FOOLCiRCLE

Just finished the June issue of BeerAdvocate Magazine, ‘The Travel Issue’. Seems like these are becoming quicker reads or something, I finished this one on two lunch breaks, cover-to-cover (well, except for every sentence in the reviews area.)

 The issue per usual was good, but not quite as fresh feeling as some of the earlier issues. It felt as if they almost pieced some stuff together to call it the ‘Travel Issue’ without writing much about traveling for beer or beer meccas or any of that jazz. The issue started with a Top 50 list from Jason & Todd that really didn’t make 100% sense and then when they were questioned about it on line they basically said ‘deal with it for what it is’. Not really a cool attitude for a list that obviously was missing some of the Top 50 American Breweries. Drew lost me a little on his homebrewing article. He was talking about how aromas and scents are important, and then rounds things off with a ‘soapy’ sounding homebrew recipe for  a jasmine-orange ale. 9Steps to Beerdom once again was my favorite, this time with Mike Stevens from Founders Brewing – blazin’ beers! The next article that is worth mentioning is actually one of the few traveling-type articles in the magazine with ‘Nine Great Beer Towns You Didn’t Know Were Great Beer Towns’. Easton, PA & Frederick, MD both made the cut and both are about two hours from here. OK, Easton has Weyerbacher, worth the trip at least once. Frederick has two brewpubs and a brewery nearby, maybe worth another trip back. Ten pages of beer reviews again left me feeling thirsty and empty at the same time, that’s a lot of space to give to reviews . . . Nice little article on beer bread followed too, from a very simple recipe to ones that are a little bit more intensive, but none that are overly complicated. And I must say one of my other typically favorite articles ‘Last Call’ was pure shite! The writer called it ‘Ranter’s Block’ and talked about how peachy the beer world is for him, must freakin’ be nice you lucky bastard, enjoy! Anyway, still a great magazine, probably not there best issue, but still already anticipating next months issue.

Not too much to say except that it has been eight days since this beer was brewed and it is still fermenting like mad with a huge fluff kaursen. It is actually higher then in these pictures now, these were taken yesterday. It is a really dense but fluffy kaursen too. Hopefully this will translate into an incredible head on the actual beer.

Yesterday was the 14th Annual BUZZ Off Competition. This years competition was once again a qualifying event for the prestigious MCAB event, well prestigious in the homebrewing world. Also, it was hosted by both Iron Hill Brewery, the West Chester location, and the Brewers Unlimited Zany Zymurgists again.

Kind of last minute I decided I was going to go up and judge. I really like to judge, but it is always a very long day and difficult to judge the way you need to. There was about 270 entries this year which broke down to each judge judging about 25 beers per person. That’s 25 little 2oz samples that you are supposed to fairly and professionally judge as quickly as possible. I try to do the best I can, but in all honesty by the end it’d more like ‘this one was better or worse than that one’ and that’s about it. In the morning I judged Maibocks, Bocks, Eisbocks, Northern German Alts, and Dusseldorfs. I have never judged these categories nor brewed any of these styles but have tasted most of them, so it wasn’t an easy table for me to judge. In the long run, unfortunately, pretty much every beer we judged in the morning was OK to worse. In the afternoon I judged Robust Porters and Baltic Porters. Again, I have never judged these styles, but I had a much better idea of what I needed to judge. I would like to mention that for the morning and afternoon I did have a set of style guidelines with me so it wasn’t as if I were shooting blindly. The Porters ranged from a little less than OK to very nice. There was actually three of us judging in the afternoon so that was different. The one guy was a Grand Master level I so he knew his stuff, but was a little intimidating to contradict if you didn’t agree with what he said or he didn’t agree with what you said. Overall, good time judging, long day Saturday.

After it was all done and said I got to pick up my results. I was lucky and scored a third place with the SAW Pale Ale in the American Pale Ale category. The funny part is I felt as though this beer was way out of balance to the hops side and used non-traditional (though not inappropriate) hops for a Pale Ale. Here’s some more:

• SAW Pale Ale – American Pale Ale – 40/40 = 40 = 3rd Place. “Very enjoyable and drinkable.”, “Very good example of style.”
• Witbier – Witbier – 26/26 = 26. “A fairly easy drinking Wit that is refreshing, but lacks the expected flavors of the style.”, “Sweet malt flavor overpowers spices to some degree.”
• Hazelnut Brown – Specialty Beer – 32/35 = 33.5. “Hazelnut is a tad big for the body.”, “A nice drinkable specialty beer, overall a strong effort.”
• Oak Aged C-Hop Pale Ale – Wood Aged Beer – 32/34 = 33. “A nice Pale Ale, hops are distinctive.”, “Interesting, like a flower bed in my mouth.”

