A chat with Bitting brewer Chris Sheehan

Newark's only craft beer-maker, Port 44 Brew Pub, folded shop just three months past its first anniversary in Brick City. On July 22, the hottest day of 2011 in Newark – a record 108 degrees Fahrenheit – the financially struggling restaurant-brewery's air-conditioning conked out. The doors closed. (The For Sale sign had already gone up, sometime around the start of July; asking price, $2.1 million.)

Tossed out of work by the closing, brewer Chris Sheehan, who came to Newark fresh from Chelsea Brewing in Manhattan (he also put in time at at Triple Rock Brewery & Alehouse in Berkeley, California, and San Francisco's 20 Tank Brewery), needed a gig, a beer-maker in search of a mash to strike.

Opportunity knocked in late August, after J.J. Bitting brewer James Moss decided to relocate to New England.

Two brews (a brown ale and a hop harvest ale) into his tenure as keeper of the brewhouse in Woodbridge, Chris took some time last week from washing kegs and other duties to talk about brewing and the beers he wants to make at Bitting. He also fielded some questions about Port 44.

BSL: How long have you been with Bitting?
CS: I've been here for just over three weeks now. After Port 44 laid me off, I was unemployed for about two weeks and then picked up one week of work over at Greenpoint in Brooklyn, just one week of work there. While I was working there, I had already been in communication with Mike (owner Mike Cerami). Mike was looking for someone to step in here, so I ended up coming over here. In these economic times, been unemployed for only two weeks is not all that bad.

BSL: Bitting has its lineup of beers that are always expected to be on a share of its six taps, but you're going to bring some things to that mix, right?
CS: Mike told me the only three beers he wants to keep on at all times are the golden (Victoria's Golden Ale), the raspberry (wheat) and the amber (Avenel Amber). After that, I have room to work within my styles. I'll still bounce things off of him ... I do want to make sure the customers here are happy. I personally can't stand pumpkin beers, but I'm going to be doing a pumpkin beer. From what I gather it's been pretty popular here; I don't want to disappoint the customers.

BSL: One of your preferred styles of beer is stout, right?
CS: Well, I have a reputation for stouts. Six of my eight Great American Beer Festival medals were for stouts. By the same token, I consider myself more of California-style brewer, or a West Coast brewer.

BSL: You worked in San Francisco for a while.
CS: Yeah, my career began in California. My whole philosophy and approach is, if I'm doing a wheat beer, I'll do an American-style wheat beer. When I think of East Coast brewers, I think of brewing much more in traditional European beer styles. When I think of West Coast, I think American styles.

BSL: Lots of resiny hops ...
CS: Lots of hops, yes, in the appropriate styles. There are other styles that are not so hoppy, but are American styles, like wheat beer for example, like an American-style wheat beer versus a German hefeweizen. This place in the past has been pretty much a classic East Coast-style brewery. That's where I'm going to be bringing a little more of a different approach, as far as my philosophy being more West Coast. Not necessarily hops all over the place, but yes hops come up a little bit more in some of the beers. But at the same time, as far as the styles I brew, I'm gonna steer away from German-style hefeweizen. I'm probably gonna do an American-style wheat beer instead, come next summer. Maybe I'll do a wheat wine in the wintertime. I don't have a specific plan at this point, I'm just kinda feeling my way at this point. I have respect for the regular customers, and I don't want to come in here and just start throwing all sorts of stuff at them they're not into. It's important the customers want to drink the beer you're brewing.

BSL: But perhaps they will be able to, at some point, have a signature Chris Sheehan stout?
CS: Right. Definitely. The brown ale, we have it on cask right now, it's waiting to come on when we run out of dunkelweizen. That is basically what Mike wanted to be our dark beer for now. He didn't want to go totally into stouts at this point. But when that brown ale runs out, we'll follow it with a stout.

BSL: Bitting has traditionally done a barleywine ...
CS: Yeah, and that's where I touched on wheat wine instead of barleywine. I doubt that it's ever been done here. I'm all for a barleywine, too. I have no problem with a barleywine.

BSL: Have you done them a lot?
CS: Yeah, I've done barleywines in the past. I had a whimsically named beer over at Chelsea – it was a barleywine – just for a joke, we called it Imperial Mild. That was when everyone was doing imperial versions of everything, imperial brown ale, imperial pilsner. So OK, here's an imperial mild.

