I always target the football cookie.

Hello football fanatics, casual sports fans, drinking enthusiasts, and web crawling bots from porn sites! You look good. It's great to be home, and when I say home, I mean football season.

This is beautiful. I am really proud to get to speak with you today. Readers, we are at the dawning of the kickoff of the finest part of the twelvemonth. I understand how you feel. It is always darkest before the dawn, but the future is near, y'all. Today we stand up tall, knowing that, depending on when you are reading this message, football season is more or less a month away. I am proud to be writing this letter to you about our mutual standing.

I speak to you today as a football fan, as a guy that knows his way around a Google Docs spreadsheet, and as a Dad... a Dad who put TVs in all the other rooms in the house so the kids won't have an excuse to watch mine, among other things of course. I am just a casual, everyday fan with four TVs tuned to football programming in my living room every weekend. My parents, aunts, cousins, in-laws , sister, wife -- all dead to me when Northwestern kicks off against Purdue at 11:00 AM on a Saturday.

I recon I'm trying to let you know that I'm dedicated to the cause. At the end of the day, I will promise stuff, and nothing is more binding than a promise. Between you and me, I run the best, most funnest football season companion game you will find anywhere on this awesome, but slowly wilting Earth. I'm not just saying, but I'm literally just saying.

Some of you missed our plea last year, and this communication is to convince you to sign up and play with me. Truth be told, that is what I'm trying to do here. I assure you that joining the Pickem-Football 2011 family doesn't hurt in any way. Hey folks, it may even save your life! Unfortunately, not everyone understands the long term benefits of joining us at Pickem-Football. Some people don't even believe it will save their lives. No, some people choose to continue down their path of unenlightenment. Some of those people may even try to prove to me they are enlightened without Pickem-Football. Merriam-Webster.com defines enlightenment as "the act or means of enlightening." Need I say more?

I want to use another word. Solidarity. I looked it up and it means a unity based on common interests. Pickem-Football is like Solidarity+™. We are good people with varied interests that get together around a common game and make the World a better place. Pickem-Football is like a movement. A movement of genuine Solidarity+™.

I write this letter to you because I know in my heart that the Internet is where real integrity can be found. And courage. Football season is quite long, and it requires sacrifice and moral incorruptibility. Pledging yourself to Pickem-Football will protect you from other forces that may seek to leach away your free time, like YouTube related videos or the dishes. We will protect you from destruction, unless destruction is necessary for us to achieve our goals as a league, wherein you may be tasked with carrying out a significant portion of the destruction. This communication will be done discretely and not through your corporate email.

Make no mistake, readers. You are winning. You are a beautiful (I'm talking on the inside, nothing creepy), veracious, and courageous individual. Sure, we are chock full of yous here at Pickem-Football, but I firmly believe that you can't have too much of a good thing. (Except pancakes. Seriously, has anyone ever made it through a full stack?)
Now, I know exactly what you are asking yourself.

You: "I'm intimately familiar with myself, but I want to know more about this game."

Me: "First of all, that isn't a question. But second, I thought you would never ask."

Every week of the regular football season I will email and post on Pickem-Football.com a Google Docs form containing:

• 15 NCAA football games and odds (you pick against the spread)
  
• Every NFL football game (usu. 14-16 games, you pick straight up)
  
• For NCAA and NFL games, there will be some optional bonus questions. While these won't increase your Pick'em score, they are collected and used in the post season games. I dole out bonus points for weekly winners, people you pay their entry fee early, and some other random stuff I make up along the way.

We also continue on after the season with an NCAA Bowl Challenge Contest and an NFL Playoff Contest. Folks, that is over five months of football picking. Do you know what our government will waste in those five months? Trillions. Maybe. I really don't know. I do know that Pickem-Football will cost you a measly $25 (payable anytime throughout the season). My friends, nothing is more fiscally responsible than signing up for five months of meaningful life for around $0.16/day. (Meaningful life is not available at any price during the baseball season.)

You: "Wait -- what?"

Me: "I'll recap."

