The next great beers

Don Russell's (Joe Sixpack) latest column recently got the gears in my head turning. It's about the wave of innovation going on in Italian craft brewing. (Italy - the next great brewmaster?)

The future of craft beer is in complex flavors. Its very important to recognize that complexity need not necessarily be at the cost of drinkability. The future is in the sophistication of people's palates and new and intriguing flavors. Whether this will come from advances in the art of brewing microbiology and yeast or finding new flavors in spices and herbs - I'm not sure. But thats where we're going. Hops will never go out of style but brewers who cannot think outside of hopping extremes are doomed to repeat Imperial one-dimensionality. Those who can respect the past but have the vision and the guts to think beyond its stylistic limitations will do well. Many forward-thinking folks across many different industries are already doing it. With beer a very niche group is getting it but its really going to take changing the way people think about beer - a beverage pigeonholed to the masses by many years of effective marketing. We are starting to undo this. There is still a long way to go. We have to continue to cross lines and blur boundaries. Beer versus wine? ~ that is just the beginning. There is no room for competition or argument - as far as I'm concerned it's all art.

... Unconventional yeast strains, bacterial cultures, spices, herbs, nuts and berries, wooden aging, different aging techniques, different sources of fermentable sugars ... there is more .. we just have to dream it up.

Putting the Boots back on

PBC First brews

Well now we've done it. The clock is ticking and your taste buds may never be the same. Sunday Feb. 9th and Mon. Feb 10th were the inaugural brews here at PBC! We mixed it all together in a giant steel pot and today our fermenters are bubbling away. It's actually a little more difficult than that but I'll spare you all the nerdy details for now.

Brew #1 was Kenzinger. I can't even begin to properly elaborate on the excitement. After a month and a half of reconstruction and anticipation it was as if the whole brewery finally exhaled a deep sigh of relief. And with that came the beautifully sweet aroma of barley mash and floral hops. We fired up the burners, dusted off the mill, and roused the yeast from its cold sleep. I've never had so many people up on the brewhouse platform on a brewday. What traditionally would have made me nervous was what made the first Kensinger brew fun. I counted six different people helping to mash-out ( physically pull the grain from the mash tun). As for the brew itself ... I'll keep my analysis to myself for now - its to early in fermentation to tell - but this brew is off to a good start.

Brew #2 the next day was Walt Wit. It's been too long since Josh or I have brewed a white beer. This one is especially exciting because we get a little more room to run and play. Thats the fun in Belgian-style beers. We got to test out our secret blend of herbs and spices along with a completely different yeast strain. Our spices for this beer are untraditional and I'm confident you'll find them in few other beers ( or none). I'm not going to list the spices just yet. I just can't decide whether to tell, but stick around - they're too exciting for me not to leak them eventually. Mostly, I just don't want anyone passing judgment before having a good couple of pints. As for yeast, if you're familiar with la Chouffe's fine beers then you'll have an idea.

So far so good. Wednesday and Thursday we'll be brewing The New Bold IPA and the Philadelphia-style Rowhouse Red respectively.

It's so nice to be back.

Philadelphia Weekly PBC Story

In todays Philadelphia Weekly G.W. Miller III wrote an excellent story about us. It's a nice pat on the back to all the fine folks who have done so much good for their Kensington neighborhood while running Yards BC and will continue to do even more as PBC. Also a nice summary of our progress!

Definitly worth a read. http://www.philadelphiaweekly.com/articles/16371

~ and for the record thats Josh on the left (I'm on the right!) in the wrongly-captioned picture.

Philadelphia Brewing Co. picking up the pace

This was a big week for us.

I hadn't posted for some time since starting this blog - there wasn't a whole lot to talk about - we were just waiting to move back in. We hit the ground running.

We put the final coat of shiny new epoxy on the brewhouse floor today. Earlier in the week we prepped the floor with a diamond grinder removing the old floor completely. Two weeks ago we knocked the cinder block out of six of the big old original windows. The walls have also been coated with a brilliant white industrial epoxy/urethane. With the fresh paint and plenty of natural light the brewery has taken on a whole new ambiance. That's right, I said a brewery with ambiance. Some of us have likened the new brewhouse to an operating room. We've retained all that familiar pre-prohibition flavor and added a progressively modern brewery taste. For everyone familiar with the old look, I think you'll really be impressed.

If the smell of fresh paint doesn't get you going like it does for me, how about the smell of fresh hops? This week we received our first shipment of hops! In the new world of hop and malt shortages where prices have gone up 2 and 4 times respectively, when demand is growing, and supply is shrinking, even when you have established contacts it is easy to loose sleep. But we worked very hard and here they are! Northern Brewer, Glacier, Sterling, Perle, Willamette ... just to name a few. Very good hops. I'll save a few names just to keep the suspense.

