Category: Brewery Tour

A concise brewery bio

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Craft in Controversial States # 1 – Wooden Robot from Charlotte, North Carolina

I try not to be too political on this blog. Opinionated, yes, but I try to keep the outside world outside this blog. But when commerce collides with politics, even craft beer becomes involved.

But with a political season in full on wacky mode, I find it hard to divorce the two. So this month, I will combine them but like church and state, they will be separated. I will first touch on a political topic in a state and then we can cleanse our palates with a look into a brewery from that state. Sort of a good news-bad news type of post.

Astute readers will probably notice that I am not a fan of Republicans and may notice a streak of Libertarianism that I inherited genetically from my Dad. That leads us into North Carolina where apparently people are afraid about peeing. To me, this seems to be a whipped up controversy in response to federal marriage laws. The equivalent of losing a ball game but instead of taking the ball away, you take away the bathroom for the players to use. Frankly, I prefer to take a bathroom break in peace from EVERYBODY because a bathroom break is just that. A break. But now, due to politicians, the bathroom apparently is to be scary because we don’t know who the hell is in there. I don’t want government in the ‘loo but others seem to like Big Government telling people where to do their business. Fear of the different is as much a part of America as apple pie and is alive and kicking in 2016.

Those are my views, now, lets go to Charlotte and have a beer and maybe a polite exchange of ideas too.
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We head to Wooden Robot now to check out their offerings.

Here are my choices for a taster tray. (Hard choices to make just to get down to five!)

Universal Automaton Sour Farmhouse Ale
“Universal Automaton is the first release that has completely fermented in our 30 BBL oak foeder. Brewed with local malts from Riverbend Malt House and fermented with our house mixed culture, this beer displays notes of tart citrus, decadent stone fruits, and a dry, slightly funky, finish.”

Extra Good Gluten Reduced Pale Ale
“Extra Good starts off with a similar malt bill to Overachiever Pale Ale. We then hop it generously with Citra and Equinox in the kettle and fermentor. This beer is treated with an enzyme to reduce gluten, resulting in a deliciously hoppy brew for everyone, whether you’re sensitive to gluten or not!”

Paranoid Android Deux Farmhouse IPA
“A collaboration with our friends at Bird Song, Paranoid Android Deux is our second version of our Farmhouse IPA. Paranoid combines citrusy and fruity American hops, with light malt backbone from 100% local malt, and a funky, spicy hop character from Wooden Robot’s mixed farmhouse yeast culture.”

Good Morning Vietnam COFFEE VANILLA BLONDE ALE
“A collaboration with our neighbors at Charlotte’s own Enderly Coffee. We combined fresh roasted Madagascar vanilla beans to produce an eye opening, enjoyable ale.”

Hop Boulders Sour Double IPA
“The bigger boulder version of our Return of Hop Rocks Sour IPA. Hop Boulders takes the tart, grapefruity hop character of it’s little brother, and turns it up a notch.”

PS – I do not know the views of Wooden Robot. So maybe they don’t want to be drawn into it. Don’t complain to them. Direct questions to me.

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2nd Visit – Iron Triangle

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Take 2 for Iron Triangle. I was pleasantly surprised by the beer the first time around and as I walked in to the brewery on a warm Saturday, I hoped that the beer would stay consistent.

I bought a sampler tray of four beers with only one holdover from the previous visit which was the …..
1581 Pale Ale – a little too sweet tart for me. A little pull back might help. Better as it warms.

New this time were the….
Land of Fire Red IPA – good hop presence here. A touch of sweetness. Not as dark as expected.
Wheat and Rye Ale – certainly malty. Kind of a weird mix. Accumulated hops from previous two beers.
Royal Claytons ESB – again fruity. Not really an ESB to me. Not enough malt here. The least favorite of the group for me.

The brewery was overstaffed for the teeny amount of customers in early afternoon. Tables were added to the loading dock area perhaps as a nod to the lack of seating at the bar.

Overall, the beer is solid but my sampler lacked a little differentiation. Maybe I should have ordered a something dark instead of the ESB.

Just as an aside: What is it with grains in jars at breweries? How often is it used for education or is it just window dressing? May as well have a jar of water too.

Just as another aside: It is weird that most of the taps say specialty when there were only three specialty beers on the blackboard.

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NW Cidery # 3 – Outlaw Apple

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Our final destination as Johnny Appleseed takes us to Outlaw Apple with the rebellious raccoon logo are former Californian’s now tending orchards in Oregon.