The Games:

1. NCAA Pick'em
   
   1. 15 games picked per week, my selections
      
   2. Players score one point per correct pick
      
   3. Games are picked against the spread (I provide the odds and they are fixed when the card is posted)
      
   4. Example card
      
   5. The player with the most points when the season is over wins
      
   6. Payout: 1^st Place 25% pot, 2^nd Place 10% of pot (Total = 35% pot)
      
2. NFL Pick'em
   1. Every NFL game is on the card, usually 14-16 games per week
      
   2. Players score one point per correct pick
      
   3. Games are picked straight up (no spread)
      
   4. Example card
      
   5. The player with the most points when the season is over wins
      
   6. Payout: 1^st Place 25% pot, 2^nd Place 10% of pot (Total = 35% pot)
      
3. NCAA Bowl Pick'em Challenge
   1. A confidence pool style game that includes every bowl game and incorporates your accumulated bonus points from the NCAA Pick'em contest
      
   2. The Bowl Pick'em Challenge card is emailed as a spreadsheet
      
   3. All picks are due before the bowl games begin
      
   4. The player with the most points wins
      
   5. Example (blog post)
      
   6. Payout: 1^st Place 15% pot
      
4. NFL Playoff Pick'em
   1. A Vegas style wagering format that includes all playoff games
      
   2. The NFL Playoff Pick'em cards are emailed in spreadsheet format weekly during the playoffs
      
   3. Points are "wagered"
      
   4. Picks are against the spread
      
   5. Example (blog post)
      
   6. Payout: 1^st Place 15% pot
      

100% of what comes in goes out to the people. What do you think of that, Teabaggers?

To wrap up. Courage. Solidarity. Destruction. Pancakes. America.

Joining starts here! Joining starts now! I guarantee the only thing you will regret is that you didn't just skip all the way to the bottom of this letter and CLICK THIS REGISTRATION LINK.

God bless you all, and God bless Football!

When I discovered recently that The Ferm got a shout out on Eating Our Words, the Houston Press' food blog, I was like -- WHAT THA H!?!

Quote-unquote avid readers of The Ferm are probably familiar with SirRon's sobering attempts at getting published on Eating Our Words. But if you are not, after reading my post (of course), try to figure out which story is more affecting, the first or the second.

Vaughn S. Gregg has higher aspirations than just being the internationally recognized creative chef on an obscure drinking blog with absentee leadership. Yes ma'am I do. But instead of a clichéd harangue against the city's only major news and entertainment weekly as brash and freewheeling as Houston itself, I've decided to share with you guys the pieces that I actually wrote and sent to the Houston Press offices. I'm all about good food and not so much about copyrights and statutes of limitations. However, our big stick here at The Ferm is a lawyer, so Mr. Smokeypants can just apply the strike-through tag on this post if he feels I've broken any blogging laws.

The first piece I sent earlier this year was on the Top 3 chain restaurants in Houston, TX. Comments are appreciated. Ladies, please use my soft taco recipe post to leave your digits.

---

Houston's Ultimate Top 3 - Chain Restaurants

1. Sweet Tomatoes
2. Grimaldi’s
3. Chuy’s

What a treat to have the opportunity to opine above the comment section level, an opportunity that is no doubt the culmination of our hard work down there (and a possible sign of the apocalypse). We should celebrate with a margarita from Chuy’s. We can love this place and not feel like we are part of the cult. When we want to feel like family, we get a pie at Grimaldi’s. If we close our eyes, the franchised version tastes almost exactly like all those pies we ate under the Brooklyn Bridge, except we don’t have to pay in cash in the suburban replicas. Sometimes we eat healthy, but only sometimes. At Sweet Tomato, it is your choice. We can tell you your life story by reading the salad you built. Grab a monthly BOGO coupon and we’ll be your plus one. You can figure us out too, that is if you can see our salad behind our four soups, two pastas, and muffin pile.

Prior to my honeymoon in the Southern Caribbean near the turn of the millennium, I'm not sure I had ever tasted a rum punch. During the island tours, I quickly became accustomed – and fond – of this Caribbean staple. It seemed like no lunch, tour, swim, museum visit, or mountain hike started or finished (or started and finished) without being offered a glass. If I had known then that rum punch recipes were so divergent, I would have pressed a local for their secret.

"Classic" rum punch recipes range from having bitters, simple syrups, fruit punch, and/or sodas. I found many recipes that called for orange juice, but all of my iterations attempting to recreate the Southern Caribbean variation fell short. To be sure, the key ingredient is the use of high quality Caribbean dark rum. In my opinion, no better rum exists that the ones made at Mount Gay. Their rum is so good you could mix it in your Bacardi to make it taste better. My next major breakthrough came when I abandoned orange juice and instead used guava and mango nectars. Eureka! 

Many years removed, I honestly don't know how close this recipe is to that once familiar Southern Caribbean drink. My recipe is unique and tasteful though, so please enjoy my interpretation of the rum punch. 

