Of course this would happen today.

Posted on May 14, 2012, 10:20 am by Jack Curtin

It’s the perfect dagger in the heart when I am stuck on a 30-plus hour no food / clear liquid only diet…

Storm King Monday
American Craft Beer Week at Victory Brewing Company
Monday, May 14 – All Day

We’re celebrating the first day of American Craft Beer Week with a 2003 vintage keg of Storm King Stout!
Explore the flavor transformation that Storm King has when paired with three distinct tapas.

Enjoy three taster glasses of the 2003 Storm King Stout. One for each dish. $20
1. buttery housemade angel hair pasta with carrot, zucchini and yellow squash threads
2. smoky bacon-wrapped pork tenderloin with garlic celeriac puree and parsley potato tuile
3. flourless chocolate cake with dark chocolate ganache and toasted almond tuile

*.3L servings of the 2003 Storm King will also be available for $8.

I most definitely blame Richard Ruch, from whom this most important information was obtained via his trademarked spam mail.

Go enjoy. Don’t worry about me.

Share SHARE
Posted in Beer Events, Breweries, Brewpubs | 1 Comment

A visit to Tired Hands.

Posted on May 13, 2012, 1:22 pm by Jack Curtin

I had planned to do a long item in the “Eastern Pennsylvania” column in the last Mid-Atlantic Brewing News (see previous post) about the opening of Forest & Main in Ambler and imminent opening of Tired Hands in Ardmore, but ran out of time and space so it will be in the next issue.

I did get to stop by at Tired Hands on April 27, though, and brought my camera along. This is the that nice Jean Broillet drawing me a sample of his 4.8% FarmHands Saison from the tanks in the Saison Dungen (Swedish word meaning “the grove”)…

Tired Hands has organized  things so that all the saisons are fermented in dish-bottom tanks in the cellar and all the American Ales are fermented in conical tanks on the first floor. “Each floor has its own yeast,” Jean says, laughing. He also has several barrels, some used for primary fermentation for the saisons, others to be used in aging beers for hand-bottling. There are eight barrels currently with another six to come.

Here’s a broader perspective of the dungen:

And here’s a shot of the first floor bar taken from the far end and looking back toward the large window at the front of the room…

I tried two additional beers while there: Fripp Special Bitter (4.6%) and Tactile Pale Ale (5.2%), rye-based and hopped with Citra, Centennial and Cascade. The latter is a version of what will be the flagship beer.

Share SHARE
Posted in Brewpubs, News | Leave a comment

Dead Tree Press alert (better late than never).

Posted on May 13, 2012, 12:32 pm by Jack Curtin

Back when you and I were young, I spent considerable time bitching and moaning that my corporate masters at the various brewspapers in which my deathless prose appears did not have the publications available on line. Thus it behooves me, now that we are older and, if not noticeably wiser, at least more seasoned, to always provide links to each issue as I have done for a while now.

This should really have been posted in April when the issues came out, but that was the stretch when The Great Silence descended upon Liquid Diet, two weeks and a day when nary a sound was heard from these quarters. Who among us can guess what that might have meant? Who among us really cares?

In any case, here is the April-May edition of Mid-Atlantic Brewing News. I wrote the cover story which begins on the left side there, beneath the barely decipherable artwork, a story about all the brewery construction and expansion going on in these parts. There’s a small sidebar to the story, which jumps inside to pages two and three; it appears at the top of page four. My regular “Eastern Pennsylvania” column begins on page 28.

I also got the cover of the April-May Ale Street News with a story about how beer drinkers are going daft for craft these days. It begins on page seven and jumps to page nine; there’s a sidebar on page ten about growlers and other methods to taking fresh beer home.

“Atlantic Ale Trail,” my regular column for Celebrator Beer News starts on page 45 in the April-May edition. It’s a long one and it begins and ends with a Victory.

I haven’t yet received hard copies of the latest New Brewer and American Brewer. the two trade magazines who also help support my lifestyle. but I know they are out.

New issues of MABN, ASN and Celebrator will arrive just before or during Philly Beer Week if the normal publication dates hold true; I’ll let know you.

Share SHARE
Posted in Beer Writing, Brewspapers | Leave a comment

Occupy the HOG (a Scoats production).

Posted on May 10, 2012, 4:35 pm by Jack Curtin

Allow me to go on the record early here than I will not be attempting to deal with the myriad events (and a few psuedo ones) that comprise Philly Beer Week. Same is true over at the Beer Yard calendar. That way lies madness and after couple of years of that, I am going to embrace sanity. The PBW people have a fine site set up where you can find out everything you want to know, including a daily calendar (which I plan to link to from the Beer Yard site every day). Plus you got your Twitter-y tweets, your Yelp-y yelps and, if you have the time and the inclination to plow through all the too-much-information posts, you Facebook thingy.

That said, when I am sent something clever or amusing or graphically pleasing enough to spruce up the neighborhood here, I am likely to embrace the opportunity. And so I have done in this instance.

Share SHARE
Posted in Philly Beer Week | Leave a comment

Help Wanted (with an attitude).

Posted on May 10, 2012, 4:16 pm by Jack Curtin

I’ve written many a time, here and in other venues, about how I damned near dropped the phone one day when Jack Joyce of Rogue Ales responded to my cliché-d “How are ya?” opening to an interview. His response: “Opinions differ.” I have stolen that and used it myself, shamelessly.

