Sauter’s custom artwork for the new HopBurst series encapsulates the essence of each IPA, elevating the visual and sensory experience for craft beer … hops into our Hazy IPA at the end of its …
We are living in a golden age of craft beer and here are some of my highlights from an amazing year of ales and lagers.
(NEW YORK, NY) — Montauk Brewing Company (“Montauk Brewing” or “Montauk) the #1 and fastest-selling craft brewer in Metro New York according to Nielson data known for its exceptional beers and a […]
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Nestled in between a donut shop and an H&R block in the 10th Ward of New Orleans is Stein’s Market and Deli, owned and operated by its namesake and local legend, Dan Stein. Starting from early in his food-service career, Stein has spent the last 16 years growing to be a flag-bearer for the city’s beer community. Leveraging distribution knowledge he gleaned from his time running a Philadelphia cheese shop and connections made through the deli, he introduced consumers to new and exciting tastes and encouraged distributors to send more beer to the region to meet growing demand.
[Above: Members of the Horsemen of the Hopocalypse donate to the Tarrant Area Food Bank in Fort Worth, Texas. Image provided by the Horsemen of the Hopocalypse.]
This is an excerpt from the September/October 2023 Zymurgy magazine. Go to Zymurgy Online to access all magazine issues through the year 2000!
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By Kristen Kuchar
Each year, one homebrew club is awarded the Radegast Club of the Year, named for the Slavic god of hospitality and the creator of beer. The recipient is a club that does fantastic things in addition to brewing great beer, such as finding creative ways to promote the hobby and joys of homebrewing, engaging in philanthropy efforts, and focusing on the community. This year, The Horseman of the Hopocalypse have been given this honor.
The North Texas club’s monthly meetings each take place at a different local brewery. To help spread the word of homebrewing, members wear club shirts and hats, and inevitably brewery patrons come ask about it. It’s a great way to introduce homebrewing and the club to beer lovers who are likely already passionate about craft beer. The club also has brew days at the local homebrew store in Fort Worth, BrewHound. Members are on hand to be an asset to new brewers and talk about the club and homebrewing in general.
There’s a priority on encouraging first-timers to the group to stick with homebrewing. “We really work to engage our new members,” says Charlie Scudder, chief information officer for the club. The goal is to bring them into the fold and help them improve their brewing and elevate their work.
A monthly newsletter (with a high open rate) keeps people involved with a calendar of events, a technical column on a brewing topic, a Q&A to spotlight a member (including a recipe), and more. They’ll also periodically host a new member meet-up where fledgling members can gather at the homebrew shop so it’s a familiar, comfortable place. “We want to be able to meet people where they are and help them improve where they are,” Charlie says.
New members are matched with the best club resources for their skill and interest level. If a new member is an extract brewer, for example, they’ll be pointed in the direction of members who are winning medals with extract beers.
Club secretary Rachael Brasovan has felt the positive impacts of those new member efforts. Rachael wanted to get into a hobby after graduating college in 2020 and a friend told her about brewing. During a visit to BrewHound, the shop suggested she check out the club, so she went to a meeting on a whim.
“Everyone was super nice and welcoming,” she says. For Rachael, the club is a source for useful information as well as camaraderie, and someone always is there with an answer. “I get tips and tricks that I wouldn’t have figured out on my own,” she says.
When she wanted to make the switch to all-grain brewing, a member invited her to come over and brew one together, to get a hands-on experience. “Doing it on your own is fun but having other people that share your hobby and love what they do and love to try your beer is really nice and encouraging,” she says. Rachael, who loves brewing IPAs and pale ales, won the IPA division at the Spirit of 76 competition last year.
As for giving back, the club has raised funds for the Brotherhood of the Fallen and Ukrainian humanitarian aid. They also rallied around the BrewHound store owner (also a fellow club member) when he lost his wife to a sudden illness. Members raised money through a GoFundMe page, helped him at the shop to lessen his workload, and planned a homebrew community event to provide additional support.
Education is a continued priority. One of the members won a five-gallon drum of high-quality honey, so the club hosted a mead day in which members learned how to make mead. Participants tried honey varieties, and everyone went home with honey to make their own batch of mead.
“It’s a really collaborative environment,” Charlie explains. “But we’re also very competitive.” There is a lot of encouragement for members to compete as much as possible, and having so many BJCP judges in the group helps guide what the judging process is like.
The club hosts a handful of competitions throughout the year. Club-only competitions are held seasonally—in February, members make a Valentine’s Day beer; in April, everyone brews a recipe from a pro brewer, and Halloween-themed beers in October are complete with spooky décor. They also host the Belgian Draft Horse and Spirit of 76 competitions, which are open to all homebrewers.