---

Southern Caribbean Rum Punch (Tribute)

---

yield:
~½ pitcher

ingredients:
Punch:
2 11.3 oz cans guava nectar
1 11.3 oz can mango nectar
1 11.3 oz can "bartender's choice" nectar (any flavor; I suggest an orange blend, banana blend, or another mango)
1 6 oz can pineapple juice
2 tbsp lime juice
½ cup canned coconut cream (e.g. Coco Lopez), stir well before measuring

At serving:
Mount Gay Sugar Cane Rum (or other dark Caribbean rum)
Sweetened coconut flakes
Ground nutmeg
Lime wedge (optional)

preparation:
Combine coconut cream, pineapple juice, lime juice, and nectars in a blender (note: some of the nectars can be left out if pitcher is full). Blend until coconut is well mixed (several 2 second pulses should do it). Pour into a large pitcher. Add any remaining juices (if some were left out of the blender). Mix well. Serve or cover and refrigerate (can be prepared a day ahead).

serving:
Fill a 12 ounce glass with ice. Pour a shot of rum over the ice. Top the glass off with the punch mix and stir. Garnish with a pinch of coconut flakes, ground nutmeg, and a few drops of lime juice or a lime slice. Salud!

As we outlined in our United States of Beer Project kickoff post, we are assembling the definitive list of breweries to represent each of the 50 states. Anyone can toss a name out and argue its relationship with a state, but we at The Ferm are only interested in cold, hard facts. Each representative has been selected after exhaustive research and extensive number crunching. As a refresher, below are the guidelines:

• The goal is to identify a single representative brewery from each state. Brewpubs are not specifically excluded, but to be a state representative, the brewpub must have significant distribution in the state.
• To be eligible as a state's representative, a brewery must brew beer in that state.
• If a brewery makes beer in more than one state, the brewery can only be named representative of one state.
• Only active breweries are eligible.

Just to be clear, I'm merely an emotionless arbiter in these selections. I first aggregate brewery data from several sources. An Excel formula then computes the score automatically. My own input came only from the scoring formula creation, which I calibrated using several states where I was particularly familiar with the breweries located within.

If you take exception to any of the selections or think I unfairly excluded a brewery (or brewpub), please hit me up in the comment section or on Twitter (@theferm) and I'll get you the score of the brewery in question. 

NOTE: I've given this post it's own page. Follow the link below for USBP's new home.

MORE>> (Follow Link for Individual State's Results)

A few weeks ago Houston Press food blogger extraordinaire Katharine Shilcutt wittingly dropped a proverbial deuce on the American beer drinker. In her post titled The United States of Beer, Katharine rather subjectively assigned each state an official beer. Her intentions were relatively innocuous, but her uneven attempt to rush the post's publication by peppering the U.S. map with whimsical selections energized the nation's beer drinking pantywadders (200+ comments!).

This was not the first time the food blog published a half-hearted post and then hid behind guise of just "having a laugh." I wonder if their editor would be as supportive of a post that jacked around with where to find good Mongolian hot pot? If the Houston Texans decided to play without cleats for a quarter, how do you think that would go over with their fans? If Nicholas Cage stopped caring about the movies he agreed to make, then what? I'm just saying, our big stick, Mr. Smokeypants, doesn't let us get away with weak journalism our site, and I've never seen a dime from the blog.

We at The Ferm are not asserting that blogs, and more specifically The Houston Press' food blog Eating Our Words, must be serious all the time. We are only suggesting that if you are getting paid to publish your work, that it be well thought out, researched, and written as if you even care that your name is on the piece. (I hope EOW blogger Kevin Shalin doesn't mind me stealing his words in that previous sentence, but there is a pretty good chance all Houston Press people stopped reading in the second paragraph anyway.)

Speaking of serious, if you are aware of someone who takes drinking more seriously than we do, I would sincerely like to know. We also tend to look at the world through practical glasses, so we understand an accurate beer map of the United States probably looks more like an election map.

"That looks about right. Print it!" - Mr. Smokeypants

Apologies to my beer nerds, but let's get really real. The craft beer segment represents only about 5% of the total U.S. beer market. What does that mean? It means Budweiser is truly the King, or President if you will, of beers. Budweiser, Miller Lite, or Coors may pick up a few electoral votes, but Bud Light is probably every state's official beer. But where is the fun in that map?

"Yes, that one looks right. Print it!" - Mr. Smokeypants

After some hard core brainstorming, we have come up with a concept that falls somewhere in between the schizophrenic Houston Press beer map and the monotony of the factual map. Katharine's idea was actually kind of ingenious, however it was executed by a foodie/journalist/musician-type instead of a lawyer/engineer/rocket scientist-type.

That is where we can contribute. What Katharine's map project needed was some rules. Some formulae. Some science. That kind of concept is right in our wheelhouse.

