What to Do About RateBeer

I've been a member of RateBeer for over 15 years, and I was for quite some time a major contributor to the site as one of the leading volunteer administrators. Over the years I've pulled back considerably from involvement, but it's still been the site where I enter my beer ratings, and what I use to look up beers and places.
  
Anheuser-Busch InBev (ABI) is the parent company of Budweiser, and has long been accused of anti-competitive practices. It's the reason why I refuse to buy any product they make, including beers produced by the many breweries they've purchased in recent years (e.g., Devils Backbone, Wicked Weed, Elysian, and Goose Island). Their acquisitions have been targeted such that the breweries are in most regions of the country (nothing yet in the Midwest), with various areas of specialization and style strengths. I'm not anti-big beer, I'm anti-ABI.

Friday's announcement that RateBeer had sold a minority stake to a subsidiary of ABI hit me like a ton of bricks, and while I've made a couple of posts on FaceBook about it, I've still been coming to terms with it, and what my response should be. With 48 hours to digest everything, I'm pretty sure that I now know my full response.

What concerns do I have about the announcement?

1. It's eight months late. The deal went through in October, and only when an article was about to be published about what had happened did RateBeer finally acknowledge that ABI was already working with the site. There's no telling how long the silence would have continued without that outside discovery. I don't buy the claim that the delay was "because the two sides wanted to get 'points on the board' to prove the value of the partnership without the 'disruption' of making it public." I mean, perhaps that's also true, but there are far greater benefits of silence, including:
• ABI access to the data without anyone getting upset and potentially leaving (as users are now contemplating doing); 
• No potential walkout of brewers from the big beer festival RateBeer holds in January; 
• No association of the change in the Terms of Service last Fall with the corporate investment; and of course 
• No scrutinizing what's going on at the site for the time folks were unaware.
2. It's a huge conflict of interest. Consumer Reports is wholly independent for a reason -- would you trust their reviews of dishwashers if Maytag were a minority investor? It's slightly different here, because the users provide the reviews, not RateBeer. But given that RateBeer compiles the data, and decides how to weight the data, certainly the potential exists for shenanigans, and I'd feel that way if any brewery acquired a stake in the site. I don't think they ever would do something illegitimate given the backlash that would follow if it ever came to light, but to say it looks bad is putting it mildly (and brings into question every shift in data weighting going forward). For similar reasons, I'm not as concerned as I originally was that ABI already may have an option to buy a majority stake/sole ownership -- I believe it's in their best interests to present RateBeer as majority-owned and operated by an independent entity, as I believe it's in their best interest that ratings continue to pile in. Which brings me to...  
3. What's in it for ABI? Lots of speculation on the RateBeer forums on this one, some even suggesting that it's simply a way to make money. For me, I think it's pretty simple. Joe Tucker, a friend and the person behind RateBeer, states, "The API is being expanded so journalists, other breweries, industry watchers, as well as app makers, academics, scholars and researchers will have better access to the same data that ZX [the ABI subsidiary] has access to." I take this to mean that ABI is helping to improve the data the site produces, in exchange for making all that data publicly available. RateBeer data isn't going to help ABI on its core Budweiser brands, because RateBeer users aren't interested in those brands (and routinely pan them). Instead, I expect that ABI wants the data to assist in making greater penetration in the craft brew market. With its numerous acquisitions, ABI is uniquely situated in the marketplace to take advantage of the information gleaned from the site's data, and I feel this is why ABI bought its stake. Further, I suspect that ABI has little concern with sharing the data with non-commercial interests, or even with competitors that aren't as well situated (especially when ABI had an 8-month head start on accessing the data). To say that the data is available for everyone isn't particularly meaningful when no one else possesses remotely equivalent resources to utilize the information within the data.

So what am I going to do about it?

I've given this a lot of thought over the last 48 hours or so, and consistent with my approach of not buying any ABI products, what I've decided is that I'm not comfortable providing any help whatsoever to ABI's desire to expand further into craft beer. This makes continuing to enter ratings on RateBeer problematic. Unfortunately, it's not as simple as finding another site for my ratings, because my existing ratings aren't readily transferable, I'm used to rating beers in the RateBeer format, and no other site has the information as readily able to be compiled as RateBeer (there's a reason why I've stayed with RateBeer all these years). Perhaps as importantly, what's to stop ABI from making an acquisition of another ratings site?

So with no good alternative to RateBeer, and discomfort with continuing to use Ratebeer, I'm left with the solution of taking my ratings private and independent, just like I was before I joined RateBeer. It's not that big of a deal -- the primary reason for entering my ratings has always been to compile my ratings, and these days it's not so hard to do so in your own file accessible from anywhere you have an internet connection.

As I'd like to have all my existing and future ratings in one place, fortunately RateBeer lets you compile your ratings. And even though it does so in blocks of 1000, and the data is wonky as Hell, it's about as good as I'm likely to get. So I've downloaded my old ratings, am in the process of cleaning them up and converting them into a single file, and will enter new ratings into that file.

Goodbye RateBeer, and good luck to Joe and all the folks still active over there.  I'm fortunate to have made many friends through the site, and over the years have connected with many of them on Facebook and in real life -- I look forward to seeing you/them in the years to come.

Changes

Kathy stopped work in June to be a full-time stay-at-home Mom, and we started living on a budget last April in anticipation.  Suddenly, the money we were permitted to spend on ourselves was restricted significantly.  It had never been limitless, but we've always been fairly responsible to the point that we never really felt restricted.  We feel it now.

