Best in show

Four years ago, a pale ale put Mike Wenzel and Steve Moen in the winner’s circle of the New Jersey State Fair homebrew competition.

Last month, they proved you can mess with success and walk away champs again, winning best in show in the fair competition with another American pale ale.

The 38-year-olds, buddies since grade school and homebrewers for about a dozen years, will again brew at Krogh’s Restaurant & Brewpub under the supervision of the Sparta establishment’s brewer and chef, David Cooper.

Look for the duo’s Turnpike Pale Ale (5.8% ABV) to go on tap sometime in early 2009. Yeah, that’s quite awhile from now, but it’s probably the earliest David can work Mike and Steve’s brew into the pub’s rotation of seasonal beers.

(FYI: That's Mike at left and Steve below. Download a pdf list of winners here.)

Krogh’s is a longtime sponsor of the state fair homebrew contest, but the grand prize of brewing a beer with the pub’s 5-barrel system to be served to Krogh’s patrons is a recent feature of the competition (more precisely, it’s in its fifth year).

Mike, a Pequannock resident, and Steve, who lives in Jefferson, were the first winners of the grand prize, in 2004, claiming the guest tap handle with their Hay Bale Pale Ale. (Krogh’s, by the way, is their watering hole, when they’re not partaking of their own brews.)

Their 2008 winner – hoppier than its predecessor – was originally brewed for a Fourth of July party. What was left over became a contest entry, Steve says. (The guys, who memorialize their brewing efforts with a Web site, also took first runner-up with an IPA; friend of the blog Dave Pobutkiewicz, an accomplished homebrewer in his own right and one-time Samuel Adams homebrew finalist, was second runner-up with his weizen.)

David says the homebrew contest is good for both the hobby brewers and the bar. When the victory brew goes on tap, it becomes a big draw, as family and friends of the winners pour into the bar to get a taste. Plus, there's a huge pride moment for the homebrewers when they see others enjoying a beer they created. "I'm still amazed to see people drink my beer," David says.

About the Turnpike Pale Ale

• Grain bill, hop profile and yeast: Mike and Steve created a base of pale and pilsner malts, and nuanced those malt flavors and color with some 20-degree Lovibond crystal malt and some munich malt. Amarillo was used as the bittering hop, with Cascade and Centennial in the nose. Another round of Cascade was used for dry hopping. The duo fermented with Wyeast 1056 American Ale yeast.
• The name: In a place like New Jersey, you might think it’s nod to our nationally known toll road ("Counting the cars on the New Jersey Turnpike, they’ve all gone to look for America," sang Simon & Garfunkel). Guess again. Mike and Steve use the name in a more general or historic sense, sort of like Hamburg Turnpike, the moniker of a local road in Wayne. Steve says the two mused that if they opened a brewery it would be called Turnpike Brewery; hence Turnpike Pale Ale.
  
• Recent notable brews: They did a bourbon barrel porter, aging it on top of some oak cubes, with two Madagascar vanilla beans (split) tossed in for some extra flavor.

What’s happening at Krogh’s
David says the pub’s wildly popular Oktoberfest beer will go on tap Sept. 26, a little late this year compared to past years, although David tries to time it to Munich’s Oktoberfest (which starts Sept. 20).

Beware: It goes quickly. The pub sped through 27 kegs of the fest beer in 27 days last year. And when it’s gone, it’s gone until next year. By the by, the fest beer will be followed by a cider ale made with cider from Windy Brow Farms, located in Fredon in Sussex County.

Meanwhile, Krogh’s is helping support veterans with promotions that run through Nov. 11, Veterans Day. (More details here.)

Also, look for the pub to mark its 10th anniversary next February with a doppelbock and some commemorative mugs. The bock has become the pub’s milestone beer, says David. It was brewed to salute Krogh’s fifth anniversary, and to mark the pub's 500th brew about three years ago.

In case you're wondering, Krogh's is now at about 750 brews. And counting.

Amethyst disappointment

Looks like Trenton is setting up roadblocks to discussion about the minimum legal drinking age.

Check out this Star-Ledger story. Senate President Dick Codey is calling out New Jersey college and university presidents on beer, wine and spirits, asking them to say just what their institutions' policies are regarding the beverages. Additionally, the Legislature plans hearings this fall on underage drinking on campus.

(Here’s a thought for lawmakers: How about taking another crack a runaway property taxes, and keep working on that until you fix it, that and the fact New Jersey is hopelessly broke and willing to hock our toll roads and bill our small towns for state police patrols to pay the bills.)

Codey’s action comes in response to the "Amethyst Initiative," a movement of college and university presidents asking for a discussion on the minimum legal drinking age, which as we all know, has been 21 across the country for the last quarter century, ever since the federal government blackmailed states into adopting it or lose highway funding.

AI does not call for the drinking age to be lowered. It seeks a discussion on the issue. College and university presidents who back AI have taken the position that telling and expecting the under 21s to not drink isn’t reallying pulling the oars when it comes to actually thwarting underage drinking. (There's also an argument that other countries akin to the US that have lower drinking ages don't seem to have our problems.)

Nearly 130 college and university presidents have signed AI. Here, Drew U, Montclair State U and Stevens Institute of Technology are the sole higher education institutions to back it. The rest of the state’s college and university chiefs have balked. (Predictably, Mothers Against Drunk Drivers has gone apoplectic about AI.)

