Pic(k) of the Week: Hop-Pickers' Lunch

Beer gardens in America are actually beer patios, to paraphrase Greg Kitsock, editor for Mid-Atlantic Beer News.

Ah, but here, pictured near summer's end, here is a real beer garden.

Hogs Back Brewery's chairman Rupert Thompson gives a final look over lunch for his hop pickers, the table set amid mature Farnham White Bine hops in the brewery's hopyard. This year's harvest was the first of that hop variety, in its native soil of Surrey, "since the last bines were grubbed up 85 years ago."

Sixty and more years ago the hops would have been picked by travellers and other itinerant workers: today it’s students, earning some late summer holiday money before returning to college. This can cause problems: the hops have to be picked when the workforce is available to pick them, and Rupert and his team say that one of the things they have discovered since planting their own hops is that the cones often have the best flavours and aromas later in the year than many hop farmers would be harvesting them.

— Hopping down in Surrey

Martyn Cornell

Zythophile

9 September 2016.

United Kingdom ---> England ---> southeast England ---> Surrey ---> Guildford ---> Tongham ---> Hogs Back Brewery.

Lupulin's majesty; bucolic repast; labor's reward. I've re-posted the photograph with kind permission from Martyn Cornell, all rights reserved.

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Cask Ale Week 2016, but “only in pubs, only in Britain.”

Cask-conditioned 'real ale' appears to be an endangered afterthought in a lot of the United States. And even when it does appear, it's often not as truly 'cask-conditioned,' but merely as uncarbonated beer in a cask with cocoa-puffs and dingleberries tossed in, or other ephemera, willy-nilly.

Of course, that's a generalization, but only because it often is the reality.

In the United Kingdom, however, that is not so. There, Cask Ale Week begins today, an eleven-day week, "celebrating Britain's national drink," continuing through 2 October, but "only in Britain, only in pubs."

To learn more:

• Go to the website: caskaleweek.co.uk
• Read the Cask Report, produced annually since 2007, a summary of the cask ale market in the U.K.
• The Great American Beer Festival, since its initial iteration in 1982, has NEVER recognized cask-conditioned ale as a category. The Great British Beer Festival, first held in 1977, ONLY judges beers in cask-conditioned form.

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Don't take away my beer pie, Google!

Google giveth; Google taketh away.

I write YFGF on the Blogger platform, supplied by Google. By the end of the month, Google will be 'deprecating' its —gasp— nine-year-old Google Feed API.

In plain English, that means that, in a few days, linked searches and the slideshow of all those pretty photos at Flickr will be disappearing from this blog's side panel. (The photos themselves will remain at Flickr — a service of the incredible shrinking Yahoo— and the search function will remain viable, but searching only for things written in the blog itself.) Oh, well.

But please, Google. Don't deprecate take away my beer pie.

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Clamps & Gaskets: News Roundup for Weeks 35/36, 2016.

A bi-weekly, non-comprehensive roundup
of news of beer and other things.

Weeks 35/36
28 August - 10 September 2016

• 8 September 2016
  The first Star Trek episode was broadcast fifty years ago, today —8 September 1966— on NBC.
  —Via Rolling Stone.


• 8 September 2016
  Voracious Anheuser Busch-InBev outfoxes Heineken; snares ownership of Belgian 'craft' brewer Bosteels for $225 million.
  —Via Brewbound.


• 8 September 2016
  

  The art of brewing, the act of brewing, no matter what you’re doing, it’s a very repetitive, structured task at its most basic. It is this. You do this. And you do it every time, and you do it right every time. So regardless of the ingredients that are in that mash or in the kettle, it doesn’t really matter. Whether it be a Golden Ale or an IPA or an Imperial Stout, if you’re doing it and you’re crushing it every time and it’s great, and you’re maintaining that—what else do you need to satisfy your ego? There’s plenty of ego in the craft beer world. I don’t think we need to add any more to it.

  —Via John Kimmich, co-founder/owner/brewer, Vermont brewery, The Alchemist (as quoted at Good Beer Hunting).


• 7 September 2016
  Hops acreage is up 17 percent in Pacific Northwest, in 2016 over 2015, and 18.5 percent across the United States. This is the 5th consecutive year of growth for U.S. hops, which now amount for 40 percent of the global suply. The U.S. Department of Agriculture projects that a record 91.8 million pounds will be harvested in the Pacific Northwest alone, a 16 percent increase over 2015 (an increase of 13 million pounds).
  —Via Craft Brewing Business.