It’s not only about acknowledging the award-winning brews, Charlie explains, but acknowledging all brewing strides. “Even if it’s not the greatest beer, if it’s the best beer you’ve made, we want to celebrate it.”
The post 2023 Radegast Club of the Year: Horseman of the Hopocalypse appeared first on American Homebrewers Association.
Around a decade ago, Avrahom Pressburger started losing interest in domestic lager. The insurance broker swapped Budweiser for fragrant Blue Moon and seasonal beers from Sam Adams. He examined cans and bottles, looking beyond styles and ABV for a certified-kosher symbol.
Born into Orthodox Judaism in Brooklyn and now living in New York State’s Rockland County, Pressburger follows dietary guidelines that forbid mixing meat and dairy and mandate how foods are processed, produced, and prepared.
Oyster stouts were off the table. What about double IPAs? Or strawberry sour ales? Details on certified beers were scarce, so he crowd-sourced information from BeerAdvocate’s message boards and Facebook groups, eventually creating the website and Instagram account Kosher Craft Beer.
“It’s been a journey,” says Pressburger, who posts pictures of kosher-certified beers such as Deschutes Black Butte Porter and strong Belgian ale La Chouffe. In the absence of certification, he contacts breweries for additional information. “There are just too many ingredients,” he says.
Modern craft beer broke free from orthodoxy by resuscitating historical styles, embracing excess, and tinkering with culinary ingredients. The anything-goes approach garnered attention and sales, but experimentalism left many kosher-adherent customers behind.
“When there’s stuff added beyond the four basic ingredients”—water, yeast, grains, hops—”it raises kosher questions,” says Rabbi Zvi Holland, director of special projects for Star-K, a kosher certification agency in Baltimore, Maryland. (It’s one of five agencies that certify most of America’s kosher food.) “We’ve had [brewers] use Greek yogurt to make a sour ale, which creates a kosher issue.”
To reach the broadest possible demographic, breweries are embracing kosher certification. Boston Beer’s Truly hard seltzer and Twisted Tea are totally kosher, and breweries both regional (Boulevard Brewing, F.X. Matt) and local such as Leikam Brewing in Portland, Oregon, sell kosher beer. Breweries and companies are also turning to kosher beer to celebrate Hanukkah, while New York City rabbinical student Jesse Epstein is reviving the Jewish-themed Shmaltz Brewing brand.
Go to any grocery store and grab non-refrigerated items such as bread or ketchup, and the label will likely contain a hechsher, a symbol or stamp signifying a kosher product.
More than 40 percent of America’s packaged foods are kosher, an outsize stat when you consider that around 2 percent of the country’s population is Jewish. “It makes companies money,” Rabbi Holland says.
Historically, German beer followed another purity law, the Reinheitsgebot, which limited beer to water, hops, and barley. European Jews who immigrated to America in the 19th and 20th centuries would’ve been accustomed to unadorned lagers. “There’s a history of drinking beer without a kosher certification because it wasn’t something that concerned them,” Holland says.
As the 1980s gave way to the 1990s, America was no longer one nation under lager. Breweries began producing assorted beer styles, and “the [kosher] community started to get nervous,” Holland says.
Coors Brewing became the first major brewery to receive its kosher certification, in 1990, followed by Miller Brewing in 1999. (The breweries are now part of Molson Coors Beverage Company.)
For more than a decade, Spoetzl Brewery has brewed kosher-certified Shiner Bock and more at its Shiner, Texas, facility. The brewery requests kosher certifications from suppliers, and a rabbi visits annually to examine paperwork. “It’s always a joyful event,” says director of brewery and distillery operations Tom Fiorenzi.
Fiorenzi has learned to navigate specific kosher guidelines such as avoiding aging a beer in a wine barrel unless the wine is kosher. And the brewery isolated its on-site restaurant, K. Spoetzl BBQ Co., from brewery operations.
“It’s a big traceability exercise,” says Fiorenzi. “I’m concerned every single day about what’s going into the beer. It’s what we practice and preach.”
Securing approvals can feel punitive for breweries. You didn’t fill out this form. Try again.
“Kosher is collaborative,” says Dan Voce, vice president of operations for F.X. Matt in Utica, New York, which has produced certified kosher beer for more than 10 years. A rabbi visits once or twice a month for a facility walkthrough including looking over raw materials and monitoring ingredient staging and production.
F.X. Matt makes its Saranac beers and contract brews for multiple companies, including Brooklyn Brewery. Kosher certification is a selling point for contract production, especially as companies seek competitive advantages and placements in chains such asWhole Foods.
