Top Shelf Thursday, February 2014: Poor Man's Heaven

This winter has sucked.  Record low temps for days at a time, persistent snow, black ice, depression, gah.  Fear not – barleywine to the rescue!  Nothing can help stave off the oppressive winter onslaught like a good, boozy barleywine, warming your insides & putting some color in your cheeks.  Seemed the perfect theme for this month’s Top Shelf Thursday!

While drawing inspiration from a particularly rough season (anti-inspiration?), we fashioned this month’s tasting as something of an homage to Hell with the Lid Off, the annual barleywine festival held by Kelly’s Lounge in East Liberty (one of my favorite non-House places to eat & imbibe).  Now in its tenth year, Hell with the Lid Off has been an institution among Pittsburgh’s beer scene, offering a dizzying selection from the barleywine family over four-hour sessions.  Along with the malty ecstasy comes a sizable entry fee &, often, a doozy of a hangover.  In modifying a barleywine tasting to fit Top Shelf Thursday, we wanted to offer an alternative with a low pricetag & a selection showing variety while still allowing for a porcelain-free Friday.  We dubbed this tasting “Poor Man’s Heaven”.

We started off with a baseline, in the form of two English-style barleywines from American brewers.  Yards Brewing’s Olde Bartholomew hit hot notes of fusel alcohol & came across a little solvent-like.  Only recently released, it may have suffered from its relative youth – barleywines are one of the few styles of beer that can not only stand up to, but actually improve from, aging, & this one may have lost its “green-ness” with a little more time in storage.  Vermilion Winter Ale, from St. Louis’ Perennial Artisanal Ales, had been hanging around our shelves & stock room a little longer, to its benefit – it bore strong brown sugar & caramel notes, rich & well-rounded.  Schlafly’s Oak Aged Barleywine hit a nice blend of woody character, with coconut & a little tannin, that complemented the sweet, strong profile of the base beer.

We switched the flight up to welcome barleywine’s half-sister, wheatwine, essentially a barleywine brewed with a portion of wheat malt, giving it a honey-like sweetness & buoyant mouthfeel.  DuClaw Brewing’s Misery was our introduction to the style for the evening.  While some were turned off by it, others found its lighter sweetness & texture (which some described as “lager-ish”), combined with a bitter & dry twist at the end, unexpected & intriguing.  Manzanita Brewing, a small, obscure outfit out of California, gave us their 3^rd Anniversary Ale, a wheatwine aged on oak.  The oak may have been too much for the more delicate strong ale, & came through overwhelmingly dry & resembling acetone.  The third in the “wheatwine” stretch – DuClaw’s Divine Retribution No. 3 – was a bit of a curveball: a 40/60 blend of their Retribution imperial stout & Misery wheatwine, aged in bourbon barrels.  Many found themselves seduced by the roasty, rich imperial stout & bourbon character, as the subtler wheatwine seemed to play a supporting role here.

ABV climbed to 11.6% by this next course: Stone Brewing’s Old Guardian.  An archetypal west coast American barleywine, Old Guardian distinguished itself in this line-up with a prominent hop character, amplified by its freshness – it had been bottled less than a month before the tasting!  For the hop heads among us, this was an enjoyable detour: hop-forward but very smooth & without the abrasive bitterness expected from Stone. 

The final three really took us home, & hit sweet spots for those who knew what they wanted from a barleywine tasting.  Bethlehem, PA’s Fegley Brew Works brewed Arctic Alchemy was based on a recipe over a century old, used to provide warming rations to sailors trekking through the far northern seas.  12% ABV, smooth, with a complex malt character that rolled out deep caramel flavors, this really hit the nail on the head.  Dogfish Head’s Olde School, brewed with figs & dates, packed a strong alcohol flavor at 15.04%, a precarious balancing act that was evened out by the sugary fruit notes.  And if Arctic Alchemy hit the nail on the head, the final course of the flight knocked it out of the park: North Coast Brewing’s Old Stock 2011 Cellar Reserve, their old ale aged in brandy barrels.  At 15.2%, this was deep, rich, going through waves of caramel, molasses, & maple syrup with enough booze warmth to prop it all up.  The aftertaste lingers on & on with waves of more & more rich flavor – a truly decadent, full-bodied, full-flavored strong ale.

