Homebrewing Modus Hoperandi

The homebrewers among you might be interested in this gentleman's attempt to clone Ska Brewing Co.'s Modus Hoperandi IPA.

It doesn't surprise me that he wasn't entirely impressed by the result. Modus, which uses four different hop varieties, strikes me as a difficult beer to clone. The teeth-kicking hop flavor of that particular India Pale Ale is unique.

Generous bootleggers

A news release from the Durango Bootlegger's Society:

The Bootlegger’s Society, the local consortium of Durango’s four craft brewers, has established the Durango Bootlegger’s Society Fund under the auspices of the Community Foundation of Southwest Colorado.

The affiliation with the Community Foundation will allow the breweries to collectively donate funds to non-profits as well as organize fundraising events and obtain a liquor license (needed for beer-related events) through the Foundation. Independent donations made directly to the Bootlegger’s Fund will also be tax-deductible.

“This is a unique situation that helps to cement our philanthropic footprint in Southwest Colorado,” said Dave Thibodeau, chairman of the Bootlegger’s new fund advisory board and co-founder of Ska Brewing Co. “I feel it can become a model for other small breweries/businesses to emulate in other communities across the country.”

Ska, Steamworks Brewing Co., Carver Brewing Co. and Durango Brewing Co. originally came together as the Bootlegger’s Society with a mission to raise the awareness and understanding of craft beer by rallying around the needs of the community.

“Our first event was the ‘Pint for Pint’ blood drive back in 2003,” said Brian McEachron, co-founder of Steamworks. “Blood was running short and workers were having little success securing donations. It didn’t take long for us to conspire and decide a little friendly competition might help raise awareness. We all asked our patrons to donate a pint blood and, in return, we offered them a pint of beer at their brewery of choice.”

The “Pint for Pint” blood drive has since emerged as a “best practice” and been modeled by blood services organizations throughout the country, according to McEachron.

The Bootlegger’s Society Fund was established with an initial $1,000 generated from the Spring Tonic event held at Carver’s. Upcoming events designed to help increase the fund include Oktoberfest, Ska’s 15th Anniversary Celebration and all four “Evenings on 8th” events held each Wednesday in September, 4-8 p.m. in Downtown Durango.

“Collectively we’ve always had a desire to help out the people of our communities who have always supported us,” said Thibodeau. “Establishing the Bootlegger’s Society Fund will make it that much easier for us to do so.”

For further information regarding the Community Foundation of Southwest Colorado, or to contribute to the Bootlegger’s Society Fund on-line, visit http://www.swcommunityfoundation.org/.

Ska Brewing Co. to release ... my beer

Ska Brewing Co. President Dave Thibodeau has invited Beer at 6512's own Soggy Coaster and Beer N Bikes' blogger Jeff Hammett to each brew a beer in collaboration with Ska.

We will work with Ska Head Brewer Thomas Larsen to choose a beer style and devise a recipe. When the beers are done, they will be put on tap at Ska Brewing's headquarters in Durango.

Meanwhile, we will blog, write, photograph, drink and be merry. You get to follow the project from start to finish and drink the resulting beers.

First, this is an extraordinarily innovative project. To my knowledge, Jeff and I will be the first beer bloggers in the nation to brew a beer with a commercial craft brewer. It's a logical extension of the collaborations many breweries, including Ska, have done with homebrewers.

This raises some obvious questions. Let's start with the fun one: What to brew?

I want to choose a style that is not brewed by any of Durango's breweries. That instantly cuts the options down dramatically. Among the four of them, Durango's breweries cover an impressive variety of styles.

I considered a Belgian abbey-style ale, but Ska is soon coming out with a Belgian-style pale ale of its own. So I'm leaning toward an imperial red ale. No brewery in Durango brews an imperial red now, and I don't recall any of them doing so in the past.

Essentially, it would be a double-Pinstripe. My inspiration for this is Ninkasi Believer, an Oregon beer that comes in at 6.9 percent ABV and 60 IBUs. Using as a base Pinstripe, Ska's best-selling beer, might give us a head start.

I don't know what style of beer Jeff has in mind.

I look forward to learning more about brewing. I think I've learned quite a bit about beer, but for a beer blogger, my knowledge of the actual brewing process is pathetically limited.

