The management of the High Falls Brewing Company does not think very highly of the citizens of its home city. They think we’re simple, maybe stupid even, with the reasoning skills of small children. They are also very disappointed in us as customers.

High Falls ran a full-page advertisement in this week’s issue of City Newspaper (and, I’m told, the Democrat and Chronicle as well) that purports to be a personal letter from President and CEO Norman Snyder to the citizens of Rochester. Now, most people wouldn’t read 7 long paragraphs of 6-point type. I did, and it pissed me off. Over the course of the letter ‘Snyder’ offers platitudes about how much he loves it here, patronizes us with his own simplification of economics, attempts to convince us that his is a craft brewery, and reprimands us for not buying locally enough.

“The Brewery’s Payroll, which is in excess of $18 million, makes a significant contribution to the local economy,” ‘Snyder’ writes. “Our employees pay taxes, purchase automobiles, clothing, groceries and other goods from local companies.” Well, duh. What’s the underlying message here? Is it that, if we don’t buy enough Genny Light, the brewery will be forced to reduce that potential pool of local economic contributors? It kinda reminds me of how PBS used to threaten to pull Sesame Street off the air if they didn’t receive enough viewer contributions.

That’s just hamfisted copy. The more inscencing thing for me is the complete hypocrisy of what the letter goes on to state:

“When you buy the beer in the blue can, you are supporting an economy whose currency is now on par with our own. When you buy the beer in the red can, you are helping the big get bigger. Every time you buy the beer in the silver or gold can, you are not buying the local beer or supporting local jobs.

The next time you order a beer, please consider that some of the best beer brewed in this country is brewed right here in Rochester, New York. Take Pride in Rochester! Take Pride in your local brewery! Take Pride in our products! But please remember to always be responsible.”

Well, Norm, I’ll take that final piece of advice. I don’t think High Falls Brands, excuse me, High Falls Brewing Company, is our brewery anymore. Not when I’m sitting at my hometown baseball stadium, within sight of your building, and the Rohrbach Brewing Company has ten times the retail presence as High Falls. Not when it’s ten times easier to get the beers of Honeoye Falls’ Custom Brewcrafters than a bottle of good ol’ Genesee Lager. Not when you try to pass of Honey Brown as a ‘craft beer.’ Not when you toss aside your locally born and bred Head Brewer, the guy who won a bunch of the awards you alluded to earlier in your ‘personal plea.’

As a local consumer who should ‘always be responsible,’ I will make sure to support local brewery employees and local jobs. I will not buy the beer in the red can. I will not buy the beer in the blue can, or the silver.

I’ll buy the beer that doesn’t come in a can at all.

-Mark

Voting with our taste buds
By Mark Tichenor and Bruce Lish

Craft beer is no longer just pale ale and porter. These days, it’s the creativity of the brewer, as well as the skill of the brewing, that’s gaining critical and customer acclaim for independent breweries. This experimental, alchemical urge is certainly one of the factors that makes the Ithaca Beer Company one of the most respected New York State craft breweries.

Long known for pale ale, and the light, sun-tinged Apricot Wheat beer, the company’s product portfolio is growing to include bolder, stronger, and more whimsical beers, and a general departure from the six-pack mentality. It’s paying off big time. Last weekend at the 2008 Tap NY Festival, New York State’s premier beer event, Ithaca Beer won the F.X. Matt memorial Cup for best craft brewery in the state.

“I can’t say we were expecting it,” says Lead Brewer Jeff O’Neil. “There are a lot of great breweries in New York, and to win this award is humbling.”

O’Neil, a former Binghamton native who moved to San Francisco, suggests that his West Coast experience helps him push the envelope with the beers he brews professionally today.  Together with former Dogfish Head Brewer Mike Smith, the Ithaca boys are introducing the kind of extra-hoppy, alcoholically powerful beers for which the brewers of Oregon, Washington State and Northern California have become renowned. “My sense is that the market has matured in the northeast, O’Neil explains. “People are more accepting of hoppy IPAs.”  He goes on to say that American brewers no longer need to copy the beers of Old Europe to excel.