Food-safety certifications such as kosher “used to be nice to have, but I would say now they’re necessary,” says Voce.
Attaining kosher certification won’t immediately draw sales from untapped demographics. Preconceived notions must be rewired, one pint at a time. “Culturally, Jews tend to not be into beer as much as they are into wine and spirits,” says Rabbi Drew Kaplan, founder and publisher of Jewish Drinking.
That’s partly due to beer’s perceived cultural status. People willing to spend big on Scotch or wine for an event might also opt for Heineken or Corona, Pressburger says. Lack of access exacerbates the issue. Specialty beer stores are absent from Orthodox neighborhoods. “Generally speaking, there’s a strong lack of education when it comes to beer in the Orthodox community.”
Solving shortcomings requires creating new beer-drinking occasions. In advance of next year’s relaunch of Shmaltz, which closed in 2021, Epstein conducted an event on a synagogue’s rooftop, invited congregants to homebrew, and threw a Purim party that included a drag performance. “I love going to synagogue, but I recognize not every Jew does,” Epstein says. Shmaltz can reach beyond pews to “build our communities through beer.”
In 2015, Sonia Marie Leikam and her husband opened kosher-certified Leikam Brewing with a desire to be an inclusive, community-driven space. “We’re also vegan and gluten-reduced, but the market differentiator that folks grabbed onto was that we were kosher,” says Leikam, who is Jewish. (Her husband, Theo, is not.)
The brewery focuses on classic styles such as porters and red ales, which are served during events like drag trivia, comedy nights, and live music. This December, Leikam turned its taproom into a pop-up Hanukkah-themed bar called L’chaim featuring Hanukkah-themed bingo, Manischewitz Jell-O shots, and the Maccabeer IPA made for the holiday.
“For folks who are more culturally Jewish, Hanukkah is a moment where they find pride,” Leikam says.
City Brew Tours includes Leikam beer in its Hoppy Hanukkah gift box, and founder and CEO Chad Brodsky hosts a nightly Hanukkah livestream with food pairings and Jewish guests. “The livestream gets to the connecting points of Judaism and beer,” says Brodsky, who typically sells around 1,000 boxes annually.
Not every Hoppy Hanukkah beer is kosher, so Brodsky selects Reinheitsgebot-compliant beers that avoid adjuncts like lactose. Star-K used to keep a list of non-certified beers, but it’s since stopped keeping track; the torrent of releases never stops. “We need to significantly expand the amount of certified beer on shelves,” Rabbi Holland says.
One sticking point is that kosher certification is a monetary investment (it’s typically measured in the thousands of dollars, says Rabbi Holland), and craft breweries need to prioritize any expense. “We’ve chosen where to put our financial resources,” says Leikam, adding that the brewery doesn’t spend money submitting beers to competitions.
There’s never been a better or more confusing time to be a beer drinker. Selecting a six-pack can be overwhelming—doubly so for drinkers keeping kosher. Why limit the audience? “When you create something for a Jewish audience, there’s this idea that you’re limiting your product,” Epstein says. “I believe there’s potential to take something that’s Jewish and give it to everyone.”
The post Keeping Kosher in Craft Beer appeared first on CraftBeer.com.
By Julia Herz, American Homebrewers Association Executive Director
On December 7, 2023, the American Homebrewers Association (AHA) turns 45. That’s a lot of beers since 1978. In four-and-a-half decades, the world has changed for the better because of the AHA’s existence, with homebrewers around the world setting the stage.
The AHA has fueled the craft beer movement and, even more relevant, catapulted the modern pastime of homebrewing. Yup, that’s what we did. In 1978, The New York Times published an article titled “Beer Is Most Popular of U.S. Bar Drinks”1, but we know what a dismal time for beer it was. Back then, the United States had fewer than 100 breweries, and rarely did one profess to be a homebrewer.
I’ll go on the record and say the two best things about beer in 1978 were the founding of the AHA and the signing of H.R. 1337 into law. H.R. 1337, signed by President Jimmy Carter, was the game-changing act that authorized “the home production of beer and wine without federal taxation.”2
The AHA’s anniversary is also an ode to the staying power of this very publication, Zymurgy, the preeminent magazine for homebrewers. Pronounced “zīˌmərjē,” the title means “a branch of applied chemistry that deals with fermentation processes (as in wine making or brewing).”3 Led by homebrewers Dave Carpenter, editor-in-chief for the past eight years (see more on his departure in Editor’s Desk); associate editor Amahl Turczyn; art director Jason Smith; Duncan Bryant, web editor for HomebrewersAssociation.org; yours truly; and an engaged team of not-for-profit professionals, we are your dedicated advocates.