I can't speak for Jeff, but for me, "working with" Larsen will mostly involve watching him brew and learning. Unless I'm distracted by whatever hairstyle he's into lately. Last I saw, he was sporting a pink mohawk.

To be clear, Ska is paying for the beer ingredients, use of their equipment and Larsen's time. I'm not making a dime from this. And although I'm grateful for this opportunity, I don't plan to begin pulling any punches on Ska or ignoring the brewery's competitors, nor would Thibodeau expect me to.

A five-gallon keg of my beer and Jeff's beer will be on tap at Ska at some undetermined date. Many of the details remain to be nailed down, including the timing, and my idea for the style could change.

But, most importantly, this should be fun. I'll let you know when I know more.

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween, dear readers. Enjoy yourselves tonight but stay safe. Drive sober, or better yet, don't drive at all because not everybody will make good choices.

I'll be enjoying Halloween with some friends and a mini-keg of Ska ESB (5.7 percent ABV, 58 IBUs).

Kegs ain't cheap. It was $57 for the five-gallon keg. That's a total of 40 pints, so it comes out to $1.43 per pint.

The other issue is the deposit, which was north of $100 for the keg and tap. Brewers in general have been charging fat deposits for kegs to make sure they come back. A couple of years ago, breweries were having big problems with people selling kegs for scrap metal.

Deposits help make sure people return the kegs, but it may be a barrier for some people to drop more than $100, even if they get the money back.

Seasonal beers on tap at Ska

One of the most fortuitous outcomes of Ska Brewing Co.'s move to a 24,000-square-foot building a year ago has been occasional tappings of some fantastic limited-run beers.

Ska purchased a small pilot system to allow its talented brewers to test their skills on small batches. One of the first of these, a Belgian amber, portended great things to come.

A visit to Ska on Monday showed the brewers have stepped up their small-batch efforts. Three very limited seasonal beers were on tap. I chose a sour, barrel-aged version of Ska's Nefarious Ten Pin Imperial Porter. The sour note was strong, a dominant taste rather than a suggestive flavor. I liked it, but a little bit went a long way, especially considering the beer's assertive alcohol content.

Also on tap were two Halloween-themed beers. I had a taster glass of a pumpkin-spiced brown ale that was delicious. It was a tad sweet with a nicely balanced pumpkin flavor. Again, one wouldn't want to drink more than a pint of it at a time, but it tasted of an experiment gone right. I didn't get to try the third beer.

These beers won't be bottled, so it behooves you to try them while they last. I look forward to seeing what comes next.

The seasons, they change

Craft beer, like leaves, changes with the seasons.

A Budweiser is always a Budweiser. There is no such thing as a fresh-hop Budweiser, nor does Anheuser-Busch InBev brew a Budweiser stout.

This is one of the great advantages and distinctions of craft brewing. Most craft breweries offer anywhere from a half-dozen to 20 distinct beers at any given time, and at least one or two will be seasonal creations.

In the earthy world of craft beer, seasons dictate brewing certain beers.

We can celebrate autumn with fresh-hop beers like Ska's Hoperation Ivy or Steamworks' Wet-Hop Brown. Or we can enjoy bottled out-of-state treats, like Deschutes' Hop Trip. Or we can taste other seasonal creations like Durango Brewing's Colorfest or Steamworks' Ale Diablo.

Just as soon as we tire of wheat beers, light lagers and other summer seasonals, the weather turns cold, encouraging us to move on to stouts, porters and dark lagers.

I've done that myself, drinking within the last week a Session Dark Lager from Full Sail Brewing in Oregon, (a near clone of Durango Brewing's Durango Dark Lager); a Black Butte Porter and a Ska Steel Toe Stout.

Steel Toe (5.4 percent ABV, 29 IBUs) has been around for quite some time, but it came to my attention again by winning a bronze medal in the sweet stout category at last month's Great American Beer Festival. It makes a fantastic dessert beer - I can vouch that it pairs wonderfully with Cherry Garcia.

It won't be long before I'll be enjoying a Backside Stout on tap at Purgatory. Summer is gone, and fall is slipping away. The current temperature in Durango is 43 degrees Fahrenheit. Luckily, we have an impressive variety of beers to keep us warm through the cold, bleak winter.

Like the sky, it's time for beer drinkers to go dark.