• Pronouncement: Katharine's list muddled beers and breweries. We will assign breweries to a state. It is reasonable to assume that a brewery's flagship beer would be the de facto beer representative for the state.
  
• Rule #1: For any state, the brewery representative must be brewed in said state. Rule #1b: If a brewery makes beer in more than one state, the brewery can only be named representative of one state.
  
• Example Formula: y = 29.936ln(x) How do you like them apples? (I don't trust the Internets enough to give out all our brewery ranking secrets.)
  
• Science: Wikipedia says science is an enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the world. Yeah, we got that.
  

Budweiser is overwhelmingly the people's popular choice for a national brewery. Don't be angry at us. You elected them without checking their proof of residence first. This post hereby kicks off The Ferm's own United States of Beer project. We will be rolling out each of the states' representatives over the next several weeks months. Stay thirsty tuned my friends.

Click map to jump to post with the states' selections

I homebrew because I can tell people I make my own beer. I homebrew to recreate beers that I enjoy. I homebrew to make beers that I can't access, to make beer styles seldom made by commercial breweries, to digress from traditions, styles, and recipes. I homebrew to make alcohol. This is a concept that seemed cooler when I was twenty, but I make alcoholic beverages in the same place I sleep. I homebrew because that is still a little cool.

I homebrew because it is easy to make good beer. With a little over a $100 investment, anyone can make about fifty standard bottles of delicious beer. For another $30, another fifty bottles can be brewed. But I don't homebrew to save money. I have hundreds of dollars worth of brewing accessories in my garage. I homebrew as a hobby. I have a several thousand dollar, digitally controlled, brew sculpture in my garage. I control temperatures during brewing to a single degree. A Red Ryder carbine-action, two hundred shot Range Model air rifle with a compass in the stock and a thing which tells time -- has nothing on my brew stand. My homebrewing equipment has a plaque with my name on it.

I homebrew for the feel, the flavor, and the aroma. Malted barley soaked in hot water can be intoxicating to the senses. I homebrew to make malty English-style beers. I homebrew to make strong, no-rules Belgian-style beers. I love Belgian-style beers. I homebrew to play with hops. I like to create strong, hoppy beers. I homebrew to add hops midway through the boil, after the boil, and while the beer in is the fermenter. I love hops. I grow hops in my yard.

I homebrew because I respect maltose, enzymes, yeast metabolism, and ethyl alcohol. I homebrew because I can make great beer and know something between a Master's Degree and absolutely nothing about any of those items. I homebrew to play with IBUs, Lovibond, and original gravity. I love my refractometer. I homebrew because I can experiment with malts, hops, yeasts, and adjuncts. I find yeast attenuation interesting. I homebrew because I like science. Except brewing is also art. Beers are designed. Equipment and recipes can play only a small part of the finished beer. Techniques play a nontrivial role. I homebrew to satisfy my inner mad-scientist. I like dialing my fermentation box's thermostat to create clove or banana flavors in my beer. I homebrew to stick it to The Man. I homebrew to flip my nose at The Reinheitsgebot.

I homebrew for the personal experience. But brewing with a friend is even better. I homebrew with my wife. I love the communal nature of brewing. Stirring the mash. Sampling past batches. I love sharing my knowledge, and I love learning from someone else. I homebrew for the fellowship. What is your favorite beer? I homebrew to brew your favorite beer with you.

This piece was meant as a finale for American Craft Beer Week. Perhaps I procrastinated just a bit in getting this published. Homebrewing isn't about haste. It takes weeks, sometimes months, to craft, ferment, and serve a beer finished beer. I homebrew because it is hard work. Patient work. Rewarding work. It's not about just a means to an end, but the end is pretty good. I homebrew for that.

Grand plans are noble, although also a grind. I intended to use today’s theme to challenge myself to create some food pairings for the beer I selected (intended = it didn't happen). But excuses are for losers. To preserve my masterplan, I'll do my best to churn out a few relevant paragraphs on beer and food pairings. And I'll still be drinking. So except for the possibility that I didn’t get raptured today, I’d say I’m still winning.

The rise of craft beers, miles apart from America’s industrially produced light lagers, has recently spawned a trend of beer and food pairing. Breaking into the mainstream has been slow. Wine is the sovereign food partner of fine dining. Every respectable restaurant has a wine list. Selections and quality of sommeliers can make or break a great restaurants’ reputation. Wine's place with food is based on its acidic, strong, and complex flavors. However, I question if the myth that wine is a superior food companion is not largely based on legacy.

