The Laid Off Brewer

Hello to all of my readers. No I haven't forgot about you. Just a lot of things have been going on. Lets get the ugly crap outta the way first.

Last Wednesday I was laid off from my job. We were notified 6 weeks before that there were going to be layoffs. Did I think I was going to get hit? Well, I had my own reason in my head why I could and couldn't. Overall I'm fine with the situation. As much as it sucks, they provided a very nice severance package. I've got a few leads thanks to everyone reaching out to me. Hopefully I can turn something here in the next month or two. As fun as it is being home, it does get a little old. Maybe if the weather was nicer so I could ride my bike or work out in the yard things would be different. Heck.. even get a brew or two in ;)

So let's get back to beer talk. Three weeks ago Tony, Rob, and myself brewed my Tree Huggin Hippy Pale Ale. It's an all-organic pale ale. I'm pretty excited about this beer for the summer. I've already kegged it and just waiting for it to carbonate and condition. This is my first beer that I've made with a yeast starter. I was amazed at how quickly the yeast kicked off, in about 8 hours for full bubbling in the airlock.

I plan on brewing my Helle here soon as all 3 of my kegs are full at the moment. I always like to have something lined up to fill an empty keg. The helle will take a while to make which will be perfect for timing reasons.

Also with this last brew session it was very impromptu. I sent out a small email to some people but others found out and were a little upset they didn't get the invite. (Sorry Curly!). If you'd like to be on the brewing email, just shoot me an email or drop me a line on here. I'll add you to the list. Sometimes the brewing is planned, but other times it's hours notice, not days.  

Here's some picture from the brew session with Tony, Rob, and myself. Pictures provided by Tony. Thanks guys for helping!

 

Prost!

-Ryan

New Years Resolution & Beer Prices

So I realized that I didn't inform many people about my New Years resolution. Yes I try to do the same things everyone else does.. exercise more, eat better, watch my weight, but I did another this year that I really am going to try to uphold. My goal at the beginning of year was to not buy any beer but to only buy ingredients for me to brew, with a few exceptions.

The exceptions are the following:

• Going out to a bar, restaurant, state fair, vacation, etc. 
• Going to a party or throwing our own party. As much as I love supplying my own beer, sometimes I can't afford to drain all 3 kegs. Not that it's the cost that hurts, it's the 5+ hours of brewing to replace what's in there that hurts.
• If something new comes out from one of the commercial brewers that I want to try. Example: Summit's unchained series. BTW the new Gold Sovereign is amazing. Go buy it if you're in the Twin Cities area. 

So, with that said something new came out that I wanted to buy to drink while having my impromptu Friday brew session (which I'll blog about once I get the pictures from Tony).  Stone Brewing out of Escondido, CA just started distributing here in Minnesota. I've had their beer before when I've gone to Washington. I was pretty excited to try their beer again. After contacting my local liquor store to insure they had some, I went down there to pick up a few 6 packs. This was the first time I had bought beer since christmas time. Holy sweet mother of god that beer wasn't cheap. They only had two of their beers, IPA and their Levitation ale. At $10.99 + tax a 6 pack, I bit the bullet and bought one six pack of each, but even I hesitated to spend that sort of cash on a quality product. I can really understand why people might be turned off from going outside of their save beer zone to try something different. Now granted that's cheaper then the $7.75 I paid the next night for a pint of Stone Arrogant Bastard at the bar I went to, but if you end up not liking the beer, that's a lot of cash to figure that out. I really do enjoy the places that allow for the build your own 6-pack. Reflecting on this now did make me just think that everytime I brew, I'm taking a gamble I might not like it also. Only problem is at that point I've dropped close to $30, 5 hours of my time, and I have 5 gallons of it. Lucky for me I typically have suckers friends I can pawn off offer up my beer to.

To close this, I still really encourage you all to continue to support your local brewer or another craft brewer, even if they are "larger" now such as the Boston Beer Company (Sam Adams) or New Belgium Brewing (Fat Tire). These companies are still locally owned and put a lot of pride in what they produce. If your name is Drea and I see you drinking another Bud Lite I will give you the finger, just like I promised at the Ginger Hop on Saturday night. Remember, it's not that I hate lite beer, it's just that I hate Anheuser Busch (which now own Goose Island... damnit!)

Prost!

-Ryan