Tastes Like Beer

"Writing about music is like dancing about architecture” – Elvis Costello

I’ve given up on trying to find a beer to my mom’s liking.  For years, I tried to convert my mother, an unpretentious oenophile, to the joy, complexity, & diversity of beer.  There was plenty of light American lager around when I was growing up, & I’m sure she’d tried it & found it unpalatable.  Understandable.  But when I hit drinking age & got into the good stuff, I discovered a whole world beyond that limited, watery, kinda-sweet-kinda-bitter pigeon hole – surely I could find something that would suit her palate.  Guinness, with its roasted coffee notes?  “Tastes like beer.”  Fair enough (she’s not a fan of coffee, either).  Lancaster Strawberry Wheat, light, sweet, fruity?  “Tastes like beer.”  Dogfish Head Festina Peche, also fruity but tart & crisp?  “Tastes like beer”.  Lindemans Framboise, the nuclear option for non-beer drinkers?  “Tastes like beer”.  The closest I got was a hefeweizen I brewed: “If I liked beer, this would be the beer that I’d like”.  Okay, she doesn’t like beer, I’m not going to beat my head against the wall.

Beer fans have all heard this, usually coming from someone we’re trying to convince/convert.  I’m sure many of you out there have had someone who’s been your “project”, typically a significant other, who stymies your efforts with that similar rhetoric: “It’s too ‘beery’.”  And it pisses us off, right?  Because we’ve found that there’s SO MUCH MORE to beer than “beery”.  It invalidates our perception of beer as this magical ambrosia bursting with all sorts of sensory fairy dust, reducing it to “meh”.  Founders Breakfast Stout?  Cuvee des Jacobins?  Busch?  Might as well be the same: “Tastes like beer”.

If you haven’t surmised by now, a large portion of my free time is passed consuming beer content (way more than actual beer, come to think of it).  Today, I spent anywhere from one to 20 minutes at a stretch, over roughly two dozen stretches, reading, listening to, or watching something about beer.  Podcasts, forums, magazines, company websites, books, social media, videos - this is a pretty typical day for me.  A good chunk of that is reviews, listening to or reading people describing a beer that they’re drinking.  Descriptions can be enlightening, vague, or sometimes straight-up confounding.  The reviewers range from BJCP Master Judges to the common BeerAdvocate user, & the vocabulary ranges from accessible & evocative – sherry, caramel, sour black cherry, vinegar, espresso, molasses, pie crust, black pepper – to vague & uninspired – malty, hoppy, spicy, yeasty, boozy – to WTF – asparagus, aspirin, nougat, carbonic acid, carrot omelet.  There are times when it seems that reviewers are in a competition to conjure the most overwrought & obscure flavor parallel they can muster. 

As much as I appreciate beer writing & programs like Cicerone & the BJCP, I think the navel-gazing can get to be a bit much.  Programs like this promote communicating beer in a verbal way, transforming into words what our taste & smell receptors perceive.  This practice definitely has its shortcomings.  I love the way Randy Mosher (always a source of wisdom) put it (& I’m paraphrasing): we experience beer on an emotional level, which is pre-verbal.  It takes a lot of work to translate that sensory information from the emotional center in our brain into words, symbols, in another part. Obviously, much can be lost in the translation.  The smell & flavor of beer is more than the reductionist components it falls into when trying to describe & categorize it.  We may fall back on describing some outlier qualities of a flavor profile (chocolate, coffee, pomegranate, honey, whatever), but there are fundamental qualities of beer that just can’t be put into words. 

Beer tastes like BEER!  There’s no other word for the family of flavors born of the combination of malt, hops, yeast, & water – it’s beyond verbalization, beyond reductive description.  This is what my mother & all the other outsiders who “just don’t get it” are still in touch with, something the “experienced” might lose sight of.  At its core, beer can’t be broken down into the sum of its parts because it has something unique, something we as beer drinkers love but may take for granted.  It’s something we can’t put our fingers on, that might turn others off but, deep down, is what we love about it.  So if you find yourself getting caught up by how to describe the dankness of an IPA’s hops or the breadiness of a doppelbock’s malt, just let it be.  Let it be & just experience the beer without words, without interference from our evolved brain.  Just feel it & let it work its magic without analyzing or judge; keep it in the realm of emotion, where its most at home.

I’ve encouraged readers in the past to “think when you drink”.  Now I want you to feel.

Top Shelf Thursday, January 2014

Alright, back into the swing of things.  2014 has not been terribly hospitable so far, what with sub-zero temps & all the havoc they can wreak, but here at The House we’re trying to re-establish our routine following the crazy celebratory upheaval of December.  Our taplist consolidation is complete, we just got our supply of Nugget Nectar in, & we christened January with a Top Shelf Thursday featuring breweries never before included in one of the tastings.  New beer for a New Year!

We popped the tops on some lighter brews to start things off, like the Four from Portland, Oregon’s Upright Brewing.  This Franco-Belgian-style farmhouse ale came across crisp, earthy, & pretty dry, incorporating Oregon-grown ingredients.  Both Four & the subsequent AleWerks Caledonia weighed in at only 4.5% ABV, packing a lot of flavor into small packages.  Caledonia is described as a “Scottish-style India Pale Ale” – we couldn’t figure out what that meant, exactly, but may have had to do with a stronger malt profile bracing the hops.

