place.
IPA: The signature Oakland version of the West Coast IPA mixes five different hops into a flavorful, year-round beer that gives off hints of citrus and tropical fruit. A great beer to pair with a savory menu.

Oakland United Beerworks is currently brewing on Alameda while it builds a brewery and tasting room on 2nd Street, near Jack London Square, with plans to open the doors by late summer. A new tap room will play host to the Oakland Beer Drinkers Association, launched by the brewery to introduce beer lovers to Oakland’s best breweries. Aldrich will collaborate with fellow Oakland and East Bay brewmasters to create and test new brews.

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Brewmaster Shane Aldrich

Mitch Steele’s New Atlanta Brewery Has A Name: New Realm Brewing

March 16, 2017 By Jay Brooks

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As you probably knew, former Stone Brewing’s head brewer, and one-time AB brewer, Mitch Steele, is opening a new brewery, which will be located in Atlanta. The official business name from the beginning has been the purposely generic American Beerworks LLC, a placeholder while they worked on the actual name the business will operate under. Today they made it official. The new brewery will be called “New Realm Brewing.”

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Here’s more information from the press release that was issued this morning:

Combining a collective passion for craft beer, partners Mitch Steele, Carey Falcone and Bob Powers will bring a “New Realm” to Atlanta’s brewing community later this year. The trio announced their new venture in the Atlanta Beltline area in the fall of last year and has spent many hours coming up with the appropriate name to suit it.
“We could not be more thrilled to announce our name, New Realm,” said Carey Falcone Co-Founder and CEO. “It has taken us quite a bit of time (over many beers, of course) to create our vision and land on the right name for our future brewery and restaurant. New Realm speaks to our desire to create a new realm in brewing and dining experiences, and to support an outstanding and dynamic local craft beer community.”
At the core of New Realm Brewing is Co-Founder, Brewmaster and COO, Mitch Steele formerly Brewmaster for 10 years at Stone Brewing. Steele, referred by many as an authority on brewing IPA’s, has decades of experience developing and brewing innovative and delicious beers. Steele authored a book in 2012 titled, “IPA: Brewing Techniques, Recipes and the Evolution of India Pale Ale.” Currently Steele is busy developing recipes and has shared that craft fans can “count on IPAs being poured at New Realm as well as barrel-aged beers and traditional lagers”.
New Realm Brewing will break ground soon in preparation to open the 20,000 square foot space located at 820 Ralph McGill Avenue in the growing Beltline area. “Plans are underway to bring Atlanta and its visitors a distinctive venue to enjoy craft beer and great artisanal foods in an inviting, unique and fun atmosphere,” said Bob Powers Co-Founder and CCO. “In addition to our production brewery, we will have a restaurant, as well as both a rooftop bar and an outdoor beer garden at New Realm and we look forward to unveiling design plans in the near future.”

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New Realm Owners Mitch Steele, Carey Falcone and Bob Powers in front of the Atlanta skyline.

Bock To Basics

February 9, 2017 By Jay Brooks

For our 121st Session, our host will be Jon Abernathy, who writes The Brew Site. For his topic, he’s chosen Bock!, which again sounds simple enough, but I’ll just let Jon explain what he means:

The month of March heralds the start of spring, and March 20 is even National Bock Beer Day. So Bockbiers seemed like a natural fit for the month!
Don’t feel constrained to simply write a review of a Bock beer, though I’m certainly interested to read any reviews that come it. Some other ideas to consider:
Dig into into the history of the style—their ties to Einbeck, the differences in the development of Bocks and Doppelbocks, and so on.
Do any of your local breweries brew a Bock-styled beer? Seek it out and write about it.
Alternatively, interview your local brewer who brewed that beer; get their take on the style and why/how they brewed it the way they did.
Have you ever attended Bockfest in Cincinnati, Ohio? It just so happens to take place the first weekend of March—write a review for The Session!
There are already the styles of traditional Bock, Doppelbock, Maibock, Eisbock, Weizenbock (and Helles Bock and Dunkles Bock in the BJCP) guidelines. Just for fun, invent a new style of Bock and describe it.
Have you homebrewed a Bock or similar style? Tell us about it, and anything you learned brewing this lager style at home.
Bock puns!

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To participate in the March Session, on or before Friday, March 3, 2017, post your thoughts on Bock beer. Either comment on the original announcement or via Twitter or Facebook. Jon’s Twitter handle is @brewsite.

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What Can Brown Do For You?