Given the fact that AI calls for a discussion, we think Codey (who by the way, doesn't drink beer, wine or spirits) has adopted a panic response (if the Ledger quoted him correctly), connecting discussion of the issue to lowering the drinking age.

C’mon, Dick. You really think it’s that slippery of a slope? And to shoot down the idea of discussion – we’re talking discussion, airing things out, sussing pros and cons – isn’t very democratic. It’s also kind of nanny state, Trenton knows best (not).

Meanwhile, the state has built another wall to talking about the issue: NJ21, a bunch of state agencies and nonprofits dog-piling on the topic with a giant over-our-dead-bodies attitude toward touching the drinking age. But again, AI doesn’t say lower it; it says let’s talk about the minimum drinking age.

(And Dick, if you or your staff read this, and think we’ve just endorsed a lowered age, you’ve missed again. We never turned that card up.)

In der Küche mit Karen

High Point Brewing, as we’ve noted a couple times since July, rolls out the Austrian oak barrel this Saturday (2 p.m. at the brewery in Butler), tapping their 2008 Oktoberfest seasonal beer. (See our video from last year.)

If you’ve been to this open house, you've probably enjoyed some complimentary food while you got a growler filled and sampled the Märzen. The beer is the main attraction, the food is that little extra that makes you feel at home, and the folks who make it happen are those indispensable volunteers that every craft brewery could probably use more of.

Like Karen Ontell, who has stepped up to fill the vacancy of Jack Brunner, the familiar food guy at High Point events, who has another commitment on Saturday. (FYI: Karen’s a Bulter resident and of German lineage; her father is from West Berlin, yes from the dark time when the city was cut off from the free world and divided with the then-Communist East).

Karen used to work for High Point in the brewery's early days, doing promotions like beer dinners and representing Ramstein at charity events, and has known owner Greg Zaccardi since Ramstein’s been a label. Husband Howard volunteers at the taps (as did Karen at the bar during the August open house), filling growlers from a jockey box in the brewhouse.

She now runs Karen’s Pet Concierge and does theme-based event catering (have a Halloween party planned? She’s got your mummy covered – in filo dough).

Here’s a sampling of Karen’s menu for Ramstein Oktoberfest 2008 (we spoke to her on Monday, so the menu could change):

Warm-up:

• Soft pretzels, with of course, mustard
• Potato soup

Fill-up:

• Mini-stuffed cabbages with dipping sauce
• Chicken friccassee
• Turkey and cheese on skewers with horse radish sauce
• Potato pancakes with apple sauce
• Salad

Finish-up:

• Butter cake
• Cherry streusel cake

Worth noting
If you’ve ever cooked for 100 people, then you know there are a lot of kitchen hours that go into it. So, some credit is due for Karen and Jack.

While you’re enjoying the beer, conversation and food – the Gemütlichkeit – don’t forget to toast the chefs.

Prosit!

After hop-picking, revisited

Meet the new video. Same as the old video.

Not quite ... New intro, new ending, new cover shot here and there in this re-cut of the Weyerbacher hops saga. The director's cut, ha!

It’s basically an updated version, with footage from their Aug. 23rd harvest day and a quick interview with Dan Weirback as he snipped bines and flung them into the bed of a pickup.

Shots of the young hop bines in the original cut have been replaced; likewise most of the shots of mature hop cones in the original intro – which came from footage of our plants – have been replaced with those from Dan and Sue's hop yard.

There’s also some additional comment from the Rutgers agriculture folks, John Grande and Ed Dager, who have our enduring gratitude for helping out with the piece. The Snyder Farm did its hops project several years ago, and no longer has them growing there in Pittstown in Hunterdon County. But it’s great to see the farm's research get put to new use and great that John and Ed were willing to revisit it.

Anyway, grab a hoppy beer, an IPA, and watch.

UPDATE: Upon checking Weyerbacher's Web site, we learn that Dan says the harvest yielded enough hops to brew three batches of the Harvest Ale, an IPA (6% ABV); it will be available in bottles, starting this Saturday (Sept. 13th). Alas, it's only available in Pennsylvania.

Calendar Notes

This Saturday – Sept. 13th – will be a busy one for beer fans. (Actually, all of September is.)

Pizzeria Uno (Metuchen/Woodbridge, located along Route 1) hosts its first-ever cask ale festival, featuring smooth unfiltered brews from Climax, Chelsea Brewing, Captain Lawrence Brewing, Troeg’s, Weyerbacher, and of course Uno, the only Uno in the USA that brews its own beers with the pizza it makes.


View Larger Map

Brewer Mike Sella says it’s a pay as you go event, starting at noon and running to the last drop (or thereabout). Have no fears, the per-glass prices will be reasonable, complemented with happy hour food prices during the event.

Mike says the cask fest, while definitely a first for Uno, is possibly the first such fest in the Garden State’s modern brewing history. So go, be part of history.

Also coming from Uno is their Oktoberfest, which goes on tap Tuesday (Sept. 9th), and a popular wee heavy that returns in October-November (and again around February).

You can also enjoy Mike’s beers at the Central Jersey Beer Fest (more on this one soon) on Sept 20th at Woodbridge's Parker Press Park and at the Manhattan Cask Ale Festival at Chelsea Brewing, Sept. 19-21.

Meanwhile, if you're the kind who likes to pack an itinerary, High Point will debut its 2008 Oktoberfest at the brewery in Butler at 2 p.m., also on Sept. 13th. (Again, more on that one in a day or two.)

