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.

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.

From Prokofiev to Pilsner
By Mark Tichenor and Bruce Lish

What could be more cultured than a night at the symphony? An elegant concert hall, timeless works of compositional art performed by virtuosos, tuxes, tails, all the stuff most beer lovers avoid. Thankfully, John Sullivan is there to prove the world of high culture and beer can live in (excuse the upcoming terrible pun) harmony.

Sullivan, 53, plays violin with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. He’s also the winner of the Upstate New York Homebrewers’ Association’s 30th annual Empire State Open Homebrewers’ Competition.

During the competition, over 300 home-concocted beers from across New York State were judged on aroma, color, mouthfeel, flavor, and a boatload of other categories. Sullivan came out on top of the pack with his Symphony Pilsner. As part of the prize, the Rohrbach Brewing Company will brew his beer, which will be available at the Buffalo Road Brewpub.

A homebrewer on and off since 1980, Sullivan’s first taste of the hobby came when his father attempted a batch of beer. “It was terrible,” he said. “I thought, if this is the best you can do homebrewing, I don’t think it’s something I want to get into.”

Bored with the watery mass-market lagers, which were pretty much the only beers available at the time, Sullivan took solace in the occasional Import such as Heineken Dark, the first beer he ever liked. It was while browsing a long-defunct Rochester winemaking supply store and discovering a slim booklet on brewing by Leigh Eadle that he decided to take a stab at liquid gold.

“The first brew I made turned out pretty well,” Sullivan said. Encouraged by the results, he brewed whenever the urge struck him, using readily available canned malt extracts as the basis for his beers, but it was when he finally joined the 20th century, bought a computer, and started finding homebrewing resources on the internet that he took his brewing to a new level.

Making the jump from canned malt extract to all-grain is a milestone for homebrewers. Suddenly, instead of simply pouring syrup into the brew kettle, they’re milling whole barley and undergoing the entire mashing procedure, in which the grain’s starches are converted to fermentable sugars in preparation for brewing.  It requires mastery of a totally new set of procedures. The rewards however, are great. By tailoring every ingredient in the recipe instead of using a premix, the brewer gains total control over the beer.

At this point, many brewers get kinda wacky with this newfound power, inventing new styles, fusing styles together, and generally pushing the envelope of taste, form and flavor. Sullivan however is more of a purist, and it shows in the traditional character of his Pilsner, a tricky style that, unlike hoppy ales, does nothing to hide any mistakes by the brewer.
“Pilsner isn’t so much a recipe because it’s very basic,” Sullivan explains. “It’s more of a procedure.”

He suggests that newbie brewers do some research before heating the water. “Read at least the first few chapters of John Palmer’s How to Brew,” do a basic extract beer and make sure that sanitation is a priority, as induced bacteria ruins beer more than anything else.

Sullivan currently has an Altbier, strong Scotch ale, blonde ale, and pre-prohibition lager in the works. One wonders what he plans to do with all that beer.

We think he feeds it to the rest of the orchestra.

In other beers:
On Thursday, March 27th, The Rohrbach Brewing Company celebrates the official grand opening of its new brewery on Railroad Street, adjacent to the Public Market, from 4 to 8pm. Brewers Jim McDermott and Bruce Lish will give brewery tours and answer questions, and of course there will be beer and food sampling. And of course Rochester Mayor Robert Duffy will be there to exhibit his zero-tolerance policy on a fancy ribbon.

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.

Beer and chocolate- an unlikely marriage.
By Mark Tichenor and Bruce Lish

Brewers have been experimenting with alternative beer flavors since the dawn of history. In fact, the tastes we today regard as “beery” were themselves an exploration of nontraditional flavor.  And while it’s amazing that brewers can coax so many different flavors out of so few basic ingredients, it’s also great that beer leaves so much room to continue to experiment with nontraditional ingredients to create combinations that sound intriguing, delicious, or just plain weird; combinations like beer and chocolate.

We’re not talking chocolatey yet conventional beers like Brooklyn Black Chocolate stout, which use chocolate malt (which is just malted barley that’s been roasted until dark, rich and nutty). No this is about beers that use honest-to-gosh chocolate in the brewing process. And as brewers continue to search for alternative flavors, for both the joy of experimentation and out of practical consideration considering the hop shortage, a growing number of chocolate beers are appearing on shelves.