And so my trips to buy new beers have dropped off -- hard to keep to a budget when a stop at State Line eats up all your money for a month.  And even though I spend far less per visit to one of my favorite bars than I do at State Line, those trips have tapered off too.  To be honest though, that started in earnest when I went on a diet at the first of the year.  

At the same time as I've been cutting back on beer geekery, I've been undergoing (as Kathy put it) my once-a-decade move to a new online community.  In the '90s, it was jumbalaya, a community of people who like playing boggle.  In the '00s, it was ratebeer, a community of beer geeks.  In both these instances, I've made a number of friends that extended beyond the virtual into the real world.  

And now, I've discovered turntable.fm, a music site where you dj for others in a chat room.  I'm finding new music, and meeting folks who enjoy the same music I do.  Given that I love music but had given up on radio long ago, this is a wonderful discovery.  And let's face it, listening to music in a chat room costs no more than one's internet connection, whereas there's only so much enjoyment one can get talking about new beers without spending on the beer itself.

And so instead of spending on beer as much, I'm now spending on concerts.  I spent about the same at each of two shows in March as I would have for a night at a bar.  And while I can't remember a single beer I had the last time I went to my favorite beer bar, I expect the great memories of the last show I attended, Langhorne Slim at Iota, will be with me for quite some time.  

I haven't stopped there either -- my passion has resulted in our summer plans including a trip to a music festival.  We'll see how it goes with the whole family camping at a four-day music fest, but fingers crossed it's the beginning of a family tradition.

This isn't about a rejection of beer -- I'll still drink and rate beer as the opportunities arise (and for the fifth year in a row, we'll still be doing at least one camping beer weekend).  I would love to try more beers and go to a bunch of shows, but the budget and the time isn't available.  And at this point in my life, to the extent I have to choose, I'm choosing music over beer.  

And My Mind Begins to Grasp the Notion of Hell...

Yesterday, Kathy, Emelia and I spent the day visiting with our friends Gary, Sharon, and their son Andrew. We spent the day in shifts, rotating which two adults would watch the kids. When we got there, we stayed for a little while, before Kathy and I slipped out for lunch. Upon our return, Kathy and Sharon went out for a movie, and when they got back, Gary and I walked over to my new favorite beer bar, ChurchKey.

There's something wonderful about having a great beer bar in town, particularly when it's only a couple of blocks for where a friend lives (no matter how much I'd enjoy it, that it's not a couple of blocks from my own house is probably a good thing).

It's not like I hadn't been there recently; in fact, it'd just been Tuesday night. And when I woke up the following morning, I had a terrible feeling -- I had undertipped "my" bartender, a guy who always looks out for me whenever he's working. So I walked in with an extra $10 bill to hand him in case he was behind the bar. He was, but he wouldn't accept the money, and swore that we were fine. No problem -- after another afternoon of stellar service, we just added the $10 to the tip on this bill.

Even having been there just five days earlier, there were two beers on draft and one on cask that I hadn't yet tried. And the AFC Championship game was on the TVs. And it wasn't crowded, which is usually the case when I go in the evening (at least the waits to get in on a Tuesday night seem to be a thing of the past). So we were able to get a seat right at the bar.

And because it wasn't busy, we were talking with the staff a little more than usual. We could hear the music that was being piped in, and as I do pretty much every time, I exclaimed at how similar the selections were to my own choices. Not just the likes of the Shins, My Morning Jacket, Belle & Sebastian or even the New Pornographers, but even less familiar stuff like the Jayhawks, Stephen Malkmus, and Band of Horses. So Gary asked the staff that was present if it was a station, and if so, which one. And suddenly, a scowl appeared, on all of their faces. Someone explained that it was the owner's iPod, and that it was the same thousand or so selections on shuffle all the time.

The rest of the evening, my mind stretched to fathom the idea of being subjected to that, where slowly my love for great tunes would turn inside-out, and I would come to loathe the very music I once loved.

My Top New Beers of 2009

Spurred by Eric Gajdzis doing the same, here are my top beers of 2009 (I gave all of these a score of 4.1 or higher) --
1. Great Divide Espresso Oak Aged Yeti Imperial Stout (as delicious as regular Yeti is, this is even better)
2. Birrificio Italiano Tipopils (after hearing great things about it, this Pilsner actually met my expectations!)
3. Free State Owd Macs Imperial Stout (finally got to try it after many years of wondering if I would)
4. Les Vergers Lafrance Bouquet sur Glace (ok, it's an ice cider -- sue me)
5. Lagunitas A Little Sumpin’ Extra! Ale (Lagunitas makes a bunch of beers like this, but they keep showing that isn't a bad thing)
6. Laughing Dog The Dogfather Imperial Stout (I tried this and the Bourbon Barrel Aged version. I like this one quite a bit better)
7. Bockor Cuvee des Jacobins Rouge (this is a great Sour beer, and has been available on draft in DC for the past few months)
8. Amager Fru Frederiksen (RateBeer raters don't know what they're talking about -- the smaller beer to Hr. Frederiksen is the better one ;))
9. Peak Organic King Crimson (from Peak? damn that was unexpected!)
10. BFM Abbaye de Saint Bon-Chien Grand Cru 2008 (Trousseau Barrel) (BFM is hit and miss -- this is definitely another hit)
11. Otter Creek Imperial India Pale Ale (Otter Creek? What's going on here?!)
12. Mikkeller USAlive! (my highest rated Mikkeller, which is saying something)
13. Lost Abbey Veritas 004 (it may not be Isabelle Proximus, but it's still great)

A Man Walks Into A Brewpub

So yesterday, Kathy, Emelia and I stopped in at a brewpub in upstate New York for lunch on our way back to DC from Vermont. We get there at noon, right as the place opens. The greeter is in fact the co-owner, and after he assures us that we haven't arrived too early to be seated, he asks if we know what was special about the day.