And coming up, Oktoberfest in Philadelphia, Sept. 27th, where Flying Fish will be pouring Oktoberfish. (Yes, more details are on the way).

Iron supplement

If you've ever thought New Jersey – with more people per square mile than any other state – should have more brewpubs than it does, then follow this link to the Beer Yard.

We first tasted Iron Hill in the mid-1990s when a co-worker at the Asbury Park Press brought us a growler of their Pig Iron Porter after a trip to Delaware (all these years later, we still say, Thanks Z! Also, IH owner Mark Edelson's brother, Steve, is a sports columnist for Asbury).

That Iron Hill (yeah, we nicked the image from their Web site) plans to strike a mash and serve food in Maple Shade (May '09) in South Jersey is really good news. In fact it's beyond good news, it's inspirational – finally another place to hold a torch and help light the way.

New Jersey has been stuck in the '90s, when most of its craft breweries and brewpubs opened. Sure, there's store shelf space devoted to Jersey-brewed micros and ones across the USA, as well as imports. And a passion among a lot of folks for big IPAs and Belgian brews.

But since the '90s, there's been virtually no movement by way of new brewing enterprises in a state where the population figure suggests there should be.

Meanwhile, at the bar scene, the suburban landscape is choked with mall-stop chain restaurants, like Applebee's, Friday's and Outback, places too skittish and formulaic to serve anything more exciting than Guinness and Sam Adams. Sadly, those places represent the countenance of beer for a lot of Jerseyans.

Most of the savvier beer bars, ones bold and daring enough have discriminating tastes, tend to be in North Jersey and accross state lines (i.e. Philadelphia and New York).

But it's unfair to dump blame on tavern owners and restaurants for being timid. They have to pay their bills in a state where Bud and Coors Light somehow maintain a Jedi mind-hold on customers and drive business for bar owners.

And after all this is New Jersey, land of the town-issued, six-figure consumption license, a price that's damned near the kind of money that buys a bayside house on Long Beach Island. (And that sky-high cost is unlikely to change, since town councils here – as often as a can – will offer new licenses in order to shave some pennies off their painfully high property tax rates, especially in election years.)

But all that's a rant. It's sort of what happens when you talk about beer and breweries in the Garden State – that we'll never be the beer garden state.

So, it's best to think good news. May '09. Maple Shade. Iron Hill.

Court of opinion is on session

The New York Times has a piece on lower-strength beers.

With that, some discussion, a few thoughts …

Sometimes it seems like the buzz about high-alcohol brews – ones Frank Sinatra probably would have dubbed gasoline (his preferred handle for Jack Daniel’s) – is the beer equivalent of Nigel Tufnel’s amplier cranking to 11.

But hey, you can make 10 louder, that is, make a quite tasty session beer (like Philly pub Nodding Head’s Berliner Weisse, 3.5% ABV), one that keeps its feet on the ground and lets you stay on yours after a pint or two (or three).

Ironically, it’s talk itself that’s one of the wider planks in the platform of session brews: You can enjoy beer without compromising your ability to converse intelligently (or work your mack daddy moves).

Big beers, and the taste for ’em, have been around long enough that they’re in no danger of fading away. There will always be fridge space for that big, corked bottle and the four-pack.

But it could be simple economics that pulls the choke chain and reins ’em in a little. They require more raw ingredients (whose costs have risen) to make and are pricier on the store shelf. And anyone who's divvying up their dollars knows the overhead of everyday living is taking a bigger bite these days.

So the marketplace will speak. Have a beer and talk about it.

Tria trip (Philly and back)

Philadelphia has been off our radar for a while now. Once there, you really don’t want to leave the city’s beer menu behind, it’s such a beer Shangri-La.

“Think Jersey, Drink Jersey” have been our watchwords; they still are, always will be. But allow us one an indulgence before summer folds its tent.

The trip to Philly started out as a quest for a pint of Sly Fox’s new schwarzbier, but the glass ended up going to a Belgian IPA and a rather robust London porter, rounded out with some exceptional blue-veined cheese. (With some luck, we’ll still get that schwarzbier.)

De Ranke XX Bitter (6% ABV) was a nice discovery on the beer menu at Tria café (18th and Sansom). Hoppy but not at all overwhelming, crisper than expected, quite good in fact. The one drawback: It’s a pricey proposition – $8.50 for an 11-ounce bottle (imports on Tria’s menu hit your wallet pretty hard).

But honestly, compare that to $10 for the same size bottle of Chimay at the tourist trap Phillips Seafood at the Pier on the Atlantic City boardwalk, poured by bar staff who don’t know much about the beer beyond sliding the requisite Chimay goblet in front of you, and then it becomes more about branding and less about the beer. (We’re not knocking our home state here, just pointing out a sad reality. But at least Phillips, a Baltimore import, has that choice on their beer list in AC.)

Tria’s all about matching beers and wines with great foods, so the timid and intrepid can pose their beer questions to the servers and get reliable answers.

We asked about the Meantime coffee porter on their menu, inquiring if they would bring one to our table. Meantime’s a London brewery that proudly wants you know they’re not a big UK national brewery. And they boast a cup of coffee in each bottle of the porter.

It’s a roasty, tasty beer, but to be honest it begs for some food to go with it, in our case, smoked chicken with Spanish peppers, cheese and herbed truffle mayo (a little less of the mayo next time, please).

