All you idiots listen up:

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Beer Tasting - one of the Complete Idiot’s series, not to be confused with the Dummy’s series. Alpha Books has grabbed Rita Kohn and “with the Upland Brewing Co” (Caleb Staton) to tell the world the basics of which beers are good, bad and why. It can be somewhat an encyclopedia for the more experienced and a tool to learn about the various styles and tastes of beer.

We’ll run through the chapters and you can see if it’s for you. Each chapter has a “The Least You Need to Know” finish that has a soup-bowl of condensed knowledge. Learning these synopses will let you amaze your friends and, oh, give a start to your advanced education. As Carl Sagan said one night in a pub: “We’re all made of beer stuff.”

Part 1 – A Brief but Fascinating History of Beer

• Early days - Ancient days of Egyptians to Ninkasi.
• Beer in the U.S. – A short look at colonists through the giants and Prohibition.
• Homebrewing starting in 1979.
• Craft Beer Comeback – Homebrewers go commercial, women join the industry, and modern growth.

Part 2 – Understanding Beer

• Ingredients (water, malt, hops, yeast and passion).
• The Brewing Process – About craft breweries.
• The Basic Styles – Ales, lagers, wheat.
• American Craft Brewing Industry – Today’s styles, ale, amber, porter, stout, IPA, barleywine, fruit wheat, lagers, lambics. If you don’t recognized all these basic styles you need Rita’s book.

Part 3 – The Art of Beer Tasting – The basis of the book and the middle 80 pages.

• Experiencing - Temperature, pouring, aroma, about taste buds, mouthfeel, finish. Malt and hop flavor, balance, aftertaste.
• The Next Level – See, swirl, smell, sip, swallow. Lacing.
• The Meilgaard Wheel – A four-page heavy-duty perforated guide is included at the front of Idot’s Guide. This traditional “Beer Flavor Wheel” comes in excruciating detail rather than the few-dozen included on web sites and books that you may have seen. It has been expanded by the American Society of Brewing Chemists. If you haven’t seen Morten Meilgaard’s analysis chart you need to buy this book.
• The Right Glass for the Right Beer – A 20-page section that goes into detail about traditional shapes (and why)
• Pairing Beer with Food – The five Cs: complement, contrast, cut, cleanse, calm. Food elements: Salt, Acidity, Sweetness, Fat, Spice, Heat.
• Pairing of food with specific styles.
• Holding a Craft Beer Event – Whether you are teaching or learning with your friends this is a must-do. Better than a wine tasting since a bottle of beer will feed a half-dozen people while opened bottle of wine is just too much. There’s also theme ideas such as having beer from each city before watching the game.
• Appendices – Glossary, books, museums.

In all, it’s an interesting reference (not all reference books are nearly as interesting). It talks about the styles of beer and the types of malt, hops, water and yeast that make them.

It can lead you to a better experience with your glass. Hopefully the Holding a Craft Beer Event section will be used by lots of people. Get this for Christmas and you can look smart as you hold a tasting for the Superbowl. Remember, as Rita says: "It's a life-ling quest, not a cram course." $14.87 (Amazon – as low as $12)

Get this for Christmas and you can look smart as you hold a tasting for the Superbowl. Remember, as Rita says: “It’s a life-ling quest, not a cram course.”

Thr3e Wise Men Brewers offer seasonal hits, hand-pull specials!.......Broad Ripple Brew pub passes 2500th batch!

