Drunk: Brownlee Brood #2 & Pyramid’s New Imperial IPA

“It just tastes flat.”

That was Rena’s honest opinion of how the third bottle of our second brew, a Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale clone, fared on her palate.

Unfortunately, she was right.

Brownlee Brood #2 in the glass

Something’s not quite right with Brownlee Brood #2, and the not knowing exactly what is what makes homebrewing so frustrating (and challenging … and fun). I don’t know enough yet to put my finger on a specific reason for the ale’s failure(s), so there’s a good chance the next batch will be flawed, too. Adding to the befuddlement is the fact that this beer’s fruition was much different than our first fermentation. This recipe required test-tube yeast, where the first was a smack-pack; it asked for Irish moss and maltodextrin, where the first needed neither. Our preparation was smoother and our boiling cleaner for this brew. The bottling was much easier, and without serious mistakes.

So where did we go wrong? What mistake resulted in a beer that tastes nothing like, my tongue-muscle memory tells me, Sierra Nevada’s consistently extremely tasty hoppy brew? (For that matter, how does a dry-hopped beer end up with no nose whatsoever? How does one avoid chill haze?) Don’t know. Think it might be too little bottling sugar, but that’s a not-completely-educated guess. We’re planning a “vertical” tasting of Brood #2 and its superior, original twin, which will no doubt highlight the shortcomings of our liquid. The Celebration bomber awaits in the fridge. I’m not thrilled to set up the inevitably lopsided comparison, but my perfectionist streak demands it.

Brood #2 isn’t all that bad, though. It has a very nice, lingering hop finish. A pleasant amber hue, albeit hazy. And a decidedly smooth mouthfeel. (Thanks, maltodextrin!) It evidences a brewing team short on experience, but not without some competence. It certainly doesn’t taste bad.

And then there are beers that don’t beg justification and the halfhearted mumbling of their positive characteristics. Beers that stand as easy testament to their creators’ talents and honed skills. Beers that live up to the intentions sweated into their being and the labels on their labels.

Pyramid's Outburst Imperial IPA

Pyramid Breweries’ new spring seasonal, Outburst Imperial IPA, is such a beer. It lives up to its style, perhaps eclipsing it in its lively clarity and lack of typical heavy sweetness. Some IIPAs take the IBU-balancing thing so far that you’re essentially drinking bitter, alcoholic honey. I worship hops, but I’ll pass on that thick resin. (Think Widmer’s Deadlift.) No, Outburst is clean and bright, extremely hoppy but with the appropriate thinness of a great pale. Here’s how the Pyramid folks describe it:

A crafty combination of four different hops [Nugget, Chinook, Centennial, Simcoe] along with a dose of dry-hopping powers Outburst to 80 IBU strong. Its bold profile offers an aroma reminiscent of the Northwest hop fields at harvest time, along with spicy overtones of fresh citrus. Seeking a harmonious balance to the hop overload, four different specialty malts are blended to create a distinctive deep amber hue, and sweet caramel and roasty flavors.

Outburst was officially unveiled at the Seattle Pyramid Alehouse last month (and is presumably still available there), so maybe you’ve had it from the tap. Better yet, though, is that the excellent brew is available this month and next, likely at your local grocery store or bottle shop, in 12 oz doses. (Yes, the label is as graphically unappealing as the others from Pyramid, its recent rebranding not such as success, in my book.)

You’ll like it. And you won’t have to think long on why. It’s good. It tastes as its style dictates, if not even better than what you’d expect.

Brownlee Brood #2? Well, it goes down just as easily, but not as justifiably. Perhaps in brewing #3 we’ll get things right. Righter, anyway.

Blood, Sweat & Beers: From Boil to Bottle

Wednesday night, Rena and I got a taste of what we boiled and strained and placed in a closet two and a half weeks ago. Despite its flatness and unfinished character and worrisome dark amber hue in the carboy, that green aroma was there. The hop bite was there. The unfinished-yeast-business sweetness of my only previous brew, 10 years back, was not there. And neither were apple, bubble gum, or any other funky flavors. It tasted like an incomplete IPA—exactly what it was. And we smiled.