Changes coming to Durango Mug Club

An alert Beer at 6512 reader left a comment a while back asking if Durango's four breweries and Farmington's Three Rivers Brewery were putting the kibosh on the Mug Club.

Not exactly. Mug club is "going through a transformation," said Bill Graham, co-founder of Ska Brewing Co., via e-mail.

Essentially, a plastic card will replace the actual mug. Your bartender will swipe the card when you purchase the beer, giving you a buck off. It costs $40 to join, so you'll have to drink at least 40 locally brewed beers in a year to make it worthwhile

Here's the relevant portion of Graham's e-mail:

We are hoping to have it all set for re-upping in November. This will be the gig: A Mug Clubber will be issued a card, like our gift card ... you know, credit card-looking thing. Upon ordering a beer at any one of the five places, you give your card to the beertender and then she swipes it at the register. The deal is you get a buck off every beer all the time. So no mug, no hauling crap around, just the card in your wallet. On Wednesdays (Mug Club night), you get $2 off every beer. It’s never been done before but the Aloha person says it can be done.

Anyway, on Wednesday there will be a lottery. Take all five places electronically, the thing is tracking all of the beers sold, and the 100th beer or 50th or whatever is the winner of the lottery, you get a shirt or hat or something from the place you happen to be sitting at. We hope it will be random enough that lottery winners are evenly split between the five places. Additionally, the thing will print out whatever on the chit; we’ll offer 10 percent off food at your next visit, discounted ski tickets, a half-price board tune from Bubba’s - whatever we can come up with in the future. But for the start up phase, it will just be the buck off thing. The other cool thing is instead of a re-up period, your card is good for a year from the time of purchase. The thing is smart enough that your card will not work one minute past a year from the time you bought it, and it tells the person at the register. So now, if you buy your card in May or June, the thing is good until the following May or June, which is cool. You activate your card by using it, but for those that choose, they can register on-line and also get bonuses sent to their e-mail.

With the caveat that the details are not yet finalized, this seems to me like a good idea in the making. The chief barrier to joining the Mug Club always has been the mug itself. Who wants to lug around a mug every time they want a draft beer?

It'll be interesting to see if the club keeps its name. "Point-of-Sale Club" doesn't quite have the same ring to it.

More details will be forthcoming. It took a few days, but the Beer at 6512 investigative team always gets results. :)

Homebrewers to convene at Ska

Homebrewing clubs from Cortez, Pagosa Springs and Montrose will meet Oct. 24 at Ska Brewing Co. to taste, brag and chat about homebrewing.

It's free, and there should be a lot of good beer. The Autumn Homebrew Hoedown is intended to be a simple meet-up, with beer enthusiasts sampling brews and discussing homebrewing.

All are welcome. The hoedown begins at noon at Ska HQ, 225 Girard St., in Bodo Industrial Park.

Durango Brewing wins GABF gold, Ska earns medals

Durango had a big showing at last weekend's Great American Beer Festival in Denver.

Durango Brewing Co. won gold in the American-style amber lager category for its Durango Colorfest fall seasonal. Colorfest (6.2 percent ABV, 21 IBUs), is on the shelves now in 22-ounce bomber bottles.

Ska Brewing Co. won three medals: silver, English-style brown ale, for Buster Nut Brown; bronze, English-style summer ale, for True Blonde Ale; and bronze, sweet stout, for Steel Toe Stout.

The GABF is the Super Bowl of beer competitions; none is more prestigious. It's a big accomplishment to win any medals, and Durango Brewing and Ska deserve hearty congratulations for their wins.

Some 495 breweries participated, entering 3,308 beers in the competition. Attendance totaled 49,000.

Colorado breweries won 45 medals, outperforming any other state.

A friend who attended sent me this: "Admittedly, as amazing as it was, I really need to go with a battle plan next time. There's so much to taste and you can get really, really lost if you don't plan out your visits. LOT of crappy beers. But then again, a lot of great ones."

Brewers tend to bust out some special beers for GABF, like barrel-aged treats. I wasn't able to go this year. Maybe next time ...

Ska releases Euphoria Pale Ale

Ska Brewing Co. has released Euphoria Pale Ale, a winter seasonal, in cans.

Previously, this beer has been available only around Durango. Ska's new brewing facility and canning line have allowed the company to release this one more widely. Don't be surprised if it makes it to the Denver area's finer liquor stores.