Thr3e Wise Men Brewing Co., with restaurant brewery in Broad Ripple and with beer flowing in Scotty's BrewHouse restaurants around Indiana, has one of Indiana's more experienced professional brewers. Omar Castrellon was a backbone of the downtown Indy brewing scene for 8 years at the former Alcatraz brewery. He now has clearly shown Indiana what he and great brew staff like Keely Thomlinson can do in quality and award winning beers since moving to Thr3e Wise Men. If we can count and drink beer, Thr3e Wise Men won five awards at the Indiana State Fair Brewers Cup in 2013.
We visited Thr3e Wise Men on a couple of different afternoons over the past few weeks chatting with Omar briefly each time. You can take a quick brewery tour with Omar using the YouTube Video below (courtesy of Scotty's/Thr3e Wise Men & YouTube)




The Thr3e Wise Men Brewing Co. keeps a beer on a hand pull and a few weeks ago we found the 4 bean vanilla porter on the pull. It delivered complex vanilla with a lot of sweetness in a nice porter, perfect delivered this way. The next time we visited we found an American Wheat with Lemongrass to be a delightful beer without what I call the grain taste of some wheats but a nice 'spice.' Lemongrass delivers flavor of lemon without the bitterness. Other Seasonals Tasty Waves California common was the July seasonal still available in September with wonderful malt and caramel characteristics coming in at 5.5% alcohol and 38 ibu for a nice little bitterness at the end.

The September seasonal is the Antonius 1742 Oktoberfest – a 2013 Indiana State Fair Brewers Cup Gold Medal winner. We had a sample and found it a very solid beer. If you can find fresh Oktoberfest on tap at a Scotty's near you or at the Brewing Co. restaurant in Broad Ripple treat yourself.

As for the regular pours, the Bulldog Brown has become one of my favorites as I believe the crystal and kiln coffee malt shine through for a nice rich but not overpowering flavor. As a silver medalist at the 2013 Brewers Cup it is apparent others love this beer, too! We have written about the Two Lucy's Blackberry Wheat from beer fests before, but as usual we had not focused on the blonde, beer that is. The blond offering at some brew pubs is a light beer designed to satisfy the yellow-fizzy corporate beer drinker in search of FizzyLite. This Thr3e Wise Men Snow Bunny Blonde is a delicious beer with a lot of flavor provided by the German spalter hops, giving it 16 ibu but a lot of taste . The Rocky Ripple Pale is a solid offering which we chose as the beer to walk around the grounds of the Penrod Arts Fair a couple of weeks ago (See Story Here) If you love hops, the Centennial Martyr Double IPA with 98 ibu will likely be your choice.


Upcoming seasonal beer from Thr3e Wise Men are: October: Milk Stout, November: Dopplebock .......... ..... . (Shown: Oktoberfest, Cali-Common, Am. Wheat)

Thr3e Wise Men Brewing, 1021 Broad Ripple Avenue, Indianapolis, Open daily for lunch and dinner at 11AM


BROAD RIPPLE BREW PUB PASSES 2500th BATCH!

Ask anyone who knows the Indy beer scene about the earliest brew pubs and they will point you to Broad Ripple Brew Pub. We caught up with current BRBP Head Brewer, John Treeter along with author Rita Kohn, the day after this monumental brew day. Kohn, has just released her latest book, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Beer Tasting

This #2500 new beer which should be coming into the tapped line-up within a few weeks is a double IPA. The beer should have a lot of citrus dimensions.

Treeter shared a Tart Lizzie, a very flavorful and only slightly sour fruit beer that was almost palate cleansing. The Tin Lizzie was an homage to the current Queen Elizabeth of England of which we think she would be proud. This not-quite-puckering offering was brewed with the assistance of nearby Brugge Brasserie owner, Ted Miller, who has sour beer expertise for Brugge.

That has since been replaced on tap with a very smooth Scottish on Nitro! This low alcohol beer gives you a nice smooth session beer at 4%! You will also find their crisp Oktoberfest lager style for the season.

The Pub, as it is affectionately known by locals, ties into local events and will be having a Tales & Ales event September 26, 6-9 PM where patrons meet local dogs rescued from animal control and ready for adoption.

Broad Ripple Brew Pub, 842 E. 65th, Indianapolis, Sunday Noon-10PM, M-S 11-12midnight


Cheers! GregKitz

Dribs and Drams

The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Beer Tasting is out and on the shelves.  By Rita Kohn with the Upland Brewing Co. Available just about everywhere. Amazon lists it at $12.98 with other vendors through Amazon at $9.32.