I immediately answer, "It's Talk Like a Pirate Day!"
"Uh, it is? Well, that's not what I was thinking."
"Oh right -- it's Rosh Hashanah."
"Is that so? Well, it's also the start of Oktoberfest in Munich!"
"It is?"
"It sure is, and we're about to tap our Alt in honor of Oktoberfest."

Even though we weren't on the same page as far what made Saturday special, I did try the beer they had made in honor of Oktoberfest, and thought it was pretty decent.

My Life With Beer Update

I've slowed down. I'm only rating at a pace of about 500-600 beers each year, rather than the 1000 or so I used to rate (ok, so it's a relative thing). I'm drinking more for pleasure rather than rating, but I'm also drinking less overall. As I'm getting older I seem to have less endurance, not that I was a real heavyweight in the first place. Also, the acidity of the beers seems to hit me a fair amount, whereas until about a year ago, I never had heartburn from beer.

Circumstances are helping with my cutting back. The DC RateBeer crew is a little less organized than it was about a year ago, as a couple of key members have moved -- thus, there are fewer local tastings to attend. It probably also helps that Tom has moved a few blocks away, so we're not drinking together as much. Also, I missed my second RateBeer Summer Gathering in a row (this year was San Francisco), after attending the first six.

Still, it's hard to limit myself as much as perhaps I should, given my continuing love for beer. Indeed, this weekend Tom and I made our way up to Cooperstown, New York to indulge in Belgium Comes to Cooperstown, an annual beer festival organized by Ommegang Brewery and held on their premises (I also made it up there last year). We got there on Friday afternoon and camped there with many other beer devotees, including a large number of RateBeer members, several of whom I've known for years. The festival is Saturday afternoon, but really the best part of the weekend is the beer that other attendees bring to share when the festival isn't taking place -- people bring bottles, growlers, and kegs to share with their fellow beer lovers.

And despite the incredible amount of great beer flowing, I actually did a fairly good job of limiting the amount of beer I consumed. I got there tired due to too little sleep on Wednesday night, and rather than force myself to stay up late that first night, I went to bed after the shmancy beer dinner (that included plenty of beer). Saturday I held off drinking until about 10am, mostly stopped by about 8pm (which was when the real beer sharing got going), and turned in early again. Upon my return I joked with Kathy that I got more sleep camping at a loud beer festival than I would have in my own bed.

For the next month or so I'm going to try to cut back dramatically, and see if I can shed a couple of the pounds that have accumulated around my waist. I'm not about to stop altogether, and indeed am looking forward to the new brewpubs to hit when we go up to Vermont next month. All the same, a little moderation for a little while could make a little difference.

The Weekend in Five

1. We went to Minnesota this past weekend to attend Kathy's 15th college reunion. Kathy went to Carleton, a small liberal arts college roughly 40 minutes from Minneapolis, which Kathy's Mom also attended. We had a great time -- I'd met a decent number of her classmates over the years, and enjoyed hanging out with both them and the ones I met this weekend. We got into Minneapolis in the late afternoon (note to self -- when flying with Emelia, it's worth booking the direct flight over the connecting one, even if it costs a little extra or we have to schlep to Dulles), which gave us enough time to check into the hotel we'd reserved right by the airport and grab a bite before it was time for Emelia to go to sleep. I have to say that most of the time, Hotwire is the best option for reserving hotels. We ended up in a lovely suite that included a better-than-average complementary breakfast for less than $60 including taxes.

2. After Emelia went to sleep Thursday evening, my friend Dan picked me up and we hit a couple of beer bars -- the selections were a bit disappointing, as not much new was available. During the evening, Dan apologized for forgetting a can of Surly Bitter Brewer that he'd intended to bring, and encouraged me to hit a beer store on my way out of town to grab some of my own (Surly is only a couple of years old, but arguably is the best brewery in town. It also provided a great private tour as part of last year's RateBeer Summer Gathering). I told him that we'd be heading out early in the morning, long before the beer stores would be open. I was, after all, in town to attend Kathy's reunion, and the fact that I was even able to get with Dan was a bit of a bonus. Apparently, having such a healthy attitude was something that the Beer Gods smiled upon, for that afternoon, when we were hanging out with Kathy's classmates and the alcohol began flowing, someone walked by with a mixed case of Surly products, including Bitter Brewer. I asked him what the deal was, and learned that one of Kathy's classmates is married to the founder of Surly, and that she was providing a few cases for the event. The fact that I since discovered that I had already rated it doesn't bother me in the least, as I enjoyed it there, along with the other three Surly beers that were in the cooler.