BSL: Three months from now, what would somebody coming here expect to find on tap?
CS: They always do winter warmer. I will do a winter warmer, but it will not be spiced.

BSL: Should people get the impression you want beer to taste like beer?
CS: I am a purist ... My mentality is beer should only be made with the four necessary ingredients: malt, hops, yeast and water. Maybe I can broaden that with: a grain, hops, yeast and water.

BSL: Let's talk about Port 44 for a minute. Newark is home to a Budweiser brewery, so Port 44 was the only craft brewery in New Jersey's largest city. It's a shame it closed back in July.
CS: I still believe it could be a successful business, with the right management and the right money. It has tremendous potential to be a very successful business ... You look at the (nearby) Prudential Center; it's the third-largest grossing arena in the country. Any start-up business, they say you should have financing to cover your two first years of operation, all of your expenses for your two first years of operation ...

BSL: So while you were serving up Port 44's brews, who were the regulars who came in?
CS: We had railroad guys – NJ Transit engineers. A whole group of them were mug club members. Other local business, small businesses. We had all sorts of regulars from Public Service (PSEG) and from Prudential.

BSL: So the business model it had laid out for itself was actually functioning, playing out?
CS: Yeah. The concept was good and the location was good. When I signed on, I really felt in my heart this would be a success. Whoever does buy or invest in that brewery, as long as they have restaurant or bar experience ... it could be a total success.

BSL: What were some of the brighter moments in Newark?
CS: I loved the brewery. Greg (Gilhooly, one of the founders) stumbled upon that brewhouse; we got that thing on eBay. I loved the system; I felt I was making some of the best beer of my career. It was an ITT system. From what I understand, there's only two of its kind in the whole country. I don't know where the other one is. I believe this one used to be in Michigan. It's a really unique system. I was very proud at the way I got the whole system set up.

BSL: Port 44 opened in April 2010 with guest tap beers, and its closing was well beyond that date, but just shy of the first anniversary of the Chris Sheehan-brewed beers going on tap. That has to be a great sense of frustration.
CS: It was really, really disappointing for me personally. Heartbreaking. That whole (brewing) system was my baby. I'd never done a start-up, and that's part of the reason I went there and did it, because I always wanted to be involved in a start-up. And to see it just go down the tubes like that so quickly was just very discouraging. But it was still a learning experience. I learned a tremendous amount going through the ordeal. I hope somebody will come along and be interested in buying the place.

EVENT NOTE: J.J. Bitting hosts the fifth annual Central Jersey Charity Beer Fest, 1-5 p.m. Saturday at Parker Press Park, Woodbridge, a five minute walk from the brewpub. Tickets are 25 bucks. Weather: High temp 75, 40 percent chance of rain. Rate date is Saturday, Oct. 1.

ADDENDUM: A note from a Port 44 denizen, Dave ...

I am one of the guys that was a regular at Port 44, and all my buddies were just as disappointed as I was when it suddenly closed. We happened to walk up there that day, and the doors were locked - but Chris was there and let us in. The place was hot thanks to the AC problems, and we shared our -last- beers there with Chris as he was cleaning the lines for the last time.

Sad!

Then, a few weeks back, I happened to be finishing up work in the Woodbridge area and stopped by Bittings for a late lunch and sure enough, there was Chris! I was happy he landed somewhere ...

Woodbridge, Belmar & Iron Hill's F.red

Turnpike Exits 4 and 11 figure big into the beer picture on Saturday, but the day has nothing to do with the Flying Fish Exit Series beers theme-brewed to those numbers.

Exit 11 on the turnpike is Woodbridge, where the 4th edition of the Central Jersey Beer Fest runs from 1-5 p.m. About an hour's drive south, in Maple Shade off Exit 4, Iron Hill brewpub will be hand-bottling and making available for sale some well-aged Flemish red ale.

On top of that, there's a worthy beer gig at the Shore where more Jersey beers will be poured.

Woodbridge
Parker Press Park, along Rahway Avenue, just past the bend in Main Street, is once again the location for the JJ Bitting brewpub-sponsored Central Jersey Beer Fest. From its debut in 2007, this has been a charity event, and this year's proceeds will benefit a cancer-stricken mother of two from Woodbridge and American Legion Post 87.