I went straight to the source, buying a six-pack of 12-ounce cans for $8.49 at Ska HQ.

This is also the first time Euphoria has been available in cans. The can design is very cool, dominated by a deep, almost purplish blue. Ska's familiar skeleton is wearing winter garb, clad in a black-and-white checkered scarf. This will look familiar to Modus Hoperandi drinkers.

It's literally been years since I've drank Euphoria. I look forward to cracking one open.

Hoperation Ivy released today

Ska Brewing Co.'s Hoperation Ivy was scheduled to be released today.

Hoperation Ivy is a fresh-hop IPA, brewed with the bounty of San Juan Hop Farms near Montrose. It is no. 13 in the Durango brewery's Local Series.

It should be in Durango liquor stores in 22-ounce bomber bottles.

I haven't tried it yet, but last year it was a very tasty, aggressively hopped ale. If you haven't tried any fresh-hop beers, you owe it to yourself to drink a bottle. Fresh-hop ales have a more floral and oily quality that less fresh beers just can't duplicate.

Fresh-hop (also called wet-hop) beers are exceedingly popular in regions lucky enough to have hop farms. These beers involve driving to nearby farms, choosing the hops, then driving back and getting the hops into a brew kettle in a hurry.

Deschutes Brewery in Oregon and Sierra Nevada in California brew fresh-hop beers that show up on our local shelves.

Steamworks Brewing, last I heard, was also brewing a fresh-hop beer using San Juan Hop Farms hops. I'll let you know when I have more information on their edition.

You can read more about Ska's hop trip to Montrose below.

Update: It's on the shelves for sure, at least at Ska HQ.

Fall brings seasonal crop

Just about everybody is brewing up something special for fall. Let's get to it:

Durango Brewing Co. is brewing a batch of a new Helles bock for fall. The German-style lager will be on tap, but not bottled. DBC's Colorfest fall seasonal (6.2 percent ABV, 21 IBUs) is out now.

Steamworks is shooting for an Oct. 16 release for its Ale Diablo. This year's edition uses a Belgian yeast strain and the juice of Riesling grapes. It'll be in 22-ounce bomber bottles, and presumably on tap. Also, Steamworks should have a fresh-hop beer out in a few weeks.

Ska's own wet-hopped beer, Hoperation Ivy, will be released in bombers Sept. 22 as part of Ska's Local Series. (See post below for more info). Merlo Stout is still around.

Carver's currently has its Monkeywrenched IPA on tap. I tried it yesterday, and it has an incredible, floral nose and a big alcohol bite.

Avery Brewing Co.'s The Kaiser is on the shelves in 22-ounce bomber bottles. The Kaiser (9.3 percent ABV, 24 IBUs) is Avery's imperial Oktoberfest lager. I haven't tried it, but such a big lager should be interesting. For more information, check out Avery's own Facebook page and blog.

Update: New Belgium has released its own fall seasonal, Hoptober Golden Ale. Hoptober (6 percent ABV, 40 IBUs) will be available through November. It was brewed with Centennial, Cascade, Sterling, Willamette and Glacier hops, pale and wheat malt, rye and oats.

“This beer is a Hop Lover’s dream within the Belgian idiom,” said Bryan Simpson, New Belgium spokesman, in a news release. “This beer is hop-forward but very well-balanced with generous mouthfeel.”

Elsewhere on the Internets

The New York Times has an amusing article about Dogfish Head, the much-hyped Delaware brewery, trying to make a traditional Peruvian beer called chicha. Chicha involves using corn that has been chewed by the brewers. Yes, you would be drinking brewer spit.

Such is the pull and repulsion of Dogfish Head. They brew a lot of interesting, boundary-pushing beers, but not all of it makes sense, works out or tastes good.

Elsewhere, Fermentedly Challenged reviews Ska's Modus Hoperandi IPA. He liked it, with the caveat that it must be paired with food. I love Ska, but for my taste, Modus is simply too bitter.

Ska's hop harvest

Ska Brewing Co. will release its fresh-hop IPA on Sept. 22.