3. Out of a recognition of the noise that would be created by partying alumni, the rooms for the alums with children were on the top floor of the dorm we stayed in, the fourth floor. I know they meant well, but the fourth floor was a bit of a haul to bring all of Emelia's accouterments (including the portable crib), seeing as how there were no elevators. Plus it was a bit of a haul if you wanted to hang with folks while a child napped, but still wanted to check on her on occasion. And it was warm -- being part of a relatively junior class, we weren't in a dorm with A/C, and the sun beat down upon the very windowed rooms all day long (and heat rises). It cooled down at night, but it was tough for Emelia to fall asleep for her nap, and even harder to do so in the evening while the room at its peak temperature. Friday night, Emelia wouldn't go to sleep, and Kathy finally brought her downstairs around 9pm. After a little time in the relative cool, we went back upstairs to try to get her to sleep. Our efforts before 10pm came to naught, as it was then that the fireworks began, seemingly right next to the building. Emelia wasn't too scared (I calmed her down pretty easily when she started to stress), but she certainly wasn't going to sleep right then. Finally at around 10:30, only ~4 hours later than usual, Emelia fell asleep for the night (she usually goes to sleep just after 7:30, but Minneapolis is one hour behind DC).

4. On Saturday, one of the activities was a porch party at the house of a couple from her class that own a house just two of blocks from campus. They have kids, and there were plenty of toys to keep Emelia occupied. She was mostly exploring the toys by herself, and while many kept her interest during the time we were there, Emelia eventually settled on a few dolls with a stroller. As is her wont with dolls, she was transfixed, particularly with an anatomically correct boy doll. At one point I explained to her that these were dolls to play with while she was there and that she'd have leave them, but I didn't have much hope that she fully understood what I was saying. And indeed, when it was time to go, she let loose the loudest series of shrieks I'd ever heard pass her lips. Ah well, these things happen I suppose, but Kathy felt pretty embarrassed (I mostly tried to suppress my laughter).

Emelia was fully over it by the time we were about a block from dinner. From that distance we saw Shizuka and Kazumi -- Emelia shouted, "Kaz," and Kaz shouted, "Melia!" Well, Kaz did that at first, but pretty quickly she noticed that we were walking with Greg (classmate to Shizuka and Kathy), and she started shouting, "Greg!" After the mothers put their daughters down, what ensued was the classic movie scene parody, with the two of them running toward each other, followed by Kaz running right past Emelia to greet Greg.

5. Carleton doesn't just recycle, it composts. At meals, pretty much everything except the metallic butter wrappers went into the compost bin, including, when we ate outside, the "plastic" (corn or potato) utensils and cups. Kathy and I thought it was fantastic, and when I got back home, I discovered that Carleton has a host of significant green initiatives. I know colleges and universities are usually at the forefront of such efforts, but it makes us wonder how soon such efforts will become mainstream.

A Going Blind Tasting

This past Saturday a group of local RateBeerians assembled at my house for a blind tasting of 25 imperial stouts. For those unfamiliar with the Imperial Stout style, it's a BIG beer, typically at least 8% ABV, with lots of malts and a fair amount of hops. Flavors that may be imparted include roastiness, coffee and chocolate, though they certainly don't stop there. And so we attempted to determine nuance among 25 different takes of this style, roughly two ounces at a time. Surprisingly, after trying so many beers over the years, I had yet to participate in a blind tasting. If you're curious how it went, I wrote an article about it over at RateBeer.

'Tis the Season 2

I know a beer snob like me shouldn't take pleasure at seeing a bunch of Grolsch bottles, but sometimes it's all in the presentation.



My friend Pete sent this to me, joking that it was something for the beer party. Maybe in past years, but all I could think of in the here and now was, "Oh yeah -- I could see Little Miss Destructo Girl having a reaaaaallly good time with that. Sure she'd just 'look' at it."

'Tis the Season

It's December, and that means that there are plenty of great events to experience. Last night, for example, there was a beer dinner featuring two highly regarded, extremely rare beers that I was looking forward to trying. Tonight is my friend's 20+th annual Hanukkah party, an event I always enjoy. And this Friday is our annual holiday beer party.

Alas, being December, it also means that sickness is capable of rearing its ugly head in any variety of ways. The malady that struck me is some sort of stomach bug, one that made my innards feel as though they were covered in bile and left me with no appetite whatsoever (it took a lot of willpower just to eat a few crackers, a banana, and a package of Ramen yesterday). Fever/chills and throbbing headache are the bonuses.

Consequently, I missed work yesterday, and skipped last night's beer dinner. I'm feeling somewhat better today (no bile!), but still very weak, so I also stayed home today, figuring it was better to rest up a little more and regain my strength. The remnants of the kegs with the two rare beers go on tap at 5pm, but I went slightly green when Kathy offered to make me eggs this morning, so beer isn't an option, nor is tonight's Hanukkah party.

My goal is to be healthy for our party, and for the slew of prep that's needed to get the house ready. As for Kathy, she seems to have come down with a cold herself (it seems to be one of the standard variety ones), but trooper/masochist/martyr that she is, she's working through it. Emelia might have been sick last week (and in fact, might have given me my illness), but if so it was mild for her, and right now she's doing fine (knock wood).

For the Love of Beer

When I found Ratebeer, I was introduced to a community of people, who, like me, love beer and learning about it. It has led to nearly five years of unmitigated exploration for new beers, and resulting discoveries of some fantastic beers that I never would have found otherwise. But what it also did, or rather, what I did after joining, is leave behind many favorites, simply because I lack the liver and caloric capacity to try so many new beers and keep enjoying the old ones. Since I've joined Ratebeer, with very few exceptions, my beer drinking has been focused on beers I can rate. And consequently, I'm closing in on 5000 ratings, and am one of the top raters at Ratebeer. But now, I'm ready to rate less and return to some of my favorites more, especially now that I have such an enormous list of favorites.