Yesterday we filled our silo with a high quality 2 row Canadian malt. This should be an excellent base malt for the easy drinkin' full flavored beers we intend to make. Its a very light golden color, promises good extract, and has an acceptable protein content. At first taste I get a pleasant grainy sweetness - subtle but solid as a Kensington deadbolt. Is there anything those Canadians can't do? All our specialty malts came earlier in the week - the best quality German barley,wheat, oats, & rye one can buy. Things are really getting exciting.

Things like this have been routine in the past but with a new name and new brands the same people are working harder than ever. I'm continually impressed. For the sake of brevity I haven't mentioned the many other projects and upgrades we are working on here (more on those later). Everybody is working - it doesn't matter if you brew the beer, deliver it, bottle it, package it, or sell it. And we're doing it all ourselves. I feel lucky to be a part of it.

With that said, as much as I love to epoxy floors and move big tanks around I am itching to get back on that brewhouse platform and turn some grain and hops into delicious Philadelphia beer.

Its almost time ...

Here is a web album of the reconstruction so far ... breaking down and building up.

Phila BC reconstruction

Everything old is new again.

'Everything old is new again' states the first line on the website of the newly established {- but mature for it's age -} Philadelphia Brewing Company. ( PHL Brewing ) - This got me thinking. This is appropriate for so many reasons but in a broader sense it rings very true. We are at a turning point in our short history. The rise of locally crafted beers are following the reintroduction of real American wine 30 years ago and coffee 20 years ago. Sure you still have industrial light lagers, jug wine, and instant coffee - but little by little the sheep are venturing away from the herd to explore. I know this because it wasn't that long ago that I began to drift from the group. Stop me if I get too metaphorical on you.

When did efficiency become cheap? And Industry become ... mindlessly big for the sake of big? We are tired of microwave dinners, fizzy yellow beer, oxidized coffee, and a blinding sameness everywhere you go. Happy meals don't make me happy anymore. Once you see the light you just can't go back to the darkside -you can only move forward. I'm not a cynic, I'm an optimist. And what better place to start than with a beverage like beer. It has changed the design of all of our past civilizations and it is changing us now. We're putting culture back into beer and it never tasted better. Don't think for a second that this is small. This is not your fathers/mothers Revolution - this is our Evolution. We may not be the catalyst but we can be the innovators. In the words of a great man, "We didn't start the fire, no we didn't light it, but we tried to fight it."

Sustainability. Local food and drink builds community. Everything old is new again. Drinking in moderation for personal enjoyment, for social lubrication, to support your neighbors. This brings people together. Fashionable again is the local farmer, brewer, vintner, artist, businessman. This is not just a treehugger trend - this is a new necessity. This is about regular people realizing that what goes around comes around. I'm not suggesting scrapping the assembly line. But let's re-think it. You have to take a step back and look at the big picture before you realize small can be beautiful. Old ideas working in a new World.

Enlightenment. When you know ... you know. Beer is not just beer. It was carefully crafted by a passionate brewer 10 miles away. It has a toasted malt flavor on top of which flowery hops dance with seductively smooth carbonation. For so long you had thought that beer only had one flavor - and that was 'beer'. Now your morning coffee suddenly has nuances you didn't think coffee could have because it was roasted 24 hours ago at a cafe down the road. It's fair trade certified and you think to yourself ... somehow coffee tastes better when you know it wasn't harvested on the backs of third world slaves. You can finally comprehend the meaning of terroir when you drink an estate wine from a farm/vineyard down the road from your home. You realize: all the wine snobs you know aren't so snobbish anymore. To make things even better the tomatoes you picked up from the local farmers market last Saturday are the best you've ever had. Your thoughts come clearer and you can literally breathe easier because your asthma you had since childhood has gone. Could this be the product of less carbon and sulfur in the air around your home?

Everything is connected. ~ I've rambled on long enough and hopefully the point has been made. Don't be afraid to ask a few questions and make a few changes. Make the old new again.

Art and Industry

I've decided to start a blog. I resisted for a good long time but my increasing addiction to reading them has prompted me to create one. I keep a personal journal of random thoughts but i believe this can be the 'yang' to that 'yin.' There is a huge difference between writing with the intention of privacy and writing with the possibility of anyone anywhere reading. A much different level of responsibility.

Further explanation:

Art & Industry ~ For the most part I don't like titles. They tend to be very limiting in any circumstance. But they do serve a purpose and I had to choose something. I stole this title from near the corner of American/ Susquehanna St.'s in Philadelphia. Painted long ago on an old Industrial brick building are these words all in caps and with a very industrial typeface. The white letters are faded almost completely over a black background. It must be 30' long and 8' high. I drive by this everyday as i approach the Kensington neighborhood on my way to work at the brewery. * Was there ever a more eloquent and inspirational phrase? I think not. It puts a smile on my face everyday. It embodies everything I aspire to be.

So there it is. This all-encompassing titled blog will likely be filled with sometimes serious thoughts, news, current events, ramblings, nonsense, lots of brewing and beer related things, and all the things that make up the entropy of my mind. If your reading - thanks.