What the hell is the Dance of the Seven Ales!? It had to be one of the most unorganized-zany-fun-stoopid-cool-off-centered Dogfish Head / Grey Lodge Pub events that exist. I have never been to the Grey Lodge Pub before but have heard good things, and as you know I am a huge Dogfish Head fan – so it seemed like a good idea to check it out.

So, Robert and I went to check it out, this is how it was billed: “Dogfish Head Dance of the 7 Ales with Sam Caligione. The Grey Lodge Pub and Dogfish Head will present Dance of the 7 Ales. Separately Dogfish Head and The Grey Lodge Pub are known for crazy (OK “stupid” might be more accurate) ideas and events, so a combined event should be extra “stupid”.

There will be 7 dances, on video, to go with each beer. And patrons are invited to create their own interpretative dance (costumes are a bonus) for a Dogfish ale or ales of their choice (bring your own music). There will be prizes for the most creative dances.

And of course there will be amazing 7 Dogfish Head ales on hand, some super rare, some less so but great nonetheless. Dogfish Head ales have been known to be effective in the aiding of dancing.

Sam will be bringing Dogfish’s Hoppy the Clown dart board game. Clowns are scary, but this seems to be OK; we can throw darts at the clown. For some of the time, Scoats will likely be wearing an old mummers costume, which was fun for everyone but him last Groundhog Day. Most likely there will be additional idiocy as well.”

Of course they had great Dogfish Head beers available: Black & Blue, Festina Peche, Fort, Raison d’Etre, 90 Minute IPA, 60 Minute IPA, Red & White, and World Wide Stout. I believe the beer rotation went R&W, Festina Peche, WWS, B&B, Raison, and then a 60 Minute. The WWS was priced basically at store price and the B&B was $20 a bottle, not a cheap night to say the least. Basically the idea was that they paired YouTube videos with the different beers. So essentially everyone gathered around a computer screen to watch the videos. The funny thing is, that is exactly what Robert and I were doing before we left – Pickle Surprise!

Later, Mitchell came up. We played many a round of Cricket. The Grey Lodge had a dope score board called the DartMaster III. After abusing the Grey Lodge for several hours we wound up at Kildaire’s Irish Pub for a while. Drank some more, ate (sliders, nice), and played more Cricket. It was a good long night, things got started about 6PM and I got home around 2:30AM. It’s going to be a long day at work. Check out some of the pictures above.

First brew day in a while and it turned out to be a good one. Today I brewed what will be my first attempt at a Saison, and if nothing else a Belgian Specialty Ale (catch all). Quick highlights of the day were that Robert was there to tag-along for the brew day and it was a success brew day in the rain.

So the day really started pretty regularly for me: had a game plan of when I wanted to start and over shot that by a good two hours which kind of just sends the rest of the day a little askew. One day I will learn the joys of early morning brewing, but first I have to be awake and mobile enough to meet it there. Since I knew it was supposed to rain today and I wasn’t real big on brewing in the garage, I decided to try and rig up some sort of tarp action. I decided the rain-fly from my tent would be the easiest choice because it was a decent size and already had bungee fasteners attached to all the corners. It went up fairly easy and looked alright. After going back down stairs and taking a look from the brew area it looked OK but pushed too far to the left. Unfortunately, there was nothing to attach it too if I wanted to move it more right, so I decided to leave it there and mental note that I want to buy a plastic tarp twice as long and just about as wide for the same application. The rain never got too crazy, though a little heavy at times, and the tarp totally did its job.

This was Roberts first time kicking it while I made a full all grain batch. So he got to help/watch as we did all the things he didn’t get to do before: grind the grains (got a new drill for the mill), heat and transfer hot water with no handles on the kettle while wearing flip-flops, mash-in, sparge, all that happy horse shit. Everything seemed like it went fine. I declared that there should be a bumper stick: Brewers Don’t Wear Flip-Flops. I just think it sounds funny, but it is also a good way to burn your feet.