Hoperation Ivy uses hops from San Juan Hop Farms near Montrose. This is from Ska:

Last summer, while returning to Durango with a truckload of Cascade hops that had just been harvested by a crew of Ska employees, co-founder Bill Graham had a revelation: “My truck smelled like hops, I smelled like hops, and I thought to myself, using locally-grown hops that we just picked a few hours ago is going to make an incredible beer," he said in a news release provided by Ska. "It’s a very unique, seasonal beer that can only be brewed once a year, and it is also low impact. That’s why there’s such a buzz around using local ingredients in food, and beer is food, right?”

Ska is once again traveling a few hours north to San Juan Hop Farms, and harvest Colorado-grown Cascade hops to create another batch of wet-hopped India Pale Ale. Generally, when hops are harvested they are dried and pressed into pellets but fresh hop, or “wet hop” beers use whole flowers that were plucked from the vine just hours before and still retain most of the volatile flavors that are lost during processing.

As Graham realized, it’s not only an opportunity to create an “almost” local beer, it’s also a chance to reduce the carbon footprint associated with producing a craft beer. Ska co-founder Dave Thibodeau said the brewery jumped at the opportunity to work with a Colorado hop farm. “We’ve always focused on trying to minimize our impact on the planet as the business grows," he said. “Using local ingredients means fewer ingredients we have to transport here from the Northwest or Europe, and that’s about the biggest reduction in impact you can get.”

Hoperation Ivy will be Ska's 13th Local Series beer. Fresh-hop beers do have a unique flavor that is difficult to explain - they're oilier somehow. I enjoyed Ska's fresh-hop beer last year, and look forward to the 2009 edition. Hop-heads should love it.

Review: Merlo Stout (Ska)

Mmm ... oak.

Ska Brewing Co.'s twelfth Local Series release, Merlo Stout, hit the shelves Aug. 25 in 22-ounce bomber bottles.

Merlo Stout is the creation of Chris Vest, a 50-year-old Cortez man who realized the dream of every homebrewer in having his beer brewed by a commercial brewery.

Vest's stout won the Osiris Homebrew Competition in February. As his prize, Ska brewed Vest's beer for a limited commercial release.

Merlo Stout was aged in oak barrels to mimic the merlot taste in Vest's original recipe. Commercial brewers are prohibited from mixing wine and beer.

Stout, of course, is the king of dark beers. Just about every craft brewer makes a version, but they can differ greatly. There are dry stouts, like Guinness, and imperial stouts like Great Divide Yeti. There are chocolate stouts, oatmeal stouts and coffee stouts. Others too numerous to list.

This is the first time I've heard of a merlot stout.

Merlo Stout is big - 9.6 percent ABV. It pours very dark, with a small, tan head that was actually less robust than I expected.

A strong oak taste is most prominent at first. Initially I was disappointed. I had been expecting a stronger fruity wine note. It tasted almost more like a strong ale rather than a stout.

Ah, but give it a chance. As the glass warmed, that wine note I had been looking for emerged. Malts came into play. My mistake was in serving the bottle straight out of the refrigerator - much too cold.

Take your Merlo Stout out of the fridge at least 10 minutes before you want to drink it. Trust me, this will allow those flavors to come in from the cold.

Given Merlo Stout's strong alcohol content, drinking it with a meal isn't a bad idea, either. Such a beefy stout surely pairs well with all sorts of dishes.

Merlo Stout is deep, complex and tasty. I was hoping for a stronger fruity wine taste, which would have balanced the big body nicely. Nevertheless, an interesting and fairly innovative Local Series beer from Ska. B+

Hop harvest

Deschutes Brewery in Oregon posted this pic on its Flickr account. Each year, Deschutes makes a "hop trip" to get ingredients to brew its Hop Trip fresh hop pale ale, out in the fall.

Incidentally, Ska Brewing did something similar last fall.

Most American hops come from the Pacific Northwest. It's funny to hear hops named after places I've tromped around - Cascade, Chinook, Mt. Hood, Willamette.

Sales up at Durango breweries

I wrote a short article for The Durango Herald about rising sales at Ska, Steamworks and Durango breweries.

All three are seeing double-digit increases in sales, even during a slow economy.

Ska's Merlo Stout hits the shelves

And here it is: Ska Brewing Co.'s pro-am Merlo Stout, released as #12 in the brewery's Local Series.

It hit the shelves throughout Durango just today. I found it for $5.29 per 22-ounce bomber bottle at my neighborhood liquor store. I'll let you know how it tastes with a review later this week, but the brewers are enthusiastic.