Stirring hops into the wort

The IPA-ness of the noncarbonated beer wasn’t just heartening because it indicated we’d done at least some things right on brew day; it proved (hopefully) that bacteria hadn’t invaded the fermenter after it blew its airlock top two days in and sat there, open and vulnerable, for at least six hours. Nor had any Clint-bacteria jumped down the carboy’s neck as I re-sanitized and re-inserted  both stopper and airlock in an awkward, nervous crouch.

We may have ruined everything, however, by introducing oxygen into the brew while bottling.

That’s what happens when you’re not adept at siphon-wielding. And when you fill several screw-top bottles, attempt to cap them with crowns, freak out and curse and accuse not one but two cap crimpers of being suddenly broken, snap off a glass thread in overeager frustration, slice open your knuckles, and finally realize you’re a moron and have no choice but to dump the beer back into the bottling bucket.

When all of our bottles—save one third-full taster—were filled, capped, checked, and tidily grouped like a boot camp regiment on the closet floor, it was time to giddily reflect on how we’d gotten to that point.

There was the six-hour brew day, of course. The savoring of authentic brewhouse aromas saturating the house. The yeast pitching and carboy shaking. But one of the best parts of our quest to create our own beer was prepping bottles.

No, not de-labeling and washing and sanitizing bottles. Those were three separate and distinct headaches. (Literally—I crashed my skull into a wall while completing phase three. Blood spilled for a noble cause.) I mean imbibing the liquid in the bottles; emptying those suckers with a twofold purpose. For business (of sorts) and pleasure.

Be sure to wear proper beer-logo attire on brew day

No, we couldn’t have bottled our beer without the help of, among others, the New Belgium folks (Ranger IPA), Sierra Nevada (Tumbler and Torpedo), Widmer (Deadlift) and a host of NW craft brewers for their 22oz offerings. Of all our unknowing glass suppliers, though, West Seattle’s own Schooner EXACT brewing and new-ish bottle shop The Beer Junction get the most elaborate tip of our caps. If Morgan at the Junction didn’t host a Schooner tasting during which one could purchase 32oz flip-tops of the brewery’s offerings—their new, limited Black IPA and Wee Heavy are simply superb—I’d have had many more bottles to clean and cap. (And now, when our brew is gone, we can refill the big bombers for under $5, right at the Junction.)

We’ll re-crack the first (and likely the second, third, fourth …) of these bottles in about two weeks.

Hair of the Dog

Maple protects the Snow Cap.

I can’t imagine what will change when we have a baby.

We’ve had a puppy now for several weeks, and life hasn’t been the same since the day we brought her home. It hasn’t changed in the way I imagine it will when we bring a tiny human being, borne of our hopefully fortunate genetic splash, home from the hospital. Nor has it really, truly changed, truth be told.

But it’s been very difficult to get to our favorite pub or catch the last twenty minutes of a happy hour since Maple has joined the family. The wife, you see, is a responsible pet owner, and wants to be home with the puppy as much as possible. To train her to soil the puppy pad instead of destroy it; to hold her bladder instead of unleash it; to learn commands instead of blissfully ignore them. My wife is the good parent.

I am the bad parent.

I don’t want to give up the post-workday pub beer. (Or the hours during which I might write something, read something, send a long-overdue email, engage in some extremely humble and mercifully brief sort of social activity, or listen to a record, honestly.) But I’m in the wrong here, folks. If my personal spare time is more important than raising a puppy, a new member of our family, what does that say about my prospects as a father to an actual child? Would I, one future day, rather enjoy an IPA at Beveridge Place Pub than swipe waste from the lower cheeks of the sponge of a person that Rena and I enthusiastically joined to create?

Well, no, dumbass. That’s why man invented the glass bottle.

Pyramid‘s Snow Cap is out already, if you can believe that. Found a lone six-pack at QFC yesterday. Don’t let the latest brash incarnation of the brand’s label turn you off; the brew within is a textbook (if not exceptional) example of a “winter warmer”: dark, well-balanced between malt syrup and hop bite, and pleasantly tongue-depressing in its 7% ABV weight.