Wine, crafted with arguably a superior ingredient -- the grape, is a one-dimensional beverage. All wines taste like fermented, aged grapes. Beers while crafted with more pedestrian ingredients -- grains and hops, are multidimensional beverages. Brewers craft their beers by tweaking the balance of malty sweetness and hop bitterness. Furthermore, flavor complexity is tailored using different types of malted grains and limitless amounts of adjuncts. Both wine and beer can utilize either naturally occurring or cultured yeasts to covert sugars to alcohol, but the yeast in beer making plays such a large part in the finished product’s flavor profile it can act as an important of an ingredient as  the malts and hops.

As a quick example, Saint Arnold Brewing Company recently replaced its lowest selling beer (Texas Wheat, an American-style Wheat) with an altered version of one of its more popular beers (Fancy Lawnmower, a German-style Kölsch). The brewery now has two beers with the exact same recipe, but fermented with two different yeasts that yield very different tasting beers. In a recent newsletter, Saint Arnold reported selling as many kegs in a week and a half of the new replacement (Weedwacker) as it did of Texas Wheat in a whole year.

With an unrestricted amount of flavor profiles, beer is unmatched in potential flavor pairing combinations with food. Beer can also leverage its carbonation to lift aromas and clean your palate between samples. Wine is challenged by spicy foods, pickles, asparagus, etc. Your local wine merchant may have thousands of wines to choose from, but only a small handful of them would even be acceptable for that coconut-curry Thai dish.

My first beer pairing education came from a session by the Texas Culinary Academy in 2005. The chef giving the seminar demonstrated the three C’s of beverage pairing: Cut, Compliment, and Contrast.

Cut: Spicy foods can be cut by malty sweet beers, like an English Pale Ale or a German Marzen. The richer the food, hoppy beers can clean the creaminess or fattiness from your palate. Dry stouts can even cut through the richness of a sweet chocolate dessert.

Compliment: Beer really shines as a food pair in this category. While wine basically enhances foods with acidity, beer can provide a subtle compliment to a food’s flavor. Belgian beers spiced with orange zest and coriander provides a great compliment to salads. Japanese beers brewed with rice are perfect companions to pieces of sushi.

Contrast: Like wine, any food that is enhanced with acidity can be adjusted to provide a good contrasting food pair (imagine something that tastes good with a lemon squeezed on it). Fish and white wine is a good pair, as is a light-bodied pilsner. However, no contrasting pair may be as sublime as a raw oyster and a dry stout. I first had this pair at SAVOR in 2009, where the Choptank Oyster Company was shucking fresh oysters. I made several trips through the line with samples of some of the best stouts and roasty porters in at the event.

Whether beer or wine, food pairing promotes the kind of creativity that I love when cooking. It also encourages a more thoughtful and enjoyable eating experience. In the end, my originally planned post probably would have been more enjoyable for me than it would have been for you (kind of like beer reviews, eh?)

Day 6
May 21, 2011
Dogfish Head Craft Brewery Namaste (Milton, DE)

Website/Bottle Information:
"A Belgian-style White made with dried organic orange slices, fresh cut lemongrass and a bit of coriander. This beer is a great summer quencher.
Namaste was originally brewed at our brewpub in with our friend Leo from Birra del Borgo in Italy as a tribute to our friends at 3 Fonteinen brewery in Belgium, who had devastating production loss (1/3 of their annual production!) at their brewery in 2009. You can read more about the original brewing of this beer here on Sam's blog."


Serving: 750mL bottle
Style: Witbier
IBU: 20
ABV: 5.0%

He Said:
I haven't poured a beer from a 750mL bottle with as light and fluffy of a head as this one in a long time. The beer is very effervescent. All the carbonation really carries up aromas of the lemongrass and coriander that the beer is brewed with and some musty funk that it probably wasn't brewed with. I'll admit that if I hadn't used it in several homebrewing recipes, I wouldn't know coriander's aroma though. Some citrus is detectable, but it seems to be more from the yeast and not the oranges used in the brewing of Namaste.

I am always impressed with the incredible balance of each Dogfish Head beer. Even their hoppiest IPAs have a malty sweetness to perfectly balance the bitterness. Namaste is no different. Hops are present in the perfect amount to balance the beer and keep the flavor profile dynamic from start to finish.

Namaste is lemony, light, and refreshing. If I had attempted to craft some food pairings, I think this would have gone great with a salad incorporating some citrus. It would have also gone equally well with a chicken quesadilla.

I generally attribute the term "Namaste" with yoga or new age-type activities. Tonight this beer was enjoyed while bathing two little children, which is probably the furthest from that lifestyle. Translated, "Namaste" means greetings or good day. I think I'd say this is a pretty good day.