Again, a price caveat – another $8.50. But the old saw about nothing ventured, nothing gained applies.

So how do you wrap up an excursion like this?

You hit DiBruno Bros. (Chestnut Street) around the corner for some take-home cheese (triple cream brie), then step over to Nodding Head (Samson Street) for a pint of Rubicon (we strongly considered the 3C Extreme Double IPA – Chinook, Cascade and Centennial hops – well, we did get a taste of it, and for a muscled-up IPA, it’s invitingly smooth), then you get naked, as in Naked Chocolate Café (13th and Walnut). The name pretty much says it all.

And for a nightcap at home base?

Well, this was supposed to be a Sly Fox moment, so their Royal Weisse fit the bill. And after all, it’s summer.

A pint of Jersey fresh

What’s better than fresh beer? Fresh beer dry-hopped with freshly picked Cascades and Nuggets.

We spent some time Wednesday in the brewhouse at the Tun Tavern in Altantic City, where brewer Tim Kelly put on tap a special take on the Tun’s All American IPA, dialing up the beer’s aromatics with a few pounds of hops grown in South Jersey.

The beer’s a lightly filtered version of the Tun’s IPA, trending toward malty but smoothed out with the Cascades and Nuggets. The lighter touch with filtering gives the brew a hint of English real ale, however the carbonation is what you’d expect with American craft beer.

This is the first time Tim’s had a chance to use locally grown hops in a brew, but his preference is to be able to do it more frequently.

The cones came by way of Tim’s friends, Ray Gourley and Kathy Haney, whose small-space garden in Haddon Heights has produced an impressive crop of Nuggets, Cascades, Glacier and Goldings, among other varieties (check out the photo by Ray, cones as big as your thumb).

What got sacked up in a mesh bag and tossed into the serving tank smelled really great, so you can bet the beer’s worth moving up on your list of pint choices. (We took home a growler pulled early from the batch; haven't sampled it yet, but it will be more like real ale IPA, nice hoppy nose and low carbonation with the malty signatures.)

While waiting for the IPA to filter, we sampled a couple of the California brews – Lost Abbey Judgment Day and Moylan Brewing’s Hopsickle Imperial IPA – sent this way by the Thirsty Hopster.

Judgment Day, wow, the Cecil B. DeMille of beers, a quad as big as its biblical name. It’s got a warm alcohol kick (10.5% ABV) right from the start, in the nose and first sip, plus some chocolate notes before you get to the raisin flavors (it has raisins as an adjunct, plus some special B in the grain bill). Let it breathe and relax in the glass and some really big flavors unfold.

Hopsickle (9-something % ABV) was a beer that smelled better than it tasted, and that’s not a slap at its flavor, just an observation. You sort of expect an imperial IPA to be as bitter Paul McCartney’s ex, but the chorus of hop aromas were a nice preface to each sip from this pumped up IPA.

Looking ahead
Leather Neck stout, which has been off the Tun’s taps for a little while, is returning soon, and Tim plans to get rolling on an Oktoberfest (a Märzen fermented with Munich lager yeast) in a matter of days (just a tad behind schedule). Deeper into the fall, think spiced beer, and another lager will probably be coming back around.

Also, look for the Tun beers – four to six of them in fact – at a dinner at the Laguna Grill in nearby Brigantine about the third week of October. Plans for that were starting to take shape on Wednesday. Stay tuned.

Stormy seas

State cutbacks are churning up some waves for the USS New Jersey, and quite possibly for fans of Garden State craft beers, who've made the trek to the battleship for the annual beer festival.

The news is this: Our perpetually cash-strapped state – overextended and underfunded – has had to slash the subsidy for the ship, which now serves as a martime museum docked at Camden's waterfront. (Read more here.)

That means layoffs for the staff that runs the ship, which exhibits the vessel's rather large history as the most-decorated battleship in the US Navy.

The USS New Jersey has provided free space for the June beer festival staged by the Garden State Craft Brewer's Guild for the past three years (twice on the ship's fantail and once along its dock). So what becomes of the relationship that has spared the guild some festival overhead?

Well, there's no word right now on what it means for next summer, presuming the guild wants to return to the ship's decks. (The festival used to move around the state somewhat, but found a mooring at the ship, so to speak, largely based on the free event space the Big J provided.)

However, an October Garden State guild festival at the Newark Bears minor league baseball stadium is still in the works. (More on that soon.)

shIPAle

We managed to get our hands on a growler of The Ship Inn's Northwest IPA.

Lots of Cascade flavor in it, and was sort of like Flying Fish's Hopfish IPA colliding with SlyFox's Phoenix Pale Ale. It has the subdued IPAness of Hopfish and the flavor of PPA.

All things considered, it was certainly worth the side trip to Milford, as we returned to home base from Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, on Saturday, where we went to check out Weyerbacher Brewing's hop harvest.

Handcrafted beer? You bet, especially when you pick the hops all by hand. The folks from Weyerbacher brought the crop in by cutting the bines and plucking the cones from morning through the afternoon.

Good thing there was pulled pork, cole slaw and a sixtel of their AutumnFest beer for sustenance, and some half-joking, half-serious comments of "have anything hoppier?"

We’ve followed their efforts to grow hops since April, and now all that’s left is to taste their Harvest Ale.