Homebrewers must know that they put the f in fun when it comes to beer. Yes, you are a part of history, influence, and ongoing innovation. Since anniversaries are about celebrating and offering presents, here are some goodies for you.
With each anniversary, there is even more meaning, more batches of beer, and more accomplishment under our belts. What about your homebrew anniversary? When did you start brewing, and how do you annually celebrate? Please consider sharing your story by emailing me at [email protected].
Julia Herz is executive director of the American Homebrewers Association. You can follow Julia’s homebrew talks and travels on Instagram @ImmaculateFermentation.
The post American Homebrewers Association Turns 45 appeared first on American Homebrewers Association.
Memphis-grown Bartosch brothers of Wiseacre Brewing Co. show off their award-winning low-calorie beer. Bringing a new twist to the craft beer scene for the holiday season.
When it comes to beer (especially craft beer), you’d have a tough time finding a beer more popular than the IPA. Whether it’s a West Coast IPA, New England … Calusa Brewing’s ZOTE IPA.
We had finally arrived at the village of Teller, Alaska, by dog team. Even though our 18 huskies were tired, they lunged forward in their harnesses and barked with anticipation. We’d been on the trail for five days, dog mushing from Nome. It should have taken us three, but the travel was slow. There was hardly any snow for the overland route, so we wound our way along the coast. We snaked through the large pieces of aufeis, which are sheets of ice formed by layers of flowing water. We were there to find a Dog Man by the name of Joe Garnier, one of the legends of the dog mushing world.
I allowed my dogs to decide the route through the village, and they crested a small hill to arrive at a few cabins, a traditional wood sauna, and a dog yard with a dozen barking sled dogs welcoming us. Joe was standing in front of his dog yard. He wore his wolf-and-wolverine-fur ruff masking his face from the wind. I pulled my dogs up next to him and set the brake. At the time, Joe didn’t know my name. I hadn’t told him when we were leaving or what our travel plan had been. As I was pulling off my own ruff to introduce myself he said, “You’re three days late. Better park your dogs. There’s a storm coming.”
As he turned away to go inside, I looked up. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. This is the typical shit I hear from Dog Men. I never know whether they’re being serious or cracking their own sort of quizzical joke.
Dog Men always seem to have one eye on the horizon, one on their team, and a combined gaze that is distant but warm. They rarely reveal their secrets, and you need to spend long periods of time with them to come to know what they know and understand how they have learned it. They are the culture bearers, and the ones who hold the knowledge necessary to disappear into the country. But they also know the bond needed with their dogs to travel long distances without a trail—a skillset that is disappearing as quickly as the permafrost is thawing and the salmon are declining in the North.
FROM SPRINT TO SPORT
The use of sled dogs can be traced back thousands of years and is woven into anthropologic history. There is geologic evidence that sled dogs and humans co-evolved together: Indigenous peoples in North America, Siberia, and Greenland relied heavily on these canine companions for hunting, transportation, and survival in everyday life. In Alaska, “sled dog racing” occurred in the spring, when teams would gather in the villages to trade furs and participate in end-of-the-winter sprint races. These were casual, friendly competitions—not the IIditarod Sled Dog Race. The necessity of the sled dog continued through the 20th century, becoming an integral part of the Alaskan identity.
The advent of snowmobiles, ATVs, and other motorized forms of transportation significantly reduced the practical need of dog teams. These machines offered faster and more efficient means of travel, making them more appealing, especially for younger generations growing up in remote communities.
The 1970s and 80s marked a rekindling of interest in mushing history and heritage. The sport, which had been a cornerstone of life in the Arctic for centuries, experienced a renaissance as people sought to reconnect with their cultural roots. Distance races with large sums of money, like the Iditarod, were entirely unheard of until this time period. They were established to preserve the sled dog culture and to keep freight trails open between villages. Purse money in both forms of racing—sprint and distance—started growing in popularity across the country. Professional dog mushing was born.
I was lucky enough to grow up among a residual cast of legends, Dog Men, and races where the prize money was thick and the cost of travel relatively low. My childhood was spent on the road, chasing purse winnings and accolades with my family. My mother claimed the most International Sled Dog Racing Association world-champion circuit titles in history, the equivalent of being an all-time great in the dog mushing Olympics. Some of my first memories were of watching the dogs run from the sled basket, learning the movements and language of Alaskan huskies. I grew up directly alongside 35 sled dogs. They were my best friends, and the older ones were my most respected mentors.
I longed for slower, sensory travel and simplicity. I wanted to suck bone marrow out of caribou legs, drink seal oil, wake up in the morning and dust myself off like the dogs, curse at the wind direction, melt snow for my water, and continue on with the day.