She Said:
Color - Golden

Carbonation - Very bubbly

Smell - Citrusy, Belgian

Taste - To be fair, I have tasted this beer before and enjoyed it even more the first time. The lemongrass and citrus flavors totally shined through in my previous tasting. This time those flavors are present but aren't as powerful (aging? storage issues?). I still enjoy Namaste's light bubbly taste that doesn't stick to your palate. The beer is a cool and refreshing treat for a hot summer day. I recommended this beer to friends after the first time I enjoyed it and would do the same now.

I would be remiss to not take a day during this week long celebration to recognize some great national events planned to promote, much like American Craft Beer Week, the culture and community of craft beer. Last year I included a list of notable some notable national events. This year I’ll be attending one of them.

On Saturday May 30, 2009, I was among the 1900 craft beer enthusiasts who gathered at the National Building Museum in Washington D.C. to sample 136 beers from 68 American craft breweries paired with 32 food items for the 2nd annual craft beer and food experience, SAVOR. The event, hosted by the Brewer’s Association, is the premier food and beer event for American craft beers. I'm just saying -- it is an awesome event.

Here is how I plan to experience SAVOR this year.

Wednesday: Fly into Providence, R.I. 
This is my airport of choice when traveling to the Northeast. First of all, flights are inexpensive. Second: Dinner at Al Forno. I’ve eaten at Al Forno more than I’ve eaten at many of my favorite restaurants in Houston. Much like many of my favorite restaurants, I’ve only ordered one main dish from the menu: The Spicy Clam Roast. This is a plate of longnecked clams, served in their shells, each with a spicy sausage slice and onions. The clams are set around Al Forno’s mashed potatoes and everything is topped with a tomato-based sauce. I'm confident that this dish was sent directly from the seafood gods. 

Thursday: Long Island's North Fork and Atlantic City
We then head to New London, CT and catch the ferry to Long Island. Our North Fork itinerary always includes a few winery stops and lunch at P.J. Lobster House in Port Jefferson, NY. This year we’ll be sampling at two wineries I’ve never visited, Bedell Cellars and Paumanok Vineyards. Both are listed in Palate Press’ recent Nine New York Wineries to Watch. Port Jeff is the prototypical harbour city on Long Island and has a Northeastern small town charm that makes it a popular tourist destination. P.J. Lobster House was recommended to me when I worked a few seasons at nearby Stony Brook University. This half fish market, half restaurant has unbelievable prices, superb service, and very fresh seafood. 

Normally at this point in the journey we stop in NYC for a few days. This year our schedule is tighter so we are heading to Atlantic City to shorten our Friday drive to Washington D.C. I scored a reservation to the somewhat mysterious Chef Vola’s a day before they received a 2011 James Beard Award, something I knew nothing about before finding their elusive phone number on Yelp. 

Friday: Rehoboth Beach, DE and Washington D.C.
From Atlantic City we travel to Cape May, NJ to take the ferry to Delaware. Our plan is to spend the afternoon at Rehoboth Beach on their boardwalk before heading to Washington D.C. that evening for SAVOR. Oh yes, and Dogfish Head Brewings & Eats is going to happen while in Rehoboth (I at least have to restock my Dogfish liquors from their distillery there).

And SAVOR should be a pretty good time too.

Day 5
May 20, 2011
Williamsburg Alewerks "400" Ale - Jamestown 1607-2007 (Williamsburg, VA)

Website/Bottle Information:
"'400' Ale commemorates the founding of the first Virginia Settlement and with it, the founding of the American brewing industry. Beer was an essential component of everyday life in Jamestown, only the security and shelter provided by the triangular shaped fort and the cultivation of edible (no doubt including barley) crops outranked the production of beer in importance. Fresh water flowing in local streams and the recently excavated well provided a source of potable water, but beer and other 'processed liquids, primarily beer' were the preferred drinks.

This ale, like the ales of the time, is brown in color. This beer may be more robust than 18th century brews, a liberty we choose to take. How could we possibly do justice to so important an event of 400 years ago, with anything other than a truly robust, full flavored contemporary 'Imperial Brown Ale.' Cheers."

Serving: 22oz bottle
Style: Imperial Brown Ale
ABV: 6.5%

He Said:
In keeping with the travel theme, "400" Ale is a bottle we picked up in 2007 while visiting Jamestown and Williamsburg. If you skipped the "Website/Bottle Information" above, then you missed a nice story about the role of beer as settlers landed in the New World.