January 19, 2017 By Jay Brooks

For our 120th Session, our host will be Joe Tindall, who writes The Fatal Glass of Beer. For his topic, he’s chosen Brown Beer, which sounds simple enough, but I’ll just let Joe explain what he means:

The colour brown has certain connotations, some of which I won’t dwell on. But used in reference to beer, it can signify a kind of depressing old fashioned-ness – to refer to a traditional bitter as ‘brown’ seems to suggest it belongs to a bygone corduroy-trousered era. As breweries who pride themselves on their modernity focus on beers that are either decidedly pale or unmistakably black, the unglamorous brown middle ground is consistently neglected.
So for Session 120, let’s buck the trend and contemplate brown beer. This might be brown ale, or the aforementioned English bitter; it could be a malty Belgian brune, a dubbel or a tart oud bruin; even a German dunkel might qualify.

In mid-2015, I was Thinking About Beer Color, so it could be fun to restrict that to just one family of color, the browns. There certainly are a lot of beers that fit into that range. What’s your take on the narrow band on the beer color rainbow. To participate in February’s Session, on or before Friday, February 3, 2017, post your thoughts on what brown has done for you. Just comment on the original announcement or via Twitter. Joe’s Twitter handle is @FatalGlass.

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Liberty IPA

January 10, 2017 By Jay Brooks

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When Anchor’s Liberty Ale was first released in 1975, few people knew what to make of it, and in the intervening years, I’ve heard debates on both sides about whether or not it’s a pale ale an IPA or something else altogether. Certainly it was the first beer to be brewed with Cascade hops. But Anchor seems to have an answer at last to that eternal question with the announcement today that they’re releasing a new beer, Liberty IPA, based on the original Liberty Ale. The press release is below, but all you need to know is in this sentence. “Liberty IPA is Anchor’s reimagining of the craft beer classic Liberty Ale, envisioned through the lens of today’s IPAs.”

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Today, Anchor Brewing Company announces the release of Liberty IPA™, a bold and modern twist on an original craft classic, Liberty Ale.
Like its predecessor, Liberty IPA (6.3% ABV) is made with two-row pale malt and Cascade hops. It is the combination of Cascade with new hop varieties—Nelson Sauvin and El Dorado—that creates the mouthwateringly complex and robust aromas of pine and citrus in this crisp, American-style IPA.
“Liberty IPA is a revolutionary brew—reimagined,” said Anchor Brewmaster Scott Ungermann. “The beer is a bright straw golden color and boasts aromas of dank and resinous pine up front, with bold citrus and grapefruit notes on the back end. You can really taste the assertive bitterness, with hints of a light biscuit malt base and a smooth, dry finish. Liberty IPA is a celebration of the Cascade hopped IPA’s that Anchor first popularized back in 1975 and remain at the forefront of American craft beer trends.”
Liberty IPA is Anchor’s reimagining of the craft beer classic Liberty Ale, envisioned through the lens of today’s IPAs. Liberty Ale was first brewed in 1975 to celebrate the 200th anniversary of Paul Revere’s midnight ride, and was the first American IPA brewed after prohibition. This revolutionary forerunner of the modern IPA introduced America to the Cascade hop and the nearly lost art of dry-hopping, a steeping process to infuse beer with bold hop aromas.
Taking cues from the original Liberty Ale packaging, the newly designed Liberty IPA label features the bald eagle, a symbol of strength and freedom.
Liberty IPA is available starting January 2017 nationwide for a limited time in 6-pack bottles and on draught at select bars, restaurants, and stores as well as at the Anchor Brewing Taproom in San Francisco.

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Getting Comfortable With Discomfort

December 20, 2016 By Jay Brooks

For our 119th Session, our host will be Alec Latham, who writes Mostly About Beer …. For his topic, he’s chosen Discomfort Beer, by which he means a beer which initially tasted funny, or odd, or off, or something, but which later became a favorite. Or maybe it didn’t. I’m not sure if I’m explaining that very well, so I’ll just let Alec take over and describe what he means:

What was your first ever taste of beer like? For me, it was like chilled copper coins mixed with tonic water and was disgusting. This is a process us committed beer drinkers can revisit every time we try something new.
A few years ago, I visited a pub in Pimlico called the Cask and Kitchen. There was a beer called Wild Raven by Thornbridge Brewery. Making assumptions based on the title, I ordered a pint as I love stout. I remember opening the sluices and then seizing up. Something wasn’t right. It had the chocolatey flavour of a stout but there was an intruder – lemon rind hissed in my nostrils and tainted my palate. Citrus grappled with the roast malt. Was it supposed to taste like this? Was it infection? Detergent? I spent some time staring at the floor in a suspended double-take.
That was my first ever Black IPA and at the time I wasn’t sure. Initially, I didn’t like it but whilst deciding whether or not to return it to the bar I kept giving it the benefit of the doubt. The dislike diminished. The acceptance grew. The pint gradually drained.
Black IPA is now one of my favourite styles but it could have gone the other way.
And does a Black IPA still get me blinking at the floor in a state of disquiet? No. Neither does the astringent character of Brett nor the dry bite of Lambic. All styles have been comprehensively “locked in”. Ultimately, familiarity devours discomfort.
For Session 119 I’d like you to write about which/what kind of beers took you out of your comfort zones. Beers you weren’t sure whether you didn’t like, or whether you just needed to adjust to. Also, this can’t include beers that were compromised, defective, flat, off etc because this is about deliberate styles. It would be interesting to see if these experiences are similar in different countries.
I think this could be a good archive for people researching fads, the origins of styles and the dearths of others – but especially how new ones were initially perceived.
Over the past year I’ve had a black barley wine, a braggot, a rye wine, a seaweed and cloudberry Gose, a beer made with Saki yeast and several made with Champagne yeast. I’ve sipped stout with Tonka beans, drank mulled lager and many tea beers – some with the tea complementing the hops – others completely replacing them. This has also been a year where 9 ABV hop-forward beers have become standard (from the UK perspective).
Some of the above I loved, others I liked and some I hated. What remains to be seen is which will catch on and which are just brief social media cameos.

