Archive for the 'Here’s What’s Brewing' Category

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Real Ale Brewing Company

Published on August 31, 2010 in 2010 and Here's What's Brewing. 0 Comments

Orignaly posted on Aug 31, 2010 19:31 – By: Jeremybanas
Weekend Destinations for the Craft Beer Aficionado

Texas is big. I know, surprise, surprise. You can drive for hours and never leave the state. So where can you go for a quick weekend get away? A place that takes both no time at all to get to, but gets you away from the daily grind? There are many places in and around San Antonio, Austin and Houston that both natives and visitors can get to with relative ease. Blanco, Texas is one such town. Nestled in the heart of the Texas Hill Country, this quant little town boasts quite a lot of history, beautiful landscape and fun things to do. Rivers, hills and lots of antique shopping. Plenty for everyone. For those who also partake in the pleasures of a American craft beer, Blanco is also home to the Real Ale Brewing Company.


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Ranger Creek Brewing and Distilling

Published on August 20, 2010 in 2010 and Here's What's Brewing. 0 Comments

Orignally posted Aug 20, 2010 14:32 – By: Jeremybanas

The name Ranger Creek conjures up thoughts mountains, streams and everything outdoors. Not the vision one might get when thinking of Texas. Yet, here they are, Ranger Creek Brewing and Distilling. Texas’ first brewstillery. Yes, that means they will be making fresh Texas craft beers and homegrown Texas Whiskey. When they start brewing, Ranger Creek will be the first production craft beer brewery in San Antonio in quite a while. San Antonio is best known for for The Alamo, The San Antonio Spurs, Davy Crocket and the Dallas Cowboys. A great city to be sure and a must visit when heading to Texas. They’ve even hosted the mens and womens Final Four a couple of times. I’ve spent many a night meandering down the twists and turns on the world famous Riverwalk.

When I heard these guys were going to be opening soon, I just had to contact them and stop by. I had to know more. I wanted to see what the buzz was all about. Texas has a steadily growing craft beer scene, one that is long overdue. I contacted their head brewer Rob, and head of Marketing, Mark and all was set for a visit.

Where the brewing magic happens

After map questing the directions, I located Ranger creek in the most unlikely of places, near an industrial park. Not where’d I’d expect to find a brewery. I parked next to a vehicle who’s bumper sticker read “I’d Rather Be Homebrewing’ and I knew this was the place to be.

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Colorado, Craft Beer and The Great American Beer Festival

Published on August 15, 2010 in 2010 and Here's What's Brewing. 4 Comments

When most people think of Colorado, they instantly think of  The Rocky Mountains,  John Denver, skiing and everything outdoors. What most people do not think of is Colorado and it’s more than solid craft beer scene. In fact, Colorado is one of the best states for craft beer, as it is very tourist friendly, high concentration of restaurants with good beer and the scenery can’t be beat.

In fact, the Colorado Tourism Office states that “If you like beer, you’ll love Colorado. Colorado has more breweries per capita than any other state in the U.S. And, we’ve been brewing beer since the 1800s. In addition to major breweries, Colorado also has one of the largest concentrations of microbreweries (producing specialty beers in smaller quantities) in the nation, with more than 100 located throughout the state. Most of the breweries offer tours of their facilities as well as beer tastings. The Great American Beer Festival, the largest domestic beer festival in the United States is held each year in Denver.”

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The World’s Strongest Beer. Thoughts and Musings on Pushing the Envelope

Published on August 8, 2010 in 2010 and Here's What's Brewing. 3 Comments

It’s August newsletter, Scottish craft brewery, Brewdog, announced it had yet again brewed the world’s strongest beer. This one weighing in at 55% ABV. For the longest time, Samuel Adams Utopias was the strongest, weighing in at around 7%, depending on the year. Then last year, Brewdog hatched its Tactical Nuclear Penguin, weighing in at 32%. This was achieved by freezing the beer, removing water from it, thus increasing the alcohol by volume. Soon after, German brewer, Schorschbrau, came up with a brew that was 40% ABV.Ok, now we’re justing trying to one up each other. Not to be out done, Brewdog came bck with a 41% ABV concoction called ‘Sink the Bismark!’. Now Brewdog has arrived at ‘The End of History’. A 55% ABV beer.

Although beers of this high an alcohol concentration should be enjoyed in very small pours and over a sufficient period of time, it’s hard to really enjoy these beers. Utopias was pushing it as it is. That tasted like a fine cognac and a very good one. With Tactical, Sink The Bismark! and The End of History, we seem to be getting to the point where were artificially upping the abv simply because we can, and not pushing the edge of brewing.

