"I request that a copy of the following documents containing the following information be provided to me: all information including created recipes or instructions relating to the brewing of White House Honey Ale or other beer made by White House Staff...", Cont.

The White House releases the recipe for their brew.



(h/t: DW)

"I request that a copy of the following documents containing the following information be provided to me: all information including created recipes or instructions relating to the brewing of White House Honey Ale or other beer made by White House Staff..."

"Also, if you could send me a copy autographed by the President, you'd be the coolest FOIA officer in the whole federal government, and who could resist that title?"

Language used in the official Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.

(h/t: GovExec)

Are There Other Heroes of Craft Brewing?

Jim Fallows of The Atlantic shows his admiration for Jim Koch - not just for his beer but also for his approach to initial public offerings (IPOs) when Boston Beer Company hit the New York Stock Exchange in the mid 90's. The beauty of what Koch did, he says, was that:

"The heart of his idea was giving actual customers -- people who loved his beer -- a favored place in line for IPO shares, and a bargain price."

Everyone, by now, has heard about some of Facebook's IPO beneficiaries - not exactly institutional investors. But Koch, New York Times writer Jeff Sommer explains, was quite different:

"He sold shares at two prices. Some went to his customers, who, in a startling reversal, got a better deal than Wall Street insiders: $15 a share for the customers, versus $20 for those who bought at the opening price in a public offering run by Goldman Sachs."

Then, something fantastic happens... Fallows receives and filters a surge of comments from his beer enthusiast readers. Some want Fallows to expand on his idea of the "Hall of Beer Heroes":

"Don't forget Fritz Maytag on your list of heroes! He single-handedly saved a  classic beer style from extinction, and was the first to introduce what we now think of as American Pale Ale. A great modern-brewing pioneer!"

One reader expresses a much more political perspective. They write:

"I personally know of 3 people who began home brewing when [President Jimmy Carter] sparked the legislation that made home brew legal. One of these people ... is a commercial brewing concern now! One of several here in the greater Springfield, MA area."

I'd like to think that one day writers will look on with admiration at the good folks at DC Brau (Brandon Skall and Jeff Hancock), Three Stars (Mike McGarvey and Dave Coleman), Chocolate City (Ben Matz, Jay Irizarry, Brian Flanagan, and Don Parker), or Hellbender (Patrick Mullane and Ben Evans, whom I've profiled).

Those people are making their mark in a town that isn't really revered for its own indigeneous booze production - yet.

Who would you put into a "Hall of Beer Heroes"?

"This convenience store may be the oddest place in North America to enjoy some of the best beers around -- a quirky testament to Seattle's redoubled passion for the frothy stuff..."

"Convenience stores occupy a strange niche in our landscape. We're always grateful for them when we need them -- that midnight run for smokes, or cough syrup, or overpriced milk for the baby. Yet who doesn't feel a small relief to escape their racks of porn and their late-night flourescent melancholy? You don't linger at the mini-mart. Their whole raison d'être is speed: You get in, you get out.

That's why perhaps the most interesting thing about Super Deli Mart isn't the beer at all, but what beer has wrought: community."

Off to Europe... See You Next Year!

I'm off to Paris, France and Bad Ischl, Austria for the holidays with Nic. When I return, I'm sure to have plenty of material to cover from my trip (as well as some items I meant to report about before my trip). Hopefully, I'll be drowning in great French wine and traditional Austrian beer.

In the meantime, if you're interested in what I'm up to you can follow me on Twitter. I hope to dispatch a few tweets, if not several, while I'm in the old world - particularly when I'm in Paris. 

Au Revoir and Auf Wiedersehen!

A FIRST LOOK: Hellbender Brewing Company Breaks into D.C.'s Craft Beer Scene

Image: Hellbender

Church had let out and cars began filling Florida Avenue in Northeast Washington D.C. as I walked up to Patrick Mullane’s apartment. 

I could see water was boiling in a giant pot outside his door and NFL football sounded from the television inside. 

Patrick poked his head out and smiled.

“Perfect timing” he said. “I’m just about to pour the grains into the lautertun. I could use your help.”

I rolled up my sleeves. I wasn't expecting to do manual labor but this was a visit with one of The District’s newest breweries, Hellbender Brewing Company, and I considered it a privilege to make beer with them.

The brewery, which goes public this coming week before Thanksgiving, will be the fourth that I tallied within the capitol city's limits. 

Patrick and his business partner, Ben Evans, who've lived in D.C. for around two decades combined, began the endeavor.

Since DC Brau hit the scene earlier this year, The District has been on the threshold of a local craft beer explosion. 

