Here’s another email I received from the American Hombrewer’s Association:
Dear Homebrewers and Beer Enthusiasts, The American Homebrewers Association (AHA) wants you to join us for a fantastic fun-filled event with prizes and an opportunity to meet and mingle with other beer enthusiasts at
Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant- with guests Dogfish Head Craft Brewery, Stewart’s Brewing Co. and Twin Lakes Brewing Co. Friday August 8, 2008.
Bring a friend to the event. The cost is $33 for new and renewing members. Entrance is free for current AHA members.
Entrance to the event includes these opportunities:
• $33 One-Year Membership to the AHA (reg. $38)
• Meet Mark Edelson, Iron Hill’s Director of Brewing Operations
• Meet Sam Calagione, Dogfish Head Craft Brewery’s founder and president
• Meet Kathryn Porter, AHA Membership Coordinator
• All beer proceeds will be donated to homebrew clubs in the area
• Bocce Ball Tournament
• Special Release on tap
RSVP TODAY! Click here to let us know you are coming!
What’s the AHA you say? The AHA is the national organization for homebrewers and beer enthusiasts! We’re about promoting the community of homebrewers and empowering them to make the best beer in the world. We are deeply passionate about all aspects of homebrewing and beer culture: technical, artistic, sensory and social.
With your AHA Membership you also receive a Zymurgy magazine every other month, discounts at pubs across the U.S. and much much more!
WHEN: Friday- August 8, 2008
Time: 6pm - 9pm
WHERE: Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant
710 South Madison Street
Wilmington, Delaware 19801 www.ironhillbrewery.com
WHY: Learn more about the AHA and how you can become a part of the homebrewing community! For the cost of entry you receive an AHA membership and a chance to win cool door prizes.
ENTRY: EVERYONE BECOMES A MEMBER!
Join or renew in advance or at the event. A discounted AHA one-year membership rate of $33 will be offered at the door.
Once you’re a member - entrance is FREE!
Already an AHA Member?– Entrance is FREE, but don’t miss this great membership rate of $33. Renew at the event!
Join with a FAMILY MEMBERSHIP rate of $43! You’ll receive one Zymurgy magazine per household and all registered family members (limit 4) become card-carrying AHA Members with full benefits!
Designated Drivers: We welcome designated drivers to the event. Entry is free, but does not include an AHA membership.
EMAIL YOUR FRIENDS!
HELP us grow the AHA. Share this email with your friends and invite them to the RALLY!
Subject: Newark Food & Brew Festival
Newark Food & Beer Festival 5
Mug Club Members,
It is time once again for the Newark Food & Beer Festival. It will be held this Saturday, July 26th, from 2PM until 10 PM. For those who have participated in the past, you know this is a great event, where local restaurants feature special beers from craft brewers along with great foods. Here is a link to festival website - http://www.newarkfoodandbrewfest.com.
This year we will be hosting Stoudt’s brewery of Adamstown, PA. Last year, this area favorite celebrated its 20th Anniversary and is the most award winning brewery in the Philadelphia region. On tap, we will feature Stoudt’s Fat Dog Stout, and Double IPA.
New this year, I will be hosting a tutored tasting of 750ml reserve bottles. In addition to tasting many of Iron Hill’s Reserve Bottles, we will be tasting Stoudt’s Barrel Aged Fat Dog Stout and Barleywine. This event begins at 4:00 PM at the restaurant and the cost is $15.00.
Cheers,
Justin Sproul
Head Brewer
Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant
Newark
I received the following email and thought I should pass them along! The damn Marxists in our government are raising the price of our beer!
Dear Fellow Delaware Homebrewers and Beer Enthusiasts,
As you may have read in the paper, once again, the Delaware legislature is working to make up budget shortfalls by targeting the usual suspects…..beer, wine and spirits. The Delaware General Assembly just passed a bill to raise the Excise Tax on beer by 50%, and comparable increases in wine and spirits. This bill goes before the Senate on Monday evening and then on to the Governor. As you also know, small brewers in this country our under tremendous pressure from historic volatility in the raw materials market. Iron Hill’s 2009 hop contracts will rise 300% and our grain contracts by 60%. As much as we hate to do it, these dramatic increases in costs have to be passed along to the consumer for all of us to remain viable business and for you guys to continue to enjoy our products. At the same time, our legislators have seen fit to add to the burden by adding a historic increase in the state’s excise tax. Delaware’s excise taxes on beer are already almost double the taxes we pay in all of our neighboring states. In the end, all of these costs are will ultimately result in consumers paying more for our products.
