Columbia, MD October 18, 2018
Black Flag Brewing hosted a HoCo Green Drinks event. Folks from environmental groups and job positions gathered, as their tag line says, “saving the world one sip at a time”. This was my 1st stop of the evening, with 2 more events to go.
Mars and I (call me Wars), walked into Black Flag Brewing, picked out a table and ordered a couple beers. I ordered the appropriately named Greenery IPA. I now understand the hype for this juicy NE IPA. For Mars, not an IPA guy, I recommended the Oktoberfest. This solid fest beer is sweet, toasty and crisp.
We discovered the Green Drinks table and mingled for an hour or so. I talked to people about Bike HoCo and met people from Sierra Club and Safe Skies Maryland; did you know glass buildings kill birds?
Maryland Homebrew
Next stop, Maryland Homebrew. Ron Pattinson, brewer, author, blogger (Shutup About Barclay Perkins), and beer historian, was the speaker for a Brewers United for Real Potables (BURP) sponsored event.
Mr. Pattinson talked about brettanomyces (brett) or British fungus. Apparently brett is everywhere and was just always present in early beer making. I learned that “mild” means new, not low ABV. Also, in the early 1900s, it was common to store huge wooden vats of ale for extremely long periods of time. For instance, an ale was brewed commemorating a birth then half was enjoyed on their 21st birthday. Some beers have been kept for more than a hundred years. As for history, Ron talked about his book (he has many), Austerity. He talked of the shortages in England after WWII. Food was rationed into the ’50s. Beer was taxed on its ABV, so low alcohol beers were quite common.
Sapwood Cellars
More than a month ago, Sapwood Cellars, a new brewery about a mile from my house, opened up. Before their opening, they tested out their brewing equipment by brewing a batch of beer using some old milled malt that was a couple years old. Instead of pouring the results down the drain, they offered it to local home brewers. DBear, Pierce and I all picked up a 5-gallon batch. Pierce made a passion fruit saison, DBear a fig saison and I made a ginger beer. Click on Homebrew Pint Night to learn more about these beers. We each dropped a few beers off to say thanks for the wort. We’re all looking forward to their reactions.
I tried their Berliner Weiss. It was quite tart. Spencer responded by providing a taste with a little woodruff syrup added. Michael called it “Lucky Charms” but I could see if the amount was toned down, this could be a nice way to adjust the tartness to match your palate.
Cheers!
Warren