Check out the stills (we shot more video, too, that's coming as a sort of sequel to what we've already posted).

Northwest IPA & East meets West

The Ship Inn reports (via newsletter) it’s got a new brew in the mix, Northwest IPA (inspired by a visit to Seattle) ... Cascades in the nose, Centennial for bittering. Ship folks say they’re initially pleased with the brew but are still fine-tuning the recipe.

We’re gonna have to book a trip to Milford and The Ship (maybe on the return from Easton and Weyerbacher on Saturday), especially since the Brit-style pub's got Fuller’s ESB on tap as one of their imports.

Speaking of IPAs, and the West Coast, we did a beer trade with The Thirsty Hopster. That would be Jessica Jones, who keeps, we think, the best beer blog in the US, and travels far and wide, sampling beers (Japan, Continental Europe, the Great British Beer Fest).

Jess made a trip earlier this summer to Pennsylvania (think Philly in March ’09, Jess, Philly Beer Week), with Troeg’s Nugget Nectar and trip to Harrisburg on her radar. Alas, it was a beer out of reach. (But check her archives, she did get to experience Pennsy's drive-through stores).

So we offered Jess a couple bottles of NN via UPS, complementing that shipment with Victory’s 12 and Baltic Thunder, and Weyerbacher's Double Simcoe™ IPA. (Yeah, no Jersey beers in that mix, maybe next time.)

In return, we got The Lost Abbey’s Judgment Day, Moylan’s Hopsickle Imperial Ale, Hair of the Dog’s Blue Dot Double IPA, Arrogant Bastard Ale and Green Flash’s Imperial IPA. Arrogant Bastard is on some shelves in New Jersey, but hey, this Bastard's not gonna go to waste.

We hear our glass calling.

After hop-picking

It was apples that Robert Frost contemplated in verse, turning the seasonal experience of picking them into a window on life lived and mistakes and regrets.

The guy seriously needed a beer, some hops. That's what he could have done after apple-picking.

But anyway, we know what comes after hop-picking. Or we'll find out this weekend.

On Tuesday, we spoke to Dan Weirback, who noted that he and wife Sue will harvest their Nugget and Cascade hops throughout Saturday.

Make that the rest of their hop crop.

They harvested about 60 pounds earlier this month, most of them Cascades, spending about nine hours plucking the cones from bines they cut down. Those hops are already beer: They went into the hopback to infuse some great aroma into an IPA Weyerbacher brewed last week.

Now the task at hand is to bring in the remainder of the crop, with the help of about eight friends who'll party while they work. (Dan says the plan is to systematically cut bines and hand them off to a table of pickers who'll strip off cones.) In the rolling hills of Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, this will probably be the beer equivalent of a barn-raising.

Pound for pound
It looks like the yield will fall short of Dan’s forecasts. No big deal. It takes a lot of hops to make a pound, and there’s really no sure way of knowing until you put what you got on a scale and see what it totals.

But remember, these are first-season bines, and for much of that time, the plants expend more energy claiming their turf, establishing a root system that will serve them well in the future, than bearing fruit.

So, in the meantime, crack open a Hops Infusion or Double Simcoe IPA and check out Dan and Sue’s saga in moving pictures and sound on tape. (FYI: We may repost this; we're going to see if we can process the audio a little better.)

About the video
We shot the interviews with Dan and Sue in late June, rounding those out with on-cameras from others in the beer or farming business a month later to hopefully bring some background or perspective to things. So some acknowledgments are in order for those who spared time from their busy schedules ...

A big thanks to John Grande and Ed Dager from Rutgers’ 390-acre Snyder Research and Extension Farm in scenic Hunterdon County. (John is the farm director; Ed is farm manager.) Snyder’s mission is sustainable agriculture, exploring potential new crops for Garden State farmers. That’s how hops ended up on the farm's radar in the 1990s, just after craft brewing took off in New Jersey, and it's how Dan and Sue came to reap the benefits of fresh, regional research.

When Lew Bryson isn’t speaking about beer or writing about beer, he’s probably just drinking beer (but we’ve seen him do both – speak and drink – at the same time, ha!). Or maybe he’s got a great bourbon or scotch whisky in the glass, one of his other areas of expertise (he’s managing editor of Malt Advocate magazine). Lew has staked out the mid-Atlantic states as a beer coverage area, with guide books on the breweries of Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania and most recently New Jersey. In what's surely a sign of modern times, Lew also has an bio in Wikipedia (albeit a brief one, but one there nonetheless.)

Greg Zaccardi of High Point Brewing helped us out last year with an Oktoberfest-themed video, and since he often travels to Europe, he was a logical choice to size up the business culture of US brewers vs. their counterparts across the pond. And as the owner a craft brewery, Greg, like his industry colleagues, had to face the bitter truth of the hop shortage and subsequent price spike.

And of course, there’s Dan and Sue, the hop farmers. Thanks.

Back to school

Rutgers’ fall semester starts Sept. 2nd, and for Harvest Moon, that means more people stepping off the sidewalks of George Street to settle in for a pint or two at the New Brunswick brewery café.

We stopped by midweek last week (yep, more Jersey beer traveling, with more to come) and talked to head brewer Matt McCord to see what’ll be coming on tap when the Moon gets full with larger crowds.

Think of it as a fall schedule, what glasses you can take. (OK, we’ll leave the bad puns and word play to the would-be Ogden Nashes of the world.)