• 6 September 2016
  The DNA of kveik —the farmhouse beer yeasts of Denmark (and Lithuania)— and their complex composition and obscure genealogy.
  —Via Lars Marius Garshol, at Larsblog.


• 5 September 2016
  'Craft' beer sales grew 9.6 percent during the first half of 2016, which, while substantial, was 'craft' beer's smallest increase since 2004.
  —Via DRAFT Magazine.


• 4 September 2016
  According to the [U.S.] Brewers Association, "small and independent American craft breweries" create more than 424,000 jobs, with more than 115,000 jobs directly at breweries and brewpubs, including serving staff at brewpubs. All put, the 'craft' brewing industry contributes $55.7 billion to the U.S. economy. According to Nielsen, more beer is sold in the United States during the Labor Day holiday than during any other of the year
  —Via YFGF.



• 2 September 2016
  Launched on 5 August 2011 and achieving orbit of Jupiter on 5 July 2016, Juno is only the second spacecraft to ever orbit that planet and only the first solar powered craft to do so. “Its first glimpse of Jupiter’s north pole looks like nothing we have seen or imagined before.”
  —Via NASA.


• 31 August 2016
  Virginia wine sales were at a record 556,500 cases in fiscal year 2016 (which concluded 30 June), up 6 percent over 2015. Virginia cider sales were at 416,750 cases, up 52 percent. http://bit.ly/2bFkEnE #VAwine #VAcider
  —Via NBC 29.


• 31 August 2016
  103-year old South Carolinian woman says the secret to longevity is drinking beer. "Doctor's orders."
  —Via Thrillist.


• 31 August 2016
  IPA is the third most poured draft beer category in the United States, 2016 versus 2015, and the top 'craft' beer draft category. Pale Ales are down 22 percent over the same period last year.
  —Via BeerBoard (at Medium.com).


• 30 August 2016
  In a landmark decision with national implications, a Texas judge has found that beer distribution 'franchise' regulations are unconstitutional under Texas law.
  —Via Craft Brewing Business.


• 29 August 2016
  In 2010, aroma hops accounted for 8,100 acres in the U.S., 26 percent of the total U.S. hops acreage. Alpha hops —hops grown for their bittering potential— were the other 74 percent. In 2016, aroma hops were planted on more than 40,000 acres, accounting for 80 percent of all U.S. hop acres. That's a 393.87 percent increase in acreage. Total acreage devoted to all hops was also at an all-time high in 2016 in the U.S.: 51,000 acres.
  —Via [U.S.] Brewers Association.


• 28 August 2016
  Beginning during World War II, American breweries' advertisements campaigned to transform the image of beer from that of a working-class vice to that of a "wholesome American domestic pastime."
  —Via The Chronicle of Higher Education.


• 28 August 2016
  

  You're not a good brewer just because someone bought your beer. You're a good brewer when that customer finishes the beer and comes back to buy another.

  —Via Travis Tedrow , brewer at Washington, D.C. brewery, Gordon Biersh (as quoted at DC Beer).




• 26 August 2016
  Denis Holliday, head brewer of Eldridge Pope’s Dorchester brewery for nearly 30 years, and creator of Thomas Hardy Ale, a barleywine that, at 1.1 percent alcohol-by-volume, was for awhile the word's strongest beer, died at age 99, on 2 June 2016.
  —Via The Telegraph.


• 27 August 2016
  

  The potential scenario where, through acquisition of craft breweries and synergies of the mega-merger [Anheuser-Busch InBev purchasing SAB Miller], a single giant player could attempt to curb the craft beer movement from behind the scenes by reducing access to raw materials [e.g. hops, malt] and distribution channels is a legitimate fear in the craft industry.

  —Via Chris Herron, CEO and co-founder of Georgia brewery Creature Comforts, (as quoted at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution).


• 25 August 2016
  

  Please can we all remember that Pete's Wicked Ale went public on the NASDAQ on November 8, 1995 and rose 40% immediately. Petes was initially priced at $18 in the offering and closed at $25.25 at the end of the first day of trading. Today the brand doesn't exist. Doesn't even exist. Not kidding. Doesn't exist.
  