A couple of them hail from Upstate New York. Brewery Ommegang, in Cooperstown, produces Chocolate Indulgence. As you ‘d probably expect, this is a mineshaft-dark, full-bodied brew, which would be substantial and sweet without the chocolate.

You can tell that Ommegang showed restraint with the cocoa. The taste of chocolate is super-distinctive, and the brewery skillfully balanced the good parts of that flavor with the inherent character of the beer, without allowing any of the bitterness that can come with the territory. Drinking a Chocolate indulgence is like pairing a sweet stout with a brownie. The two flavors combine nicely on the palate while still maintaining their separation.

With it’s limited-release Choklat, Lakewood, New York’s Southern Tier Brewing Company gets a bit more audacious, and the result is one of the finest beers we’ve encountered.

“It’s like chocolate in a glass,” marvels Tap and Mallet owner Joe McBane. “It even leaves your lips sticky.”

There’s no better way to characterize this extremely strong dark brew made with fine Belgian chocolate. It is a dessert in itself. The base beer is transparent to the flavors of the chocolate, resulting in an effervescent sweet cocoa flavor that’s complimented by a warming alcohol glow.  The beer also benefits from a heavy, substantial body that props up all that flavor.

McBane adds that, in his opinion, were Southern Tier to release Choklat year-round, it would be a nationally known and talked about beer.

Jason Fox, Head Brewer for Custom Brewcrafters, might not necessarily agree. “With flavored beers, people are split. They love them or hate them,” he says, pointing out that this is the reason most brewers release such specialties on a limited-time basis.

Fox has a point; it’s difficult to consider chocolate beer as a daily drinker or “go-to” beer, and it’s certainly not something you’re going to down a pitcher of with the softball team, but a slice of ganache isn’t something you eat after every meal, either.

But isn’t it something you crave from time to time?

In other beers:
Custom Brewcrafters is taking the populist approach for their new house-brand IPA. For six nights, they’re taking a test batch of the beer to various establishments in order to gather and gauge public reaction. They’ll be using the data to tailor the recipe to the tastes of the community.

Tastings will be (or have already been) held at The Boulevard Grill, The New York Wine and Culinary Center, The Tap & Mallet, The Old Toad And Acme Pizzeria.

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.

American brewers redefine style
By Mark Tichenor and Bruce Lish

We have, in the past, been accused of being flagrant traditionalists. This annoys more than one American beer connoisseur.

“You can’t always live in the past,” they sputter, indignantly spitting food particles into their shaggy grey beards. “American brewers have done a lot to create new styles and advance beer tradition for the future!”

And truthfully, there’s some validity to that. Many American craft brewers have shown an eagerness to shuffle off the mantle of the past that doesn’t always sit well with us, not because of any reverence to tradition, but because those stodgy Olde Worlde breweries had 500 freakin’ years to get their beer perfect.

Still, brewing, like any art, is a continuum. It changes with the times. It always has. And as the tastes of the day develop, new traditions and styles are being invented. And just about all of that creativity is taking place in the USA and Canada.

It’s not that Americans are inventing wacky new beer styles (well, they are but these almost universally suck, or, as in the case of pumpkin ale, only go down well at a particular time of year). American brewers are taking existing styles imported from Europe, such as pale ale, barley wine, or stout, and pushing the boundaries in terms of ingredients, flavor profile and strength. The resulting beers are usually so different from their parent titles that the original appellations no longer apply.

So we get new hybrid style names, such as American pale ale. Sierra Nevada Pale Ale is the archetype of this beer group, which replaces the Kent goldings and fuggles hops of English pale ales with Pacific Northwest hops like cascade and chinook. Thus, the earthy, more subdued and buttery flavor profiles of the English originals are superseded by much bitterer, citrusy, piney flavors.

The result is a beer with greater presence that cuts through fat when paired with meat dishes and bounces off the palate. Beers in the American pale ale style are fresh-tasting, snappy, and easy to find in any bar that knows its beer.