We’re talking fall here, so naturally Oktoberfest is in the mix, a traditional take on the fest lager with some dark Munich malt and some Vienna. Look for it in late September. It’s worth mentioning that Harvest Moon does go lager with their Oktoberfest. Not all breweries or brewpubs do, since it can mean tying up tank space they just don’t have to let the beer sit and chill for those lager durations. Ones that don't go alt instead.

Pumpkin pie
Also this fall, look for two versions of Harvest Moon's pumpkin ale, with allspice, cinnamon and brown sugar (among other flavorings). Matt says he and backup brewer Kyle McDonald (pictured below) will do two regular takes on the seasonal, plus a high-gravity version.

Last year, the Moon’s imperial pumpkin ale had vanilla beans in it to create a graham cracker crust signature. All three will have the vanilla this year, Matt says.

Deeper into the fall term, Matt has plans for a winter imperial stout and winter warmer. Too bad winter isn't now. Matt also says the schwarzbier, a personal favorite for us, should be coming back around, too. He didn't brew it this past spring, just didn't get it into the mix. So there's something to look forward to.

And speaking of Kyle, the new (but not so new by now) guy on the block, he worked at a brewery in his home state of Iowa before pulling up stakes for New Jersey around the start of 2008, after his girlfriend took a job in the Garden State. Kyle may be the backup, but Matt refers to him as one of Harvest Moon’s brewers, like himself.

Matt brewed solo for about half the six years he’s been at Harvest Moon, and he lives in South Jersey, a fair distance to travel to work. So naturally, he’s glad for the extra hands.

Matt's a guy who respects beer and likes to talk beer – take a look at his extensive beer list on the Moon's Web site; it's pretty impressive, no question. He knows the kind of hard work it takes to always have six to eight house beers flowing (featuring Belgian and wheat brews in that mix) when there's just you and one extra person, plus not a whole lot of floor space available for your brewery. (HM’s brewhouse sits in an elevated spot to the right just as you walk in the entrance from George Street; the fermenters and serving tanks are downstairs; some of the equipment is kinda shoehorned it, but not all. Still, it's not exactly a wide open arrangement.)

Campus life
And what of the Rutgers crowd (notice the big red R on the doors)? Matt says they tend to favor bigger beers. It’s a study of economics, since money can be tight for the college crowd. The equation kinda works out as 1 pint of a bigger beer at $4.50 = satisfaction and savings vs. 2 pints of a lighter style for the same per-pint price. Pretty simple math.

That formula makes Hops2 Double IPA, one of Harvest Moon’s signature beers, in demand with the Rutgers crowd, but it's also popular among women beer drinkers. Hops2 (that’s 2 as in squared) gives you a lesson on hops and bigger beers, but it also mellows somewhat toward the bottom of the glass, and calls on you to answer the question, “Having another?”

It was one of our growler beers – we also took home their kölschbier – so why not? And the kölsch, well it's taken over for the MoonLight Ale on the beer board, to satisfy the session beer end of the scale and lighten the mood. It also fits in with Matt's taste for kölsch beers.

Lastly, also, a quick shout-out to the guys having a school reunion at the bar ... St. John's Prep, was it? Hope the fourth you were expecting in your party made it.

Dates of note
Sept. 1: Rutgers takes on Fresno State in its home opener (4 p.m). The Moon sounds good for pregame or post-game wrap-up, if you ask us.
Sept. 9: The New Jersey Young Professionals group holds a brewery tour and tasting at Harvest Moon. Details here ... tickets here.

Piece of the Rock

One of the things about craft beer and New Jersey – more specifically South Jersey – is that if you want to try all of what the Garden State brews, you must travel.

What’s brewed in North Jersey – Climax, Cricket Hill and Ramstein (High Point) – isn’t widely (or readily) available to South Jersey. It’s a distributor/liquor store thing, certainly not something the breweries are doing wrong. (Yes, we know Climax self-distributes; South Jersey's a long haul from Roselle Park.)

Meanwhile, NJ’s brewpubs, stationed at all points of the compass, are locked into selling only on premise: filling pint glasses, growlers and offering kegs, unlike their counterparts in, for example, Pennsylvania, where beer makers (like Sly Fox, Stoudt's and Victory) enjoy the best of both worlds – production brewing and serving retail on premise. (Conversely, as most of us know, production brewers in Jersey can’t serve/sell you a pint on premise. More on this a bit.)

So if you want what the Garden State’s pubs brew, yes you must go to the mountain. In our case, Berkeley Heights, home of tree-lined streets and Trap Rock Restaurant & Brewery.

We hit TR last week on a return trip from a High Point open house, capitalizing on the fact it’s only about a half hour south of Butler, High Point’s home base.

Our only gripe about Trap Rock: we wish it were closer. There’s good beer all around at the pub; ditto for the food.

Ample sample
If you are doing the beer traveler thing and fear you may not get back soon, make your first round the sampler – six 5-ounce servings of three lagers, a raspberry-cherry wheat (that’s quite good, not overdone with the fruits), an IPA and an oatmeal stout. We usually pass on samplers and just order a pint from the beer board (so we can enjoy the range of that beer’s flavors, from the first sip to the bottom of the glass). But in this case we made an exception before settling into a couple of pints of TR’s William Tell, a session ale (4.7% ABV) on the hand pump; it’s hard to pass on real ale hopped with Kent Goldings. It’s hard to pass on the serene pleasures of real ale, period.