Here is my cider taster tray, starting with the Original…

“Apple Outlaw Original is our flagship cider. This sparkling, golden, semi-sweet cider has strong floral and fruity aromatics with a long finish. Just one taste and you’ll understand why the Bandit is wanted in every state.”

Then…. “Ginger Bite spices up this band of Outlaws! Made with a delicious blend of apples and Peruvian yellow ginger at our family-owned orchard in the Applegate, Ginger Bite is bursting with apple aromas and the spicy zing of ginger. The combo packs a punch sure to reward your rebellious palate, should you be so adventurous.”

Third up is….Expertly crafted with apples, tangerines, and hops, Tangerine Twist was made to revive tired taste buds. This hopped cider balances bold citrus flavors with floral aromas and crisp apple overtones.”

Then finish with…”Rabid Dry is for the experienced outlaw; its intense flavor so infectious, you’ll be left craving more. Apple aromas persist in this slightly acidic, dry cider, creating a bold flavor with no residual sweetness.”

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Crafted Chapman

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When Haven Brewing exited Pasadena it was an unexpected loss especially of the talented brewing skills of Brian Thorson. But now from the ashes comes the Chapman Crafted Beer Company.

Per the Orange County Register the new brewing operation will be near the Orange Depot in Old Towne.

According to the article, “The brewery will include a tasting room open from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. seven days a week.”

On the downside, despite two other breweries in the area there are 34 conditions added to the permit. The most egregious being “tastes are limited to five samplers of two or three ounces, depending on the alcohol content of the beer.” And weirdly, sales (which I assume means bottles) are limited to a ratio of overall sales. Which will hamstring the tasting room more and probably mean that the nearby Haven Gastropub and Provisions will be better outlets for the beer.

We will see how this plays out but hopefully once the dust settles and the community gets to visit the 34 conditions can be lessened.

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Ordnance

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More math here. Sorry in advance. Where I currently live, Glendale, CA. has around 191K in population and growing if all the condos on Central Ave. ever fill up and we technically have one brewery in Brewyard. Eagle Rock is in LA as is the ABInBev plant in the blue building on San Fernando.

The city of Boardman in the Eastern-ish part of Oregon has under 3,500 people and also has one brewery. You tell me how that works.

Ordnance Brewing gets its name from the massive war buildup that created whole communities. Communities that are now decaying ghost towns since the weapons (ie ordnance) manufacturing left. And they already have a lengthy list of beers brewed, starting with their regulars:

Old Craig
An old style ale brewed with the addition of brown sugar which gives it a nice candy-like flavor, as well as the ability to warm your belly. A light hop character combines well with natural fruity notes to make this beer a special treat.

FMJ
Western Europe meets West Coast in the quaffable Full Metal Jacket (FMJ) IPA. A fusion of new world hops are held up with a malty backbone reminiscent of a maltier English Style pale. This is a beer of the highest caliber.

Kolsch
An ale in lager clothing, this is our take on an old German style. Of course we revamped the droll style with a little northwestern malt backbone. If you’re looking for an easy drinking anytime beer, this one goes down smooth.

Rye Extra Pale Ale
Pouring a light straw color, this ale gets its spicy flavor from a healthy dose of rye malt. The rye spice combines nicely with a Citra and Mosaic nose to bring you a beer that is just what the doctor ordered.

Other seasonals and specials that caught my eye include:

Batch 100 – Cherryfisk Cherry Imperial Stout
LIMITED RELEASE!!! To mix things up around the brewery we decided to take 160# of sweet dark cherries and infuse them in to our favorite dark beer. This gave our imperial stout a lovely cherry nose and a sweet but smooth flavor that evolves into a light roasty cherry aftertaste.

Cherry Snapper Barrel-Aged Sour Ale
LIMITED RELEASE!!! We brewed this amber ale in April 2015 and then hid it away in red wine barrels with a healthy supply of dark, sweet cherries and brettanomyces. We pulled the beer out of barrels the last day of November to find a pleasant brett tartness co-mingling with cherries and oak.

Little House Brown English Brown Ale
A malt dominant session beer that is reminiscent of an English mild. Lighter on the hop and alcohol spectrum, but still has a malty presence on your pallet. Go ahead, have another, I know I am.