The reason why I said that this is my first attempt at a Saison, besides that I have never brewed one, is that I always feel as if it is more difficult to stay within style guidelines than it is to just brew what you like or to not brew what you don’t like. Typically I would say my favorite “styles” of beers that I like to brew and drink are big and hoppy, experimental and one-off, and Belgian-esque,  specifically Dubbels and Tripels. I brew enough big and hoppy and experimental stuff, so that’s good, but I can’t think of the last Belgian-style beer I’ve brewed versus drank. Probably my last one was the ol’ Double Dubbel back in 2004, I’ll have to break one of those bottles open soon. So anyway, this is me taking a stab at the style, Saison, and like I said, If nothing else it is definitely a Belgian Specialty Ale.

My brother receives the Keystone Homebrew newsletter (I wonder why I don’t?) and brought to my attention a new event they are kickin’. It is called ‘The KisE (Kissy) Challenge”.

Here’s a little cut and paste action from their website for anyone too lazy to hit the link. Why do I want to take the time to bring this to your attention, well, one Keystone Homebrew and Jason (the owner) are good people so why not promote some brotherly love, two it seems like a neat event, and three it sounds like a twist on a familiar idea. Anyway, here you go: “We are proud to announce the first Keystone is Everywhere (KisE) Challenge: A fun contest, sort of like a scavenger hunt, with real prizes! You’ll need three things to participate: 1. an official Keystone Homebrew t-shirt, 2. a camera, 3. the official KisE Challenge List.

Here is how it will work. Below is a link to the official KisE Challenge List of places, people, and events. Each will be worth a certain point value. Participants will have until June 30 to take pictures of as many KisE Challenge List items as possible. Everyone who participates wins valuable coupons. Collect 50 points and get a free t-shirt. Those with the most points will win:

• 1st place $100 gift certificate to Keystone Homebrew or a 15% discount on all items purchased at Keystone Homebrew through the end of 2007
• 2nd place $50 gift certificate to Keystone Homebrew
• 3rd place $25 gift certificate to Keystone Homebrew

Additionally, more prizes will be awarded for the funniest, most creative, and best overall pictures. Entries must be submitted in electronic format via e-mail or by dropping off a CD or DVD at one of our stores.The official KisE Challenge List, including official rules, is now online! The race is on!”

There you go, Jason, there’s some love for you. Now all I need to do is to get that Keystone Homebrew link up for you, I promise I will. Hope your event works out as well as mine. – B

So Saturday I dropped off beers at Iron Hill West Chester for the 2007 BUZZ Off Homebrew Competition. Basically I chose to drop off the four beers I had brewed for the Scavenger Hunt: the Oak-Aged C-Hop Pale Ale, the S.A.W. Pale Ale, the Belgian-style Wit, and the Hazelnut Brown.

Not that I am being pessimistic, but I do not have high hopes for these beers. Most of these beers are slightly out of style (per usual) for what I entered them in, but I figured some constructive criticism never hurts. Plus, since the BUZZ Off is a qualifying event for the MCAB lots of people mail in some excellent entries. Hopefully if my schedule allows I will be up there judging for this competition, more on that the closer we get to June 9th.

 

On a side note, the More Beer competition was also on Saturday (in California). This was the competition where I was invited to compete in the Stainless Brewer event. Two days later and no results are posted yet, weak. They did post that there were eight judges judging the Stainless Brewer event and that there was a unanimous winner. Somehow I’m not feeling it, but still curious. UPDATE: (6/1/07) – The results are in from the More Beer Competition and I did NOT place in the Stainless Brewer Competition. Still waiting some clarification from More Beer on how they were judging this one.

Finally finished the May issue, the ‘Music Issue’, of BeerAdvocate magazine today on lunch. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, magazines are the perfect material for reading on lunch and on the shitter.

