I read with disdain in the April/May, 2008 Northwest Brewing News in an article in The Business of Beer Section by Rick Lyke that a group of Utah Republican state legislators is considering sponsoring a bill that would prohibit grocery stores from selling cold beer assuming that it would cut down on people walking in, buying a cold six pack, getting into a car and drinking and driving. Hey, now there’s a thought! It’s a stupid one, but it’s a thought. Indeed, it may deter some drinking and driving, but it’s more likely to deter people from shopping for beer at that locale if they want beer they can convey a couple of blocks down the street to their house and enjoy it there, immediately and cold. What I fear more is the obvious damaging effect that heat has on beer. It might not matter for mass produced beer, but craft beer is fragile and heat remains a big enemy leading delicate beers to premature degradation.
I recall arriving in
Not only is daylight harmful, but even the florescent light that bathes the product and highlights often flashy and attractive labeling has degrading effects. Marketing has also demonstrated that big stacks of beers in a store, out on the floor makes a store look full and vibrant in our thirsty minds’ eyes. End cap displays add a splash of design and color and often promote impulse buying. None of this is good for delicate beer, indeed a perishable product, but it’s not likely that much will change anytime soon.
There are some notable exceptions. High-end specialty stores that really care about their beer keep it refrigerated and use special lighting that isn’t as damaging as conventional and typical standard fluorescent or incandescent lighting. It’s an expensive and labor intensive venture. We don’t have any of those committed stores here in town. The Bottleworks in
Things aren’t horrific in
I was a little worried about how the energy situation in
Naturally, the brewery is operating as conservatively as possible while struggling to maintain normal output levels while going into a very busy summer tourist season. Unused lights, fixtures and appliances have all been scuttled. Beyond that, Alaskan is working with Alaska Electric Light & Power Company to help manage electrical load during peak periods during the day when the rest of the community is also
gobbling power. This has required some re-scheduling at the brewery, but these adjustments aren’t too painful. Finally, the brewery was recently visited by a senior scientist from the Energy Analysis Department at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. This guy is some sort of energy efficiency expert. He toured the brewery and was impressed at power utilization programs that were already in place before the avalanche, but that should be no surprise at Alaskan.
The big question is whether or not the cost of Alaskan beer is going to spike. It’s tough to tell at this point and of course the brewery is doing everything possible to prevent a cost increase, but if you do see the price go up, remember that the price of all beer is on the rise due to the current hop and malt crisis. Alaskan’s been around for 20 years; no avalanche is going to force them out of town so keep supporting them by purchasing and consuming their fine ales.
I thought that the Jalapeno Imperial IPA was all gone, but it’s showing up again around town. For sure, at least, it’s on at Humpy’s and Café Amsterdam. This is a second batch of beer; the first one was the one that was sent to the World Beer Cup in San Diego, but it’s the same basic beer than took a bronze medal in the fruit and vegetable beer category, so it’s a winner and worthy of your palate. Although the beer had been up here before, I didn’t get a chance to try it until my recent visit to Café Amsterdam. It’s actually a lot more subtle and balanced than a pepper-beer aversive beer drinker would expect. The abundant hop bitterness lends a slight cutting effect. The pepper essence is evident slightly in the taste and slightly in the heat. This is no napalm beer and would be good with a variety of foods.
On the event of my daughter’s wedding, my emergent craft beer-drinking son blew into town. There was a big fight over who got to go pick him up at the airport, and the future bride won. That was fitting, I suppose. But part of the deal was that he was to be immediately delivered to my “care” and I had him dropped off to my waiting arms and taps at Café Amsterdam. My son Scott actually has a bigger penchant for Belgian ale (specifically, Belgian tripels) than he does craft beer and Café provided a good mix. Some degree of beer sparing ensued, and although Chimay Cinq Cents ( a triple, one of my son’s favorite styles) was on tap, I talked him into local fare including Alaskan Brewing Company’s Summer Ale to begin with, followed by
From there, it was off to The Moose’s Tooth Pub and Pizzeria because no trip home would be complete for my son without good local pizza and beer. May’s First Tap beer is Rye’d Redjudice, a red rye beer that weighs in at 5.4 percent alcohol. The beer is somewhat malt forward and caramel-ly sweet in both aroma and flavor with some dusty-edged hop flavor and aroma. The yeast is also evident in the flavor along with rye’s dry, light tart contribution. I note a touch of diacetyl in the beer that finished clean and dry on the palate. This is a nice beer as we transition from spring to summer.