Looks like the Brewers of Indiana Guild may be spending $171,000 per year for a lobbyist. Davey Neal got an exemption to be able to go straight from the statehouse to the guild house. “In the last year, a handful of top state officials have received approval to leap directly from government work to outside employment, including former Gov. Mitch Daniels.” article

“In each case, the state's ethics panel pointed out the law does not apply to their situations, largely because they would not be directly working on projects or programs they worked on while in state government. But government ethicists say the cozy relationships still raise other questions of favoritism.”

Indiana City Brewery gets ink in the Indy Star about their building in downtown Indy that once housed the Home Brewing Co.

Great Fermentations homebrew store has opened a second outlet. This on in Avon at US 36 and Dan Jones Road. They will have a grand opening party on Sept. 14th. info. The annual Great Grain Sale is also happening – today through Sept 8th. Apple juice is also available now by pre-registration. Yumm.

What goes better with apple cider than donuts? Well, a lot of things but the segue was necessary to take a jibe at Lift Bridge’s mini donut beer that they served at the Minnesota State Fair. article

Reader Justin Kloer sent us some pictures and stories to add to the Hoosier Beer addenda.

I noticed a gap in your breweries index, specifically you don't have the brewers listed for C.L Centlivre brewing company of Ft. Wayne and later, as it became Old Crown Brewing Co.
As it happens I'm proud to know who they were, as it was my grandfather and great-grandfather. 
My great-grandfather Frank’s WWI registration card lists him as the Master Brewer for Centlivre. he would later become Vice President of production and his son, my grandfather Herbert Kloer, would become brewmaster, as seen in the attached scan of an advertisement during their 1950 expansion.  
Just as a fun fact in beer history, Frank continued brewing in his garage during prohibition, selling beer at $3 a bottle until he was busted in 1924, paid $518.50 in fines and spent 6 months in Terre Haute federal pen. 
My great great grandfather Josef was a brewer in PA, but I don't know the brewery.  He was a cooper in the old country (we're Transylvanian Saxons, a German people.)
Being the family historian I have a great many documents about Centlivre and Old Crown brewery.  I also have union books and cards, pictures, article etc. should you have interest or need of info about the brewery. … If there's ever anything you're looking for or want to know I might be able to find it and send it your way.  The only thing I like more than drinking beer is talking about it.

Thanks Justin. We’ll update the HoosierBeer web any day now.

Dribs and Drams

If you haven’t heard (and we didn’t until straying on this post), Rita Kohn was awarded the Woman’s Press Club of Indiana’s Communicator of Achievement honor. She writes Beer Buzz for NUVO and the book True Brew. Oh, and plays (Edwin Booth) and books about Native Indianans, steamboats, and more, lots more. She also might well have The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Beer Tasting out soon with Upland Brewing.

Choosing a beer is no longer a simple process, as the beverage has gone from a world of relatively small offerings from major brewers to a universe of hundreds of unique styles from around the world. The Complete Idiot's Guide® to Beer Tasting is a comprehensive introduction to the vast styles and complex characteristics of beer, including brewing style, the yeasts and hops that determine taste and character, how the various grains are used in brewing, and more.

Readers will discover how the brewing process can affect a beer, learn to recognize beer tasting notes and aromas, identify unique styles, select the right glassware, and much more.

Two sides of the gas station suit to sell cold beer in Indiana. Pro, No.

Bell’s is suing Enbridge Oil who dumped a million gallons of oil into the Kalamazoo river.

If only labels could be animated.

Doom Bar says it’s the biggest selling cask ale in the U.K. It’s brewed by Sharp’s brewery in Cornwall. It’s a 4.0% bitter that we liked even though it had lots of sharp edges. Oh, did we say Sharp’s is owned by Molson Coors?