Jersey brews at the event, according to organizer and Bittings owner Mike Cerami, will include brewpubs Harvest Moon (New Brunswick), Tun Tavern (Atlantic City) and host JJ Bittings; production brewer Cricket Hill (Fairfield); and Boaks Beer (contract brewed at High Point in Butler) and East Coast Beer Company (contract-brewed in New York). Rounding out the list will be beers from Brooklyn, Blue Point, Ommegang, Erie Brewing, Boston Beer, and Doc's Cider.

There will also be food vendors and live music.

Admission is $25, and $15 for designated drivers. Unlike last year, no tickets will be available at the gate (you can buy them at Bittings on Main Street).

If you were at last year's event, you may recall things got a little testy when the admissions outpaced the beer. In order to keep things running smoothly this go-round, ticket sales will cut off at 800.

The park is spacious, with plenty of shade trees. Plus you'll find picnic tables to relax and take a load off. Travel tip: There's construction planned to commence very soon on Route 9 in the area, so coming in on Routes 1 and 35 may be the best path. NJ Transit is a good bet, too, since the train station is a bottle cap's toss from the park.

Maple Shade
The folks at Iron Hill always have something up their sleeve. This time, it's a bottling party for a 9-month-old, barrel-aged Flemish Red tricked out with wild yeast and bacteria to give it a tang that's worth writing home about. (It's a pay as you go event.)

The brewpub will be tapping some F.red (5.3% ABV, 20 IBU), as it's called, while it packages the beer (made in December 2009 and stored in Beaujolais barrels since the headwaters of this year) in corked and caged 750 ml bottles, labeled, signed and numbered by head brewer Chris LaPierre (who's a big fan of sour beer styles) and assistant brewer Jeff Ramirez.

Bottles will then be available for sale at the bar.

FYI: This deep red ale is a bottle-conditioned beer, so the bottle you buy must be stored until it carbonates naturally (Chris recommends a couple of months, or even letting it mature for years).

From Chris' note to mug club members: "This will be a couple of firsts for us: our first beer available in bottles and the first time we’ve done an entire batch of sour, wood-aged beer in Maple Shade."

Belmar:
With this festival, Beer on the Pier, look for Jersey brews from Climax (Roselle Park, go for Dave Hoffmann's well-regarded Oktoberfest and his IPA) and Artisan's brewpub (in Toms River where Dave is the hired consultant/brewer), Cricket Hill, River Horse, New Jersey Beer Company (North Bergen, makers of 1787 Abbey Single and Garden State Stout), and East Coast Beer Company and Hometown Beverage. Hometown, like East Coast Beer Company, is a shore-based contract brewer. East Coast is based in Point Pleasant Beach, while Hometown, the purveyors of New Jersey Lager (as well as New York Lager and Pennsylvania Lager), is based in Manasquan and closing in on a second anniversary in the beer business.

Both Cricket Hill and East Coast Beer are doing double duty on Saturday. Newly minted in the beer scene, East Coast is a co-sponsor of the event with BeerHeads and the borough of Belmar, and just brought its Beach Haus pilsner to market (it's brewed by Genesee in upstate New York) late last month.

"We actually sold through 650 cases in three weeks. We’re thrilled; we're just starting off and we're at the higher end of expectations," says East Coast founder John Merklin. Saturday's event is part of a marketing blitz that has seen the company hit nine craft beer events or tastings in those three weeks.

John says the company has message beyond the flavor and style of its beer, a pre-Prohibition pilsner. "This is not a summer seasonal. It's regional; it's a reflection of the region ... a direct reflection of being at the Shore. The analogy I'm using is the Beach Boys, (hearing them) you know what it's like to be in California," he says.

Beer on the Pier, Belmar Marina, Route 35.
VIP Tent: 1-3 p.m
. General Session: 2-6 p.m

$40 online; $50 Gate; $60 VIP (soldout); 
$10 designated drivers. (A portion of the proceeds go to benefit the Monmouth County Foodbank.)
Food from 10th Ave Burrito, Mr. Shrimp, Crab Shack, Jacks Tavern, Federico's Pizza.
More info (732) 681-2266

Roundup

Reminder
Basil T's in Toms River, soon to be known under the moniker Artisan, holds its Oktoberfest dinner on Friday evening (starts at 7 p.m.). It's a multi-course dinner by chef Steve Farley, paired with several beers from brewer Dave Hoffmann. PubScout Kurt Epps keeps the event on pace as emcee.

