Follow Sean Inman to the best in craft beer
If you want proof (bad too early pun, sorry) that brewers treat (ugh, another one) water with a lot of thought and care, then look no further than Beachwood who have a new pizza place in Huntington Beach.
They took the dough so seriously that they now have special water that they sell that you can use to make your own pizza dough. I am somewhat tempted to buy and taste it.
NEWBrew from Singapore has a new blonde ale. How is that news, you say? It is brewed using recycled sewage. You read that correctly.
It is a joint effort between Brewerkz, a local craft brewery, and Singapore’s national water agency.
To keep the all caps NEW going, NEWBrew uses NEWater. According to an article at FoodBeast, “NEWater is made using ultraviolet light to disinfect sewage followed by passing the liquid through advanced membranes and removing contaminant particles. What remains after the process, the brand asserts, is simply clean water.”
Considering that many breweries alter water based on their supply or a particular beer style, if this NEWater is neutral and has proof of no other issues, it might be worth trying.
This story was recently in the L.A. Times….
It is rare that a government body is even a tiny bit pro-active but San Diego has seen the power of both biotech and beer and have created a new bank. One that will be filled with water and (hopefully) won’t increase taxes.
The city wants to take “stranded”, unused water from business ventures willing to part with it and offer it to water dependent companies willing to pay for extra. It is a clever idea and one that could conceivably work with other finite resources. It will be interesting if this project takes off and can be a model for other water districts.
If you have the hops book (which I do) and the malt book (which I don’t) then you might want to complete the set with Water: A Comprehensive Guide for Brewers, by John Palmer and Colin Kaminski, “which will help brewers who have long been flummoxed by the liquid’s complex chemistry.”
Yup, this book from the Brewers Publications’ Brewing Elements series is “solely devoted to the use and treatment of water throughout the brewing process. From an overview on sources, quality and geography, the book shows brewers how to read water reports, understand flavor contributions, and adjust the chemistry of brewing water. A discussion of adapting water to styles of beer, residual alkalinity, malt acidity, mash pH, brewery process water and wastewater treatment is included.”
It’s gonna get technical but if you have an interest in diving deeper into beer then this book will give you some key information because….
“If you don’t get the water right, neither will you succeed with the beer,” said Charlie Bamforth, professor of malting and brewing sciences at the University of California in a review on the book.
I don’t highlight enough foreign breweries, which isn’t right,. I need to educate myself and my faithful readers about where to go while on vacation. So here goes…
Burton-on-Trent is known for the water but it is also the home of a nice amount of small brewers. Black Hole Brewery started life in the old Ind Coope bottling plant close to Burton town centre in January 2007.
These two beers intrigued me the most from their list…
Supa Nova
ABV 4.8%
Supa Nova is a premium pale ale brewed using lager malts with a top fermenting ale yeast. A variety of hops from Europe and America combine to provide a floral taste.
No Escape
ABV 5.2%
A combination of chocolate, crystal and roasted barley produce the subtle series of smooth flavours in this award winning dark beer, whilst a balance of dry bitterness and spicy aroma is achieved by a late hop of Goldings.