Merlo Stout - the spelling is intentional - was brewed with Chris Vest, a homebrewer who won Ska's Osiris Hombrewing Competion during the Snowdown festival. It was aged in oak barrels to mimic Vest's original recipe that included actual merlot, and it will be entered in the 2009 Great American Beer Festival's pro-am competition.

Ska to release "merlo" stout

Ska Brewing Co. will release what promises to be a very interesting beer on Tuesday, Aug. 25: a barrel-aged "merlo" stout.

The recipe comes from a Cortez man, Chris Vest, who won the Osiris Homebrew Competition during the Snowdown festival in February. The prize: Ska promised to brew his beer for commercial release.

Vest's stout originally used the red wine merlot in the recipe. Unfortunately, the feds prohibit commercial brewers from mixing beer and wine (I know, dumb, huh?). So Ska instead aged the stout in oak barrels to get what they say is a similar taste. Ska also renamed the beer "Merlo Stout" to appease the feds.

Merlo Stout is big - 9.6 percent alcohol by volume, according to a news release.

Ska Head Brewer Thomas Larsen said the stout's aromas of "coffee, earthy hops, alcohol and a hint of smoke jump from the smooth blackness of this complex stout. For such a strong stout, the light body makes for a surprisingly quaffable brew.”

Merlo Stout also will be entered in the 2009 Great American Beer Festival's pro-am competiton.

Ska didn't mention it, but if Merlo Stout acts like other imperial stouts, it should age well. You might want to buy a couple of bottles and put one in a corner of your refrigerator for a few months.

Merlo Stout will be released in 22-oz. bomber bottles as part of Ska's Local Series, so it should be in liquor stores around Durango. If you're from outside the area, you're out of luck. And for those who live here, it won't last long.

Review: Wheelsucker Wheat Ale (Ska/Avery)

It was a good and lucky thing that Ska Brewing Co. joined forces with their brothers to the north at Avery Brewing Co. to brew a collaboration beer.

Some of the best beers in the country have resulted from collaborations - Collaboration Not Litigation (Avery and Russian River Brewing) is a notable Colorado example. And Ska and Avery are both excellent breweries.

The brewers settled on a wheat ale, a good choice for a summer release. Wheat beers easily take flavors, most often orange peel or coriander, but one of the best I've had recently was a prickly pear-flavored hefeweizen from Santa Fe Brewing.

There was never any question that Wheelsucker Wheat Ale would be more than a typical wheat. Avery's involvement ensured that. The brewery's special releases are almost always amped-up, or "imperial," beers containing at least 7 percent alcohol, and sometimes more than twice that.

Adam Avery and his crew came to Durango July 1 to brew Wheelsucker along with Ska head brewer Thomas Larsen. Wheelsucker was released July 24 in 22-oz. bomber bottles. It is also available on tap at Ska and, I hear, Lady Falconburgh's Barley Exchange.

Wheelsucker pours triumphantly, a cascade of bubbles rising to form a substantial creamy white head. It quickly settles down, an indication of the beer's strong alcohol content (around 6.6 percent).

The mouthfeel is very full; it's almost a little bready. It reminds me somewhat of an orange smoothie.

Flavor comes in waves, first a full wheat taste, and then a moderate orange note. It goes down exceptionally easy. This is a beer one could drink in substantial quantity if not for the assertive presence of alcohol.

In short, I loved it. Wheelsucker tastes great and mixes easily with Sprite or syrups to create a Radler, a traditional German drink. It's a refreshing summer ale and a notable accomplishment for two breweries that, despite their excellent lineups, have little experience with German styles.

Soggy Coaster would also like to make note of the price. Wheelsucker is available around Durango for about $4 plus sales tax per 22-oz. bomber bottle. That's cheaper than most of Ska and Avery's own bombers, not to mention expensive out-of-state breweries. It's as good or better than beers more than twice its price. Get it while you can.

Wheelsucker is the best wheat beer I have ever drank. Nevertheless, the style lacks the complexity of say, the best saisons, abbey ales and imperial stouts. Even the best wheat ale cannot measure up to the very best beers in the world. Yet Wheelsucker accomplishes all a wheat ale can be, and Soggy Coaster heartily recommends it. A-