Upcoming
The Garden State Chapter of the Brewery Collectibles Club of America holds its fall show on Sunday (Oct. 4) at the Polish Cultural Center in Clark.

It starts at 10 a.m., and speaking of Dave Hoffmann, you'll find his Climax beers being poured there.

River Horse
River Horse's annual nod to fall will be held the weekend of Oct. 10-11, noon to 5 p.m. both days. As usual, it's pay as you go with the lineup of RH flagship beers; proceeds benefit Twin Rivertown Project.

Missing from this year's Oktoberfest beer lineup is Dunkel Fester, the dark larger RH did last year as a fall seasonal. Co-owner Glenn Bernabeo says the brewery had to sacrifice the seasonal to keep up with demand for RH's mainstay beers.

For instance, for 2009 the brewery nearly doubled last year's 7-barrel production of Summer Blonde.

The brewery also slipped a special project into its production, brewing the winning beer for a homebrew contest connected to the Office chain of restaurants. Glenn says the brewery hopes to boost capacity soon by adding additional tanks.

Given all of that, if you were a fan of last year's oatmeal milk stout, fret not. It's due back in Novermber, while RH's Belgian Freeze comes out this month.

Recap
If you made it to last weekend's cask ale event at Pizzeria Uno, then you saw a great model for scaling down beer fests: a low-key, pay-as-you-go affair with access to good food. Some of the bigger festivals (like Atlantic City) have become drunkfests, while the beer festival idea in general has become overplayed. It makes sense to rein things in a little, downsize and bring some focus.

Speaking of the Uno event, a shoutout goes to Kai Todd of Somerset County, who took the time to talk to us about the beers he was sampling, and Jersey beer in general. (Kai say he's considering adding his voice to the beer scene discussion with a Web site. There's always room for another perspective.)

Constructive criticism
We won't pound this too hard, since we couldn't make it up to the Woodbridge event held in mid-September. But a lot of folks told us about the long lines at the gate and beer staind, and the event running out of beer. Sounds like the Central Jersey Best Fest hit a growing pain, one that limiting ticket sales and boosting the $20 admission price to $35 could solve. (Thirty-five bucks is a common price, and quite frankly, 40 is not out of the realm of reason.)

Granted the Woodbridge festival is a charity event, so if organizers (J.J. Bitting brewpub is the main one) are worried that capping ticket sales will limit the amount raised for the dedicated charity, that can be addressed by having an informational booth to explain where the proceeds are going and to solicit donations. The festival's been a sensible fall addition, and the park where it's held is a great location. Some fine-tuning should help.

Beer in Woodbridge

PubScout Kurt Epps has a report on the 2009 Central Jersey BeerFest.

We didn't make it up to Woodbridge this year, owing to a prior commitment. Looks like the festival at Parker Press Park is building on its momentum from the past two years.

The news from Kurt's post is August Lightfoot will be leaving as brewer at J.J. Bittings brewpub.

Speaking of brewpubs, Basil T's south will be changing its name. The restaurant and brewery in Toms River will soon be known as Artisan.

The new moniker will be good for the establishment. It allows for genuine separation from its similarly named progenitor in Red Bank. (A lot of folks who have been around the craft beer culture in New Jersey for some time already knew about the two Basils, the history and the eventual different ownership. But there are new recruits to the beer culture ranks practically every day. So you could say the shared name was a bit confusing.)

Plus, Basils in Toms River ably moved beyond its founding roots long time ago, and gained in brewer Dave Hoffmann, who, as many know, also owns Climax Brewing in Roselle Park, a cornerstone on which to help build the new identity. It's been awhile since that happened.

(And if you've been in the brewpub latley, you know it has been undergoing some remodeling. The work should be done by the start of October.)

The future is bright. Like a fresh pint of beer.

Fest Radar: Woodbridge this weekend

The third Central Jersey Beer Fest is this Saturday (Sept. 19) in Woodbridge.