Indeed, Excelling has been O’Neil’s intention for a while. His and Smith’s “Excelsior” series, a limited-release line of iconoclastic beers packaged in wine bottles, echoes the appreciation of connoisseurs as well as the motto of the state in which they’re brewed.  Ithaca Ten, one of the Excelsior series, is the beer that won the brewery first place at Tap NY.

Ten, named to commemorate the brewery’s tenth anniversary is a huge double IPA made with a complex blend of malts and enough American hops to kill a vampire.” He describes the flavor as thick and creamy, slightly oily from the hops, edgy from the smoke. You can almost hear him grin over the phone as he settles on the word.

“Hedonistic,” he drawls.

To some, Ten is the archetype of the double IPA style, but a greater number of people will find its aggressive bitterness a challenge. That, however, is ultimately what separates dedicated craft brewing from national-level corporate brewing. Where large conglomerates must find a common flavor profile to please millions of people, O’Neil and Smith are able to uncompromisingly brew the beer they want and rely on a smaller, dedicated base of hopheads to make it a success. The Excelsior series beers cost more, but deliver a level of pleasure for which aficionados are happy to pay.

In addition, Ithaca’s Flower Power IPA won the silver at the festival, and reached the Final Four in the Great Lakes Brewing News’ NCAA tournament-themed nationwide IPA challenge. Cascazilla, a hop-heavy dark red ale, explodes with flavor in every sip. And Ithaca Apricot Wheat, the brewery’s best seller, appeals to everyone through it’s light mouthfeel and touch of summery fruit.

O’Neil endeavors to use New York State ingredients whenever possible. The brewery has belonged to the New York Farm Bureau since its inception, and buys hops from Seneca Castle’s Pedersen Farms, the only commercial produce remaining in this former epicenter of hop growing. “We also have a tart beer coming out, finished with New York State Grapes, O’Neil reveals.

O’Neil and the Ithaca Beer Company will continue to aim for, and quite possibly redefine, excellence in the future. For a modern craft brewery in a market rapidly gaining sophistication, there’s really no other way. “My peers are making such good beer that no one can really mail it in.”

As a guy who brews professionally because his homebrewing hobby got out of control, it’s doubtful O’Neil will ever settle for second best.

Bruce is a certified beer judge and commercial brewer. Mark owns a laptop and likes beer. For more on beer, check out the beercraft blog, updated regularly, at http:://www.beercraftsite.com. Send your questions, suggestions, or comments to beercraft@rochester.rr.com.

Yep, it’s that time again: the time when another obscure holiday from some other country has been turned into a big, slobbery drunk-and-disorderly fest for American young adults, thanks to the marketing dollars of a large brewing conglomerate.

In honor of this grand occasion, Beer School will be featuring the Beers of Mexico, mostly because that’s what Monty’s Korner will have on tap. In addition to pisswater Corona, we’ll also be tasting other Mexican pisswater export lagers, as well as some of the beers for which the Mexican brewing industry should be known: Vienna-Style lagers and darker, complex brews that don’t require a friggin’ lime to be rendered barely palatable.

Did that whet your thirst buds? Good. We’ll see you tonight at 7:30, Monty’s Korner, Rochester, NY. Bring your own stupid hat.

-Mark

Readers of this blog will be all to familiar with our generic stance on beer extremity, but we prefer not to paint ourselves into corners. With this in mind, I bellied up to the The Old Toad’s weathered bar and ordered a Boulder Mojo Risin’ Double IPA.

It pains me to admit how much I liked this beer, mostly because the name references a Doors song and I hate The Doors. All through high school I was subjected to their uninspired, organ-heavy boring, flat-voiced singsong pop. And everyone’s always like “Oh! Jim Morrison is such a great poet!” He was not a poet; he was a hack. ee cummings was a great poet. Ralph Waldo Emerson was a great poet. The guy who wrote “There once was a girl from Nantucket” was a better poet than Morrison, who once penned the line “If they say I never loved you/You know they are a liar.”  Jim Morrison can kiss my ass.

But I digress.

I was expecting a raw, bitter, overwhelmingly hoppy beer with a back end composed of harsh alcohol heat, but Mojo Risin’ is much more subtle than that. It’s buttery smooth without being cloying, and the intense bitterness is complemented by a malt smoothness that rounds off and effectively subdues the taste of the alcohol. This is a dangerous beer; it would be easy to absent-mindedly consume several pints while forgetting that it’s 10.5% ABV.