Last night, Tom, Gary, and I were supposed to go to a "Wet Hop" beer tasting, but it unfortunately was canceled (a wet hop beer uses moist hops straight off the vines, whereas most beers use hops that are first dried, and sometimes even reduced to pellet form). So instead, we went to the Brickskeller, and I got to serve as the beer "sommelier" for a flight of hoppy beers.* We started off with a couple of pints of Sierra Nevada Harvest Ale, a long-time favorite of mine. Harvest Ale is the most readily available wet hop beer, and in fact, one of the only wet hop beers that makes it off the West Coast (outside of special tastings). It's one of my favorite seasonal beers, and it isn't bottled, so there's only a month or so that I can get it. Next up was another hoppy beer, Victory Hop Wallop, which has a bitterness that blows away the Harvest Ale. We finished with Weyerbacher Double Simcoe IPA (Simcoe is a hop varietal), which has enough hoppiness to overcome the light coating of resin that had formed on our hop-addled tongues. These are all beers I love (I've given each of these beers a rating of at least 4), and it was great to enjoy them rather than pick out beers I wouldn't like as much, or to analyze them for rating purposes.

I still plan on rating beers, because wonderful beers are being introduced all the time, and because I'll travel to places where I can try beers I've never had. It's just that rather than rate 9 out of every 10 beers I drink, I expect it'll be closer to 3 out of every 10. At this point, it seems like a better balance.

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* -- Some of you may be asking what I was doing going out while poor Kathy had to stay home with the baby. Kathy wasn't left alone -- her folks are in town. FWIW, I've encouraged her to leave me with Emelia right after a feeding, so she can get out some, but so far she's declined.

When are we going back?

In a time before we knew of RateBeer and before there was mapquest, there was Coop's, a set of maps that purported to include the addresses of all the breweries in a particular region. And when we embarked on a two-week Northern California brewery tour in the Fall of 2000, there certainly were more than enough breweries to keep us tipsy, or worse. The only trick was figuring out where each one was without a streetmap. At each brewery I took notes on each beer, for the first time in my life, never realizing that someday I'd enter all of them into a giant web database. You had let your driver's license lapse, so I had to do all the driving (grumble grumble).

Was it only six years ago that we waited in a state park outside of Boonville for a brewery tour, and sat in Sierra Nevada's beer garden in Chico? Walked among the redwoods and along the coast, saw El Capitan and the potheads on the town square in Arcata? To pass the time on the long drives in those days before digital jukeboxes, we played word games, sang songs to each other, and argued whether religion had done more good or bad in the world. In the Russian River Valley, famous for its wineries, I offered to take you to them rather than the area's breweries -- you've always loved wine, and this was a golden opportunity. You replied, "No, we're here to drink beer." Always we visited breweries. Some of them are long gone, others have beers I had just the other day.

I saw your grandfather for the only time in my life on that trip, pushing 90 years old and riding his motorized scooter, living by himself because he didn't want to be dependent on others. We stayed with all three of your father's siblings, including the teetotaler and her husband, who were more than a little bemused by one of the functions of our travels. We had bought little gifts along the way, but didn't fully consider the recipients -- she assured herself that the preserves made with beer must have had all the alcohol burned off. We were awed by the simple beauty of your uncle's timber-frame house, where he and his wife had retired just half an hour from Yosemite. He had been to Fresno just before we arrived, and had bought a growler so we could try something from their local brewery.

There was a newness to those adventures. It was our first big vacation after our honeymoon, and we learned as much about each other as we probably had in the six months prior. And from those two weeks, our friendship bloomed ever more colorfully, and our love deepened to a level far beyond where it was at our wedding one-and-a-half years earlier, even if it was but a fraction of where it has gone since.

Name My Beer

Shizuka, one of Kathy's best friends from college, is also expecting her first child (~10 weeks before Kathy's due). Shizuka's husband Eric lives ~20 minutes away, and a couple of months ago I suggested to him that we needed to brew a celebratory beer in honor of the children-to-be and to aid our wives' lactation. Eric embraced the idea. Good thing too, since he's the homebrewer, having made dozens of them over the years (though not that many of late), and he was the one with the equipment. I've helped on a few homebrews over the years but never have done one on my own.

After consulting with Kathy and Shizuka, we decided to go with a stout. Eric proposed a recipe that uses his favorite type of hops, but I didn't like the composition of the rest of it. So I found a different recipe that was more to my liking (and which still used his favorite hops), he suggested a couple of tweaks to it, and we were good to go. The recipe was labeled a "Robust Porter," which might as well be a stout, given that historically, porters came before stouts, and in fact, stout was originally called "stout porter" before the name got shortened. Today, this is what is meant by Robust Porter -- as you can see, the style allows for a pretty wide range of characteristics, most (if not all) of which you'll find in some stouts.

We scheduled a day to brew, and only the day before did it dawn on me that we had coincidentally chosen Father's Day. Over the course of several hours, Eric led us through the necessary steps (and I hope I have them right) -- put the grains in hot water, then let the mixture steep several hours; sparge the mixture in order to remove the fermentable sugars, thereby creating wort; boil the wort and add in the hops; cool the wort and add in the yeast; and seal up the mixture so the yeast can get busy.

After one week, Eric transferred the beer to another container, and two weeks after that, we were ready to bottle the beer. Conveniently, this past weekend Shizuka was in town (she and Eric are professors -- she teaches in Massachusetts, and he's at the University of Maryland), so on Sunday the four of us got to hang out for an afternoon of lunching, talking, bottling, and of course, World Cupping.