Let’s glance at another style completely altered by US brewers: stout. In American vats, stout became stronger, heavier, and dramatically more skewed toward dryness or sweetness than anything the English would have thrown at you. Sure, the Brits made stronger imperial stout, smoother milk stout, and nutty oatmeal stout, among other subvariants, but once again American brewers have altered all of these into creations most drinkers from the UK wouldn’t even recognize.

One thing many brewers did was combine terms. Southern Tier’s simply named “Oat,” is described as “an imperial oatmeal stout.” Black and viscous, coating the sides of the glass like motor oil, the beer lives up nicely to its somewhat pompous description. Oat warms the palate with a gentle but firm sweetness that rounds out into a hearty, warm alcohol finish, the immense body claiming the taster’s mouth for the next half hour or so.

Obviously, this 12.5% alcohol brew is not one to pound with the dudes from your softball team. It’s a good nightcap beer, and it goes well with chocolate or strong caramel desserts.

Since there are no rules in American Brewing, Southern Tier has gone a step further, creating one of our favorite “extreme” beers: Choklat. Brewed with actual dark Belgian Chocolate, this heavy, onyx-colored beer has an aroma, body and finish like no other. You smell taste and sense chocolate in every sip. You can even tell it’s good chocolate!

And it’s not like the chocolate seems out of place in the beer, the brew is actually well-balanced and quite drinkable. Go ahead and guess what desserts this 11% alcohol behemoth pairs well with.

The modern American brewing tradition was begun by tinkerers and experimenters, and even traditionalists like us benefit from that. In today’s craft beer industry, that chaotic spirit remains alive, well, and, gosh darn it, uniquely American.

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.

By Mark Tichenor and Bruce Lish

Custom Brewcrafters of Honeoye Falls has been a staple area brewery since 1997. During their decade of existence, Custom’s beers and business model of brewing house beers for bars has been embraced by pub owner and thirsty patron alike. Today, the brewery serves well over a hundred accounts in Rochester, Buffalo, and the Finger Lakes.

In addition to that, Custom formulates and brews its own line of craft beers, such as the delicious, onyx-colored Double Dark Cream Porter and Wee Heavy, both of which issue forth from numerous taps across the region.

As the business grew, shoehorning all that beer through CB’s original Brewhouse on Paper Mill Street became something of a challenge. Fortunately one thing Honeoye Falls has in abundance is available land. Currently, the company is building a new brewhouse and retail area that will afford substantially more space for brewing, in-house sales, and expansion.

“We want to have room to do signature beers and one-offs,” explains Jason Fox, Custom’s Head Brewer. “We’ll also want to be bottling, which requires a lot of space.” The brewery will also offer many more taps for walk-in retail business and a function room for conferences and events.

The future bottle availability of two of the brewery’s flagship beers, English Pale Ale and CB’s Double Dark Cream Porter, will do much to increase regional availability. It will also demonstrate that Custom Brewcrafters is a true craft brewery, not just a third-party producer of vanity beers.

Once the new brewhouse is up and running (planned for this coming April), Fox wants to use the extra capacity to push the envelope with respect to beer. “I like beer to be balanced, but within the balance I like to play around.” That yen for experimentations shows up in several CB’s beers, from the coffee-infused Canaltown Brown Ale, to the five-spiced Christmas Ale.

Fox also speaks of his interest in historical brewing methods, and his desire to implement them with authenticity. In 2006, a number of breweries across the country celebrated the 300^th anniversary of Ben Franklin’s birth by brewing beer using one of the statesman’s old recipes. In his quest for authenticity, Fox hooked up with the brewing school at the University of Sunderland in the UK to make sure his methods, ingredients, and conditions were representative of Franklin’s times.

Fox plans to continue that awareness of today’s beer as a descendant of brewing tradition. While CB’s continues to create popular specialty beers for the areas eating and drinking establishments, it’s in their own beer line where the great potential for discovery lies.

In other beers

Join Joe McBane, owner of Rochester’s Tap and Mallet, and Steve Hodos of the Great Lakes Brewing News, for an IPA tasting session Wednesday, January 30, at the Tap and Mallet, 381 Gregory Street, Rochester, NY.

As you quaff your way through both English and American versions of the style, McBane and Hodos will explain the colonial seafaring history of this rugged beer, as well as how IPA has evolved in America. Oh, and they’ll give you cheese and stuff.