The heat rose only incrementally with Kili Wit, a Belgian-style white from Logsdon Farmhouse Ales made with Oregonian hops & African spices.  Logsdon has garnered a lot of attention for their funky farmhouse ales, & the Kili packed a subtle but surprising tartness that nicely complemented the traditional seasonings.  Our path continued in the Belgo-American vein with Pyrus Saison from St. Louis’ 4 Hands Brewing.  The use of pear juice brought a sweetness to the fore, while the addition of orange zest & white peppercorns melded well with the naturally spicy notes of the farmhouse yeast strain.  And speaking of yeast: Lambickx Kriek, from importers Vanberg  DeWulf, hit chords of all kinds of microfloral harmony.  This cherry-aged lambic, blended by Don Feinberg of Brewery Ommegang, delivered the sour & funk with some deep, dark, juicy & nutty notes from the fruit.

We veered into “snowy night” territory & the alcohol climbed with Blind Spot, an 8.2% winter warmer from High Water Brewing.  While some found the addition of cardamom, dried ginger, star anise, & grains of paradise overwhelming, others pleasantly likened the blend to a comforting molasses cookie.  The bear hugs continued with Velvet Glove from Iron Fist Brewing (“An iron fist in a velvet glove” – get it?).  The use of oatmeal in this imperial stout gave it a smooth, easy texture that hid the 9% ABV remarkably.  And what could be cozier than the smoke & whiskey notes of Smoked & Oaked from Epic Brewing?  This Belgian-style strong ale was made with cherry wood-smoked malt & aged in whiskey barrels for a beer that evokes an evening by the fireplace (sipping on a potent drink).

Though it took nine courses in the flight to get here, it just wouldn’t be a Top Shelf Thursday if we didn’t reach ABVs in the double digits.  Few in attendance were new to St. Bernardus Abt 12, part of the holy trinity of Belgian quads – nor was anyone complaining.  This complex-yet-delicate abbey ale engendered a lot of discussion & differing opinions on its merits compared to Rochefort 10 & Westy 12.  And what better way to wrap things up than with Wulver, the bourbon barrel-aged wee heavy from Thirsty Dog?  The heavy caramel malt of the strong Scottish-style ale married seamlessly with the vanilla & oak of the wood, & just makes you go “Mmmmm…”.

After a break in December, it was nice easing back into things with some friendly beer & friendlier faces.  As always, many thanks to all who ventured out & had a good time.  Doesn’t look like Old Man Winter plans on giving us a break any day soon, so it might be time to kick up the heat a few notches come February (barleywine, anyone?).  

Much Ado About the Goose

Back in the fall, a good bit of House blog-space was afforded to sharing thoughts on the definition of craft beer, why it’s important, should we care, etc.  The Brewers’ Association & their stance was both propped up & critiqued; the crown “offender” – Blue Moon – was put into perspective a little (at least, our perspective).  They represent a big monkey wrench gumming up the works of the operational craft brewers & those associated with them professionally: an alternative beer made by a mainstream brewery.  As you might have surmised by now, we at The House are largely apolitical – if it’s good, & if people with taste like it, we’ll carry it regardless of who makes it.  Sure, there’s always context, but we prefer to offer, inform, & let people make up their own minds.

The other stripe of outlier in the craft/crafty equation is the “acquired brand” – breweries that began as small, independent, but later got assimilated into the portfolio of a larger corporate beer entity.  There were the contingencies for years with Redhook & Widmer Brothers.  These breweries were at the vanguard of the craft brewing movement decades ago, & later came under ownership of the Craft Brew Alliance, a conglomerate with a minority stake (to the tune of 35%) held by Anheuser-Busch InBev.  This classification of brewery anomaly was blown wide open when, in 2011, Goose Island Brewing – formerly a member of the Craft Brew Alliance – was bought wholesale by ABInBev.  One of the nation’s biggest craft brewers was no longer independent AT ALL, 100% the property of the biggest in the biz.  People were dumbstruck.  This was the biggest ripple through the craft community that…well, that I can recall.  Some swore off Goose Island, maybe in a moment of impulsive self-righteousness that they may have since retracted, but there was plenty of the kind of indignation that arises when people are passionate about something.  Others saw the silver lining, that a bigger financial trough might mean more freedom – more Bourbon County Stout, please?

So it’s a few years later, & by all accounts Goose Island’s new gaggle is doing pretty well by it.  Sure, the core of the company is no longer at the helm, but the original production facility has stayed intact & largely in charge of brewing its specialties.  ABInBev’s plants have taken over the production of the flagships: 312, Honker’s Ale, IPA, the seasonals.  Bourbon County & its incarnations, the traditional Belgian styles, the crazy Belgian styles, & other more niche brews are still under the watchful gaze & careful hand of the old guard.  In the time following the backlash, many of the “little guys” – other craft brewers - have come to Goose Island’s defense.  New ownership doesn’t appear to have affected its ratings among the beer geeks: at the time of writing, the fifth, fourth, & first positions in BeerAdvocate’s “Top New Beers” list, which spotlights beers at the forefront of connoisseur popularity, are occupied by Goose Island brews.  In my own opinion, Goose Island under new ownership makes fantastic beer – Bourbon County Stout remains one of my all-time favorite, &if it’s suffered at all under the new umbrella, I don’t care.  It’s still to die for.  Their Belgian-style sours are top notch as well, a passion of the pre-transition brewers on which they can now focus more of their time & energy.