Here’s a map of where Beer is Pivo, Cerveza, etc.

We’re not sure about a 5,000 year old beer recipe. This “Hymn to Ninkasi” recipe seems to be a bit old.

How’s your cell phone coverage? It was a bit worse near Melbourne, Australia until a beer fridge was found to interrupt the signal.

Spain’s Joaquin Alcaraz Garcia won a beer drinking contest at a festival with six litres in 20 minutes. Vomited. Died. article

Headline: Beer Festival Closes Early – After Running Out of Beer. Don’t panic, this was in Sunderland, England. It was a three day (Fri, Sat, Sun) fest that had to close on Saturday when they ran out of beer.

Also in England, they’re looking at a synthetic yeast. Yumm or umm? article

 

One picture is thought to be the first ever taken of a beer glass (1844). The subject of the other picture is, with the Octoberfest waitresses, deserving of an Olympic gold medal.

Misc News – May 20

Upland's UpCup Homebrew competition was won by Brian Steuerwald of the FBI with a Altbier. It will be brewed by Upland in June and available in the tap rooms later in the summer.

Second was Brent McGill of MASH for Duwerdesteinekrankenschwesterbrauchen Berliner Weiss. Third was Peter Cowles of Connecticut for a Black IPA. source

Jim Ailes and David Pentzien of the Chatham Tap on Mass Ave in Indy are looking to open a new place, where the Fionn MacCools was on 116th St. in Fishers. The Fishers Tap might open as early as next month. article

On June 8th, Omar will tap an Alt at the Alcatraz in Indy. An early preview shows a malty start and quick mellow Saaz bitterness. It is currently maturing at 40°. He also has a couple of kegs of Milk Stout aged on Bourbon Oak chips. Roasty when cold and Bourbon roasty when warmed. It will be poured at the RadFest and other special occasions.

Ram's Maibock (Tool Box Bock) is appropriately light, pale, sweet and fits the warm sunny days ahead.

Bob Mack posits both sides of Cans or Glass? Which is Greener?

41% Sink the Bismarck from Scottish BrewDog. Piffle. Schorschbräu (right) takes the title back with 43% ABV. "In our graciousness we had decided not to begrudge the Others the little joy of holding the title for a few weeks. Let’s not overdo this – from now on, the World’s Strongest Beer lives again where it belongs: in Franconia! Schorschbock 43% Vol., ’cause Frankonian Men don’t dress like girls.” article

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Now for something completely different.

Last weekend my high-school-graduating niece commented as I extolled the virtues of New Belgium 1554 that I should be a beer critic. I had to reply "Sometimes I am". Now I get a chance to be a arts critic. We probably wouldn't have heard about Rita Kohn's play "Before the Shadows Flee" if Rita wasn't one of the good guys of beer.

Ron Spencer (left), an actor of large emotive hands and an infinite memory, gives a 60-minute soliloquy as Edwin Booth (right) preparing to play Hamlet in the 1890s. Rita gives him period speech where "forced breath" is three syllables – suitable and quickly natural.

Booth laments his father's life, his life, Hamlet's life, and the life of his brother, John Wilkes. It's real and it's fascinating. The research comes through and the attention to detail is heard in every voice of the character.

Using just 3 simple props, each representing a Shakespearian mood, Ron gives life to a fascinating character who's tragedy is mostly in his own mind.

It's not all somber because Edwin Booth was a real larger-than-life person. He owned his own theater in New York City. He had gone to the gold fields of California. He had prospered and busted many times during his long life. He had redefined the acting methods of the century to be approachable and acceptable to a changing modern theatergoer. He had even saved the life of a young Robert Todd Lincoln. He was the Richard Burton of his day. A bit of both Richard Burtons.

Go, See, Enjoy Rita's 24th play. It has one more performance at the Indiana State Museum on Saturday the 22nd at 2pm. You should be there.

Ron Spencer is the artistic director of Theater on the Square.