I’ve had this experience with a couple “extreme” beers lately. Could it be that the brewers who make them are growing a bit self-conscious about their single-minded pursuit of strength and bitterness above all else? If extreme beer turns into good beer, the American brewing community will realy have made its mark in the world of beer.

-Mark

It’s amazing what some people will do for fun. Some run marathons, some get shot with stingy little paintballs, some even suspend themselves from sharp hooks pushed through the bleeding flesh of their own backs.Bruce and I dispense beer at beer festivals.

This weekend found us in the teeming metropolis of Hunter, New York, for Tap NY, the state’s premier beer festival, and due to its proximity to the Tri-State area, one of the most attended. Dozens of breweries from all over New York, New Jersey and Canada offered up their finest for the sampling pleasure of the masses.

For the first day, the masses didn’t seem overly interested in the finest. Maybe the most alcoholically strong, but subtle flavor and aroma characteristics did not seem to be a top priority for many. One poor kid (I’m guessing he was about 21 by the way he couldn’t stand up) managed to get himself literally covered in a complex, hoppy yet smokey carmel-tinged Ithaca Ten, which dripped sadly off the brim of his baseball cap onto the back of his right shoulder as a big brown stain spread across his Abercrombie logo. Even with the younger crowd though, drink-addled outbursts seemed to be kept to a minimum. I saw no violence, no vomit. Oh well, you can’t have everything.

Give me your huddled masses waiting to be drunk

No, seriously, it’s a tribute to the festival organizers and the Hunter Mountain staff that things went so smoothly. This is a long-standing and well-run festival, and every effort is made to accommodate the brewers. Festival Co-Founder Nat Collins stood on his head to make sure that every exhibitor had a problem-free festival. The guy did laps the whole time; it looked exhausting.

 Festival co-founder Nat Collins

We basically poured nonstop for four hours, running out of the Rohrbach Bluebeary ale on the first day, and growing concerned that we didn’t bring enough beer to last the entirety of the two-day event. You can only fit four kegs in the back of a Honda Element.

The night was spent dodging creepy twin toddlers in the hallway at an anachronistic borscht-belt era resort called the Villa Vosilla, and drinking the neighboring O’Neil’s Pub, which had the common decency to feature one of our favorite beers, Roosterfish Nut Brown Ale, on draft. This went over particularly well considering we were drinking with Jordan Sunseri, one of the Roosterfish brewers.

The outside breweries prep for Sunday

As is the norm at these festivals, the Sunday crowd was thinner in number, older, and generally more interested in the beer.

The day kicked of with the chick from the Ale Street News booth apologizing profusely for how she acted while partying the previous night, which must have been terrible because we never laid eyes on her. But being magnanimous, I offered my forgiveness with a stern admonishment not to let it happen again.

We cruised through the Sunday crowd with relative ease, with plenty of sampling opportunities for the two of us. My favorites: Sixpoint Gorilla Warfare, Southampton Secret Ale, and Chelsea Cream Stout. We also met a bunch of cool brewing guys from Sixpoint, Keegan and others. This is the part I like best about working beer festivals: making new friends, talking beer and coming away a bit envious that I don’t work among the big tanks myself.

Lake Placid Maibock: a malty standout 

After the last gasp of foam spurted from our final keg, we packed up and hauled ass through the backest of central New York State roads, to the Thruway and over to Rochester’s Tap and Mallet, where we shared a couple pints with Rochester radio dj Dem Jones. A great end to a great festival.

Jeff from Ithaca Brewing with his prize, apparently some subs. 

Congratulations to all the breweries that won prizes. And a special shout-out to Jeff and the guys from the Ithaca Brewing Company who won Best New York State Craft Brewery. We’ll see you at Hunter Mountain next year.

-Mark

A quick shout-out to the folks at the Hoxton Square Bar, in Hoxton Square, London. This place chucks the traditional tied-house system out the window.

You see, by tradition, the typical British pub is “tied” to one particular brewery. In exchange for assistance with rent, material goods, and other favors from the brewery, the pub agrees to sell that producer’s beer exclusively. It’s one of the things that frustrates English beer lovers who search for variety.