Our top picks: Raptor Trust IPA (7% ABV and brimming with hops); the Czech-German hybrid JP Pilsner (and it’s worth pointing out, as Tom E from the blog Destination Beer does, TR always has a lager on tap).

Our take-home beer: a roasty, chocolatey Capt. Carl’s Oatmeal Stout that was a silky, solid companion to some home-made pumped-up, shredded chicken nachos (plenty of jalapeños, diced tomatoes, pinto beans and chicken simmered in Sly Fox Pikeland Pils, topped with some organic pepper jack, gruyère and mahon reserva cheeses; more about our culinary prowess and beer soon).


Futurama
But there’s no sense in taking up any more space on what we had. Here’s what you can look forward to at Trap Rock. Brewer Charlie Schroeder has a smoky, caramelly Scotch ale (8% ABV) coming up toward the end of September. But don’t forget, Oktoberfest is the fast-approaching season, and TR has one (5-plus percent on the ABV, with Hallertau hops) due around the first week of September. Look for that same beer to lead a beer dinner around the end of next month; there’s another beer dinner to take place before Thanksgiving time.

Cha-cha-cha-changes
Now about those Jersey-brewing restrictions …

Charlie says Trap Rock’s beers are enjoying a good run, so much so, it’s all he can do to keep up. What does that mean for beer drinkers? Well, the up side is fresh beer’s always on tap; the down side is, it’s hard for Charlie to slip in a different style without coming at the expense of his mainstays. It also means TR’s keg availability is pretty tight right now.

But if New Jersey allowed brewpubs to also hold production licenses (or production brewers to have pubs) – bottle their beers and sell them retail – it opens the door to more styles and boosts the brand, not to mention creating another revenue stream for the brewpubs/restaurants, which have fairly high overhead and could use the financial backstop.

Charlie, who did a six-month stint at Victory Brewing in Pennsylvania, would love for Jersey’s restrictions to be relaxed, and says Trap Rock would look for the brewing space if things were changed.

The idea – one that’s not lost on others in the industry, nor beer enthusiasts – makes a world of sense. And after a decade-plus of craft brewing in New Jersey, it’s way past time to modernize the state’s brewing regulations.

What’s more, for a state that’s hopelessly in debt, can’t put together a budget without scrounging for cash and choking off money to schools and towns, and has resorted to talk about raising tolls or hocking its toll roads, you’d think that revenue-needy Trenton lawmakers would find ways to improve the business climate for those industries it collects excise and other taxes from. Like brewers.

A rising tide floats all boats. Whaddya say Jon, Dick and Joe?

Horse of a different color

A quick post off what tumbled into the mailbox today.

Look for River Horse's draft-only Oktoberfest beer next month. The brew's in the tanks now, says co-owner Glenn Bernabeo.

RH is skewing more toward dunkel with the style, and who can't help but high-five the name: Dunkel Fester (the moniker is the brainchild of Chris Walsh, the other co-owner). The liner notes point to toffee and chocolate.

We're all about Oktoberfest – some of our favorite beers – so we're naturally looking forward to this. RH's two-day O-fest event is Oct. 11-12 at the brewery in Lambertville. We went last year: plenty of occasion-themed food and lots of beer, of course. Plus, the bands RH lines up are really good.

Cherries jubilee
We have a sixpack of Batch #002, the Imperial Cherry Amber, the second of RH Brewer’s Reserve limited edition series. It goes into the pint glass lineup this weekend.

We've been trying to concentrate on the brewpubs lately – we've hit J.J. Bittings, The Ship Inn, Trap Rock and Pizzeria Uno in the past two weeks, with Harvest Moon up next – and have some of Trap Rock's oatmeal stout ready for the glass. Hence, the RH cherries have been on deck for a while.

We did speak to Chris and Glenn about the second installment of the Brewer's Reserve around the end of July. With this brew, don't look for a bowl of cherries. It's an aroma thing that subtly emerges as a flavor. As Chris said, they didn't want it to end up a Jolly Rancher.

Meanwhile
As we noted, we've been hitting the brewpubs, and we've got a post coming on Trap Rock, which is certainly a place that has us wishing it were closer to home base. But for now, we'll say TR has a kickin' IPA (which we'll be back for), and some fine ale on the handpump.

Winter on their minds

Say you have some left over beer and you don’t even want to think about it going to waste … what do you do?

You invite some friends over to help you make good cheer of it, right?

That’s what High Point Brewing (Butler) did with a leftover keg of their 2007 Ramstein Winter Wheat, a doppelbock that has a quite a fan base and has earned a measure of critical acclaim.

The open house on Saturday drew a crowd of about 100 or so beerheads armed with their growlers to the brewery, where they snapped up the doppelbock faster than you can say ice bock (or more aptly, eisbock), which is what it became after the brewery staff froze it, drew off the ice, and split it into sixtels, adding another dimension to a beer that's great to start with.

Clocking in around 12% ABV (the strongest offering from the brewery's lineup), the winter wheat/eisbock was definitely rich, deep, dark and inviting – even in the dog days of August, when you'd wonder if it was going to seem like the beer equivalent of a parka in summer.

But it was a really tasty offseason headliner, a pleasant surprise to the loyal Ramsteiners, accompanied, of course, by Ramstein's Classic Blonde and a pilsner and golden lager (which was our take-home beer; the bock ran out before we could think about getting a growler filled. Alas.)