  These issues, I am certain, will only intensify as more breweries come online and capacity starts to outstrip demand, and distributors and retailers start to say 'no mas' on additional brands and SKUs. [...] Too many breweries creating a crowded marketplace, tap rotation nation, too much brewing capacity but not enough packaging capacity, too much bad/infected beer being produced, too much dusty old beer on the shelves, rampant pay-to-play, and big brewers aggressively getting into the game. Oh, and deep discounting: the biggest red flag in predicting a 1997 redux. [...]
  
  There will be more Pete's Wicked Ales, mark me. The reverse-tipping-point is here, or will be soon. And when times get tough and the craft pie is not growing even high or mid single digits anymore -- or, god forbid, FLAT -- people will get sharp elbows. It's already happening.
  
  Look, I was already armpit deep in the business in 1996-2000 when the last time this was happening in craft. Everybody now seems to hopefully say, 'This time is different.' From what I saw back then and what I see now, the only difference is people have more tatts. Even the beards are the same. And the blithe ignorance. They know what they know, but what they don't know, they assume doesn't exist.

  —Via Harry Schuhmacher, at Beer Business Daily.

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Pic(k) of the Week: Got Beer?

An Oktoberfest blast-from-the-past.

Here was Sweetness, the St. Bernard. Her name matched her temperament. Her flask, unfortunately, did not. It was empty.

On 4 October 2008, Sweetness was attending the 9th annual Capitol City Oktoberfest, hosted by the (wonderfully misspelled) Capitol City Brewing Company, in Arlington (Shirlington), Virginia. Then and there, alternate supplies of beer were, fortunately, ample.

Four thousand two hundred and forty miles away, the 2016 iteration of the world's original Oktoberfest begins today in Munich, Germany.

Normally, the party would run for sixteen days with the last day being the first Sunday in October. A celebration revision in 1990, however, ruled that if the 16th day of Oktoberfest falls before German Unity Day (3 October), Oktoberfest would continue until that holiday.

Thus, in 2016, Gemütlichkeit will flow for seventeen days during Oktoberfest.

Meanwhile, back in Arlington, Virginia...

The Mid-Atlantic Oktoberfest marks its 17th year, this year, on 1 October, with beers from more than sixty-five breweries.

For the first time, the festival, this year, will be included as a "marquee" event of DC Beer Week —a celebration of beer in the nation's capital and its environs. This is the 8th year for DC Beer Week; for the first time, the DC Brewers Guild will be its organizer. Putting its stamp on things, the guild has transferred the event from the heat and humidity of late August to the crisp weather of early autumn, 24 September through 1 October.

Again, Gemütlichkeit.

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Flag through the foliage

Fifteen years since 11 September 2001, remembering the heroes and the victims of that terrible day, the veterans of the war(s) that followed, and the soldiers killed since.

And the people of Afghanistan and Iraq.

And you, God's little flowers
May you blossom all around
So that my son
May sleep happily.

"Symphony of Sorrowful Songs"

Symphony No. 3, Op. 36

— Henryk Górecki, 1976.

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Pic(k) of the Week: #YeastNeverSleeps

On Labor Day Monday, the above photo was attached to the following tweet:

If you have the day off today, #LaborDay, keep in mind that #YeastNeverSleeps. Your local brewer is hard at work. pic.twitter.com/k0OmSuBJNY

— YFGF (@Cizauskas) September 5, 2016

As a scientific observation, #YeastNeverSleeps is not accurate. Yeast does 'sleep,' does go dormant. As a practical matter, however, the meme can be a truism at a working brewery. Yeast is always active, in various stages of fermentation and maturation, in the brewery's various tanks. Brewers must remain in attendance or on call.

The photo above was not taken on a holiday but on an early Friday evening in a brewery taproom. Customers (including the photographer) were there, after their work had concluded for the day and week, sipping beers. But the maker of those beers was yet at work.

At Eventide Brewing, in Atlanta (Grant Park), Georgia, on 26 August 2016.

Et factum est cerevisia. You get the point. #YeastNeverSleeps.

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Clamps & Gaskets: News Roundup for Weeks 33/34, 2016.

A bi-weekly, non-comprehensive roundup
of news of beer and other things.

Weeks 33/34
14 August - 27 August 2016

• 26 August 2016
  The Craft Brew Alliance (consisting of Widmer Brewing, Red Hook, Kona, Omission, Square Mile, and KCCO) signs agreement with Anheuser-Busch InBev to join the latter's distributon network, brew a substantial portion of its beers at Budweiser plants, and set qualifying offer terms should A-B IB, which already owns 31.5% of the consortium, move to purchase it.
  —Via Brewbound.