Like the two previous incarnations, this year's event will be held from 1-5 p.m. at Parker Press Park, a bottle cap's toss from the taps of the festival's organizer, J.J. Bitting brewpub.

Amonng the Jersey breweries, contract brewers and brewpubs attending will be the Tun Tavern (Atlantic City), Harvest Moon (New Brunswick), Pizzeria Uno (Metuchen), River Horse Brewing (Lambertville), Cricket Hill Brewing (Fairfield), and Boak's Beverage (Pompton Lakes). Last year also featured out-of-state breweries represented by Hunterdon Distributors. And speaking of Boak's, owner Brian Boak says Kohler Beer Distributors will be handling his beers in the seven northern counties of the state. Brian has self-distributed and largely focused on Pennsylvania as a market for his brew lineup, which he has contract-brewed at High Point Brewing in Butler. Kohler now helps him devote some attention to his home state.

Admission is 20 bucks and there's unlimited sampling, plus and plenty of food vendors to sate your appetite. Proceeds from the admission will go to a local charity cause (a terminally ill child from the Fords section of Woodbridge, we're told).

The park is easy to find, but your best bet for getting there is probably by train. NJ Transit has a station right beside the park. As with any festival, your behavior matters, so if you're inclined to get tuned up, you run a risk of not being served, or worse, asked to leave. (The past two festivals have gone very smoothly, so make the third the same.)

Weather.com right now is calling for a chance of rain on Saturday. So keep an eye on the forecast. Contact J.J. Bitting brewpub for tickets.

Here's video of last year's festival.

Central Jersey Beer Fest 2.0, Part 2

Here’s the video we shot in Woodbridge a week ago.

And we’ll make this point about the 2008 Central Jersey Beer Fest: Growth suits it. It doubled in size from last year, and it has more room to grow for next year, room for more brewers and vendors, especially food.

The pizza and bar-type fare are OK, but the event's all about beer, and that creates a great opportunity for more interesting pairings. That’s probably easier said than done, but we still think it’s something to consider, something worth investigating.

Anyway, the video ... It runs a little under 6 1⁄2 minutes. Thanks to everyone who paused for an interview, and a special thanks to Brian Boak for sparing some time from his Boaks Beer station, where for most of the day, he was working solo, keeping up with the demand for his Abbey Brown (7% ABV), Two Blind Monks (7.4% ABV) and Monster Mash imperial stout (10% ABV), all proving to be very popular choices of the day.

A longtime homebrewer, Brian jumped into commercial beer not quite a year ago, hiring High Point (where he volunteers and conducts the tours at the Butler brewery) to turn out a batch of Monster Mash for him under contract. Woodbridge was Brian’s first festival, but he’ll be pouring at Sippin’ By The River, the beer, wine and food fest at Penn’s Landing in Philadelphia, on Sunday (Sept. 28).

Monster Mash and Two Blind Monks form the core of his brands right now. But if you check out his Web site or brochures, you’ll notice he has plans for a porter, a wheat beer with lemongrass and Three Blind Monks, a stronger version of Two Blind Monks that's meant to be aged.

Aside from the contract brewing, Brian’s essentially a company of one, labeling his bottled beer by hand from his business digs in Pompton Lakes, and trucking cases and draft versions of his beers in his white van to bars (like Andy’s Corner Bar, the first establishment to carry him) and outlets in New Jersey and a distributor, Stockertown Beverage, in Pennsylvania, a state that’s so far been good for business. (Brian’s beer is in 17 eastern Pennsylvania counties, including Belgian beer-loving Philadelphia.)

With 33 barrels brewed so far this year, Brian forecasts finishing the year at 60 to 75 barrels. If Woodbridge is a bellwether, 2009 could a Monster year.

Central Jersey Beer Fest 2.0

It’s back, it’s bigger, and yeah, as all promos for sequels boast, better than ever.

