"We Are Craft Brewers"

The Brewers Association announced this morning that it was adding grodziskie and adambier to the ever-expanding list of official styles.  (More on that soon.)  I happened to be looking through my notes on an interview with New Belgium's Peter Bouckaert this morning, too, and I found a nice resonance between a comment he made and that news.

Credit: Brewpot

Obscure styles may have some commercial prospects, but probably not.  Yet brewers make them anyway.  When I spoke to Bouckaert, I asked him why New Belgium spends so much money on the foeder program, a project that--in an era when another brewery may be plausibly watering down their light lagers--can't be a huge profit center.  Here's what he said.

“One of the meanings of ‘La Folie’ is that it’s a business endeavor you’re sure to lose money on so we thought that was a great name for it. Why would you overly dry-hop a beer? Why would you do something stupid like that? Why would you make something that is the highest alcohol beer? We are craft brewers. That’s what we do. We are creating different flavors; we are reviving older beers that used to exist and faded away. Maybe there were financial reasons they faded away and that’s a good reason for us not to do it.”

The phrase "craft brewery" has become nearly meaningless in modern usage, but I would agree with Peter that projects like New Belgium's qualify as actual "craft."  That's why you'd brew an adambier or grodziskie, too.

New Belgium Now Employee-Owned

Fascinating news from Fort Collins:

It's true, we are. Up to this point (well, December 28, 2012) the employees of New Belgium owned 41% of the total company. The controlling share was owned by our co-founder and CEO, Kim, and her family. Well, we bought it. As of December 29, 2012 the employees own the whole she-bang. New Belgium is now 100% ESOP (Employee Stock Ownership Plan). 

The attached press release also mentions that the future workers in the new North Carolina plant will also be owners.  I've always run hot and cold with New Belgium's beers, but as a company, they make incredibly good citizens. 

Photo: Tracy at The Slow Life.

New Belgium has one of the greenest facilities in the world, and they have long been a leader in supporting charitable activities.  Now that they have hundreds of co-owners, we can add great labor relations to the checklist.

The idea of American "craft-brewing" has always had a quasi-ethical component to it--one I mostly abjure.  It's easy enough to get lost in the weeds of ethics when you're talking about fermented barley juice, particularly when you're trying to use those ethics to carve out special places for those with purportedly superior qualities.  [cough]Brewers Association[cough].

On the other hand, there's absolutely no reason not to celebrate those breweries that really do make an effort to make the world better for their customers, their workers, and their communities.  Full Sail went ESOP in 1999 and is also incredibly green.  England's Adnams actually turns their waste into biogas.  Breweries are really quick to sponsor charity events--Deschutes has been a leader on this score, but you could run down the list and find brewery after brewery participating--often with little fanfare--in charity events.  We can endorse these fine practices by drinking their beer, and I am all in favor of that.  This may be a good excuse to go find a Tart Lychee. 

Straight Outta the Foeders: Blending With New Belgium

My excursion through the old breweries of Belgium was both intoxicating and alarming.  It was a joy to see traditional practices still retaining viability in a brutal modern marketplace--but alarming to see how few practitioners still remained.  On Monday, I got acquainted with New Belgium's wood-aging program at a symposium for PDX Beer Week.  It was heartening to see a brewery pick up where so many in Belgium have left off. 

This is the second year New Belgium has been doing these symposia, and they manage to serve as a crash course in Blending 101 and even a pretty fair virtual tour.  The first part of the evening is devoted to a slideshow narrated by the married team of Salazars--brewer Eric and blender Lauren--from the brewery.  It's not the immersive experience you get by visiting the brewery, but it ain't bad.  After a brisk journey through the brewhouse, they turn to the cellar where the real action happens.

New Belgium's wood program is pretty amazing.  The importance of wood in the care and nurturing of wild yeasts is critical, and a feature that distinguishes certain beer styles.  As beer ages in wood, oxygen enters the slightly porous container and feeds a chemical process where alcohols are converted to acids and esters (among other, sometimes less savory, compounds).  You can't make lambic or the Flanders style characterized by Rodenbach without wood.  Indeed, it's not easy to make some of these beers in anything less than very large wooden tuns (foeder in Dutch, foudre in French) because the flow of oxygen has to be just right.  In large vessels, where the surface area is low (far lower than in wine barrels) and the oak staves thick, the oxygen just worms its way in molecule by molecule.

New Belgium's foeders.  Photo by Todd Gillman.

Over the course of the past decade plus, New Belgium has quietly been picking up massive foeders ranging in size from 60 hectoliters to over 200--with a preponderance at 130.  They've managed to score them the same way the Belgians did--by scooping up cast-offs from wineries.  There's a pleasing quality of symbiosis in the arrangement, because after a certain number of years the wine will no longer pick up oak tannins--which is exactly what wild-beer breweries want.  After the wood character is gone, they're perfect for lambic and tart Flanders ales.  Amazingly, these old tuns will last decades; Rodenbach still has three that date back to the 1830s. 