The tasting costs $9.Originally, tickets were going to be sold but now it’s on a first-come, first-serve basis.

This is the first in a series of monthly tastings at the Tap. McBane is planning one for the final Wednesday of every month. More than just a gulpfest, the Tap & Mallet’s tastings are meant to inform, educate, and draw participants deeper into the nature of beer and how it intertwines with our culture.

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.

Low Alcohol, Big flavor
By Mark Tichenor and Bruce Lish

So how were you feeling under the harsh dawn of New Year’s Day?

A bad hangover, which some of you readers undoubtedly had, can put a person off of alcoholic beverages for quite a while, and rightly so. A hangover is a message from your brain that you were drinking in an irresponsible fashion.

One of the trends in craft beer over the past few years has been to make the occurrence of those hangovers much more likely. Strong beer has been king. The alcohol content of craft brew by volume usually tops 6%, and routinely spikes over 8%. Some of the strongest “extreme” beers pack an alcoholic punch eclipsing wine, up to 22% alcohol by volume in some cases.

These are fine, but it’s difficult to have more than two of these alcohol-bombs and still remain socially acceptable. Fortunately, and especially if you’re cool with drinking imports, there’s a whole range of commonly available beers that offer huge flavor while treading a bit more lightly on the old liver. If you’re planning a longer night out, you can’t go wrong with any of the following.

We’ll start with the obvious session beer: Guinness Irish Stout. Imposing, nearly opaque black, and bursting with dry, nutty, roasty flavor, Guinness does much to explode the myth that high alcoholic content is necessary for a satisfying beer.

Guinness is the beer we use to free beer newbies from their preconceptions. Many people believe that darker beer is stronger and heavier. But the only thing that makes Guinness dark is the roasting of the malt before brewing. A heavy roast results in grain that’s nearly black in color, and the use of this grain in brewing gives Guinness its inky, seductive hue.

Take a look at the numbers. The black beast of Dublin clocks in at 4.2% alcohol by volume, the same as a Bud Light. At 220 calories per pint, Guinness isn’t murder on the waistline either.

Of course, the flavor of Guinness isn’t for everybody. If you prefer a crisper, lighter, clean-tasting beer, a Pilsner might be just the thing. Pilsner Urquell, from the Czech Republic, is the original Pilsner beer (it’s brewed in the town of Pilsen). Over the years, the term “Pilsner” has become bastardized to refer to any light colored lager.

But the original Urquell is packed with flavor. You can taste the sweet malt in each sip, bready, yet light on the tongue. As you swallow, that clean sweetness rounds into a gentle bitterness imparted by Czech Saaz hops, lingering on the back of the tongue and inviting another sip.

Urquell is refreshing enough to drink outside on a hot day, complex enough to stand up to most food pairings, and, at 4.4% alcohol, light enough to make it your “go-to” beer when out with friends.

Our third suggestion comes from the Rhine river town of Cologne (spelled ‘Koeln’ in German). The city’s breweries are famous for their Koelsch- a slightly sweet, light colored low-alcohol ale that serves as an accompaniment to many meals and an excellent social lubricant in the evenings. It’s not the easiest style to find in Rochester, but Gaffel Kolsch has recently been on tap at the Tap and Mallet, and is available bottled at Beers of the World.

While Gaffel Koelsch is in fact an ale, its clean flavor and grassy body seem very lager-like. The key to this beer is balance, with neither the hops nor the malt dominating the flavor. Instead they combine to impart a gentle spiciness with noticeably grain and floral aroma.

Gaffel checks in at an underwhelming 4.8% alcohol, making it a good choice if you’re planning to have multiple brews over the course of an evening.

So who says you have to compromise? Pick one of these beers, or really pretty much any Irish stout, Koelsch, or Pilsner, and you can be assured you’re drinking a beverage that’s absolutely delicious, and is likely to split your bladder prior to splitting your skull. High alcohol content is great from time to time, but moderation hurts less in the morning.

In other beers

The annual Scottsville Ice Arena Winterfest is taking place on Saturday, January 19th, from 5pm to midnight. Included in the $10 admission is a beer and wine tasting from 7-9pm. Head on over to darkest Scottsville and sample the finest from Southern Tier, Rohrbach, Brooklyn Brewery and many more fantastic New York State craft brewers. There’s also music provided by The Meddling Kids and Random Act, and by you if you bring bongos and join the rhythm-optional drum circle.