But that system is going the way of the red telephone box. The Hoxton Square Bar has a worldly beer list, from Belgians like DeKonick to Brooklyn Lager and other American craft brews. They also have a full restaurant and an attached music venue, so you can get your entire evening’s worth of entertainment in one place, which, if you’re visiting London, is probably exactly what you’d want to do.

-Mark

Oak ‘em if you got ‘em

Looks like Bruce got his hot little hands on an oaken barrel– a tool which can only be used for evil once the Buffalo Road Rohrbach Brewery is set up. Let’s just hope he doesn’t go all overboard and brew an “oaky-weizen” or something. You never know with that freak. Anyway, the location is coming along, but it’ll still be a few more weeks before any brewing resumes at Buffalo Road.

A beer journey

Bruce and I are doing another beer trip this weekend. We’re heading down to Tap NY to pour for the Rohrbach Brewing Company. It’s a long drive with four kegs in a Honda Element, but epic journeys are our thing. We live for the danger, baby. The excitement. That’s how we roll.

Tap NY is one of the premier events for New York State breweries, and this will be the first time in six years that Rohrbach has a booth. It’s held a picturesque Hunter Mountain in picturesque Hunter, New York, in a picturesque ski lodge. It’s my understanding that action has been taken this year to reduce the heavy crowding that was becoming a turn-off to many festival attendees.

High Falls

No specifics yet, but I’ve heard the sad news that Dave Schlosser has moved on from the High Falls brewing Company. That’s a loss not only to the brewery, but also to the entire beer lover’s community in the Northeast. Details are nonexistent, but my gut tells me High Falls might be prepping for a sellout to the majors. Of course, folks have been speculating about that for 20 years.

Custom Brewcrafters

Brewing has commenced in Custom Brewcrafters’ monolithic new Honeoye Falls brewery, but the brewing area is not quite ready for tours so don’t go rushing down there and bothering Jason, Greg and John. The retail area of the brand-new, custom built brewery is open to the public; I’ve heard it has the feel of a Finger Lakes winery tasting room: inviting, warm and spacious. I’ll be checking it out over the next few days. With a designated driver.

-Mark

American Wheat Ale
By Mark Tichenor and Bruce Lish

You know those really hot summer days? The kind where your tires stick to the blacktop and, once you get out of the shower in the morning, you never really get dry? Those sweltering days cry out for the refreshment only a beer can bring.

But not just any beer. No one wants to sit on their sun-spattered patio with a mouth-coating imperial porter. Better off with something light and quenching. The Germans had the right idea when they invented Hefeweizen, the quintessential wheat beer of Bavaria. The wheat which substitutes for a portion of the brewer’s barley lend the beer a lightness and mouthfeel that’s beyond compare.

Likewise, on the rare occasions when the sun peeks through the omnipresent cloud blanket over Belgium, the thing to do is sit at an outdoor table with a witbeer, the indigenous pale, wheat ale with hints of clove and orange zest.

Hefeweizen and witbier are now well known in the USA; you can find Fransiskaner and Hoegaarden all over the place. Unsurprisingly, American brewers have taken up the challenge of recreating these European styles with zeal.  In fact, Pierre Celis, the Belgian guy who created the now-famous Hoegaarden, moved to Texas to open up the Celis Brewery (which he eventually sold to a major conglomerate that destroyed it).

More still have done to wheat beers what they did to IPA a decade earlier: they turned them into a brand new, uniquely American style.

American wheat ales may share the light body and crisp finish of their continental ancestors, but that’s about it. Gone are the banana and bubblegum notes of Weizen. Likewise, the distinct orange peel and clove flavors of Wit make little more than cameo appearances. Hardcore beer geeks might sneer at the style because of its lack of explosive flavor or character, but that might be missing the point. The strength of American wheats is their refreshing body and light mouthfeel.

And as is so often the case with American breweries, our wheat beers show only a passing commonality among each other. Some might have a gentle sweetness, while others might be a slight hop bite due to the use of high alpha acid domestic hops,

Some, Like Long Trail Blackbeary Wheat and Saranac Pomegranate Wheat, are brewed with fruit. These tend to be extremely light in body, and neutral in hop character so as not to overwhelm their delicate flavoring. They’re a great choice for people who really don’t like the grainy and hoppy flavors of traditional beer.

