20 teams of fierce amateur chefs bring their hot dog prowess to this competition and fundraiser to benefit local charities including Food Bank of New York City. This annual event has grown from a friendly grill off to a hot dog throw down of epic proportions. Don’t miss this opportunity to get some hot dog inspiration. Visit The Great Hot Dog Cookoff website for information and tickets!
What is KIMCHIPALOOZA? Mama O’s Kimchi is going all out at this year’s CookoutNYC event on Governors Island (July 10th- a featured event of July Good Beer Month) and putting together a mess of Kimchi contests including a Homemade Kimchi Contest, Creative Cooking with Kimchi Contest, a Daikon Kimchi Eating Contest and A Super Spicy Kimchi Eating Contest! For rules and more information, check out Mama O’s Kimchee and join in the fun at CookOutNYC.
Just last week, brewer, author, intrepid beer personality and Brewer’s Association President, Charlie Papazian called in to Beer Sessions Radio (TM) causing a bit of buzz amongst some of our close friends in the beer industry. Ben Granger of Brooklyn’s treasured (and recent Good Beer Seal inductee) Bierkraft had this to say in a recent correspondence with Beer Sessions Radio’s host, Jimmy Carbone:
“THE CHARLIE PAPAZIAN? I have and old ass copy of the Joy Of Homebrewing and suggest it to all of the new home brewers that come to Bierkraft. The man is a legend! Please tell him he has much respect in Brooklyn from us. Now [in response to your question re: deans of beer after Michael Jackson] beer “deans” or figureheads when speaking of Charlie Papazian is a difficult comparison. Charlie is a science teacher/home brewer that has climbed to the top of the heap by simply being a bad ass. Most of the figureheads in beer now are commercial brewers, who are recognized for brewing the beers that we drink on a daily basis and have the ability to market themselves as brands. Michael Jackson and Charlie Papazian are quite different in that they were born almost out of Counterculture. They rose to fame and popularity by simply being real people who worked in different aspects of our industry. It is tough to compare to guys like this, I mean they really were and are legends. I guess the real question is; who are the new champions of beer without being brewers or brewery owners? People who have moved the industry forward without letting it lose sight of its past: The Alstrom Brothers, Tom Peters, Alex Hall, Ray Daniels and John Palmer, to name a few.
This is a tough question because I would lump Mike J. and Chuck P. into the same group as Louis Pasteur, Duke William the IV of Bavaria (Reinheitsgebot), and Billy Carter as people who have helped direct the course of craft beer over time into the place we know it today.
Please tell Charlie Papazian that Ben Granger and the staff at Bierkraft say thanks.”
And thanks to you, Ben Granger, for sharing your thoughts with us. We’ll relay the message!
Craft Brewing Meets Green Development: A Forum Over Food & Drink
This year’s July Good Beer Month will throw the spotlight on 34 Good Beer Seal Bars, local brewers, charitable organizations, delicious food and great New York City destinations. Keep watching this website for special offers, pub crawl suggestions, and information about upcoming events. Here is a taste of some of the great events of July Good Beer Month 2011! See our July Good Beer Month page or click on the logos for more details.
Craft/Beer/Jam at WNYC's Greene Space
Also, check out the Thrillist Rewards we have set up for July Good Beer Month! Here’s how it works: for $30 you get a choice of a curated 4 beer craft flight or a full pour (selected by a knowing bartender!) at one of 20 participating Good Beer Seal Bars. Each $30 Passport is good from July through September 30, 2011. If you are among the First 10 People to fully complete the Passport you’ll get a 1 on 1 beer lesson during NY Craft Beer Week at Jimmy’s No. 43!
A great beer crowd assembled to welcome the new bars into the ranks of The Good Beer Seal. Great beer was flowing and Barcade pulled out all the stops to host a great celebration. There was food from Lorimer Market, Jimmy’s No. 43 and Sam Barbieri of Waterfront Ale House brought some of his famous BBQ offerings for revelers to enjoy with their beloved beers. Brewers, bar owners, beer reps, beer writers and serious beer fans jammed the place with joyful discussion as they awaited the announcement of the Good Beer Seal Class of 2011. When the big moment came, each bar was greeted with delighted whoops and whistles from the crowd. When the announcement was over, no one wanted to go home. Why should they? There was still more beer!
The New York Observer covered this week’s event, which you can read HERE, but the biggest news to come out of Tuesday’s Good Beer Seal Awards is that July Good Beer Month is just around the corner. If you missed the party (or if you went and wished there was still MORE party!) don’t worry. An entire month of great beer events awaits you. Keep an eye on our calendar for updates on July Good Beer Month events and visit your favorite (or a NEW favorite) Good Beer Seal bar today.