Emerging from this local brew revival are other businesses like Chocolate City, and Three Stars - each attempting their own distinct beer making philosophy and style.

Hellbender's first beer release will feature three flagship products – a Kölsch (ABV 5.1%), an IPA (AVB 7.2%), and a Red Ale (ABV 6%). 

They also plan on doing seasonal brews similar to a pumpkin ale I had helped Patrick make when visiting his Northeast D.C. apartment.

Why did Hellbender choose a Kölsch style as one of their products? For one thing, there are not many Kölsch beers in this city. 

Ben and Patrick also feel like many of the products out there either miss the mark or are weak imitations of the traditional German Kölsch.

So DC Is Making Beer Now! But Wait... Why Aren't We Getting Cheaper Prices?, Cont.

Jeff Alworth of Beervana isn't so impressed with Tammy Tuck's City Paper piece, which I wrote about last week:

A magnum opus on beer pricing, and we come up with no real explanation. My guess is this: craft beer is in its novel, exotic phase in DC and there isn't a huge amount of competition. As a consequence, the small group of consumers who are supporting the local breweries are willing to shell out a huge premium on a price of beer. If the market were healthier, bigger, and more competitive, those prices would drop like a stone.

If that's true, it seems beer-loving Washingtonian entrepreneurs need to get to work opening up more breweries.

So DC Is Making Beer Now! But Wait... Why Aren't We Getting Cheaper Prices?

Tammy Tuck of City Paper tries to understand why the prices of local craft beers are so high in the District compared to notoriously expensive cities like San Fransisco:

"Ask craft-beer folks about prices and they tend to stress their product’s artisan quality. Of course you can find some cheaper swill, the logic goes. But it’ll be made with rice or corn instead of barley and other fine grains. A can of National Bohemian, for instance, will set you back just $3 at Smoke & Barrel—and a mere $2 at the Raven. To craft devotees, that’s like opting for a McDonald’s burger."

Ok, so good things cost money. But, surely it wasn't always like this, right?

"The modern craft beer movement began in California. Pioneering breweries, like Anchor and Sierra Nevada, have been in operation since the late ’70s and early ’80s, when lower-priced mass market brews set the tone for the industry. In contrast, D.C.’s beer scene came of age much later and grew out of the rising popularity of Belgian beers, which tend to fetch higher prices to begin with."

But what about the global brewing giants? It's not unusual for a mega-corporation to exert influence in the market. Tuck explains:

"Another big factor impacting the price of craft beer at the distributor level is the bigfooting influence of Big Beer [...] In other words, when the price of Blue Moon, a Coors product, goes up a buck, your beloved Bell’s Two Hearted Ale may suddenly suck up another one of your singles, too."

Ah, so maybe if we examine the distributor level of the business we can find some answers for consumers. What about them? Aren't they being a little greedy?

"Craft aficionados, of course, love to gripe about the middleman. And it makes sense: The distributor isn’t anyone’s beloved local beer bar, and he’s not anyone’s innovative craft brewer, either."

Unfortunately, the new wave of establishments that we love and which bring vitality to so many Washington D.C. neighborhoods may have a part to play in the price:

"every one of the complaints leveled against wholesalers and distributors could be leveled in other markets too. To understand D.C.’s price situation, it makes more sense to look at those snazzy, beer-focused taverns that have sprung up here over the past decade"

Not surprisingly, the upward trend ultimately rests on the consumers themselves:

"The District’s neighborhood politics—which make it very easy for local residents to get in the way of liquor licenses, adding new costs for retailers—also pushes prices above where they’d be elsewhere. Washington may have seen a gastro-pub population boom, but many of those births required tavern owners to hire pricey lawyers to navigate Advisory Neighborhood Commissions, who are able to wring sometimes costly concessions from new establishments. The overall effect also reduces competition."

As a former bartender at Tonic at Quigley's Pharmacy when they spent a year struggling for a liquor license, I had a window into the political side of all this. DC's ostensibly grass-roots neighborhood governing system presented more than a few hurdles for Tonic's owners in 2008. 

And while few people openly complain, there have been comments made mostly by tourists and out-of-towners in Tonic about the cost of fare and booze seeming a bit excessive. But what are the owners going to do when they have more than a year's worth of legal bills?

Hopefully, I'll be able to bring a little more perspective on the District's growing beer industry in the coming months. Stay tuned.

MxMo: The White Trash Mimosa

For July's MxMo, Cocktail Virgin Slut is graciously hosting this month's theme: beer cocktails. And while I'm sure everyone else is fashioning a well-crafted cocktail that involves some ingenious method of incorporating beer, I'm going shamelessly low-brow.