We are asking you to please take time this weekend to contact your representatives and let them know your feelings on higher taxes. Please visit:
Mark D. Edelson Director of Brewery Operations Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant 2502 West Sixth Street Wilmington, DE19805 Phone (302) 888-2739 X110 Fax (302) 652-4115 www.ironhillbrewery.com
June 27, 2008 Dear Delaware Beer Activists and Homebrewers,Delaware small brewers need your help! Please read the following information provided by the small, independent breweries of Delaware:A proposal currently moving in the legislature would raise the state tax on beer almost 50%. The small brewers of Delaware are asking you TO CALL YOUR STATE SENATOR TODAY to ask him/her to oppose this unprecedented increase as an extremely harmful measure to the state’s small craft breweries.At this point, this proposal has not been formally drafted as legislation, but will be amended into an existing bill and voted on Monday, June 30. NOW IS THE TIME TO CALL YOUR SENATOR – CALLING IS THE QUICKEST, MOST EFFECTIVE METHOD AS TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE!
For contact information for your Senator, click here.
You will find links to the Senate roster of members. Simply find your Senator and click on their link for contact information.Following are several suggested points to make to your elected representatives:
Delaware has one of the most vibrant and varied craft brewing communities on the east coast.
Delaware’s small breweries are good for the economy and very good for tourism. Thousands of visitors journey to the state every year to visit these breweries and experience their unique products where they are made.
Small brewers are facing astronomical costs increases across the board – from malt and hops to energy and packaging materials - nearly 40% over last year. If a further tax burden is placed upon Delaware’s small breweries in this challenging economy it will surely put many of those small businesses at risk.
A tax increase of this magnitude will deter start-up breweries from considering locating in Delaware, as it will affect existing breweries’ ability to expand, stalling job growth and possibly forcing Delaware breweries to relocate to states that have more competitive tax structures.
The small, independent breweries of this state need their legislator’s support now more than ever.
Diageo to sell 50% of Dublin’s Guinness brewery
Diageo, the world’s largest producer of alcoholic drinks, today admitted it will sell half of Guinness’ historic home in Dublin and cut 250 jobs as part of a £520 million investment plan.
The company said it will continue to brew the Irish stout at St James’s Gate, situated on the banks of the River Liffey, but will close properties around the brewery as well as shutting two smaller production plants in Kilkenny and Dundalk. The company will build a new brewery close to Dublin, which will open in 2013.
Diageo pledged to keep open the St James’s Gate site, where Arthur Guinness started brewing in 1759. The company will also continue to run the Guinness Storehouse museum, one of Dublin’s biggest tourist attractions.
Hop prices are insane, and many varieties are getting very scarce. We’ve heard it time and time again over the past few months. Luckily our local homebrew shop, HDYB, has secured a good cache of hops and through their smart rationing policies, they should be able to give you the variety you seek in some form, either pellet, plug, or whole. In case you don’t know the policy: Maximum of 4oz per customer, only 3oz of any one variety. If you find yourself in there for anything, its probably worth making use of this and buying 4oz of hops, even if you don’t need them.
I am fortunate enough to be sitting on my own cache of 8-9 lbs of hops, which should only require occasional augmentation from Joe & Marlana. Many I have not come up with a gameplan for yet. I think next year will be one of significant experimentation and reformulation of recipes - many of my favorites that use Columbus, Simcoe, and Magnum hops will require substitution or retirement until the current crunch is over. I have several that I am pretty excited about using (and using up):
Summit hops (1 lb whole)- Citrusy, and 16.5%AA. I think these will go great with some Amarillo, Centennial, and maybe some Pacific Gem. Some homebrewers have said they didn’t know whether to brew with these or smoke them, they were so “aromatic”.
Mt. Rainier (8 oz pellets) - Herbal, slightly minty and some say has a licorice taste and aroma. Time to crank out some new dark beer (porter or stout) recipes for this one. These came from an informal hop swap with Ric at Stewart’s, and I traded him 8oz or 16oz of Sorachi Ace whole hops for them (I can’t really remember how much). The american brown he brewed with the Mt. Rainiers was outstanding.
Warrior - (~8 oz pellets) - Strong bittering hop and good replacement for my Magnum usage due to its low cohumulone content. I’ve had these since our big club buy from NCMS two years ago, but have never managed to work my way through all of them. I even gave about 8oz to Joe & Marlana at one time.
Horizon - (~5 oz pellets) - English dual-use hop with nice aroma and bittering qualities. I’ve only used it once before, when Mike Castagno and I brewed a split batch of english brown ale with it back in early 2006. I’ve been meaning to get back to these hops for quite a while.