The micro-macro brewery celebrates its latest Snow Cap release with a Seattle Alehouse parking lot party this Saturday at 7 p.m. I’ll miss it, of course. (Puppy training stops for no man.) But if any of the six bottles I giddily cradled across the threshold of our home yesterday remain unopened, I’ll party from afar.

Here We Brew Again

… and I’m back. The long break wasn’t a result of a health emergency, natural disaster, lifestyle change, or even epic laziness. And no, I didn’t stop drinking beer. (Are you freaking kidding me?) Just had a lot of other things going on and let myself slip into the wonderfully blissful and undisciplined routine of not writing. There’s just always something more interesting, fun, or unfortunately unavoidable to do—like streaming an appealingly empty Netflix movie, playing with your puppy, or staring at all the pretty brake lights ahead. But as we all have to regrettably admit, there are still shallow pockets of free time here and there, during which we could (and should) do the things we claim to truly enjoy.

The good book of homebrewing.

Like writing about beer.

Or brewing it.

A full decade after brewing my first and only beer (with an equally untrained good friend), I’m close to boiling batch #2.

It will be an IPA (of course), with Amarillo and Columbus hops sitting in for Magnum, which wasn’t available at the shop. Aside from that detail, I’m still pretty clueless, despite having recently crammed the relevant chunks of John J. Palmer’s impressively detailed How to Brew.

Give Palmer credit for his many attempts to speak more simply to those of us with mathematically-defective minds; sometimes simplicity is still just too complicated.

But hey, that first brew turned out remarkably tasty, if not a little too sweet. (Perhaps we didn’t let the yeast feast long enough?) So I have some small hope that this future IPA will, at the very least, have a clean amber hue and above-average hop zing. I’ll let you know, in a month or so, if those modest expectations are met.

In the meantime, I’ll try to keep spewing forth about beer and its multifaceted relation to my life. Since that requires putting down a couple of pints, I’m off to do just that at Beveridge Place Pub.

Retool Your Resume in Just Three Celebration Ales

Please promote yourself responsibly.

Sometimes you just don’t have the time or ability to pick up a pint away from home. Sometimes it just wouldn’t be responsible.

Like when you’re freshly unemployed and clambering back on the career path horse. When crafting your resume and portfolio is much, much more important than making it to the pub.

But even then, you can get your pints in. Today I chose Sierra Nevada‘s big, warm, bitter (not sweet) winter offering: Celebration Ale. It’s a heartening, confidence-building brew. (And $12.99/case at Metro Market.)

Objective? Check. Key highlights? Yep. IBUs? Oh yeah.

Imperial IPA Soothes Layoff Blues

Tuesday afternoon, my employer informed me (and scores of others, most of us creative types) that, after six years on the books, my services were no longer needed. Here’s your papers. Don’t the let the door hit you on your way out.

Two hours later, with my office possessions in the trunk of my car and my job security in a Dumpster behind the building, the lot of us creative folks gathered at Queen Anne’s Buckley’s to drown our sorrows.

Five Maritime Pacific Imperial IPAs later, I felt a tiny bit better about the situation.

Much as I love that powerful, bitter brew, I gotta say too much of it makes for one hell of a hangover. Or maybe that’s just the next-day sting of being cut loose.

I’ll buy an IPA for fellow beer enthusiasts who can help a marketing/UI/etc. writer/editor out with leads. Just sayin’.

Always Vote For Brewers and Beer

Full Sail Cascadian Fresh Hop full pint; wee cider pint; voting materials

Whether you choose Mallahan or McGinn for Seattle Mayor and approve or shoot down tax-money initiatives, on Election Day (and, hey, every day), raise a pint to the brewers who continue to keep our city/county/state/country in incredible microbrewed beer.

Better yet, show your democratic support (or lack thereof) while consuming a pint of said beer. I trust your opinions and personal endorsements will be made before you drink … too much.

Also, on this particular election eve, raise a pint to the families and friends of two particular brewers who’ve very recently, suddenly, and unfortunately left us to our earthly imbibing and decision-making devices: Dick’s Brewing Company‘s Dick Young and Diamond Knot Brewery’s Brian Sollenberger.