I wish that bottling were as simple as pouring the beer into bottles, then cap them, but there's also the matter of cleaning and sterilizing all the bottles before using them (we also had to add more fermentable sugars so the beer would carbonate). The truth is, every step of the process required cleaning and sterilizing, but given how many bottles have to be sterilized to hold five gallons of beer (made slightly less burdensome by our using 750ml bottles), we were at it for a couple of hours. A sampling of the beer at this stage gave us every reason to think we'll have a great beer in a few weeks (which makes the decision to wait until the end of October to open it a little more difficult).

One thing we haven't been able to do is come up with a clever name for our beer (Mothers Milk Stout has been used many times before). If anyone can think of a good name for our beer, let me know. If I use anyone's suggestion, I'll put a credit on my blog, and if you're around D.C., I'll be happy to share a bottle with you.

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I'm going to be pretty busy for the next few days, enjoying soccer tomorrow night, followed by the RateBeer Summer Gathering that runs all weekend, and then I'll be going out of town for a week. In other words, I'm not promising any posts for the next dozen or so days. Pictures when I return.

Nothing

Just posting to let folks know that I'm alive and well. All is fine, but it doesn't feel like there's anything interesting to say. Kathy's progressing through pregnancy -- she's starting to show, but is at an awkward stage where she feels like the slight bulge doesn't make her look pregnant, just fat. I have a feeling that in late August, when she's seven months pregnant, she'll be wondering why she didn't appreciate the slight bulge stage more.

Summer travel has begun -- Chattanooga last weekend for a beer meet-up was fun. Friday night I stayed at a fellow beergeek's place ~75 minutes from Chattanooga. His house is beautiful, it's on 300+ acres in the middle of nowhere, and I have to admit I was jealous of the natural beauty and tranquility. Kathy and I talk from time to time about moving to the middle of nowhere, and regularly indulge that little fantasy by looking at ads here. On the flight back from Tennessee, the guy next to me and I talked about beer, and he said that when his wife was pregnant (and this happened a lot -- he has 5 children), he'd wanted to give up beer but never was able to bring himself to do it. And he figured that with his wife's hormones out of whack due to the pregnancy, he didn't need the added stress of not drinking to complicate his marriage. It sounds like a good theory, but I can't say it's the reasoning I used. Basically, I have few interests in life, and enjoying good beer, together with traveling to enjoy it, are among my favorites. I'll be cutting way back on these soon enough, so I figure I may as well enjoy them now.

This weekend the two of us are going to Cleveland. No idea what we're going to do there, but I'm sure there's more to do there than see the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. I don't expect to see a burning river, but maybe a Burning River Pale Ale.

And so it begins...

Overkill
Overview
Over my dead body
Over me
Over you
Over everybody

Too much information running through my brain
Too much information driving me insane

-- The Police, "Too Much information"

Apparently, the first phase in a pregnancy is the "I'm not allowed to eat or anything" phase. Don't eat most types of fish, and even then, not much of it. Don't eat soft cheeses. Avoid caffeine. Of course no alcohol. Limit junk food. Somehow gradually increase caloric intake, particularly protein, despite these limitations.

The thing is, I know it can be done, and without too much difficulty (easy for me to say, when I don't need to do this). The problem is that there are 63 gazillion sources for what not to eat, and it seems like Kathy may end up looking at all of them. It seems as though when something ends up on any one of the lists, it's out the door. I guess it could be worse -- no nausea so far (and with luck she won't have any at all), which would preclude many more options.

And the 63 gazillion resources all mean well (particularly the friends and family), but all provide slightly different info, which creates more anxiety for Kathy, which creates more stress for me (of course you knew this was all about me). Truly, I just want to help make things as easy as possible for Kathy -- funny that the stress all these resources create in Kathy is bad for the baby that these resources are trying to assist.

Closely related to the "don't eat anything" phase is the "don't do anything" phase. With all the difficulty we've had getting pregnant, Kathy is determined not to do anything that might jeopardize the health of the fetus. Exactly what's on that list is something that she's keeping close to the vest, but woe unto me when I don't pick up on the fact that her resistance to doing something is over concern for the unborn child. And I know that I need to be more cognizant of such matters, but I much prefer it when she can put them into words.

The fact of the matter is that I haven't been the best spouse this weekend, so I probably shouldn't be complaining. Despite the fact that I drink lots of beers, usually I'm very good about not overdoing it. I drink for taste, and there comes a time when one's senses can no longer discern the details that make beers enjoyable. It is then that I stop drinking, if I haven't already, and this results in buzzes but rarely full-on drunkenness. So amid all the stress of the new pregnancy, yesterday was not a good day for me to get drunk.

We went up to Baltimore with friends of ours. While Kathy, Marie Esther and her 5-year-old daughter hit the Baltimore Aquarium, Peter and I went to a great beer bar in town, one I've gone to several times as it's possibly the best in the area (and it's only ~45 minutes away). With Kathy not drinking, it would be nice to have someone to drink with (and to share beers with), plus there were college basketball conference tournament games on TV. Knowing that time at the aquarium would probably exceed the amount of time we'd want to drink, Peter and I killed a bit of time by stopping at a beer store on the way up -- it had a new beer from Colorado that's receiving all sorts of raves over at RateBeer.