While it was surely a pleasure savoring all these big sipping beers over an evening, it was just as enjoyable seeing everyone pacing themselves, drinking plenty of water, & not overdoing it on some high-alcohol brews.  As always, thanks to those who spent the evening at The House.  As much as the cold, dark months of winter can be a challenge, I’m glad they exist; they give us an excuse to rail against the frigid darkness by banding together in warm, well-lit places & down some boozy brews with good company & conversation.  Sounds like a little slice of heaven to me.

Po-Mo Beer

Occasionally in the hallowed halls of the House blog, I like to ponder the intersection of beer & art.  In the entry ‘Conceptual Beer’ from last…uh, summer, I think…I used East End Brewing’s Stigmatized Wholly Indigenous Local Lager (S.W.I.L.L.), a pre-Prohibition adjunct lager based on an old recipe, as an example.  The point was that this was a craft brewer creating a beer from a non-‘craft’ recipe, for the purpose of resurrecting an extinct style, briefly.  I noticed other brewers taking cues from old school industrial lagers, like Avery Brewing’s Joe’s Premium American Pilsner (in a can, naturally), part homage, part tongue-in-cheek irony.  Stillwater made an old school lager that they funked up  with brett & again, in a smack of double-irony, gave the name ‘Premium’.  The Bruery released Run B.M.C. (awesome name), a “quadruple-hopped imperial pilsner” (get it, Miller Lite?)  “meant for enjoyment on a hot day in your back yard while surrounded by bikini clad women and professional football players”.  Dogfish Head’s Liquor de Malt, Rogue’s Daddy’s Little Helper (in its original incarnation), & recently Voodoo’s #22oz.tofreedom are all malt liquors, the most parodied & scoffed at style of beer “elevated” by the fact that they are made by esteemed craft brewers.  I was fascinated by this phenomenon; artisanal, quality brewers choosing to take a stab at styles of beer that most beer geeks view as quaint at best & much worse at worst.

Within the past year, Stillwater released Classique, a post-Prohibition ale with corn, rice, old school American hops, & put it in a can.  In a knowing move, they dubbed it a “Postmodern Beer”.  ‘Yes!’, I told myself.  ‘That’s exactly what this trend has been all along, & Stillwater nailed it on the head!’  These brewers are taking the modernist definition of “craft beer” & turning it inside out.  The perfect malt?  The perfect hops?  Precise brewing techniques that all converge into a Platonic ideal of beer, an archetype that says ‘This is the fruit of progress?  “Screw that!” these po-mo brewers say.  “Let’s go old school!  Primitive!  Simple!  DUMB!”  Only dumb in the smartest way!  Postmodernism says that there is no “truth”, only “truths”.  No one ideal, only individual values & perspectives.  Why have a Westy 12 when you can have a Bud?  Bud makes a whole lot more people happy, after all.

Dada artist Marcel Duchamp is best known for his work “Fountain”, a urinal he found & signed.  What makes it art?  An artist signed it & called it “art”.  The Brewers’ Association’s definition of craft, what seems to me to be a modernist standard for sealing the identity & “stamp” of beer, eats itself when Dogfish Head makes a malt liquor with three different kinds of corn. It’s a malt liquor.  What makes it a craft beer?  A craft brewer made it!  But it’s a malt liquor!  Check the rulebook, you standard-setting Phillistines.  There’s a blurring of “high” & “low” art in post-modernism that’s parallel in this trend.  Take Andy Warhol, who took photos of celebrities & methods of mass production, the antitheses of high art & artisanship, & made mass-produced photos of celebrities in art.  Avery looks back to simple, mass-produced lager, & makes it their own.  Voila!  If only they’d put it in a soup can… 

There’s a ton of critical ore to mine here, which is part of what’s so captivating about the craft movement: while its roots are quality & technique, it’s branches are symbolism & aesthetic.  A big part of postmodernism is self-reference, the knowing nod that each of these beers gives the consumer as it eyes them up from its lofty position on the shelf.  Maybe there’s a longing for yesteryear at play in craft beer, a remembrance of a simpler time un-fraught by a sea of choice, complexity, & complication.  Maybe deep-down we each want to be spoon-fed.  Eh, probably not.  But it’s fun to see beer take on the role of gadfly & make us think about some of the ideals we take for granted.  