Despite this cocktail's empty calories, obvious lack of nutritional value and convenience-food quality, the general response from imbibers is that its delicious. The recipe is simple and the ingredients are available in most major supermarkets.

As a result, many customers who became fans of the drink have returned to my bar to boast that they now make them at home. Who am I to second guess the satisfaction of a customer?

The Background

Sometime between December 2007 and January 2008, a new bar in Foggy Bottom, Washington D.C. called Tonic at Quigley’s Pharmacy won approval to serve alcohol by the Advisory Neighborhood Commission (ANC).

But the approval was initially only for beer and wine. Spirits would not come to the bar until approximately four months later.

At the time, Tonic's management decided to create a set of beer and wine cocktails (or “mocktails”). One drink, which apparently sprung from one of the twisted minds working there, soon became an unlikely outlier. Its name seemed to come from a familiar scenario; a snarky comment that sticks and becomes the best possible cocktail name.

The White Trash Mimosa

- Miller High Life "The Champagne of Beer" (get it!)

- concentrated Tang

- ice

Glassware: pint glass

First, I'd advise mixing a little water into some Tang powder to make a concentrated syrup. Add ice to the pint glass. Add either a spoonful or a couple ounces of concentrated Tang to the glass depending on your desired level of sweetness. Fill with the champagne of beer. Lightly stir (the glass can get very sudsy). I added an orange peel for garnish. Enjoy.

Note: This post has been revised since its original publication.

Three Words: Free. Beer. Fountains.

Do we have anything like this in the United States? If so, get me there straight away.

(emphasis added)

"One of the highpoints of the Bavarian Beer Week is the opening day, the Bavarian Beer Day, when the Bavarian Brewers Federation dispenses free beer to the public from a specially designed open-air beer fountain in front of the Federation’s 'Brewers House' in downtown Munich."

 (Hat tip: reddit)

So This Happened Today...

Sláinte!

Good for Ollie Hayes Pub. Reddit has the entire Ireland trip.

The Menu of Music: A Response

Harness Your Kim Chi recently wrote a blog post detailing a menu of music to accompany a full course dining experience. She challenged me (ok more like... politely suggested), via Twitter, to come up with music to go with the aperitif and digestif. Very well.

But I'm going to do her one better. I'm going to match her entire menu with my own picks. However, I am also going to pair a tasty alcoholic beverage for the dishes.

Here we go...

Aperitif (I actually had no idea amuse-bouche was a one-bite spoiler. It was always just a funny sounding word to me, like "bouillabaisse" or "couscous").
Drink: Campari and tonic with a squeeze of lemon.
Music: The Dears - "Omega Dog"
I know we haven't even gotten our trousers off yet. But I'm not afraid to start off guns blazing.

Appetizer (or to you Frenchmen, "the entree")
Drink: Pimm's Cup.
Music: Broken Bells - "Vaporize"
Appetizers are fun. And so is James Mercer. Seriously, I met him in Baltimore after a show at Ram's Head Live! and he was rad.

Main Course 
Drink: Racer 5 IPA.
Music: Little Dragon - "Feather"
You want meat? I'll give you meat. You want umami? I got your umami.

Dessert
Drink: Ramos Gin Fizz. The secret to this one is you got to take the spring off the strainer and throw it into the shaker. When shaken, the spring acts like a whisk to the cream and the egg. Mixes quickly and nicely.
Music: Born Ruffians - "What to Say" 
It's got sprinkles. 

Digestif
Drink: The Macallan 10 year Sherry Oak (cask strength).
Music: Erykah Badu - "I Want You" 
Don't worry, Erykah will get you home and put you to bed. And you just might wake up the next morning with no pants.

Meet the beer that has an ABV at 41%

It's called Sink the Bismarck. One bottle just might render you unfit to drive.

Sink the Bismarck! from BrewDog on Vimeo.

And I want one.

(hat tip: Daily Mail)

Congratulations to Churchkey

Express Night Out listed Churchkey in their Best of 2010 beer list.  Congratulations to my friend Erik Bergman, the general manager of Churchkey, and his staff for the well-deserved recognition.

Current Events: California Beer & Beverage Distributors v. California Proposition 19

True story.

Question: Is it shocking to see opposition from the California Beer & Beverage Distributors?  What's the significance of the support from microbrew companies?  What does the cigarette industry think about the possibility of a new kid on the block? 

Meet Fritz Maytag

Owner of Anchor Brewing Company.