• 25 August 2016
  

  Rudy Van Gelder, perhaps the most influential recording engineer in the jazz genre,who brought to vivid life the sounds of such legendary artists as Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Herbie Hancock and Freddie Hubbard, has died at 91.

  —Via USA Today.



• 25 August 2016
  Cooking with 'spent' beer grains.
  • In the brewpub:
    —Via [U.S.] Brewers Association.
  • In the home kitchen:
    —Via Brooklyn Brew Shop.


• 25 August 2016
  The National Park Service is one-hundred years old, created on 25 August 1916. The first U.S. national park, Yellowstone, is older, created in 1872.
  —Via National Park Service.


• 25 August 2016
  'Craft' beer bubble: a 1997 redux?

  Please can we all remember that Pete's Wicked Ale went public on the NASDAQ on November 8, 1995 and rose 40% immediately. Petes was initially priced at $18 in the offering and closed at $25.25 at the end of the first day of trading.
  
  Today the brand doesn't exist. Doesn't even exist. Not kidding. Doesn't exist.
  
  These issues, I am certain, will only intensify as more breweries come online and capacity starts to outstrip demand, and distributors and retailers start to say 'no mas' on additional brands and SKUs.
  
  Too many breweries creating a crowded marketplace, tap rotation nation, too much brewing capacity but not enough packaging capacity, too much bad/infected beer being produced, too much dusty old beer on the shelves, rampant pay-to-play, and big brewers aggressively getting into the game. Oh, and deep discounting: the biggest red flag in predicting a 1997 redux.
  
  There will be more Pete's Wicked Ales, mark me. The reverse-tipping-point is here, or will be soon. And when times get tough and the craft pie is not growing even high or mid single digits anymore -- or, god forbid, FLAT -- people will get sharp elbows. It's already happening.
  
  Look, I was already armpit deep in the business in 1996-2000 when the last time this was happening in craft. Everybody now seems to hopefully say, 'This time is different.' From what I saw back then and what I see now, the only difference is people have more tatts. Even the beards are the same. And the blithe ignorance. They know what they know, but what they don't know they assume doesn't exist.

  —Via Harry Schuhmacher, at Beer Business Daily.[redacted slightly]


• 24 August 2016
  An earthquake of 6.2 magnitude strikes central Italy, killing 247.
  —Via CNN.


• 22 August 2016
  Jean "Toots" Thielemans, Belgian-born harmonica virtuoso and jazz composer, dies at 94.
  —Via Bloomberg.


• 22 August 2016
  

  Since 1990, [brewery] production has grown faster than the total brewery number. The one time this wasn’t true – the late 1990s and early 2000s, when the index of permits caught up with the index for production – we got a shakeout. [...] All signs point to a future with slower growth in demand. A slowdown isn’t a bubble bursting and what we won’t see is a cratering number of breweries.

  —Via [U.S.] Brewers Association.


• 20 August 2016
  The return of Stroh's Bohemian-Style Pilsner: NOT fire-brewed, NOT horizontally-aged, and NOT actually brewed by Stroh.
  —Via Detroit Free Press.


• 19 August 2016
  The Red Cross considers the floods which inundated Louisiana to be the worst natural disaster to strike the United States since Hurricane Sandy four years ago. More than 31 inches of rain fell in 15 hours; 13 people died.
  —Via CNN.


• 19 August 2016
  The state of Virginia gives a $500,000 performance-based grant to MillerCoors to assist with a $60 million expansion. The brewery says that its capital investment will create 27 additional jobs for Rockingham County in Virginia, where the plant is based.
  —Via WHSV-TV.



• 19 August 2016
  According to Gallup, 43% of Americans who drink alcoholic beverages choose beer; 32%, wine; 20%, liquor; 3% have no preference between the three; and 2% have "other" or no opinion. The percentage of Americans who do consume alcohol (~65%) has remained relatively steady since 1939.
  —Via Gallup.


• 18 August 2016
  Pumpkin beers are not always made with real pumpkins.

  The fall fruits don’t lend a ton of flavor to beer, so instead brewers rely on 'pumpkin spice'—a combination of cinnamon, cloves, and other pie-like flavors that conjure up the holiday season. When brewers do use pumpkin, it’s often canned or frozen. The fresh stuff isn’t in season until its too late to market and sell the beer.