That same sort of wit is evidenced in this Craigslist ad for a manager for the Oregon brewery’s Astoria pub:

We have jobs — some existing, some new, for hard core unemployables who understand:

We believe “Job Security” is a myth, seniority is not fair. God gave us 1 mouth and 2 ears for a reason, win-win is a book title not a reality, the risk of insult is the price of clarity, thinking, problem solving, courage are more important than WPM or other computer skills, but we do have pet and legal insurance, 401K match, phantom plan, 2 paid holidays, bad health insurance like most others not paid for by us for Government staff, hurt feelings report.

We do not plan, budget, forecast, or waste time on getting bigger. We only wish to get better.

Failure is encouraged — Even if you suck at one position you may be perfect for another position within the company….

There’s lots more. Go read.

Share SHARE
Posted in Entirely Too Much Time on my Hands, Fun Stuff | Leave a comment

You say you never been to Philly Beer Week. For shame. Here’s your chance to maybe rectify that.

Posted on May 10, 2012, 3:43 pm by Jack Curtin

It’s almost time for Philly Beer Week (PBW),

held June 1 through 10, 2012.

Maybe you don’t live close, you haven’t booked a flight and once you get here, you don’t have a place to stay.  Well, do we have news for you.

Starting today, Thursday, May 10, through Thursday, May 17, beer lovers around the country can enter to win the

Southwest Airlines Dish Trip Contest to attend

Philly Beer Week

Arrive in the city of Brotherly Suds on Friday, June 1 and check into the luxurious, beer-loving Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia.  Then, head over to official kick-off of party of PBW – Opening Tap.

Next day, you’ll enjoy VIP entrance to the International Great Beer Expo followed by an evening to explore, at your leisure, endless beer events throughout the city.  Before you head home on Sunday, you’ll enjoy a Funky, Sour Beer Brunch at Jose Pistola’s.

You can find all the details on how to enter to win here -

http://www.blogsouthwest.com/blog/dish-trip-contest-philly-beer-week

NOTE: The above is taken directly from the official press release. I cut off the bottom portion to spare you the embarrassment of seeing their repeating that phony Ben Franklin “proof that God loves us” quote that any beer lover should know by now he never said. You can thank me later.

Share SHARE
Posted in Philly Beer Week | Leave a comment

Peggy, the video.

Posted on May 9, 2012, 8:55 pm by Jack Curtin

Share SHARE
Posted in Goat Races | Leave a comment

How Diageo tried to screw Brew Dog.

Posted on May 9, 2012, 12:37 pm by Jack Curtin

If you haven’t seen this story, check it out. It is astonishing that a huge corporate entity like Diageo could be so outright stupid. There will be repercussions, of course. Jenn Litz sums it up nicely in this morning’s Craft Business Daily:

The incident will no doubt fuel craft brewers already acute mistrust of large brewers, and shines a light on how important transparency is in this age of instant electronic media.

Share SHARE
Posted in News | 1 Comment

An update of a personal nature.

Posted on May 8, 2012, 8:31 pm by Jack Curtin

The management and staff of Liquid Diet has just now, at 8pm, finished consuming a growler of Sly Fox Peggy Maibock. This may not be surprising in that the same gang reported how impressed it was with this beer in a previous post, but it is still somewhat disturbing given that this has been achieved in rather brief stretch of time. There is also the fact that this particular beer clocks in at 6.6% and the management and staff etc. are still functioning quite well; this will likely incite the session beer crowd to finger-wagging, if not outright violence.

The management and staff etc. also feels compelled to say that it has fallen madly in love with Weyerbacher Merry Monk’s Ale in recent weeks. This too is not surprising, at least to those who are paying attention, because the management and staff etc. tends to have a passionate love affair with one Weyerbacher beer or another a few times every year.

The management and staff etc. is quite pleased with itself, having today knocked out two, count ‘em, two columns for print publications which are willing to compensate it for the effort. This may be but a temporary situation, however, as the management and staff etc. must on the morrow confront a 48-hour stretch in which it has to produce a major story on a topic so broad and unfocused that it has no idea what the story will be about.

The interesting thing about the management and staff etc. is that it relishes such situations and greatly appreciates the editor who has either been convinced or beaten down into accepting that the management and staff etc. is likely to produce a story of its own design in any case so why burn energy trying to pin it down.

This may be a classic example of self-loathing, who can say?

Whatever, this situation may account for the excessive beer consumption of the evening and and agita is almost assured once the management and staff etc. sits down in front of this computer in the morning and confronts a blank screen.

This writing for your life gig is not a healthy lifestyle.

But, lordy, lordy, it do be fun when it works.

Share SHARE
Posted in Brewspapers, Personal, Website | Leave a comment

Goats Illustrated.

Posted on May 8, 2012, 6:37 pm by Jack Curtin

I assume some of you are beginning to suffer from Peggy Overload and I apologize, but the folks at Virtual Farm Creative keep creating this incredible stuff and I am unable to resist using it. Plus also, shhh, don’t tell them, but not everybody has or wants access to Facebook.

Share SHARE
Posted in Goat Races | 1 Comment