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://beercraft.wordpress.com. Send your questions, suggestions, or comments to beercraft@rochester.rr.com.

India Pale Ale- a craft beer staple

By Mark Tichenor and Bruce Lish

Craft beer comes in seemingly limitless variety. Doppelbocks, imperial stouts, and Belgian-style tripels dot the shelves of any beer store worth its salt, and nearly every small brewery makes some form of extreme, unique, or rare beer style, if only for the bragging rights. IPA, however, spans the craft brewing scene from coast to coast. While the style may be universal, and an anchor point for most breweries’ product lines, the flavors of IPA can be intriguingly diverse.

IPA, it should be noted, stands for India Pale Ale. What you get when you order one is a modern interpretation of the Victorian-era pale ale that Breweries in England made stronger and hoppier in order to survive the sea voyage around Africa to its Indian colonial holdings. The hops acted as a preservative, preventing the unpasteurized ale from going bad during the long, sweltering journey. What the colonists tasted was substantially bitterer than the pale ales they would daintily quaff in the social parlours back in Britain.

When American homebrewing and craft brewing got going, IPA’s adventuresome history and crisp hop bite captured the imaginations of drinkers who were used to the far tamer flavor of American light lager. As the craft beer experiment exploded into a full-blown industry, American brewers approached IPA with an experimental spirit, as well as that uniquely American trait of pushing something to its limits of good taste.

Today, American IPA eclipses the British original in every possible aspect except subtlety. We’ve made IPA exponentially stronger, heavier, and hoppier than anything those colonials in India would have experienced.

That freedom from tradition is both a benefit and a curse. The English would argue that a good British IPA, such as Samuel Smith’s India Ale, embodies two hundred years of brewing expertise and an affinity for how to use the hard water of the Trent river combined with noble English hops to create a beer that’s a perfect mélange of body, flavor, and nippy hop finish. Whereas their American counterparts might point out that, compared to Colorado’s monstrous Great Divide Titan IPA, their English stuff hardly has flavor at all, paling compared to Titan’s astringent citrus bitterness, not to mention its near 7% alcohol content (by volume).

Of course, neither side is right in this hypothetical argument. Both Sam Smith India Ale and Great Divide Titan IPA are excellent. The soft, earthy flavor of the English IPA might go very well with an after-dinner fruit and cheese plate, whereas the tangy explosion of flavor provided by an extreme American IPA like Titan would pretty much kill the taste of anything you put in your mouth for the next hour. Ultimately, it all depends on the type of flavor the drinker is looking for.

We kind of lament the fact that American brewers take IPA to sometimes ridiculous extremes. It’s getting to the point where ordering that dry-hopped, double Imperial 12% IPA is the equivalent of ordering the super-hot chicken wings: a display of unadulterated machismo and little more.

But there are plenty of American IPAs (Great Divide Titan IPA being one of them) that wear their bold flavor very well. Brooklyn IPA, Ithaca Cascazilla, and Lagunitas IPA, all readily available in Western New York, combine their bitter flavors, alcoholic warming, and weighty mouthfeel into delicious, uncompromising palate-pleasers that frequently convert beer drinkers into raging hopheads.

And, although they won’t admit it, the English like ‘em too.

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://beercraft.wordpress.com. Send your questions, suggestions, or comments to beercraft@rochester.rr.com.

The intricacies of flavor
By Mark Tichenor and Bruce Lish

It’s possible to be a geek about anything. Computer geeks go on about processor speeds, mySQL, and World of Warcraft. Sports geeks corner you and drone on endlessly about their fantasy football (or, in our case, fantasy soccer) teams. And it’s just as possible to be a beer geek.

You’ve heard them; they’re the reason you’re leery about wine or craft beer. When self-styled aficionados rattle off comments about “nose,” “finish,” or “mouthfeel,” it makes people who, well, just enjoy a brew leery of craft beer as a whole.

Thing is, beer is so varied in flavor, color, and character that you need that descriptive terminology in order to describe the thing you’re drinking. Let’s go over some of the common terms together, shall we? That way, should we slip into the realm of beer geekdom in a future column, you’ll at least know what we’re talking about. Not that you’ll care.