But we did get to the bar (it was a beautiful day, just the sort to spend outdoors rather than in a dark bar, but hey -- plans are plans). We each started off with a mild pint, followed by sharing four fairly strong pints. And that would be the normal stopping point. But the women were still at the Aquarium, and there I was, a kid in a candy store, so I decided to get a 750ml bottle of a Belgian beer for us to share, one that I discovered was 9.5% ABV. And after that was consumed, they still weren't ready, and there was another Belgian 750ml bottle (8%) calling my name and which we consumed. So by my rough calculations, Peter and I each drank the equivalent of a 12-pack of standard (4.5% ABV) beer. Thus, by the end of those roughly four hours of drinking, I was drunk. In the afternoon.

Kathy wasn't happy. And she was even less happy when I went to sleep right after dinner, at 7:30. She was pretty beat herself from walking around the Aquarium all day despite feeling worn down by the demands the fetus is placing on her body. Fortunately, she loves me and after a mild chewing out this morning, has forgiven me, probably remembering that she on occasion has had too much to drink herself. Nevertheless, I know she's under a lot of stress, and by my actions I put her under more. Mea culpa.

On Barleywines

Barleywine is a style of beer that's traditionally produced for the winter months -- it is bold of flavor, and strong in alcohol. Figure that the average American barleywine clocks in around 10% ABV. Their British cousins are usually somewhat milder (though not always), but at 8% or so, they are by no means mild. In beer, most of the flavor is determined by the malts and hops used. Generally speaking, malts provide for the sweet, and hops provide for the bitter. American-style BWs generally favor the hops, while British BWs usually emphasize the malts.

The first barleywine I had was Anchor's Old Foghorn, probably around 1994. That first time, I was overwhelmed by the alcohol qualities it contained, and did not appreciate them. Rogue's Old Crustacean (yes, many barleywines are called Old something) soon followed, and it too took some adjustments to my palate, but I did in fact enjoy it. Since then, I have tried well over 100 barleywines, and the style has become one of my favorites.

In recognition of their higher alcohol content, barleywines have traditionally been bottled in sizes less than 12 ounces. Both Old Foghorn and Old Crusty were for sale in roughly 7-ounce bottles, as was the most famous of the style, Thomas Hardy's Ale, a British brew. The barleywine I just consumed, Lakefront's Beer Line, was in such a traditional bottle, which is well-suited to its 10% ABV. These days, however, the smaller bottle is the exception rather than the rule. Like many wines, bigger beers can develop different characteristics as they age. Yeast is placed within the sealed bottle so the beer can continue to ferment -- this is called bottle conditioning. The thing is, the aging process works better with larger bottles, which is why the bottle of Cisco's barleywine I'm currently drinking -- Baggywrinkle -- which clocks in at a very strong 12% ABV, is 750ml (25.4 ounces for the less mathematically inclined out there), the same size as a standard bottle of wine. Unlike wine, unfortunately, an opened bottle of beer generally cannot be stored.

Thus, such large quantities of high-alcohol beer certainly produce a challenge to consume by oneself, particularly on a weeknight. I wish Kathy could share this with me, but recently she seems to be have developed an allergic reaction to bottle-conditioned beers, quite possibly from the yeast (she hasn't had any reaction to draft beers), so I will soldier on, perhaps into oblivion. Not likely though -- it's not like this is the first time I've done something like this.

Post-Party Oppression

Last post I talked about our party that's taken place the first Friday in December for the last 10 years, but I didn't discuss a newer tradition, the second night. Yes, Saturday has become the beer geek tasting, when I invite people from RateBeer, along with a few of my other beer geeky friends, to hang out and drink some rarer beers (most of which they provide). So we really serve as hosts of a non-stop beer-bash weekend. As usual, this past weekend was amazing in terms of the people who came, and in the quality and quantity of beer.

Regarding the quantity, on Thursday a neighbor came by, apologized for not being able to come on Friday, and handed over a high-quality case of beer. At 5pm the day of the party, a couple came over with three cases of beer (he's the manager of a liquor store), including a case of homebrew. So by the time we were up to two guests, we already had four cases of beer (thank goodness this year I decided not to "prime" the beer fridge). And from then on, people brought six packs or more, much of the beer relegated to sitting on the porch out back, kept chilled by the cold weather. A former co-worker of Kathy's showed up with a growler (half a gallon) of a Chicago brewpub's winter seasonal, along with another dozen bottles of top-notch beers -- I don't think we even got to try any of those on Friday. There was a fair amount of drinking, but even so, lots of beer was never was put out back to cool or refrigerated, as there was no chance it would be consumed. The later guests were all given mixed 6-packs to take home, as were those who came on Saturday night. I left a six pack with the neighbor who'd brought the case. And after giving all those beers away (~3 cases), by Sunday afternoon we were able to fit the remainder of the cold beer into the two refrigerators (I have an under-the-counter beer fridge). Barely. We needed to go grocery shopping, but there's been no place to put any of the perishables.

So I'm condemned to keep drinking through our beers, to clear out space for food. It's a thankless task, one that appears Sisyphean. Today I gave out another couple of six packs to co-workers, now we have room for orange juice. I seem to be fighting a cold, but I must keep drinking. I'm not sure it'll be enough, I think I need help. What does it mean when I've been thanking people for giving my beers a good home?

Incidentally, even once we clear out beer from the fridge, there's still lots more beer in the cupboards, and yesterday, another mixed 12-pack arrived as a make-good from someone who stiffed me a couple of months earlier.

Finally, I'd have to say that my decision last night to attend a beer tasting, despite the gallons waiting for me at home, removes any lingering doubt on the question of whether I'm sane when it comes to beer.