Of Chimpanzees Coffee Porter
This porter showcases locally roasted coffee from Home Town Coffee Roasters. The beer was specifically brewed to accentuate the darker roasted flavors of coffee. True story- Of Chimpanzee was named from a quote from our brewer’s childhood. Every morning before school Logan’s mom would replace “breakfast of Champions” with “breakfast of Chimpanzees” a tribute to growing up and those early childhood memories in our own family kitchen.

Pallas Pilsner
Best Heidelberg Malt and Glacier hops team up to bring you this Single Malt And Single Hop (S.M.A.S.H) classic American pilsner. It starts with a surprisingly full-bodied malt flavor that leads in a refreshingly crisp finish.

(Thanks to Nathan for the heads-up about this and many other breweries in Eastern Oregon)

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NW Cidery # 2 – Portland Cider Co.

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During my last Portland visit, I was finally able to sneak in some time at a cider tap room. In this case the satellite for Portland Cider Co. on Hawthorne. They lead with their own ciders including ciders with fresh hops (First Crop), cider with a Hawaiian twist (Maui Cruiser) and a cider aged in used gin barrels (London Dry). They also have ciders from other producers on tap as well so you can easily compare and contrast styles and apples.

I suggest going for the weirder ones but you could also start with their mainline offerings:

Kinda Dry
“Traditional English cider is dry, lightly carbonated, has very subtle apple flavors, and a lingering fresh finish. It is in the spirit of this traditional cider that we blend our Kinda Dry. We use fresh pressed juice from a blend of NW grown culinary apples such as Honeycrisp, Granny Smith, Jonagold, Gala, Golden and Red Delicious, carefully ferment them with a yeast that preserves their subtle characteristics, give the cider time to develop to its full potential, then bottle or keg at just the right time. Just off dry, light, clean, refreshing, with a pleasant finish, Kinda Dry is the cider to always have on hand.”

Sorta Sweet
“If we had to describe this cider in a word it would be YUM! Blended with similar varieties of apples as our Kinda Dry, Sorta Sweet will hit you with apple flavor right from the start. Balancing the higher levels of residual sugars with just the right amount of tartness gives Sorta Sweet a fresh flavor that tastes like biting into your favorite apple. A nice long finish follows that makes sipping a pint something not to be rushed. We ferment it with the same care and give it the same attention to detail as our other ciders. Also lightly carbonated, pair a glass of Sorta Sweet with your favorite curry or any spicy dish and you cannot go wrong.”

Pearfect Perry
“Made from nothing but a blend of Bartlett and D’Anjou pear juice. This light perry is medium sweet and bursting with pear notes. Like all our ciders it is balanced and refreshing. Available on draft and in 22oz bottles, ask for it at your favorite growler station or pub.”

Hop’rageous
“Take a balanced dry cider, infuse it with the fragrant Citra variety of hops, then double down on the citrus notes of those hops by throwing in some bitter orange peel, and the result is an outrageously refreshing hopped cider that can only be described as Hop’rageous! With equal notes of bitter hop and tangy citrus, this unexpected combination pairs well with anything coming off the grill.”

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NW Cidery # 1 – Cider Riot

Why cider tours of the NW this month? Well, they are in the news (see HERE for taxes and HERE for breweries making cider) + I visited one on my recent trip.

With the MLS 2016 season now underway and the Timbers of Portland attempting to defend their championship crown, it felt right to start with avowed Timber fan and Cidermaker/Owner Abram Goldman-Armstrong and his Cider Riot.

I like this one quote about cider, he says that it “challenges me, it inspires me, and there’s nothing quite like the dry tannic flavor of a well made cider.”

Here is what I would like to try:
Burncider® Dry Draught Cider 6.8% abv – Silver Medal winner in the Portland International Cider Cup 2014 – Inspired by the pub draught ciders of the English West Country, Burncider blends Oregon-grown traditional English cider apples, tart wild apples and dessert apples from Hood River. Just like Portland’s Old Main Drag™, this cider has a rich history and flavorful character.

Everybody Pogo™ Hoppy Cider 6.7% abv- A refreshingly dry cider that’s got hops. Our roughcut tribute to football terraces and punk rock shows, dry and quenching with a hint of sweet apple flavor, as organically grown Goldings hops do the pogo dance across your taste buds. A distinctly Oregonian product, Everybody Pogo mates Hood River apples and Willamette Valley hops. Unfiltered and lightly carbonated.