The Ws and the H
What: Second Annual Central Jersey Beer Fest
When: 1-5 p.m., Saturday, Sept. 20th (Rain date is the 27th)
Where: Parker Press Park in Woodbridge
Why: It’s for charity; plus it's one of Woodbridge's Main Street events
Weather: As of now, the forecast is picture-perfect: sunny in the mid-70s
How much: Twenty bucks. Tickets are limited (Phone number is 732-634-2929)
What you get: A souvenir glass and unlimited sampling (which means, you can enjoy small pours of the brews; however, don’t get drunk or be dickish. That will get you – rightfully so – shown the door. The 2007 event was family friendly and commendably free of bad behavior; help keep it that way)
Hungry? Yes, there will be food vendors (plus live music)

Last year’s inaugural drew 650 people, depsite only four featured breweries: JJ Bittings (the event organizer), Climax Brewing (Roselle Park), Pizzeria Uno (Metuchen/Woodbridge) and the Tun Tavern (Atlantic City). It was a crowd pleaser, answering a thirst for a fall beer festival in the Garden State. (Watch video of the 2007 fest.)

This year, the lineup has doubled, with Jersey brewers Cricket Hill (Fairfield) and River Horse (Lambertville) and Boak Beverage (Pompton Lakes), joining the returning 2007 lineup.

Brian Boak, a familiar face and volunteer at High Point Brewing (Butler), started Boak Beverage on the strength of winning top honors in the New Jersey State Fair homebrew contest a few years back and the fact that plenty of people liked his beer. High Point contract brews for Brian, and he self-distributes in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. This is his first festival, and he'll feature his core brands, Monster Mash Imperial Stout (the state fair winner) and his Belgian turn, Two Blind Monks.

Rounding out the beer lineup are Weyerbacher Brewing (Easton, Pa.) and Hunterdon Distributors, which will bring draft and bottled beers from out west: Lagunitas, Boulder Brewing, Stone, Rogue and Flying Dog, and Smuttynose from the Granite State.

Point of order
That latter part of the list raises the question, is this a Jersey brewer fest? Yes and no. Yes, in that the foundation of the festival is made up of Jersey-based brewers, and no, since this fest is independent of the Garden State Craft Brewers Guild (although five of the home state brewers are guild members). The guild will hold a fall festival at the Newark Bears stadium on Oct. 19th (that’s a Sunday; more about that one soon).

OK enough parsing. The bottom line is, version 2.0 of the Central Jersey Fest grew, fattened up and looks to easily outdo the inaugural version.

We chatted briefly with August Lightfoot, brewer at JJ Bitting brewpub (which is a stone’s throw from the park), who said he’s bringing his 2008 Märzen (it's not on tap at the pub yet, hint, hint), an imperial IPA inspired by the WHALES homebrew club, his raspberry wheat and a standby keg of porter.

Some more styles to expect: Tim Kelly of the Tun Tavern plans to bring a Belgian wheat, possibly a pumpkin spice ale (it was being filtered on Tuesday), and an IPA dry-hopped with Jersey-fresh Cascade and Nugget hops (grown by Tim’s friends, Ray Gourley and Kathy Haney).

See you there.

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.


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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).

Central Jersey Beer Fest 2.0

We popped up to Woodbridge for a chat with J.J. Bitting Brewing owner Mike Cerami and his brewer, August Lightfoot (pictured below), for a handful of reasons, one being to enjoy a Best Bitter on the handpump (it’s got this creamy, dense head that clings to the sides of the glass, a great beer for English ale fans like us).

But the headline on our mind was an update on plans for a second Central Jersey Beer Fest, the Indian summer answer to the state’s more widely known craft beer event held in June, which seems to be anchored on the decks of the USS New Jersey in Camden, something that’s made a few beer drinkers north of Interstate 195 flinch at the travel distance and say, “Pass.”

The folks at J.J. Bitting got the Central Jersey festival rolling last year with the blessing of Woodbridge town hall, attracting two other brewpubs (Atlantic City’s Tun Tavern and Pizzeria Uno in nearby Metuchen) and production brewer Climax Brewing (Roselle Park) to pour with them at the event. Turnout at Parker Press Park was great (see video from last year here), and those in the crowd were quite appreciative to have a festival not too far away.

Version 2.0 of the festival is set for Sept. 20 at the park, which is within walking distance of the NJ Transit train stop. The lineup right now looks like Climax, Cricket Hill, River Horse and Pennsylvania brewer Weyerbacher, as well as J.J. Bitting. Mike says he’s still doing some follow-up on invitations to other brewers, so hopefully more will follow suit.