When you bring a beer into close proximity with your face, the first thing you’ll notice is the visual stuff. We don’t think any of our readers really need a definition of the word color. But we’d suggest you notice head retention. After the initial foam dies down, look for a slight foamy film remaining on top of the beer. This is a signal that the beer is till effervescing, and releasing aroma, which accounts for a big chunk of a beer’s perceived flavor.

Head retention can be retarded by contaminants in the glass, especially oily substances. We all know a dirty glass can compromise your health but, far more worryingly, it can compromise your beer.

Now that the beer is directly under your proboscis, give it a covert swirl; just a little shake of the wrist. This releases the a-ro-ma. Different styles have different aromae. Some, like IPA, smell predominantly of hops, whereas a Doppelbock will carry a bready, sweet malt aroma. The scent of certain Belgian styles will be caused primarily by the yeast.

As we mentioned a couple of paragraphs ago, aroma is an important component of how your beer tastes, so take a big whiff. And for God’s sake don’t drink straight from the bottle. That’s for ‘low carb’ beer drinkers who have a vested interest in avoiding their libation’s flavor at all costs.

And flavor is the ultimate reason you’re even drinking beer in the first place, right? As you know, beer can be sweet and bready, dry and bitter, or anywhere in between. What’s important is that you realize that taste is composed of multiple parts, (the smell being one of them). The initial flavor as the beer splashes across the frontal taste buds is often completely different from the flavor you get as you swallow and the liquid hits the taste buds in the back of your mouth.

We’re not going to dissect the flavors beer is supposed to have; that’s part of the joy of discovery. But you should be warned about off-flavors that can result from poor handling, or screwing up the brewing process.

If you’re pouring beer form a bottle, especially a clear or a green one, you’re going to taste skunk. Ultraviolet rays, such as those radiated at us by the sun, react with the acids in the hops to create 3-methyl-2-butene-1-thiol (note- that presence of that chemical compound name is evidence of actual research. We promise it won’t happen again). This is actually the same chemical found in a skunk’s butt, or wherever the spray comes from.

This chemical reaction is most prevalent in beers that come in green or clear bottles. On a sunny day, it can take as little as 5 minutes for this flavor to materialize in those vessels, so handle with care.

Another extremely common flavor flaw in beer is Diacetyl, which is caused by yeast reacting to the alcohol synthesis process. It’s a buttery, slippery taste that, while working well in certain styles like Scotch ale and some English ales, sticks out in most beers like a monster truck in a kindergarten.

Brewers usually control diacetyl flavor by performing a diacetyl rest, leaving the fermented beer at fermentation temperature for 24-48 hours. Thus, if you taste this butterscotch flavor, you’ll know the brewer is rushing his beer out the door instead of waiting for the process to reach completion.

OK, that concludes this part of our beer tasting primer. Perhaps we’ll go into greater depth in the future, when we’re having an equal amount of difficulty coming up with a topic. Until then, we encourage you to taste unashamed, and don’t let the terms throw you.

We’ll make a beer geek of you yet.

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://beercraft.wordpress.com. Send your questions, suggestions, or comments to beercraft@rochester.rr.com.

Beer Renaissance in Rochester
By Mark Tichenor and Bruce Lish

We’re going to go out on a limb with this column’s opening statement. Ready? Ok, here goes:

There has never been a better time to be a beer lover living in Rochester, New York.

By now that sentence has the coveted 65+ age demographic in a tizzy (or it would if any of them read this magazine). And rightly so. After all, Rochester has an extremely rich brewing history. During the second half of the 19^th century, the only thing that kept our town from rivaling great American brewing centers like Milwaukee and St. Louis was their population explosion and high-level German immigration at precisely the right time. But Rochester had no trouble attracting brewers of its own, thanks to the area’s secret weapon: the pristine, Alpine quality water of Hemlock Lake.

So yeah, Brewers came, set up shop, competed, and after prohibition were systematically destroyed by the consolidation that wracked the American brewing industry. Topper. Fyfe & Drum. Ballantine. All lost to the history books. By the mid 1970s, only Genesee remained to carry on the brewing tradition. 