Over time, sled dog breeding programs started to shift. Europeans introduced racing hounds into North America, which created a faster dog but at a cost of shorter hair and weaker feet. They needed dog jackets and dog booties to travel, and had to wear almost as many layers as people did. Packed trails became fundamental for racing, which meant a snow machine had to be out in front of the dogs at all times.
Media attention on dog sled racing escalated, as did the race entry fees. Meanwhile, the rising costs of dog food, veterinary care, and equipment—coupled with the economic challenges faced by many remote Alaskan villages—made it increasingly difficult for non-wealthy families to sustain a sled dog team. The populations of salmon, which had been a staple of dogs’ diets, were decreasing, while the cost of commercial dog food tripled.
As the ubiquity of sled dogs started to decrease across Alaska, so did local races and purse money. The sport became more gentrified, a pursuit only for the elite and white. I longed for slower, sensory travel and simplicity. I wanted to suck bone marrow out of caribou legs, drink seal oil, wake up in the morning and dust myself off like the dogs, curse at the wind direction, melt snow for my water, and continue on with the day. I wanted what anyone does in their youth: to break my own trail.
‘A BLIND FAITH’
I, too, competed in track and field and dog sled races for a time. But I retired from the race circuit with a final national championship at the age of 25, and reverted to mushing a breed of sled dog that could read the mountains and sea ice. I started hauling freight for Denali National Park through four million acres of wilderness, the Alaska Range and up to McGonagall Pass on Denali. I later ran polar expeditions for filmmaking and photography, traveling deep into trailless areas and along the coastline.
I started to pursue the elder dog mushers’ deeper ways of knowing as well. I mushed teams into villages to find the Dog Men, seeking their riddles that would shape me into more of a successful traveler and navigator. The skills were becoming vestiges of the past, and they wouldn’t be found in the racing circuit anymore—but maybe they still existed out in the country. I mushed along the coast of Alaska, deep into the interior, and throughout the northernmost mountains of the Brooks Range. I went to Greenland several times and learned to build sledges and understand different terrains and dog breeds.
Adaptability stands as the linchpin in preserving the cherished legacy of dog mushing culture, bridging the gap between the past and the future. An enduring strength lies within the hearts of dog mushers dedicated enough to continue forward without a known future or coordinates ahead.
The Arctic’s largest contributing factor to dog mushing decline is climate change. Reduced snow cover, thinning sea and glacier ice, as well as extreme and unpredictable weather events have melted away traditional hunting and traveling routes. On one winter expedition, aiming to sled from Greenland to Canada, we were 500 miles from the North Pole and couldn’t find enough steadfast ice to attempt a crossing. This crossing was a traveling and trading corridor for the Inupiat peoples, marked with an inukshuk—a type of stone landmark where people have been leaving objects for thousands of years to bless their travel across the ice.
The sadness of our expedition being brought to an abrupt halt was overshadowed by the pain and existential dread I felt for the people and all other species depending on sea ice for protection and migration, now becoming landlocked. All of our fates were becoming irrevocably braided right before my eyes.
It reminds us that adaptability stands as the linchpin in preserving the cherished legacy of dog mushing culture, bridging the gap between the past and the future. An enduring strength lies within the hearts of dog mushers dedicated enough to continue forward without a known future or coordinates ahead. This type of faith is something dog mushers have held for hundreds of years.
LIVING KNOWLEDGE
The storm Joe Garnier alluded to when I arrived at his house lasted one week. As the winds raged outside, he shared his food, wood stove, home, stories, and laughter with us. We learned how to find fresh water miles out on the sea ice, so the dogs wouldn’t become dehydrated. He taught us about the best parts of a seal to feed to the dogs, the winds that indicated immediate danger, and those that signaled smaller storms that could be traveled through.
The stuff you see out there—it’s going to be better than any acid trip you’ve ever been on.
The Dog Man is content, because he is living and existing in these moments with his dogs. Some would describe it as a meditation. Knowing that this form of travel might not always be able to persist makes me enjoy the moment that much more.
A week later, the skies cleared. When it was time to leave, Joe broke trail for us for a few miles, leading us out of the village and into the mountains.
“I’d go with you, but my body is older, and my back hurts,” he said. Reluctantly, he gave a smile, a nod, and turned back to the village. “Oh, hey Dittmar. The stuff you see out there—it’s going to be better than any acid trip you’ve ever been on.”
This is the shit Dog Men say. As we traveled up the coast, we experienced horizons that blended together, conversations with wild animals, and snowfall that was more illuminating than you could possibly imagine. He wasn’t wrong.
Words + Photos by Jayme Dittmar