Note: The festival on the battleship is sponsored by the Garden State Craft Brewers Guild, while the Woodbridge soiree is organized independently of that group (although J.J. Bitting is a guild member). Still, the Central Jersey fest has a lot of promise as a craft beer event (the town itself worked the festival into its lineup of Main Street happenings) and is worth the trip. And yes we know the guild has an October festival planned for Newark. We're saving that for a future post.

Jersey Date
While we’re talking about J.J. Bitting, Lew Bryson and Mark Haynie will hold their first Garden State signing party for their just-released New Jersey Breweries book on Aug. 1, from 5-8 p.m. (the kickoff is July 27th in Philadelphia), right around happy hour. Salut!

Central time, Part 2 & No fest like O fest, Part 3

Overheard at the Central Jersey Beer Fest in Woodbridge last month: “Pretty good festival. Wish there was more brewers here.”

Not once, but a number of times we heard this. Full disclosure: We asked, so yeah, that’s why we heard about there being only four Jersey craft brewers – three brewpubs, one production brewery – pouring at Parker Press Park on Sept. 29.

But those words should be taken to heart by Jersey’s craft beer industry. The folks who went drink your beer and appreciate what you create. And that is – aside from the obvious, beer, – choice. Craft brewers create options for people who like beer. Porters, stouts, ESBs, IPAs, Oktoberfests, Vienna lagers, amber ales …

Some notes
This was the inaugural Central Jersey Beer Fest, the proceeds of which will help pay for a Veterans Day parade in Woodbridge.

So on a first try, getting only four brewers – three really when you consider that the hometown brewpub, J.J. Bitting Brewing Company, was the organizer – isn’t bad. If you checked the schedules of other craft brewers in the state, you would have seen they had other commitments for the same day. Others just opted not to go. Maybe it’s festival fatigue, or a desire to first see how the festival went and then sign on for next year.

And speaking of next year, we hope this festival does grow. It’s centrally located with great access to public transportation (train station); the town has embraced it and offered up a spacious park with plenty of shade trees; and it fills the fall calendar slot.

If we had our way, we’d turn it into a real Oktoberfest event with beer tents and the state’s craft brewers ceremoniously tapping actual wooden barrels of fest beers brewed for the occasion.

Sound like big production? Maybe, but High Point Brewing already does this, at least three times each fall. Barrel tappings, that is.

And while we’re making suggestions for a bigger event, we’d also suggest networking with the state’s German-American clubs. Feels kind of odd, to us anyway, to just co-op their cultural event and not genuinely have them represented.

Tech note:
The video is up (runtime is just over 7 minutes), but we're not happy with the resolution we're getting with YouTube. We're also a little frustrated with blip.tv at the moment, since the resolution is better on that site, but the only html that's available for embedding in the right dimensions ends up playing all the Beer-Stained Letter videos we've posted on blip, when we merely want the latest one to play.

This is an ongoing headache, the crapshoot of getting quality image resolution, and results from cross video formats (QuickTime to Flash). So we're checking some advice sites to find reliable settings for the source video that gets uploaded to YT, blip, et al. We hope to get our hands on the Flash software next year (costs about 700 bucks, and shouldn't be confused with the free download Flash player). By the by, the video was also submitted to Current.tv, but we don't know what's up with them. They haven't posted it, and looks like their site, after a redesign, morphed into something with a heavy emphasis on social networking.

In the meantime, our recommendation is watch the vid in iTunes (search for the blog title under podcasts) or at the blip.tv site.

Gemütlichkeit
And speaking of German-American clubs, we got to enjoy an evening at the Oktoberfest held by Deutscher Club of Clark on Saturday.

Two oak barrels of Paulaner Oktoberfest beer were flown in from Munich for this dinner. That’s a really big deal, since only five of these barrels get parceled out to the Northeast this time of year. Deutscher Club got a brace of them. Did we mention it tasted great? It was also unfiltered. Golden, too. (For more about Oktoberfest beer, check out Lew Bryson's piece in Condé Nast Portfolio.)

But Oktoberfest isn’t just about the beer. It’s about keeping good company, too, the conviviality. So a special note of thanks for the warm hospitality that we, as guests unfamiliar to the club’s regulars, received. Prosit!