If you missed the winter wheat, be patient. It’s the brewery’s November-release seasonal. It’ll be back around (and maybe the eis, too).

Meanwhile, we got an early taste of the 2008 Ramstein Oktoberfest ...

It’s still a little young and yeasty, with some hop presence that will fade and take its proper place behind the malt flavors by the time it’s ready for September release.

Speaking of debuts, circle Sept. 13 on your calendar. That’s when the brewery kicks off Oktoberfest with an oak barrel tapping.

Bring your growlers that day, too.

FOOTNOTE:
High Point will be pouring at the Stoudt’s Microfest Aug. 23 in Adamstown, Pa.

Walking point

Curious about the Budweiser foray into ale? Don "Joe Sixpack" Russell can give you the lowdown on this beer due to get pushed in September by bartenders whose employers went out on a limb and put it on tap.

After some searing commentary regarding the brew's liner notes, Don's blog entry gets down to brass tacks and tells you how it tastes. (We won't spoil it, just read it for yourself.)

But our prediction: Budweiser American Ale will be DOA. Why? Just based on a comment made to us at a party over the weekend when we offered some Climax ESB for tasting: "No thanks, I don't do dark beers."

Neither do Bud and Coors drinkers, nor fans of skunky Heineken. They're like Tareyton smokers (would rather fight than switch). And people already drinking craft beer, who may be slightly curious about the new kid, aren't switching, either. They've got far richer landscapes to explore from sources far more reliable than one they've been looking at with disdain for better than a decade now.

Plus in the modern business world, new owners who financed a $50 billion acquisition are probably going to really trim the bottom line and clean up the balance sheet by concentrating on core brands and quickly kill the marginal performers in the portfolio. Budweiser American Ale has that sword hanging over its foamy head, we suspect.

Sunny side up

Denny’s and IHOP may think they have a lock on breakfast, but here’s an angle the two chain (blecccchh) eateries didn’t think of: a breakfast beer for the shorts and tank top months.

But Cricket Hill did: Jersey Summer Breakfast Ale. (And yes we know it's getting into late summer, late for talking about hot-weather seasonals, what with Oktoberfest just around the bend. But we had to track this brew down, and it took a little bit of time.)

To be sure, part of the charm is the name, but as a bottle-conditioned Belgian summer beer that’s aimed as a full-bodied first step for some folks not quite into the full-bore saisons yet, this is a quite-drinkable brew. And as far as sales go, it’s also pulling some oars this summer for the Cricket (Fairfield in Essex County), outdoing its inaugural year (2007) when it was a draft-only beer.

Like a lot folks at the Garden State Craft Brewers Festival back in June, we ordered breakfast – JSBA was the first keg at the festival to kick – a few times over. Then we set out to find it the bottle, in the 12-packs that CH uses to market its seasonals (maibock and porter are two others).

It took a while, since CH doesn’t have much distribution in South Jersey. But we finally got our hands on it by heading up to Spirits Unlimited in Red Bank (Newman Springs Road & Route 35). We’ve been enjoying it with some revved up summer foods, tangy ones and practically anything you can put jalapeños on.

Try it with our very own burger recipe: douse a lean ground beef patty with some Caribbean jerk seasoning, grill a pineapple slice on both sides (sear it so the sugars caramelize), top the burger with the grilled pineapple, then top both with a slice of melted pepper jack cheese.

Like a good Jersey diner, Cricket Hill’s got breakfast whenever you want it.

On the horizon

Owner Rick Reed says CH is gearing up for version 2.0 of their bourbon-barrel brew. This year's is a small batch of naturally carbonated ESB, with some twists, that’ll stay parked in Jack Daniels oak (last year’s was aged in George Dickel barrels) until it’s time to be racked into four or five firkins (we did say small batch, didn’t we?) and maybe into some growlers for faithful followers.

Meanwhile, CH also has a Festivus for the best of us. OK, rest of us. We just didn’t want to be so linear with the Seinfeld reference. But yes, CH’s Fall Festivus amber ale is also on deck. Rick says it “tastes like the colors of fall.”

And yes, the name is borrowed from Frank Costanza’s contra-Christmas holiday. You’ll probably have to supply your own pole though.

Two steps closer to beer

Our hops have taken two steps closer to becoming beer.

We picked them on Sunday, and friend of the blog/South Jersey homebrewer Julian Mason has set them out to dry in a screen frame he made.

Julian (who took the pics here) will brew with ours, plus some Cascades and other varieties he and his co-worker Gerry Mann have been growing since May (we planted ours at the end of March, hence our picking them now). That's a beer to looking forward to.

Our Centennials have a nice piney aroma to 'em and should go well with the Cascades. Makes you think of SlyFox's Phoenix Pale Ale (a Pennsylvania beer that's won permanent shelf space in our main fridge; yeah, this is a Jersey beer blog, but there's room for some outside influence).

For the record, we picked just under a half pound, basically off two first-year plants. We may get another 4 ounces of the remaining two plants we have in the ground that lagged behind. They've got cones beginning to mature on 'em, and one is still throwing burs that will bud up into cones soon.

That may seem like a small yield, but these, as we noted, are first-year plants, which expend a lot of their energy getting their roots established, as well as flowering. Plus, it takes a lot of hop cones to make a pound.

Still, they were hardy this season. Will be next year, too.