I also sampled the Moonlight Lager at the Tooth. This 5.7 ABV sports the use of
Oh, and word of warning: It’s summer and the tourists have started to descend on Anchorage, I think few people in the world haven’t heard of the Moose’s Tooth, so the place is undeniably packed most of the hours it’s open. The season hasn’t hit with full force yet, but it’s coming. Kudos to the Tooth staff and especially the dedicated and hard working servers who still manage to maintain a welcoming attitude despite a huge amount of adversity and sometimes less than cordial clientele. Plan ahead and be prepared to wait for a table, and when you finally get seated, understand that it’s not the Tooth’s fault that they’re so popular.
My son told me that where he lives (
Back to the wedding. There’s nothing worse than being trapped in a venue that doesn’t understand beer. My daughter got married at the Marriott and had contracted with the catering folks to provide a bar with beer and mixed drinks. She stipulated that she would provide each attendee with two drinks and it would be pay as you go after that. I waited until the day of the wedding to nix that against her wishes and pledged to pay for an open bar. So far, so good. But the bar didn’t officially open until after the formal wedding part and I was reduced to going downstairs to the bar on the ground floor. Ms. Fermento opted for a gin and tonic and I got an Alaskan Summer. Total cost: $13.50. It’s enough to drive a man to drink…water. When the reception bar opened, .bBeer selections included your standard schwag, and given the younger crowd in attendance, this wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Selections included Budweiser, a couple of light selections, Heineken and Alaskan Amber. Tubs were positioned in the bar area and warm cases of bottled beer were opened and set in the tubs and ice poured on top. At the rate at which the beer was being consumed, this translated into the coldest beer I got being lukewarm. There just wasn’t enough time on the ice to chill the beer and new beer kept being mixed in with the stuff that had been bathing for a while. I was never once offered a glass to drink the beer out of and the bartender had a totally cavalier attitude about the whole thing. What does one do? My complaints fell on deaf ears.
I had lunch with Marty Compton, formerly of Alaska Distributors and now Sales Manager at Bell’s Brewery, Inc in
His recent visit was too short to accommodate a big get together. He’s doing great in his new position and was positively bubbling over during our engagement at Café Paris earlier this week. For those keeping score at home,
In fact, Ed Cowger of the Brown Jug Liquor Store on 88th and Old Seward inquired with Magic Hat recently about getting some beer up here. He got a great, albeit realistic response:
“Our beer will be in
I wonder if outside entities asking for our homespun darling
How did you celebrate your 21st birthday? Can you remember? I can’t. It wasn’t that important because I was already an aficionado of fine beers by then (by a number of years, I’ll admit). If you’re brewery, you do something special. Full Sail Brewing Company turns 21 this year and to commemorate the event, started a new line called the “The Brewer’s Share.” Small batch brewing defines the line. The line came about because so many ideas bubbled up that each of the brewers in the plant was given the chance to make their own beer for the
event. Full Sail lead brewer Barney Brennan actually came up with the name of the series. “There is that mysterious portion that vanishes from a barrel during aging that brewers refer to as the ‘angels share’ that led me to ‘Brewer’s Share,” an equally mysterious offering that appears during inspiration,” he said. Brennan’s beer is called Extra Special Barney and if you couldn’t guess, it’s an ESB. Each brewer will take his or her turn at the kettle and a new beer will be release approximately once very six weeks. The fun part is that no one’s going to know what the next one is until it’s released. This will keep local crowds thirsty. Unfortunately for us northerners (or anyone else outside of the proximity of
While on the subject of birthdays, one of the gifts I received on my 50th birthday was a bottle of Morimoto Imperial Pilsner from Rogue Brewing Company. The Morimoto series of beers are part of the brewery’s Signature Ale Series of beers. The series was launched in September of 2003.