Never Give an Inch™ Oregon Blackberry Cider 6.9% abv – A testament to determination, hard work, and downright cussedness, Never Give an Inch celebrates the spirit of Oregon. Invasive Himalaya blackberries run riot across the fencelines and fields all across western Oregon. Fire, chemical poisons, machetes, bulldozers, even goats can only beat back their inevitable advance, as they attempt to take over every square inch of cleared land. Luckily their fruits are delicious, juicy, and plentiful, spawning the phrase “as Cascadian as blackberry pie.”In Never Give an Inch, Oregon blackberries and blackcurrants combine with Hood River and Yakima-grown apples create a tart dry cider with a fruity aroma.

Black Bloc series is our Bogman’s Cranberry Brettanomyces cider – Bogman’s is a blend of over twenty different cider and dessert apple varieties aged for a year on natural brettanomyces from the orchard where the apples were grown. Oregon cranberries were added to add a touch of acidity to balance the flavors of the brett. The cider was then allowed to bottle condition for nine months, to achieve a smooth round carbonation. It’s been a long road from the initial pressing in 2013 to your glass in 2015, so savor the complexity of this Black Bloc cider before it vanishes.
wildfree

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English Brewery # 3 – Tiny Rebel Brewing

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It started with a garage and Gazz and ended up as a three time winner at the Champion Beer of Wales in 2013. Not a bad start for Gazz and Brad (the other half of the duo) and their Tiny Rebel Brewing.

And here is what I would order when in Cardiff….

1. “Arguably the coolest word on the planet, Cwtch is our very own untraditional Welsh Red Ale. Six malts, two US hops and weeks of Tiny Rebel love and attention go into making this unique beer. Citrus and tropical fruit dominate the taste that is backed up with caramel malts that balance the moderate bitterness. Drinkability & balance makes this beer.”

2. Full Nelson. “Our ‘Maori Pale Ale’ came together after months of experimentation with a very unique hop – Nelson Sauvin from New Zealand. Strong grape flavours are complemented by the sweet Munich malt, making this beer crisp and refreshing.”

3. Bonsai IPA. “”International” collaborations like this don’t come along very often, but when they do, someone’s supply of hops usually gets rinsed! Brewed with ALL of Arbor’s hops, this IPA is big on flavour and way too sessionable.”

4. “A unique schizophrenic beer where you’ll face off against floral hoppy flavours up front, leading into a dry spicy bitterness on the back. Need something a bit different to wake up your taste buds? It’s time to get FUBAR.”

5. And on cask: Hank an American Pale Ale. “This light US-style pale ale took a bit of tweaking to get just right. With tropical and citrus aromas and a low-to-medium bitterness, this is one easygoing West Coast-style beer. Floral flavours with slight caramel and biscuit notes make this well-balanced and highly drinkable.”

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English Brewery # 2 – Brew By Numbers

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The second stop in England is at Brew By Numbers or known by the shorter (BBNo.) They have quite a list of beers. All numbered that riff off of the founders early influencers from Australia and New Zealand as well as the now famed Kernel Brewery.

Here are my numerically ordered choices:
01 SAISON – Gotta start with the first
09 BROWN ALE – Brown ales get a bad rap but it is a must-try English style
10 COFFEE PORTER – How does English coffee differ from hyped American ones?
14 TRIPEL – A style that I need to try more of.
19 GOSE – had a few goses recently and it would be a good test
25 WHITE IPA – need to try at least one IPA

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English Brewery # 1 – Howling Hops

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As I was paging through a recent All About Beer magazine, I had the thought that for the months of January and February, I would cherry pick breweries to feature from the pages. And this month, we will head to England and peek in at three breweries over there.

We start at Howling Hops which probably makes gruits. Not.

Howling Hops started in the basement of the Cock Tavern. They outgrew the brew cave quickly. Brewing over a 100 different beers can speed that process and moved to an old brick warehouse nearby in the lovely sounding town of Hackney Wick where they now brew and operate their Tank Bar.

They offer beers mostly under 6% ABV with one beer down at 3%!

Here is what I would have in my first taster tray…..

Riding Ale 3.0% – gotta start with the low end and see what it is like
Running Beer 4.0% – slowly work up the beer ladder
Howling Pils 4.6% – to compare against the ales
Ruby Red 5.2% – because me mum’s name is Ruby
IPA 7.5% – finish up with the biggest beer on the list.

I am also intrigued by their Pale XX and the Rye Wit as well.