This issue of the magazine followed the same format as the others, which I think is good. Readers can jump to a favorite section, or avoid sections that they typically don’t enjoy. This was the ‘Music Issue’ and basically the overall theme drew on the similarities between the beer world and the music world and in all honesty, I couldn’t agree more. Favorite section AGAIN was the ‘9 Steps to Beerdom’, it just hits right for me for some reason. And of course the cover story, about beer and music, was interesting. The only beer/music group I knew of is The Pain Relievaz, and they freakin’ rock my world no matter how lame some of their beats are sometimes. I actually wrote a song for them at one point, a re-make of the Beastie Boys ‘No Sleep Till Brooklyn’ as ‘No Sleep Till Milton’ – it was real tight and I still hope they bust it out sometime. And OMG, freakin’ 10 pages dedicated to beer reviews, with no advertisements for the whole stretch!?  I can’t stand reading that many random reviews, don’t get me wrong I’ll check out one if I am very interested in the beer like the New Glarus Wisconsin Belgian Red, and I often read the last paragraph of each review where they talk about pairings and an over all statement, but that’s about it for me. Overall it’s still a great magazine, just maybe not the best issue yet. Keep up the good work!

On Saturday May 19, 2007 was the 2nd Annual Delaware Digital Scavenger Hunt and I feel as if it were a great success, again! This year we had a strong eight teams competing in the DDSH roaming an area that consisted of New Castle County “Plus”. “Plus” basically meant about a 10 mile radius around NCC was also considered legal territory. The list for the DDSH is listed below, check it out!

First off, the majority of the pictures are now available for your viewing pleasure. I had a problem with Heather & Robert’s and Craig & Alycia’s photos, but hopefully they will be coming. But just click on the link and you should be able to see all of the foolishness: 2007 Delaware Digital Scavenger Hunt Photos. UPDATE: (6/1/07) – ALL of the pictures are now up: Heather & Robert’s, Craig & Alycia’s, and several more added to the After Party section – go and RE-check it out NOW!! (That will be all.)

Overall it was a great time, but a lot of blood, sweat, and tears go into the preparation of this event. This year I made a few mistakes off the bat; I didn’t give myself enough time to fully prepare, I was occupied the two weekends before the event, and my partner/co-moderator was excessively burdened this year. But, I also made some advances; we had more than enough beer this year, not as many teams seemed cranky by the time they got back to the house, and the expenses were more evenly distributed.

This year a new team that participated, Derek & Chad, swept the DDSH! I was really surprised and happy how enthused they seemed about the whole event. They captured 68 of the 100 items, not bad at all in a 9 hour period. The second place team this year was last years winner, Jody & Shawn, with 56 items. And the third place team this year was last years second place team, Wooly & Mitchell, with 53 items. Also, for the other award winners there were Dave & Catherine with Best Picture, Craig & Alycia with most miles driven, and Craig & Alycia for the Weiner Award, for the team with the least amount of items acquired. Unfortunately that was due to an error in reading the rules, better luck next time. Also, this year we had a door prize with a random winner, and the winner was Dave who won a new Cornhole set, themed in the Delaware colors of blue and gold. Again, unfortunately the boards weren’t built yet, so Dave went home with a box full of bean-bags. Trust me, you’ll have fun with the game after you get all the pieces.

One of the highlights for me was after everyone got back to the house watching everyone enjoy the batches of homebrew I made. I have been posting about them for the last couple months, but available that night were the bottled version of the Stainless Pale Ale, draft Oaked C-hop Pale Ale, S.A.W. Pale Ale, and a Belgian-style Wit Bier. Available too was a Hazelnut Brown but we never made it that far, but we did kick 2 of the 3 beers on draft, and there was only three growlers worth of the Wit in the end. The Oaked Pale Ale kicked within an hour and a half of peoples arrival – damn beer drinkers. Also a blast, and basically unplanned, was having Mitchell and Robert play with Dave sitting in for the first set. I wasn’t expecting to have a live band at the party, but it totally made it cool, I think the neighbors probably thought so too!