The beer pours a slightly hazy golden/orange in the glass. The head rocks up with an alluring white foam that sticks and laces nicely throughout the sample. The aroma is clean, malty and almost vanilla-like. Refined, floral hops accent the sniff and just a hint of yeast pushes through in this incredibly clean-smelling beer. The 8.8 percent alcohol is also evident. Morimoto is bold in both alcohol and hop bitterness, but it’s not IPA-like. The 74 IBUs are propped up nicely by the significant malt underpinnings. Absent is the ale fruitiness which lets the slightly citric, almost background hop flavor emerge. The beer’s 100 percent French pilsner malt, 100 percent
Are you interested in a position with a forward-thinking, aggressive, globally positioned brewing company? And, would it interest you
that not all of the positions involve shoveling out a mash tun or actually making beer? A good friend of mine,
Corporate Capacity Planning Manager
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Sales Intern
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Brewer III
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Brewer II
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Director of Financial Planning and Analysis
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Geographic Marketing Rep - S. CA
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Lead Packaging Operator
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Sr. Staff Accountant
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Sr. Financial Analyst
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Pricing Manager
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Packaging Operator
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Warehouse
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On-Premise Key Account Manager- Southern California
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Region Sales Manager- Dallas, TX
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Here’s the Humpy’s line up earlier in the week. I’m late in posting this week’s rant by about three days, so expect some inconsistencies here…
Wheats / Fruits
Moose’s Tooth Wild Country Raspberry Wheat
Sleeping Lady Chocolate Cherry Wheat
Pyramid Apricot
Pyramid Hefeweisen
Lindemans Framboise ####
Celestial Clarity Mead
Served in an 8 oz glass for $11.25
Golden Ales / Pilseners /
Alaskan Summer Kolsch
Midnight Sun Goldstrike Kolsch
Harp Lager *
Kronenbourg 1664 Lager *
Stella
Pale Ales / E.S.B.’s (medium hop bitterness)
Alaskan Pale Ale
Moose’s Tooth Polar Pale Ale
Kona Fire Rock Pale Ale
Humpy’s Sockeye Red by Midnight Sun
Moose’s Tooth Fairweather I.P.A.
Big Sky I.P.A.
Full Sail Slipknot Imperial I.P.A. * (7.8%)
Great Divide Hercules Double I.P.A. # (9.1%)
Stone’s Arrogant Bastard Ale
Belgian Ales
Blue Moon Belgian White Wheat Ale
Rodenbach Flemish Sour Red Ale ###
Strong Belgian Ales (Alcohol by Volume over 7.5%
Midnight Sun Big Fish Winner Triple # (9%)
Midnight Sun Mars Belgian
Imperial Red I.P.A. ## (8.7)
Brasserie Dupont Avec les Bons Voeux #### (9.5%)
Chimay Cing Cents Triple ##### (8%)
Delirium Tremens #### (8.5%)
Liefmans Lucifer Belgian Golden ####(8.4%)
St Feuillien Belgian Triple ##### (8.5%)
Unibroue Trois Pistols ## (9%)
Barley Wine
Sierra Bigfoot Barley Wine # (9.6%)
Stone Old Guardian Barley Wine ## (11.26)
Amber Ales / Bocks / Dopplebocks / Scottish
Alaskan Amber Ale
Midnight Sun Oosik Amber
Mac Tarnahan’s Scottish Ale
Pike St. Kilt Lifter Scotch Ale
Baron Liberator Dopplebock # (8.5%)
Brown Ales
Midnight Sun Kodiak Brown Ale
Full Sail Nut Brown Ale
Porters / Stouts
Anchor Steam Porter
Deschutes Black
Rogue Mocha Porter
Full Sail Imperia Stout * (8%)
Guinness Stout ***
Seasonal Ales
Elysian Bifrost
Alaskan Jalapeno Imperial I.P.A. * (8.2%)
Rogue Chipotle Ale
Dr Fermento Beer Calendar
05/16/08
05/16-17/08 Andrew Mellon Auditorium (D.C.) Savor Craft Food and Beer Event Sessions $85.00
05/23/08
05/23/08 S.E.
05/23/08
05/23/08
05/24/08 SE Alaska Fairgrounds Great
05/24/08 Great Northern Brewers Annual GNBC House Crawl Noon $30.00
05/25/08 Pelican (
05/30/08
06/06/08
06/13/08 Great Northern Brewers Brew Club
07/12/08 Silver Gulch Brewing Company E.T. Barnette Homebrew Judging 10:00 am Free

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