  —Via Washingtonian.


• 17 August 2016
  Millenial 'craft' beer drinkers comprise 57% of 'craft' beer drinkers; Gen X-ers, 24%; aby boomers, 17%; "matures', 2%.
  —Via [U.S.] Brewers Association.


• 17 August 2016
  

  You can, arguably, buy a relatively good table wine for $12. But if you compare that to $12 and up for a craft beer six pack, beer is not such a great deal anymore.

  —Beer and whiskey writer Lew Bryson, at Charleston City Paper.



• 16 August 2016
  Is pH the new IBU of 'craft' beer?

  Brewing beer with the lowest pH is like making an IPA with the most IBUs.

  —American Sour Beers author Michael Tonsmeire, via Appellation Beer.


• 16 August 2016
  The state of California considers allowing its 42,000 hair salons to serve wine and beer on their premises, without standard on-premises alcohol license.
  —Via Steve Heimoff.


• 16 August 2016
  San Diego, California 'craft' brewery, Green Flash, announces that its new East Coast plant, in Virginia Beach, Virginia, will be opened on 13 November 2016. Green Flash joins three other west coast breweries with plants in Virginia: Stone Brewing (open in Richmond) and Deschutes and Ballast Point (the latter two to open soon near Roanoke).
  —Via The Full Pint.


• 14 August 2016
  The [U.S.] Brewers Association hosts a 5-course vegetarian dinner served with American 'craft' beers, in ... the United Kingdom.
  —Via Roger Protz.

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The fruit of the labor of brewers

These facts and figures are from last year, but you'll get the idea. On Labor Day, enjoy a beer produced for you by American laborers, or as you might call them, brewers.

• Overall, the beer industry contributes about $252.6 billion in economic output which is equal to about 1.5 percent of the U.S. Gross Domestic Product.
• Brewers and beer importers directly employ 49,576 Americans. More than 70 percent of brewing jobs are linked to large and mid-sized brewers and beer importers.
• The number of distributor jobs has increased by more than 20 percent in the last decade, to more than 131,307, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.
• Suppliers to the brewing industry – enterprises that manufacture bottles and cans, cardboard case boxes, brewing equipment or marketing displays, for example – generate more than $83 billion in economic activity and are responsible for more than 383,190 jobs alone.
• More than $48.5 billion in tax revenue is generated by the production and sale of beer and other malt beverages. This is equal to nearly 40 percent of the retail price paid for beer by consumers.

Beer Serves America

Beer Institute

July 2015.

According to the [U.S.] Brewers Association, "small and independent American craft breweries" create more than 424,000 jobs, with more than 115,000 jobs directly at breweries and brewpubs, including serving staff at brewpubs. All put, the 'craft' brewing industry contributes $55.7 billion to the U.S. economy. * Obviously, different metrics than those of the Beer Institute.

And what of that second 'tier' of the beer business, the wholesalers —the drivers who get up at 4 in the morning to get you your beer— much maligned in the 'craft' beer ambit?

• The beer distribution industry directly employs 135,000 people in the United States.
• When the impacts of distributor operations, capital investment and community involvement are considered, the total number of impact jobs exceeds 338,000.
• Beer distributors contribute a total of $70 billion in economic impact across the U.S.
• Beer distributor activities contribute nearly $13 billion to the federal, state and local tax bases. This does not include the nearly $11 billion in federal, state and local alcohol excise and consumption taxes.
• The beer distribution industry contributes more than $23 billion in transportation efficiencies for the beer industry each year.
• Beer distributor activities result in nearly $178 million in economic impacts to communities through support of charities, local events and economic development.

America’s Beer Distributors: Fueling Jobs, Generating Economic Growth & Delivering Value to Local Communities

National Beer Wholesalers of America (NBWA)

2015.

According to Nielsen, more beer is sold in the United States during the Labor Day holiday than during any other holiday of the year.† Thank you brewsters, brewers. et al.!

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Pic(k) of the Week: City scene with truck

A photo of an old truck doing double-duty as a signboard, with a little bit of after-the-fact green cross-processing. Heck, so many movies are off-colorized like this these days, then why shouldn't I join in the fun?

Photo originally taken in the East Atlanta neighborhood of Atlanta, Georgia, USA, on 26 August 2016.

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