Summer is clearly on its way and with it comes July Good Beer Month, a monthlong celebration of New York City, its craft beer bars, and its vibrant beer culture. The good beer fan can look forward to everything from Cookout NYC to the 3rd Annual Good Beer at BAM to bar specific events around the city. You can find all the information about July Good Beer Month events right here, so keep checking back for more great events.
The countdown to July Good Beer Month starts on June 14th when The Good Beer Seal will announce the 2011 inductees into The Good Beer Seal. A panel of beer writers has been hard at work looking at New York City good beer bars to decide which independently owned watering holes will earn the Seal. Will your favorite bar make the cut? You’ll have to wait until June 14th to find out!
On May 3, Beer Sessions Radio (TM) was able to sit down with Brooklyn Brewery founder and local beer historian Steve Hindy. To say that Steve is an interesting fellow would be a gross understatement. He’s Brooklyn’s own International Man of Mystery and we’re pretty sure he could take the Dos Equis guy down in under 5 seconds.
How and when did beer and brewing history become a part of your life?
When I worked for Associated Press in the Middle East, I met American diplomats who had worked in Saudi Arabia, where there is Islamic law—no alcoholic beverages. These guys all made their own beer at home. It was delicious, and I took up homebrewing when I returned to NYC. We settled in Brooklyn, and I went to work for Newsday. Being an editor was not the same as reporting from the field. I felt a little antsy. I started reading about these microbreweries that were starting up, mostly on the West Coast. I was jogging in Prospect Park one day when I saw another runner with a sweaty old t-shirt that said: BREWERIES OF BROOKLYN. I stopped him and asked where he got the shirt. It was Will Anderson, author of an out-of-print book about the history of brewing in Brooklyn. I read the book and became an expert on the history of brewing in Brooklyn.
How does one make the switch from journalism to beer?
Most journalists love beer. I had been a beer drinker since high school. The idea of starting a brewery was like a magical quest to me. And I enlisted my downstairs neighbor, Tom Potter, a banker with an MBA, to help me get started.
Knowing what you know now, would you choose to start a brewery in Brooklyn today? How would that venture be the same/different today than 20 years ago?
There are two other breweries in Brooklyn today, and more on the way. I think it is much easier to get started today mainly because all wholesalers, including the best, are now very eagerly courting craft breweries. When I started, they wouldn’t give us the time of day. That is why we distributed our own beer, and a great line-up of U.S., Belgian, British and German beers, for 17 years.
So many small brewers today are facing questions of expansion both of their output and geographic reach. What factors played a part in the decision to go ahead with your recent expansion project and what lessons have you learned along the way?
We brew our draft ales and specialty beers in Brooklyn. That part of our business has been growing rapidly. We looked for more space to expand for five years, unsuccessfully. There was a residential real estate boom in Brooklyn that raised property values beyond our reach. When the economy crashed, we were able to find more space adjacent to our current brewery. We moved quickly to expand our operations and have no regrets. Are sales are up more than 40% in the first quarter of this year.
What could be better than great food, delicious, beer and an afternoon on NYC’s island getaway? How about two afternoons?! Brewers PicNyc is brought to you by Food Karma Projects (producers of Pig Island, Meatopia 2010 and Brewers 4 Brewers), Brewers’ PicNyc is a two-day celebration (May 29-30/11am-5pm) of everything that makes NYC great: street food, craft beer and music on Governors Island’s historic Colonels’ Row.
A portion of the proceeds will go to Added Value Farm – a sustainable farm on Governors Island. This is Governors Island’s official 2011 kickoff, and the unofficial beginning of summer, so spend your Memorial Day weekend with us – and about 5,000 of your neighbors – eating well and doing good.
For tickets and more information, visit the Brewers PicNyc website and make your Memorial Day plans!
This week is being billed as The Mother of All Beer Weeks by the Brewer’s Association. Julia Herz, a Brewer’s Association spokesperson recently told us, ” Beer weeks are giving craft beer fans across the U.S. ever-increasing options to enjoy and share the beverage they love. Beer weeks celebrate the culture and community of craft beer, and give breweries and beer businesses the opportunity to connect with the fans…This week recognizes the efforts of today’s U.S. smaller breweries and also cheers today’s beer lovers who have made the shift in our beer culture go beyond light American Lager.”
For more information about American Craft Beer Week, visit CraftBeer.com.
What are the challenges in making an organic beer that may be different from a beer not labeled organic?