Thanks for everything, sirs.

Hale’s Mug Club: Two Harvest Pints in One

I’ve been frequenting Hale’s Ales brewpub for almost ten years. It’s the only place I can walk in and the bartender (typically friendly, red-haired Don) knows not what I’m drinking—remember, I like to mix it up—but in what glass I’ll drink it. I’m a mug club member at Hale’s, so my glass is one of those great big beautiful ones hanging over the bar. It took a few years to go from waitlistee to inductee, but it was well worth the wait. I just wish I made it to Ballard more often.

Another so-so photo taken with the iPhone.

The pub has evolved, for better and worse,  since I started visiting. The old motto “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing” has been challenged over the years by repeated menu upgrades, live event hosting—anybody else disturbed by something called the Moisture Festival taking place close to your beer?—and guest taps and tastings, but the house beers still shine brightest. (I’m not knocking the kitchen; the food’s consistently terrific.)

Hale’s O’Brien’s Harvest Ale, one of the brewer’s seasonal staples, was probably the first fresh hop-crop brew that I tried in Seattle. As my 24oz taste this past weekend proved, it’s still one of the best of a dynamic-by-design category. (Okay, I can’t remember if the club mugs are 20, 24, or 900 ounces, and the Google can’t confirm, either. Anybody?) With a caramel-red, amber ale-like hue, it appears heavier than it tastes. It’s IPA-bitter but with a smooth, lightly sweet malt complement and barely-there carbonation. Hale’s uses a different Harvest recipe each year, and the 2009 version might taste familiar (if your palate memory’s miraculous) as it’s the same recipe used two years ago, when the brew garnered a silver medal at the GABF.

Beer/food pairing has always seemed an unnecessary drinking justification to me, but if you find yourself in Ballard with a parched throat and an aching sweet-tooth, an O’Brien’s and a piece of peach cobbler is one contentifying dessert. Get it while you can—before Hale’s potent winter sipper, Wee Heavy, replaces the rotating tap.

Darktoberfest at Beveridge Place Pub

Finally made it in to Beveridge Place Pub to celebrate Hoptoberfest, their annual IPA jubilee. Fourteen hoppy Washington taps. Voting for the 2010 “house” IPA. Fellowship.

Darkness.

The power went out Wednesday night as soon as the wife and I sat down. The trivia night crowd cheered the sudden darkness. We squinted at the food we’d brought for dinner—a Subway/Zeeks combo—and thought maybe we’d have to down our beers quick and eat at home. (I require light to eat.) But before I could fret too much, BPP’s generator keyed an emergency light close to our table. The pub’s staff hit the darkest tables with candles a few minutes later.

“What’s the word?” I asked one of the candle-carrying bartenders.

IPA keeps the darkness at bay

She took a stool beside us and grinned. She dismissed the blackout with a wave, said Seattle City Light was working on a downed telephone pole and would have a fix in “45 minutes to an hour.” “But we’ll never fucking close,” she said. “We never close. Remember the windstorm in 2006? The snow last year?” We made it in for the latter debacle, I said. She got animated talking about how people came to the dark pub with sleeping bags and lanterns. How they enjoyed beer despite nature’s wrath. “The generator goes to the beer first,” she said, assuaging fears that the IPA could go warm. “It’s covered.”

The bar line was long half an hour later, and not just because every transaction was done on a napkin or old-school credit card slip. The place was filling up despite its dimness. I followed the Schooner Exact 3-Grid IPA (my choice for BPP house brew since the beer’s inception) with a wonderfully yellow-bitter (and limited-release) Lupulin Fresh Hop from Full Sail Brewing. Rena stuck with Whistling Pig. (Bo-ring.)

I got back to our table to find my wife eyeballing a yellow lab puppy across the room. The little dog was flopping on an admirer’s lap, flashing a fat pink belly and teeny sharp teeth. “I’m going to kick those people and steal their puppy,” she said. Her smirk belied the jealousy of a dramatic squint.