Here’s the setlist of what the boys played that night:
5/19/07 The Calhoun, Wilmington, DE
Stripper’s Zipper
Flagger’s Lament>
Not Fade Away
The House Of Osiris
Something Good
Piece Of The Pie
All These Words
Baba Dochia
Every Rose Has It’s Thorn

In The Bayou
Wanted Dead Or Alive>
Dirt
Dognation
Martyr
Bakerloo>
China Cat Sunflower*>
Drums*>
The Humpty Dance>
Permanent Reaction
The Scavenger Hunt Song*

Pepper’s Ghost
Waterlillies*^
Since You’ve Been Gone
Cold Lampin’ With Flavor*+
I Gave Her A Ring, She Gave Me The Finger
Out In The Rain
Runaway Jim>
Taste>
Runaway Jim
The Scavenger Hunt Song Reprise

all songs with Robert Desjardin on drums, first set with David Moore on bass
*first time played
^w/Dan Woolard on vocals
+w/Drums only

Basically I had a blast and I hope all that participated did also. We’ll have to see, do you think we can pull off another Scavenger Hunt next year, who knows . . . ? If any one has any additioal photos they’d like to contribute, please contact me. Also, I’d love to hear some of your comments about what you thought, what you liked, what you hated, whatever. – B

The New Castle County “Plus” 100
1. ‘5 M to W’ Stone

2. Air Transport Command Restaurant

3. Alapocas Run State Park – Blue Ball Barn

4. Arden Guild Hall

5. Ashland Nature Center

6. Auburn Heights Preserve

7. Battery Park

8. Bayard House Restaurant

9. Baynard Stadium

10. Beck’s Pond

11. Bellevue State Park – Bellevue Mansion

12. Blue Diamond Park

13. Bob Carpenter Center

14. Booth’s Corner Farmers Market

15. Bowlerama

16. Brandywine Battlefield

17. Brandywine Creek State Park – Thomson Bridge Entrance

18. Brandywine River Museum

19. Brandywine River Park – The Bridge

20. Brandywine Springs Park

21. Breck’s Mill from 1814

22. Broad Dyke Marker (sign)

23. Buena Vista House

24. Candlelight Music Dinner Theatre

25. Carousel Park

26. Caufiel House

27. Chaddsford Winery

28. Claymont Stone School

29. Cowtown Rodeo

30. Dayett Mills Historic Area

31. Delaware Art Museum

32. Delaware C&D Canal Wildlife Area

33. Delaware Center for the Contemporary Arts

34. Delaware History Museum

35. Delaware National Country Club

36. Delaware Sports Museum and Hall of Fame

37. Delaware Toy and Miniature Museum

38. Delcastle Recreation Area

39. Ebright Azimuth

40. Everett Theater

41. Fair Hill Natural Resource Area

42. Flintwoods Preserve

43. Fort Christiana Park

44. Fort Delaware State Park on Pea Patch Island

45. Fort Mott

46. Fox Point State Park – The Flags

47. Gander Hill Prison

48. George Reed House

49. Grand Opera House

50. Hale-Byrnes House

51. Hoopes Reservoir

52. Hotel DuPont

53. Iron Hill Brewery – Wilmington

54. Jasper Crane Rose Garden

55. Linvilla Orchards

56. Longwood Gardens

57. Lums Pond State Park Campground

58. Marcus Hook Rear Range Lighthouse

59. McKenzie’s Brew Pub

60. Mendenhall Inn

61. Millburn Orchards

62. Mt. Cuba Observatory

63. Mt. Pleasant Meeting House

64. Nemours Musical Tower

65. Newark Country Club

66. Newlin Grist Mill

67. Old Library Museum

68. Old Post Road 1666 Sign

69. Omalanden Firing Range

70. Packett Alley

71. Rittenhouse Park

72. River Road Park

73. Robinson House

74. Rockwood Mansion

75. Ronald McDonald House – Picture with Ronald McDonald

76. Simon Pierce Glass Blowing & Restaurant

77. Site of Bellanca Airfield

78. Smith Bridge Covered-Bridge

79. State Line Liquors

80. Summit North Marina

81. The Big Doctor’s Bag Sculpture

82. The Dive Bell

83. Three Forts Ferry Dock

84. Three Little Bakers Dinner Theater

85. Tri-State Bird Rescue

86. Tubman-Garrett Riverfront Park

87. Tweed’s Park / Tweed’s Tavern Location

88. University of Delaware Solar System – The Sun

89. Veterans Cemetery

90. Veterans Memorial Park – Blue Star Memorial

91. Vicmead Hunt Club

92. Vince’s Sports Center

93. WDEL / WSTW Station and Radio Towers

94. White Clay Creek State Park – Nature Center

95. Wiggins Mill Park

96. William Penn Statue

97. Wilmington Drama League

98. Wilson Warner House

99. Woodlawn Wildlife Preserve

100. Woodside Farm Creamery