Fortunately, those days have passed. Three factors have made this time, and this place, an epicenter of beer culture.

The first is the mass distribution of imported brands. We’re not just talking about the mass-market stuff from Canada, nor status-driven Mexican lager. If they have the inclination, your local bar can get their hands on all KINDS of wacky beers from England, Germany, even Estonia or Poland.

Rochester bars and restaurants have responded enthusiastically. Of course the main beer places like MacGregor’s, Monty’s, the Old Toad and the Tap & Mallet are expected to carry import variety, but now suburban joints like Quimby’s in Henrietta, Paddy’s in Greece, The Boulevard on Empire, and Fairport’s Donnelly’s, have paid meticulous attention to their beer offerings. Great beer from around the world is becoming more of a rule than an exception.

This availability has given even casual beer drinkers insight into styles that, ten years ago, one would have to visit their countries of origin to experience. It was precisely that kind of exposure while traveling abroad that compelled the first wave of home brewers to try to replicate those wonderful flavors in their basements, kitchens or self-storage units.

Today, the ability to sample, say, a smoky German Rauchbier, Wee Heavy from Scotland, or Belgian Lambic gives people a firm baseline on how beer is expected to taste in the rest of the beerocentric world. Not only does this give them something against which they can compare the USA’s domestic brews, but it also engenders a desire to expand one’s taste envelope.

The craft beer movement is another factor. Is it even unusual anymore to walk into the supermarket or bar and face a choice between Saranac, Otter Creek and Magic Hat?  Think about that. Rochesterians not only have a choice between mainstream brands, but can also choose dozens of beers from local and national small brewers. Not only that, but the beers these small brewers make are so ubiquitous that they almost seem pedestrian, like Kraft brand food products or Gilette shaving cream. We are USED to these brands and they’ve become integral to what and how we drink. And when’s the last time you’ve seen an Otter Creek TV commercial?

Third, and most specific to Rochester, is the way the movers and shakers of the local beer industry are capitalizing on the other two factors. The Old Toad, MacGregor’s and the California Brew Haus have been the longtime stalwarts of our beer scene. Monty’s Korner and Monty’s Krown came later to the game, but have certainly done their part, focusing on US craft offerings and imports to create a strong following. And the brand new Tap & Mallet is currently the “pace bar,” changing their tap selections daily and running certainly the riskiest beer lineup in town.

 Faced with a more discerning clientele, other bars have either dived into good beer with enthusiasm, or been dragged kicking and screaming into the realm beyond stereotypical American macrobeer. Even Solera Wine Bar on South Avenue carries a small but excellent selection of craft beer (including one of our favorites, Victory Prima Pils).

Retailers have also embraced American craft and specialty import beer. Beers of the World is the obvious focal point for take-home sales, but Southtown Beverage and Hegedorn’s in Webster also stock impressive beer coolers. Wegmans is catching on, especially in the Pittsford and East Avenue stores. Smaller places within the city have also recognized the value of a wide range of upmarket beer. (Magnolia’s on Park Avenue comes to mind).

Even convenience stores are stocking great beer. The 7-11 on the corner of Clinton and Elmwood in Brighton carries growlers from Custom Brewcrafters and the Rohrbach Brewing Company. Hell, even the Wilson Farms across from the Airport sells Spaten by the six-pack these days.

But perhaps most central to our claim that Rochester is undergoing a beer renaissance, as opposed to a mere retail fad, is the commitment local brewers are making to the growth of their businesses. The Rohrbach Brewing Company is in the middle of their move to a much larger Railroad Street location and Custom Brewcrafters has broken ground on a brand-new, expanded production facility. Meanwhile, High Falls’ J.W. Dundee’s line improves year by year, and continues to bring interesting specialty beers (including their excellent porter) to their home market.

These entrenchments signify that, like in many large cities on the West Coast and in the Northeast, the perception of beer in Rochester has irrevocably changed. Perhaps the wounds caused by prohibition are finally healing. Perhaps a consumer base jaded by avalanche marketing is voting with their taste buds instead of their TV remote.

Or maybe, just maybe, we Rochesterians have found an area of life in which we get the respect we deserve.

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://beercraft.wordpress.com. Send your questions, suggestions, or comments to beercraft@rochester.rr.com.