I was reminded this was a brown ale while trying to detect its aroma prior to my first sip. It has very little hop profile and smelled bready (malty and yeasty). The flavor was good, but I found it a little hard to objectively assess a modern Imperial interpretation of an 18th century beer. When I checked Beer Advocate, most reviewers noted a strong sour flavor. In our bottle, the sourness must have completely gone away. I found "400" Ale to be much more pleasurable than BA reviewers that opened this in 2008. I'm just glad the beer was still enjoyable after five years in the cellar.

She Said:
Color - A dark, almost opaque brown with a tinge of red.

Head - Minimum white head. Lightly carbonated. Tiny bubbles.

Smell - Sweet, maybe a cherry bourbon smell (without the boozy notes).

Taste - Smooth and delish! This is a tame beer, but it is packed with a chocolate/cherry flavor. The beer finishes with sweet darker chocolate notes. The beer is very good, and I'm sad to see it go. I would buy more if it was still available.

What a tribute to Jamestown 1607!! (editor's note: TwoPints has a bachelors degree in history. Can you tell? :)

The "Mother of All Beer Weeks" is not only a celebration of craft beer and those who make it, but just as importantly a celebration of the American craft beer culture.

Most people attribute the offset of the modern day American craft brewery to be around 1980 when pioneer Fritz Maytag finished modernizing Anchor Steam in San Francisco, CA. Soon after, Ken Grossman opened Sierra Nevada in Chico, CA. The beer geek counterculture at that time was small and somewhat fragmented, and it would be another decade before the American craft beer scene began to take shape. Growth during the 1980s and 1990s was slow due to the outdated post-Prohibition laws most states, some which still exist. Even today, many craft beer enthusiasts don’t have access to the local options available in Portland, Asheville, or Denver. However, the common denominator for all of us is the pub.

Local pubs offer beer enthusiasts an opportunity to experience top offerings from around the country (and World). Great pubs play a huge role in fostering the growth of local beer culture. In Houston, TX, we are fortunate to have a distinguished homegrown pub like The Ginger Man that has been synonymous with beer culture since the mid-80s. The uniquely cool Petrol Station and notable chain Flying Saucer have also been beacons during the development of Houston’s craft beer scene.

This afternoon I am scribbling this blog post on a notepad from a bar stool at one of the best cocktail bars in America. With Anvil Bar & Refuge’s accolades for cocktails, I guess it is easy to overlook that beer guru Kevin Floyd may be the most knowledgeable and influential craft beer minds in Houston. Anvil may be hated as enthusiastically as it is praised, but Houston is lucky be able to claim such great cocktail and beer minds as Anvil co-owners Bobby Heugel and Kevin Floyd. I imagine there are a lot of sleepy bars that would gladly trade for a piece of Anvil’s hype.

As Houston’s craft beer venues increase in number, so does the city’s beer culture in strength. Craft beer bars aren’t the place to grab two shots and a light beer before heading home to the family. Craft beer bars are a subset of bars just as “foodie finds” are a subset of restaurants. Great bars educate consumers about what is being served and the brewery where it was crafted. The growth of these venues is intriguing because instead of dividing up the existing faction of beer enthusiasts, the base seems to be growing. I predict we are not seeing the pinnacle in 2011, but we are merely in the upward segment of the craft beer popularity bell curve. More or less, this prediction is literally almost virtually scientific law. Fact.

Day 4
May 19, 2011
Uinta Brewing Cockeyed Cooper (Salt Lake City, UT)
Bottled 03/23/11

Website/Bottle Information:
"Launch into the exquisite flavors of bourbon with splashes of vanilla. Watch for currents of dark chocolate and dried fruit. Generous amounts of hops and malts make for a smooth journey from start to finish. Decadent desserts and aged cheeses make superb companions."

Serving: 750 mL bottle
Style: American Barleywine
ABV: 11.1%


He Said:
This bottle came by way of a Beer of the Month club, which like a craft beer bar is another great way to try beers not available at your local beer merchant. I've never tried any beers from Uinta, and to be honest I've never really noticed the brewery until I researched it for our United States of Beer Project (Uinta finished #2 in Utah to the Utah Brewers Cooperative).

The packaging on this beer is awesome. The label was designed by a local artist, and the 750 mL bottle even has a punt!

The barrel aging is quite evident on the nose, as are sweet and hop notes that are expected in a 11.1% ABV barleywine. Cockeyed Cooper was aged for six months in Heaven Hill rye bourbon barrels. Judging from the taste, six months may have been a little too long, but I'm not complaining. The front end of each sip is very oak-y; almost drowning out the typical sweetness of a barleywine and masking most of the beer's malt and yeast flavors (until the beer got closer to room temperature). The finish was very hoppy. A transition from intense wood to intense hops proved to be somewhat challenging to the palate.