So start thinking about that new beer or new take on a familiar beer that made you wonder. Did you come around to it? Or did it stay as questionable as the first sip and never seemed like a good idea in the end? Did you react the same as others or is just something that you never came around on?

To participate in January’s Session, on or before January 6, 2017, post your comforting thoughts about discomfort beer and leave your URL to the link at the original announcement. Now that won’t cause any discomfort, will it? The only way you can be wrong, is to not participate.

Benefit For Pete’s Sake At Spartan Stadium In San Jose

November 14, 2016 By Jay Brooks

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You may not have heard the name of Peter Cogan. He’s not a household name, not a rock star brewer and does not make a point of making sure people know who he is. He just does his job, and makes things happen. Born in England, Peter has been helping promote the beer scene in the South Bay as long as anybody can remember and has been working for Hermitage Brewing and the Tied House in Mountain View since 1990. He also helped launch the beerfest there, one of the biggest and most important early Bay Area beer festivals.

Peter Cogan, from the Tied House
Peter Cogan in 2009.

So what does that have to do with a beer festival on November 19 called “For Pete’s Sake?” Well, recently Peter was diagnosed with cancer, specifically lymphoma, and is undergoing chemotherapy treatment to beat back his cancer. For Pete’s Sake is a benefit to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS), and also for Peter. Take my word for it, Peter is a great person and if there’s any stranger you help this year, let it be him. But besides a great cause, it should be a great time, too.

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Your ticket includes admission to see the San Jose Spartans play Air Force in college football, plus a beer festival with unlimited samples from at least twenty local breweries. This all takes place on Saturday, November 19, 2016 at Spartan Stadium, located at 1257 South 7th Street, CEFCU Stadium, in San Jose. The brewfest starts and 2:30 PM and lasts for four hours, until 6:30 PM. Then at 7:30 PM, the game kicks off, and you’ll have a seat on the 50 to 30 yard line. Tickets are $40 in advance, and $50 on the day of the event. Tickets are available online. Use the promo code “FORPETESSAKE2016.” Visit the For Pete’s Sake Brewfest webpage for all of the details.

So even if you’ve never met Peter, if you’ve ever enjoyed a craft beer in the Bay Area, you probably owe him at least a small debt of gratitude. And what better way to thank him then to attend a beer festival and drink some more beer and have a great time. Is that too much to ask? Let’s all help Peter beat cancer.

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Peter, with Steve Donohue, now with Santa Clara Valley Brewing, at the 21st Celebrator Anniversary Party.

More, More, More … How Do You Like it? The Future Of Beer

October 27, 2016 By Jay Brooks

For our 117th Session, our host will be Csaba Babak, who writes the British beer blog Beer Means Business. For his topic, he’s chosen More, More, More, by which he’s asking us all to “paint a collective picture of what the future related to beer will be like.” To explain more fully what that means, I recommend pushing play on the song below, “More, More, More,” by the Andrea True Connection, and then reading what he has to say.

Here’s his full description of the topic:

I have always been obsessed with asking what happens next or what is still ahead instead of simply embracing what is in the present. Ever since I heard about Beer Blogging Fridays, I have been toying with the idea of hosting a Session to paint a collective picture of what the future related to beer will be like.
This month, Beer Means Business has the honour to host The Session and to make this happen. The final picture of Beer Future will be based on what you think we will see MORE of.
Over the last 10 years, numerous topics have been presented and the bloggers who discussed them expressed a rich diversity of perspectives or specific areas of interest. Therefore, I refrain from giving you further ideas or examples. There are no limits in time, space or nature either. I would like you to let your imagination free, and capture ONE thing you think we will see MORE of with an explanation of the idea.

So grab your crystal ball, and start pondering on your prognostication, so next week you can begin pontificating.

Here’s Csaba’s instructions on how to participate in November’s Session. “To participate and leave your stroke of brush in the painting of Beer Future, please publish a post with your contribution on Friday, 4th November [or before] and comment on [his announcement] post with the permalink to it.”

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