Rena wants a dog. She wants to be one of the people who bring their cute dogs to BPP, to Lincoln Park, to everywhere they go. As do I. But who wants to raise a dog—or a child, for that matter?—in a crappy little apartment? The little lab, twisting in someone else’s arms now, gets us talking about a house again. Can’t have two pints without discussing it.

Twenty minutes later, the power’s still out. The puppy is spread-eagle on the floor, tuckered out. I’m wondering how we’ll cash out without any cash.

The bartender who said BPP would never fucking close comes by as I drain my glass. I hand it over and ask about using a debit card. She says not to worry, they’ll take a rubbing of my card if need be. She picks up a half-empty pitcher from a vacant table beside ours. “Who would do this?” Waste good beer, she means. She sticks her nose in the pitcher and takes a deep breath. “Smells like 3-Grid.” She puts the pitcher on our table and walks away.

The lights pop back on then, eliciting a collective groan. The puppy lifts its head and locks tired eyes with Rena for a moment. She looks to me to see that I witnessed the brief, across-the-room gaze, then dons that pissed-off, jealous squint again. And we both laugh.

The pitcher isn’t 3-Grid. It’s some kind of amber. But it’s another two pints. Ten bucks we can say we saved, that we can add to our down-payment, dog-and-a-family-someday kitty.

Friday Night Pints

Big Al's Harvest Ale and a light cider

Finally, the work week ended. Rena and I attempted to race home to catch as much Porterhouse happy hour as possible. Of course everyone else on the road had similar designs. We got to the neighborhood with just 15 minutes to spare, which meant—bastards!—only one beer at the super $3 HH rate. Figures. It was par for the course for the  crappy week.

Porterhouse pub is easily the coolest place outside of the West Seattle Junction, and cooler than most places there, too. And that’s just for its fine, 28-tap beer selection. The cheap happy hour pints are gravy. The fantastic food and friendly staff? Gravier gravy. It’s no wonder the place has been packed every night we’ve visited.

First pint: Big Al’s Harvest Ale. Rena opts for a cider. Ahh. The weight of the last five stressful days begins to slip with the first taste. The Harvest isn’t as hoppy as I’d expected; it’s a little sweet for my taste. But who’s complaining?

The plan was to stick to beer and have dinner at home—the eggplant we’d picked up at Sunday’s farmers market wasn’t getting any fresher—but halfway through the Big Al’s offering, hunger prevailed and I ordered the House Fries. I cap them because they aren’t your average French fries. These are barely-crispy, tossed-in-parmesan-and-truffle-salt wonders. Served with curry ketchup. And of course I ask for a side of their cheddar ranch.

As we trade parting remarks for the week that was, Porterhouse fills up. With couples our age, families of six, and parents (our age) with their small children. “Our booth,” as we like to call it, is really a half-booth just inside the door at the front window, so we see everyone filing in. As I sip pint two, a wondrous, citrusy/bitter Lagunitas concoction, Little Sumpin Xtra, a baby girl perched on her father’s shoulder looks down at us with what seem like incredibly perceptive baby eyes. She stares and blinks at us; we stare and smile at her. Strangely enough, she’s wearing a knit eggplant cap, its little green stem sticking straight up from her crown.

“What if our kid didn’t like what we like?” Rena asks, apropos of our frequently chatted-about plans to get into a house and then get into a family way. It’s a great question, one our pregnant friends may contemplate often. “Wouldn’t that be strange?”

It would be. We wonder about that, in sweeping terms—movies, art, food, clothes, beer—for a couple of minutes, between meeting eyes with the eggplant-head baby. It’s about that time that we start to feel guilty for not ordering dinner. We’re odd.

“Like music,” Rena says, looking to me from the baby retreating with her parents toward a table. “What if it liked that one guy?”

“Michael Buble?” I have no idea what the guy sings, but I do know I don’t like it.

It’s exactly who she meant. “Yes!” We get a good laugh out of that.

“And that other guy,” she adds.

“Josh Groban?”

It’s another match.

The mental serendipity, laughter, and now full-freedom feeling of Friday night eclipses our guilt. I order a Boundary Bay Double Dry-hopped IPA and we stick around a while longer.