The above image is Jasper John's Painted Bronze (Ale Cans), 1960.

Acquired Taste

Today, while making the rounds of compulsively consuming beer content, I sifted through the usual kind-of-boring news on beerpulse.com & saw the headline “Anheuser-Busch InBev to Acquire Blue Point Brewing Company”.  Whu-HUH?!!  I even said that on Facebook.  What did you, the people, have to say?  There was the kind of vitriolic outcry one would expect from the beer-impassioned, many of whom hate ABInBev for making a mass-marketed product (that’s also just not to the taste of many beer geeks); for acquiring smaller, independent companies; for being the big, bad Goliath.  Believe me, the list of transgressions goes on & on.  At the time, I tried to temper what I saw as knee-jerk rage: look at what they’ve done for Goose Island, is always the golden exception.  I was prepared to come on & blog about how this was no big deal, about how “business is business”, about how ABInBev isn’t gobbling up anyone who doesn’t want it – generally defending both parties involved, & trying to ease some of the vox populi’s indignation.

But then I actually went back & read the press release.  I’d figured I’d be better prepared to sound informed & do some grounded opinionating, say “Let’s all calm down” now, if I saw what everyone else saw.  But reading the release made me feel…icky.  Like, big business PR icky.  Some highlights, & accompanying thoughts:

Blue Point, known for its creativity, was founded by Mark Burford and Peter Cotter 15 years ago in Patchogue, N.Y., where the brewery will continue to operate.

Is Blue Point known for its creativity?  Nothing against their beer, but what comes to mind for me are a toasted lager, a blueberry ale, a very recognizable logo…nothing terribly creative.  Solid?  Sure, BP makes some well-crafted beers, but I can’t think of anything that slaps me in the face as “creative”.  Nice, though, that they’re keeping the original brewery up & running in its hometown.

Anheuser-Busch also plans to invest in the brewery to grow its operational capabilities and enhance the consumer experience over the next few years.

“Enhance the consumer experience”?  Are they including 3-D glasses with each bottle?  This sounds like straight-up corporate marketing oleo to me.  My guess is that the consumer’s experience will pretty much remain the same.

“We are deeply grateful to our family of loyal employees and customers. Our success was made possible by the hard work of good people and good beer in Patchogue,” said Peter Cotter, who will continue to be instrumental in the success of the brands along with co-founder Mark Burford.

Doesn’t say how the co-founders will continue to be instrumental in the success of the brands.  Ceremonial figureheads?  Will this give them more of an opportunity to develop recipes & tweak the process in a “creative” way?  Seems to me that ABInBev doesn’t really need any help with branding.  Maybe they’ll make a Blue Point commercial with a puppy & Billy Joel or something. 

“Together, our talented brewing team and Anheuser-Busch will have the resources to create new and exciting beers and share our portfolio with even more beer lovers,” said Mark Burford.

Okay, so it’s “our” talented brewing team, which I read as “the same guys who’ve been brewing the beer you’ve enjoyed all along”.  That’s cool – this is one of the big plusses in the Goose Island transition.  So what is AB’s role in this, looking to the future?  Publicist?  Plus: AB creating something new & exciting?  Don’t get your hopes up, guys.  Now, AB bankrolling something new & exciting?  That I can see.

A few examples of what left a slightly bad taste in my mouth.  This doesn’t go into the companies’ bios at the end of the press release, the entirety of which you can read here.  I guess there are some questions to be answered, is al:  Are ABInBev just Blue Point’s new sugar daddy?  How much production control will BP be able to maintain?  What will “expansion” entail?  Rightly so, some of the concerned voices on Facebook wondered about the priorities of quality vs. profit?  I think that quality & profit can be symbiotic, but that requires a faith in the product – AND the beer-drinking public themselves.  ABInBev aren’t dummies; they can feel the tides shifting, & they’ve (in my belief) wisely overcoming dismissing craft beer & the maturation of the beer drinking public’s palate.  Sure, it might not be for everyone, but maybe they can sense that this shift is real, which is why they seem prepared to do something about it.  This impression, however, left me feeling a bit tainted.