Despite these nit picks, I still enjoyed this unique offering. Cockeyed Cooper is a great example of how American brewers are continuing to explore the boundaries of what the industry considers "craft."

She Said:
Aroma - Chocolate
Look - Head was minimal, white, and creamy. The color was translucent chocolate with a red tint.
Taste - The first taste is bitter and carbonated that almost over-powers anything else. The finish is drier than expected with cigar notes (dark and bitter). Overall there is a chocolatey taste to the beer. The booziness of the beer burns going down and left me with a dry mouth feeling.

Cockeyed Cooper is not my favorite. I feel like I sucked on a lot of bark (not that I've ever done that).

Sometimes when I sit down, queue up something on the TiVo, and open a beer, I feel like I am single handedly saving the World. And why shouldn’t I?

I work for a cancer hospital. I get paid to reduce the energy and water use of our facilities. I even donate to my university’s athletic program. In my spare time, I literally drink my carbon footprint to oblivion.

For decades brewers have reduced waste by sending their spent grain to be used as animal feed or fertilizer. Modern facilities are beginning to utilize energy efficient brewhouse designs to offset the enormous heating and water demands of a commercial brewery. Efficient boilers are being implemented to reduce the fuel required for steam generation, boiling, etc. Around 45% percent of the brewing process’ total energy is spent in the brew kettle during the boiling stage of brewing. Once this heat is produced, efficient breweries take steps through heat recovery devices to capture and reuse it in other processes or to convert the heat to usable energy that can power other devices.

Over 90% of beer is water. Furthermore, to make a unit of beer, it typically requires 4 or 5 units of water. Process water reduction, recycling water from process to process, and wastewater recovery are beginning to be implemented by commercial breweries to protect this natural, but finite resource.

Many breweries have also minimized their environmental impact by implementing sustainable business practices (e.g. purchase materials made of 100% recycled content) or by purchasing from suppliers utilizing sustainable farming practices (e.g. minimize fertilizer use, purchase local ingredients, no-till production).

Today we open a beer from Rogue Brewing’s Chatoe series. Rogue is considered by some to use gimmicky marketing ("Brewed using... free range coastal water" -- awesome), but Chatoe Rogue is the real deal. The brewery grows its own barley and hops for these beers. The beers are brewed onsite and include no chemicals, additives, or preservatives. Now if they could only get on the development of wormhole technology so mine doesn’t have to be delivered across the country using fossil fuels…

Day 3
May 18, 2011
Chatoe Rogue First Growth Creek Ale (Independence, OR)

photo courtesy of beerinfo.com

Website/Bottle Information:
"We made this beer with our own hops and barley. Malty aroma, dark mahogany-brown in color with a rich, malty sweetness that finishes dry on top of a lush cherry flavor.

Brewed using 8 ingredients: Wheat, Rogue Barley Farm Dare and Risk Malts, Rogue Hopyard Revolution Hops, Montmorency Cherries, Pacman and Belgian Yeast and Free Range Coastal Water.



Dedicated to Farmers and Fermenters. GYO is a Rogue Ales term for Grow Your Own"

Serving: 22oz bottle
Style: Dubbel
25 IBU
ABV: 6.0%

He Said:
It is almost a lock that any dreamy, high concept beer is going to be a disappointment (just like my blog posts!). The bottle says they used cherries, but you wouldn't be able to tell from the nose. The beer has a slight malty sweet aroma, but almost nothing else. I either detect some mustiness or it is just that I'm imagining the aroma of the Oregon hippies that crafted this beer.

The flavor is a real sucker punch. Wow. Tart (Ha! Now I get it. Creek = Kriek. Those tricky Oregonians). The beer is so tart that it covers up some of the deeper malt flavors, Belgian yeast flavors, and any of the custom Rogue farmed hops that the label advertises. Surprisingly, the cherry tartness is not cloying, but overall it isn't amazing either.

Can I really like this beer and also be a little disappointed? That was a rhetorical question. I'm going to buy another one of these and taste it again next year. I also look forward to trying future Chatoe releases.

She Said:
The beer is red brown in color. It smells "woodsy rustic" (much like it looks, actually). The aroma does not hint at the flavor. The tartness hits your mouth with such a surprise it made me pucker and squint. I'm reminded of the flavor of an unripened cherry. While the beer is tart to start, it is quickly goes away on the palate.

First Growth Creek Ale might age well. I'd really like to try one of these aged in oak. Think cigars and brandy.