The main difficulty with brewing organic beer compared with “regular” beer is just the sourcing of ingredients. Obviously, we have to be more careful where they come from and can’t spot buy them off the market as much. This has become a positive for us, however, because it has led to many personal relationships with farmers.
After a long battle, organic hop growers have finally won their fight to require beers labeled organic to be brewed with organic hops (For more information on this issue, click here.) Will the upcoming, new organic hop regulations have an effect on Peak Organic?
We planned far in advance for the new hop regulations and now have some of the most amazing hop varietals being grown for us organically, including Amarillo, Cascade, Centennial, Summit, Simcoe, Citra, and more. We went to the source, in the Yakima, and forged great relationships with the farmers themselves.
In what ways can the beer industry at large improve on issues of sustainability?
This is a question with many answers, and many of them not specific to the beer industry. More renewable energy, more responsible farming, etc. Comparatively, brewers are actually pretty good at this, and aware.
Chef’s collaborative is a group that promises to use local and sustainable ingredients in their restaurants, so we have a natural synergy with them as far as mission goes. Then we make a beer with them, the Maple Oat Ale, that uses organic Maine oats and organic Vermont maple syrup.
Are there any upcoming events/ releases/ other news about Peak Organic that you would like our listeners to know about?
We just finished our last Single Hopped Seasonal – our Simcoe Spring Ale. Each of our seasonals is a showcase for a specific hop variety – that we created to make sure all the more badass hops had a definite demand. Our Summer Session will follow and is hopped with Amarillo, Fall Summit with Summit and Winter Session with Citra. I’ll have some Simcoe Spring to try out on everybody, its killer.
Joy and Jeremy brought in a selection of delectable ciders made in their Brooklyn home from locally sourced apples. Jeremy used his knowledge from his time in France working with wine makers to develop their home cider making process which currently yields a little over 100 gallons of cider each year.
The cider making season begins in late August and stretches to Thanksgiving, allowing Joy and Jeremy to harvest, sweat, wash, chop, grind, press, and ferment, their ciders. In 2010, Joy says they picked 21 different varieties which added up to 1600 pounds of apples. Joy was kind enough to break down the process for us this way:
Harvest: Each apple is chosen for a different job; sweet, aromatic, tart, astringent, etc. I like to stick with the older apples because they have amazing complex flavors that just aren’t present in newer/popular apples…[the cider apples] some of them taste like poison but make pretty amazing juice!
Sweat: We let the apples sit for about 2 weeks after picking. We to this to develop the apple sugars and concentrate the flavors.
Wash and Chop: We deal with a lot of small orchards using organic methods and aren’t sure what protein is going to add to the final product. So, we wash all the apples and at least quarter them to determine whether they have a resident and so that they can fit into the grinder hole.
Grind: [We use] a home-built modified garbage disposal.
Pressing Apples
Press: [We now use] a steel shop press. Pulp gets folded into cloth, stacked between plates of HDPE, pressure is applied with a hydraulic jack and the juice is collected in 25 gallon brew buckets.
Ferment: We use wine yeast and basically re-hydrate it and pitch it in the juice. Primary fermentation takes place in plastic buckets or an oak barrel. When primary is over, we rack off to glass carboys or the stainless steel tank.
Taste and Blend Juice: Around March everything has pretty much dropped clear and this is when we start tasting and considering our different blends. We really only started blending in the past few years as we moved into using heritage and true cider apples. Another reason is that we are dealing with different apples that have all been picked and pressed at different times, and in different quantities, that sometimes even age differently.
Tasting and Blending Ciders
Bottle: We bottle as much as we can when we have time and have enough bottles.
The resulting ciders are complex, flavorful and definitely something to talk about! If you want to know more about this urban cider making duo, tune in to Episode 53 of Beer Sessions Radio (TM).
Thank you to Joy and Jeremy for the wonderful ciders and the great pictures! For more information about Joy and Jeremy check out their Slanty Cider page on Facebook.
Tickets for Kelso’s 6th Annual Great Hot Dog CookOff go on sale July 1st!
(July 10th- a featured event of July Good Beer Month) and putting together a mess of Kimchi contests including a Homemade Kimchi Contest, Creative Cooking with Kimchi Contest, a Daikon Kimchi Eating Contest and A Super Spicy Kimchi Eating Contest! For rules and more information, check out Mama O’s Kimchee and join in the fun at CookOutNYC.
Just last week, brewer, author, intrepid beer personality and Brewer’s Association President, 
On May 3, Beer Sessions Radio (TM) was able to sit down with 
What could be better than great food, delicious, beer and an afternoon on NYC’s island getaway? How about two afternoons?! 