I am also eyeing (with significant salivation) a new high %AA variety over at Puterbaugh Farms, Bravo, which sounds like it is a super-centennial. At almost $30/lb, it’s not cheap - but it IS whole hops instead of pellets, and sounds like it could be awesome in an IPA (probably with some Summit, Amarillo and Centennial). If they are still available after Xmas, I may have to sweet-talk the wife into letting me get some.
My recent brewing activities have got me re-energized about brewing next year, and I am looking forward to the next time I fire up the propane burner. I hope to do several more cooperative brews with other folks next year (Brian and Heidi & David jump to mind), and need to do a better job preparing for the local competitions - some have gone by with me having nothing to submit.
I’ve brewed the last two weekends, and it has been great - I can’t really explain the long hiatus (1 1/2 months) other than I was busy with other things… But last weekend I brewed 10 gallons of my black honey ale (w/ 4 lb buckwheat honey), and yesterday was a 5 gallon batch of Queen’s Darkness IS (8 oz of molassas). The Queen’s Darkness came in at around 1.084 OG, and the Black Honey is something on the order of 1.065-1.068 (will back calculate when I keg it).
I repitched about 1/2 of yeast from the honey ale into the stout, and had signs fermentation within 2 hours. It is rocking this morning. I also used the product from American Hop Plugs yesterday, which How Do You Brew? is currently carrying, and I must say - I really liked them. I will definitely look at buying and using more hop plugs in the future. They are expensive ($3/oz), but the convenience of dropping hops into the kettle in 1/2oz plugs is really nice… and they smell very fresh. Joe and Marlana have lots of Hop Plugs inventory, so if you are a “whole hop” fan as I am, I would strongly encourage you all to check them out as a viable alternative. Its amazing that those little plugs expand so much in the kettle.
My next brew will probably be “Homegrown Ale 2007″ or an American Pale / IPA. I’m itching to use my Summit hops in something, and I’ve got 2 lbs of Amarillo hops to play with. With all the dark stuff I’ve brewed recently, something on the lighter end of the color spectrum is probably a good idea too.
Gardai in Dublin are on the lookout for 36,000 pints of beer stolen from the Guinness brewery.
More than 400 kegs were stolen in what is likely to be the largest carry-out of drink this Christmas.
A man drove a truck into the yard on Wednesday, and left with a trailer containing 180 Guinness kegs, 180 Budweiser kegs, and 90 Carslberg kegs. Police estimated the haul to be worth at least 64,000 euros (£46,000), at wholesale prices.
However, this figure would be considerably more if Dublin pub prices were charged. The robbery occurred the same day as a special Garda operation known as Freeflow was launched to ease traffic congestion and combat drink-driving over Christmas.
BBC NEWS REPORT.
Freeflow officers manning many checkpoints across the city are expected now also to be on the look out for any large quantity of stolen drink flowing through Dublin’s traffic.
The stolen trailer has since been found at Slane Hill in County Meath. It was empty.
Scientists have found a new threat to the planet: Canadian beer drinkers.
The government-commissioned study says the old, inefficient “beer fridges” that one in three Canadian households use to store their Molson and Labatt’s contribute significantly to global warming by guzzling gas- and coal-fired electricity.
“People need to understand the impact of their lifestyles,” British environmental consultant Joanna Yarrow tells New Scientist magazine. “Clearly the environmental implications of having a frivolous luxury like a beer fridge are not hitting home. This research helps inform people — let’s hope it has an effect.”
The problem is that the beer fridges are mostly decades-old machines that began their second careers as beverage dispensers when Canadians upgraded to more energy-efficient models to store whatever Canadians eat besides doughnuts and poutine.
University of Alberta researcher Denise Young, who led the study, suggests that provincial authorities hold beer-fridge buy-backs or round-ups to eliminate the threat — methods that Americans use to get guns off the streets.
My miniscule Freshops order came today. I’m not quite sure which aspect is more insane:
The alpha acids on my WHOLE LEAF Summit hops are 16.5%
I only ordered 2.5 pounds this year, compared to 8+ last year
It cost me $75 to order 2.5 lbs, which is about as much as I spent last year.
This is probably the last order for me for quite a while. My plan is to use the store of hops in my freezer until it runs out, or I can’t take it anymore and break down again. I am bummed that there were no Columbus or Simcoe hops to be had this year - at least not when I ordered. Now it looks like Freshops has some surplus 2006 inventory of Simcoe they are selling, but still no Columbus.
But why am I whining. I haven’t brewed in over a month, and the next one may be the last of the year.
Cheers, Scott