Dark wheat beers also pop up from time to time. Odd Notion, from Magic Hat, is a unique caramel-colored winter wheat ale that combines chocolate notes with fruitiness.

The latest trend is wheatwine- a take on very strong ale that uses wheat to impart a lighter consistency than its all-barley cousin.  Two years ago, you couldn’t find a friggin’ wheatwine anywhere, But since American brewers are slightly more fad-oriented than 13 year old girls, wheatwines are popping up like dandelions.

Trendiness aside, American wheat beer is a very good introduction to craft beer for people used to mass-market lager, it also makes a compelling alternative to high-status, overpriced imports from south of the border. You won’t even need a lime.

In other beers:
Fishfest is in full swing at The Old Toad. Rochester’s long-standing signature beer bar is showcasing the beers of Dogfish Head, one of the moment’s trendiest breweries, and the undeservedly obscure Rooster Fish brewery in Watkins Glen.

Some Dogfish Head beers, like Chateau Jiahu and Raison D’etre, you just never see on tap. The Toad has them. They’re also pouring Indian Brown Ale and 90-minute IPA straight from the Randalizer, a DFH invention that filters the fresh draft beer through fresh hops and into your glass for an extra grassy kick.  The Rooster Fish offerings are casked, bringing out their subtleties and showcasing what this small Finger Lakes brewery is capable of.  Try the Hop Warrior and odds are you’ll order a second pint.

The Tap and Mallet will be featuring the next installment of its Beer Social series on Wednesday, April 30. The theme: dark beers. This is so open-ended that big surprises are almost a certainty. A brewer (unspecified) from The Southern Tier Brewery of Lakewood, NY, will be guest presenting.  Tickets are $12 and you should buy them in advance to guarantee a place at the social.

Bruce is a certified beer judge and commercial brewer. Mark owns a laptop and likes beer. For more on beer, check out the beercraft blog, updated regularly, at http:://www.beercraftsite.com. Send your questions, suggestions, or comments to beercraft@rochester.rr.com.

This one’s back by popular demand. From women.

Beer has been brewed with fruit since a time long ago, the specifics of which I don’t feel like looking up, and that tradition continues today, through the classic lambics of Belgium to inventive new concoctions on the cutting edge of American brewing.

Join Mark, Bruce and Pat at 7:30pm on Thursday, April 17, to taste for yourself how harmonious these combinations can be. As always, we’re at Monty’s Korner, on the corner of East Avenue and Alexander Street, in scenic Rochester, New York.

Edit: The Tap and Mallet’s beer social is April 30, no this week as originally reported. Oops.

Rochester has some pretty cool beer events coming up. The Tap and Mallet will be hosting the fourth of its “Beer Social” tasting sessions Wednesday April 30. The theme is dark beers, and the guest presenter is some guy from the Southern Tier Brewing Company.

I run a regular tasting session too, but it’s nothing like what Joe does at the Tap. His beer selections are impeccable, his guest speakers knowledgeable, and dude puts out a mean antipasto tray. It costs $12, but you don’t go away thirsty. Or hungry.

Meanwhile, this coming Thursday, The Old Toad is kicking off Fish Fest, an ongoing celebration of the breweries Dogfish Head and Roosterfish. They’ll have rare casked ales and unique one-offs not usually available in Upstate New York. It’s going to be the first time Dogfish Head’s Chateau Jiahu is on draft in Rochester. I think the festival is going to go on until they run out of the beer, but for the best stuff, get to the Toad soon.

Fellow beercrafter Pat Hughes and I made a pilsner in his comically well-equipped basement brewery last friday. We did all-grain with a decoction mash. It’s a bit dark, but everything looks like it went well.

Of course, Pat gets most of the credit. He’s an experienced all-grain homebrewer and one of those guys who’s depressingly good at math. So he formulated the recipe did the timing, operated hos valves and levers, and handled the troubleshooting. I ground up grain and stirred. And lifted heavy stuff.

I gotta tell you, homebrewing is a terrific hobby for anyone who loves watching large quantities of liquid heat up.

-Mark