The point is this: your drinking ought to be, probably is, guided by your values & priorities.  If “selling out” to the big boys is a deal breaker for you, hey, more power.  There are thousands of excellent beers made by small, independent brewers who you can feel good about supporting.  If you like what you like, regardless of politics or affiliation, Goose Island is now more available than ever before, churning out some great-to-amazing beers.  We’re happy to be featuring them on draft in the next week in a series of tappings we’re calling “5 Days on Goose Island”.  We start on January 24^th with their Ten Hills Pale Ale, named for the ten hills of hops originally planted for the brewery years ago on Elk Mountain Farms in Idaho; the 25^th, we tap an encore keg of Bourbon County Brand Stout; the 26^th, we pour Bourbon County Brand Barleywine (#5 on the afore-mentioned BeerAdvocate list); the 27^th, Matilda Lambicus, their Belgian-style pale fermented with 100% Brettanomyces Lambicus yeast (wild fans, take note); & wrapping up on 28^th with The Illinois, a double IPA inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright, of all things!  We hope to see you there, & invite anyone who’s into good beer, regardless of who signs the check. 

2013 at The House

Whoa, look at the time.  It’s been a while since we posted a blog - to the tune of about a month.  Sorry ‘bout that, guys.  Can you blame us?  December was nuts, with all the big brews, holiday festivities, & actual, legitimate DAYS OFF!!!  Might have gotten a little distracted, & maybe a little resistant to getting back to the grind – not like writing this blog feels like work, mind you.  But procrastination comes easy this time of year.

Moving from Christmas into 2014 has given me pause to reflect on what was a pretty big year here at The House.  We did some remodeling, & for a while the place felt like a Lego set, with walls & shelves torn down & moved around.  The register moved to the side & back again, the Mix & Match section opened up, the wall to the bar area got chopped in half (now there’s a clear line of vision from one end of the building to the other), the front seating area got some booths, we installed a kitchen. 

Oh yeah – we now have a real kitchen!  With a grill!  And an oven!  And a fryer!  And a real menu, with food made on-premise!  This is the biggest change that’s happened to The House in years (maybe ever, really).  It’s awesome seeing people stick around for dinner rather than heading home or to another restaurant for something substantial to eat.  We launched the new menu in late October & so far have gotten some very positive feedback.  The menu will continue to change, but focus on a tight, quality spread.  Sadly, this meant saying good-bye to our friends in the food trucks, & while we’ll miss their delicious grub, this has been a real step in the right direction for us at The House.

Obviously, beer is what we do best, & 2013 was full of it.  We had fun with some great events.  Dave auctioned off his private stash early in the year, spreading the love around to some high-rollers with a beer jones.  We spotlighted some great drafts throughout the year: KBS & Bourbon County Stout come to mind (both kicked within a couple hours).  There was the tapping of Voodoo’s 2 Live Grand Cru, Vol. 1 that kicked off Pittsburgh Craft Beer Week for us, followed a week later by the return of The Sour & the Funky, southwestern PA’s only sour & wild beer festival.   There were events with Great Lakes for their 25^th anniversary, another Voodoo barrel-aged beer tapping, Rogue, A’Chouffe, & Finch’s.  We continue to be a launch point for the PA Brew Tours excursions - which, if you haven’t jumped on one, you really should check out.  There were weekly glass giveaways, monthly Top Shelf Thursday tastings, & the introduction of our Sunday Tap-ins.  And day-to-day fun, hijinx, & beer – always lot of good beer.

We said good-bye to some much-loved Ho1KB faces in 2013: Emily, Zach, & the legendary Meghan moved on to bigger & better things, & will always have a place in House lore.  But we gained a big asset in T.J., a dude who’s beer-wise beyond his years & has brought facial hair to heights never before seen among our team.  A big thank you to all our associates – the contractors, consultants, & reps with whom we rub elbows to make our magic happen.  And the most love goes out to our friends who spend their hard-earned cash to buy a little slice of heaven, one glass, bottle, or can at a time.  Our customers are our lifeblood, & it makes our hard work worthwhile knowing that folks come out of their way (sometimes waaay out of their way) to get the good stuff.

2014 will have some fun stuff in store, no doubt.  We’ve already got some more events in the works, putting together the next Top Shelf Thursday, as well as some special Goose Island beers going on tap soon.  And there have already been the rumblings of change – just announced that we’re tightening our tap selection from 40 down to 24, & there’s already a tumult of response on Facebook.  Ah yes, the only constant… 

From all of us at The House, a happy, healthy, & prosperous 2014 to all!