Party Time

This evening will be my 10th time hosting a Holiday Beer Party, the 8th time with Kathy. With one exception, the party has always been held on the first Friday of December (when my sister got married that weekend, it got moved to the following Friday), and guests who have attended most of them have learned to set aside that date in their busy seasonal calendar. Originally the party started simply as a recognition that winter seasonal beers make some of the best beers out there. Holiday beers are when brewers get the most creative, and the designation doesn't necessarily mean anything other than that the brewer decided to brew something special for the winter. Generally speaking, there are two types of winter beers. Quoting from an article I wrote a few years ago:

The first is a spiced treat - the most commonly used spices seem to be nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, orange peel, and cardamom. Probably the most well-known examples in the U.S. are Anchor Our Special Ale and Harpoon Winter Warmer. Quite a few of these beers, including Our Special Ale, change their recipes from year to year, thereby increasing the excitement associated with their annual appearances. The differences each year also encourage one to try vertical tastings, assuming you can stand to leave some to sit for a couple of years.

The second type of winter seasonal is big and bold, and likely high in alcohol. Certain barley wines, imperial stouts and Belgian-style strong ales only make their appearance to counter those brutal winter nights. Victory Old Horizontal is one example, the Belgian treat Delirium Noël another. One of the most extreme examples is the relatively recent Dogfish Head World Wide Stout, all 23% ABV of it. A few of the beers in this second category also change recipes, but even when they don?t, the beers can still vary noticeably across the years.

This isn't a party just for beer geeks, as it's anything but a formal tasting. That being said, we provide tasting glasses, which lets people drink less than a whole bottle at a time, thereby giving them a chance to sample more beers without acquiring an otherwise certain hangover (though they're still welcome to hangovers if that's what they really want). Not everyone partakes of the beer -- some even stick to soda. Imagine, some of our friends find they have a good time with us even if they're not drinking alcohol!

The first time Kathy joined me in hosting the party, she started decorating like crazy. When I asked her why, she answered that she was preparing for the Holiday "Beer Party." I tried to explain that it was a "Holiday Beer" Party, but to no avail -- now it's both (ah, the compromises one makes in a relationship).

That first year together was also the first year we started the tradition of serving up a U.S. Capitol made out of Belgian chocolate (in recognition that we live on Capitol Hill) -- it's delicious, and I find myself enjoying the leftovers for the following month. One tradition that's been around since the first party is chili. That being said, what started as a double batch of the chili I've been making regularly since college (though it's evolved considerably, and switched from ground beef to ground turkey) has turned into my making 2 quadruple batches that add special ingredients (this year each quadruple batch includes a bottle of Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout), and Kathy making a veggie chili that's about half that amount. We cook the chili at least one night in advance (that's right, this year's is already made). Aside from making it easier to do set-up when not also having to cook, it tastes better -- the meat (and in Kathy's case, the beans and veggies) does a better job of soaking up the seasonings, resulting in a more flavorful chili.

With Kathy's adherence to the "better to have too much than run out" school, we offer up a lot beyond chili and chocolate. Almost makes me wonder why we don't start the party at 6 rather than 7:30. Almost.

Hope everyone has a similarly fun holiday party to attend tonight.

I Can't Believe They Bleeped Out Shit

Beer rating is an interesting obsession -- if I'm not careful, I end up avoiding beer I know that I love because I've already rated it, in order to drink beer I don't think much of. Lately I've been trying to make more of an effort to balance my drinking so I can drink more old favorites (like this one, which I'm drinking right now). This time of year I'm more likely to drink old favorites, as I think that overall, winter seasonals are the most enjoyable. They're richer and bolder, or spiced, in a manner that goes well with the winter chill. I've already tried this year's Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout, always one of the first winter seasonals to be released, and yesterday I picked up this year's Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale, an annual favorite of mine. Truly, winter is my favorite time of the year beerwise.

On the subject of beer rating, I recently found out that I am being used. To be more accurate, a beer review of mine is being used by Great Divide Brewing on its website. Perhaps this will be the first step toward becoming a professional reviewer, a dream job if ever there were one. Not so coincidentally, the beer reviewed is Yeti Imperial Stout, the Great Divide beer to which I've given the highest rating. Yesterday while out beer shopping, I decided to pick up a bottle, to see if I still like it as much (or perhaps even more) as when I rated it, over 1 1/2 years ago. It is, after all, an old favorite.

Mr. Bad Example

Friday night we went out with friends to an Ethiopian restaurant. Our friends have a 21-month-old boy, and before dinner he asked what I was doing on the notepad I'd brought with me. His parents told him that I was rating beer, which indeed I was. The dinner itself was quite tasty, and the adults agreed that we'd need to return.

It turns out that these friends didn't know who Wallace and Gromit are, or why we're so excited about going to see the new movie (which we haven't done yet). We offered to loan them one of the short movies, but they no longer have a VCR, and we only have the movies on VHS. So with Saturday being rainy, we invited them over to see Kathy's and my favorite of the three movies, The Wrong Trousers. The couple enjoyed it quite a bit, though their son was asleep upon arrival, and so missed it. Not a big deal, I suppose, because he's not quite to the point of appreciating even short movies.

It was a little after noon when we finished watching, so we asked if they wanted to order pizza. They said yes, and we went downstairs to wait for the arrival. To keep her son occupied, Ann borrowed pen and paper we had at the kitchen desk. After he had been drawing for a while, Ann asked what he was doing. The response, clearly enunciated, was, "Rating beer."