Second Floor Brewing

Last week we brewed the first of two beers we hope to have on tap at an upcoming Baltimore Beer Week event at Little Havana’s!

The first beer is a rebrew of our Oatmeal Stout to which I will try adding coffee.  It looks like I may have overfilled the carboy a bit but at least we got vigorous fermentation.  And that is what unfinished basements are for, am I right?

The second beers is going to be a hoppy, West Coast-style red.  While I realize that SFB and reds do not get along very well, we have had such consistent fermentation lately that I am willing to try again.

Both beers will be kegged and (hopefully) served to attendees with the proper amount of carbonation.  Nevermind how carbonated the last beer we kegged became.  There is nothing like a deadline plus the threat of public humiliation for motivation.

The event, labelled a “Homebrew Showcase,” is October 13th from 630 to 930.  According to the site it is $3 for all-you-can-drink samples.  I have no idea how many homebrewers will be there or how many beers they will offer.  If SFB was good at believed in networking, I would say this is going to be an excellent opportunity to do such.

If I learned anything from the Great American Beer Festival it is that you must have an exciting booth.  Extra points are given if you provide swag.  So what I need is 1. something to give away and 2. something to decorate.   I have no ideas for either.

GABF Edition!  Denver was fun, as it probably always is in the time surrounding the Great American Beer Festival.  There was an abundance of good beer, if it even needs to be said.  Since I’m still in a listing type mood (and since I can’t think of a better format) here are some GABF thoughts:

• Pretzel necklaces — Where did that idea come from?  Big pretzels, small pretzels, chocolate and yogurt covered.  Some people had slim jims on ropes around their necks, others had string cheese.  One guy had a bottle of Pepto Bismol on his necklace.  There are a few pictures below.
• Costumes — Always a good idea.  There are pictures below of a few choice groups.  I suggested that my three companions and I go as Mount Rushmore next year and I called Lincoln.  Not everyone was enthused as I was with that idea.
• Ohhhing — Every 30 seconds or so the crowd omits an extended “ohhhhhhh.”  It takes a few of them before you figure out that each oh immediately follows someone dropping their tasting cup.  This game becomes extra fun during the Saturday Members-Only session in which your tasting cup is glass instead of plastic.
• Farm to Table – In a quiet corner of the convention hall, through a set of guarded doors stood the Farm to Table Pavilion: a dozen tables covered with food and paired with beers.  Excellent.  There was no “ohhhing” in here, no costumed revelry: good beer and good food backed by people knowledgeable about both.  This ticket is a must buy for my next visit as well.
• Crazy Booths – Sierra Nevada did it right with their booth (see picture below) consisting of an 10-person bike-mobile.  You wait in line, you get up there, you pedal, and they pour you beer until all the sand falls out of the top of the giant hourglass.  The booth doesn’t power anything nor do you move but it was still fun.
• New Breweries / New Beers — Because some beers that I would like to drink are not usually available in Maryland, it is always fun to go to, say, California, and drink beers by Pizza Port or Russian River.  I also liked that I got to try Bitches Brew which sold out of stores quicker than I can fathom, beers from Cigar City Brewing, and Utopias which was surprisingly smooth.  Looks like I’m going to have to start “randomly” showing up at Max’s on that one-guy-who-orders-it-each-year’s birthday to befriend him.
• Mediocre Offerings — Maybe I’m asking too much but I think, for the GABF, you should bring your A-game.  Quite honestly, if you are some bobo brewery, you must entice me to come over and try your beer.  Too many breweries were content with the standard yellow sign and random volunteers pouring.
• Saturday – This year (my first) I bough tickets for the Friday, Saturday Afternoon, and Saturday Evening sessions.  If I am ever to go again, I will change that to either Thursday and Saturday Afternoon or Friday and Saturday Afternoon.  On Saturday there are more people and less beer plus I think two days is pretty much all you need.
• Beer celebrities – Sam Calagione, Jim Koch, and C-PEEZY are about the only national beer celebrities I would recognize in a room with 39,997 strangers so it makes sense that those were the ones I saw.  I thought I might recognize Greg Koch or Ray Daniels but I guess not.  I saw a few bloggers, one lady whose likeness appears on a Rogue bottle, and a whole bunch of people around town with brewery credentials hanging from their lanyards.  I don’t know who they were but I saw them!

My tour of Oregon and Northern California continues.

As I write this I am in Healdsburg, CA — home of Bear Republic Brewing.  I stopped by their Brewery and Restaurant today and had a Peter Brown Tribute Ale.  It was delicious and entered my belly rather quickly.  I’ve had a few other good beer-related stops including the Barley and Hops Tavern in Occidental, CA where I had a Pliny the Elder (my first one) and a Death & Taxes from Moonlight Brewing in near-by Fulton CA.

I had a few good local Portland beers as well and it seems that craft beer logos are on every set of tap handles I see.  Today I stopped at the Hop Kiln Winery which — before grape vines grew a-plenty in Sonoma County — used to dry hops from local hop farms.  The main building should be my Wordless Wednesday tomorrow.

At another winery I got to taste the grape “wort.”  It is the juice from the crushed grapes before fermentation.  I expected it to be sugary and hard to drink but it was delicious, perhaps more so than any of the wines I sampled today.

So far so good.  Six days to go.