It seems to be trendy to have the highest ABV beer out there and as much as I love and respect what Brewdog is and seems to be trying to do, please, let’s stop the madness and brew a beer that isn’t a marketing ploy. Brewdog has some very solid beers and I buy many of them, let’s stick with creative and not blow my palette .

That being said, I don’t mean to offend the fine folks at Brewdog. I love their stuff. I just had to get this off my chest.

Nebraska Brewing Company and the 2010 US Open Beer Championships

Published on July 8, 2010 in 2010 and Here's What's Brewing. 0 Comments

Hot off the press!

US Open 2010

Cicerone. What the heck is it anyway?

Published on May 30, 2010 in 2010 and Here's What's Brewing. 1 Comment Tags: .

The wine world has the Sommelier. A well respected, intense program that produces the best wine experts in the world. Wikipedia describes a Sommelier as someone who is “responsible for the development of wine lists,[1] and for the delivery of wine service and training for the other restaurant staff. Working along with the culinary team, they pair and suggest wines that will best complement each particular food menu item. This entails the necessity for a deep knowledge of how food and wine, beer, spirits and other beverages work in harmony. A professional Sommelier also works on the floor of the restaurant and is in direct contact with restaurant patrons. The Sommelier has a responsibility to work within the taste preference and budget parameters of the patron”. In order to truly achieve this designation, you must go through The Court of Master Sommeliers, the governing body for the Sommelier program since 1977. When anyone hears the term ‘Sommelier’, they instantly think of wine expert, someone who knows their grapes. But the beer world? What do we have? Why, we have the Certified Cicerone Program, run by Ray Daniels, a know industry expert, author and dare I say legend in the craft beer world.

Photo courtesy of Ray Daniels

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My Attempt At Building A Mash Tun

Published on April 2, 2010 in Here's What's Brewing. 0 Comments Tags: .

Ok, So I decided to get industrious and make my very own mash tun. For those not familiar, a mash tun is a pice of brewing equipment used with All Grain brewing. A mash tun is used to steep the grain and pull the fermentable sugars from it to create sweet wort, the beginnings of your beer. I got the basic directions from Homebrew Talk article: Converting a cooler to a mash tun. Please join me while I attempt to explain how I got all this together!

After what what probably far too much research for what turned out to be a simple device to build, I was set to begin. First up was getting a cooler. Either a rectangular or curricular beverage cooler will do. I picked up a 52qt Igloo rectangular cooler at Target, $20. You can also use a round beverage cooler for this, a common one being a 10 gallon model from Rubbermaid. Either way, you’re good.

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Brewing it up at Freetail Brewing Company

Published on February 25, 2010 in Here's What's Brewing. 4 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

About a week ago, I got a chance to do something I thought I never would: brewing beer at a brewery. I reviewed beers from freetail before and written about them. I’ve gotten to know Jason Davis a little over the last year or more and have always wanted to try my hand at helping out at a brewery. Learning from the professionals. I got my chance a little over a week ago.

What is John doing?

I arrived a little before 9 a.m. Jason had already started the mash, so I was a little behind. As I walked in Jason said ‘Hi, come on back’, but looked not my direction, as he was busy stirring the mash. As I walked into the brewing room and around the mash tun, he said come on up, ‘it’s you’re turn to stir’. I’ve been homebrewing for a little while, however this was going to be something very new for me. A giant leap in my brewing education.

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Beer and Cheese Tasting At Freetail Brewing Co.

Published on February 21, 2010 in Here's What's Brewing. 2 Comments

Yesterday was a day indeed. After spending a couple of hours bottling my Coffee Porter Friday night, I was tired. Then the time spent ordering more homebrew equipment and ingrediants for the next batches..whew!

I did find a way to get the kiddos to their rocket launches, piano lessons and other shenanigans! In the middle of all this, I did find a few moments to stop by my favorite brewpub in South Texas, Freetail Brewing Co., for their February 2010 Beer and Cheese Tasting. As always, brewmaster Jason Davis did a fantastic job (I still need to chronicle my brewing adventure with him).

3 courses, 3 cheeses and 3 of Freetail’s intoxicating elixers…

A nice and simple plate

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Pavil Restaurant and Bar – Not An Average French Restaurant

Published on February 15, 2010 in Here's What's Brewing. 0 Comments Tags: , .

What has become part one of my experience with Pavil Restaurant was entitled ‘Brasserie Pavil – Not your Average French Restaurant’ and posted on UpTake.com. Recently however, they have gone through a name change. What was once Brasserie Pavil, is now Pavil Restaurant and Bar. This will serve to be part two. In part one, I spoke of Pavil’s monthly beer dinners, their focus on craft beer and the Stone Brewing Co beer dinner I attended earlier this month. In this article I’ll speak more of the Stone dinner, as well as my talk with Pavil’s manager Luciano Ciorciari.

Classic Decor

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