Apparently now there's a bit of a run on them in the American market as other breweries try to score their own--but New Belgium has already gathered quite a trove.  After the a new set of foeders arrive, they'll have 3200 hectoliters of capacity--a massive quantity compared to other breweries, but just a drop compared to the brewery's total capacity.

New Belgium makes two beers to put in the foeders, Oscar, a dark ale with a grist very similar to 1554 lager (14-15 Plato) and Felix--get it?--a slightly stronger (17 Plato), light-colored ale.  Listening to Lauren talk, I heard this familiar echo that came all the way from Roeselare.  New Belgium's process isn't exactly like Rodenbach's, but the fidelity to wood-aging and acidification sounded so much like what Rudi Ghequire told me.  This isn't too shocking; New Belgium's Peter Bouckaert came to Fort Collins from Rodenbach in 1996.  The program that would result in La Folie--really the only example of a credible commercial Flanders red/brown I know outside Belgium--began a year after he arrived.

In Rodenbach's process, the foeders are filled and left to ripen for roughly two years.  Batches of old beer are blended together to form a "mother blend" which is then blended back with young beer.  New Belgium does something more along the lines of a solera project.  Lauren, who is the principle blender, samples beer from each foeder and takes notes on what she finds.  She then creates a master blend of different proportions of each foeder--30 hl from Foeder 1, 60 from #2, 70 from #3 and so on--leaving the foeders partly full.  Eric replenishes them with fresh beer and they let them ripen further until its time to make a new batch.  So each foeder may have a more aged or younger character, depending on when it was last replenished and by how much.

Incidentally, Peter used tons of different bugs in the original inoculation, including strains of pediococcus, lactobacillus, and brettanomcyes.  This is similar to Rodenbach as well, but the proportion of brett is a lot higher at New Belgium.  (Another funny parallel.  Rodenbach used to supply all the area breweries with their yeast, a practice they finally curtailed when Palm bought them in 1998.  New Belgium did, too, until other breweries started gathering accolades for the beer made with their yeast.)  I can imagine style Nazis complaining that La Folie is too funky with brett to be considered authentic.  Hogwash.  This is the beer New Belgium wants to make, and the brewers and blenders relish the brett character.  (American in general seem more tolerant of brett than Belgians.)

The last thing we did at the symposium was try a blend of our own beer.  New Belgium had racked off four firkins from Foeders 2, 7, 8, and 14.  We all got samples of each and did our best effort to mix up a master blend.  La folie ("the madness") indeed.  It's a whole different post, but I'll say this: blending is hard.  I would say that the skill of a good blender is an order of magnitude rarer than the skill of a good brewer.  (Let's not even speak of bloggers.)  You have to have an exceptional palate and a talent for understanding how the flat, warmish beer you're swirling together will taste when its carbonated and chilled.  I once watched Ron Gansberg begin the blending process for his sublime Apricot Ale, and what he came up with tasted kind of raw and harsh to me.  Somehow Ron could understand the language that beer was speaking and knew what that blend would ultimately taste like.  It was probably Flemish. 

A great time, and one I'd encourage you to experience if you ever have the chance.  Most beer events are high on the sensual aspects but low on educational ones.  This was high-fiber larnin.  We could use more of them.

La Folie is Really Good

On my way to a social gathering last night, I stopped off at Belmont Station to pick up a range of Baltic porters (from Poland, Russia, Finland, Latvia, and Lithuania). (Report on that at some point--it was fascinating.) As I charged in, I was brought up short by a crowd just inside the door. A New Belgium tasting--bonus! Some comments:

1. NB was pouring the beer in a strictly prescribed fashion: Fat Tire from a can, Ranger, and then either La Folie or Kriek. The guy who was pouring the beer seemed to be centrally interested in talking Fat Tire. I accepted the pour to get along to the good stuff.

2. I managed to skip the Ranger, thinking that a sharply hoppy beer is a poor lead-in to a kriek. Interesting decision by the brewery.

3. La Folie is an exceptional beer. So much complexity (full review here). They were also pouring a Lips of Faith-series kriek, which was a collaborative brew with Frank Boon. Boon spontaneously fermented a kriek, sent it to Fort Collins, where it was blended with a beer from NB (I missed what their contribution was). Interestingly, I found it to be far less complex and interesting than La Folie. Interesting, because Frank Boon's lambics are my favorite, and are to my mind the most complex, with layered sourness that never gets too dry or funky.

4. The guy pouring the beer seemed actively irritated by my questions, when I could get his attention. He was far more interested in promoting canned Fat Tire. Maybe just an off day, but I gotta say, if someone's interested in talking to you about your beer, talk to him. A bit off-putting, but essentially beside the point. He was offering me free beer and I was happy to accept.
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PHOTO: Atlanta Beer Master. | Share

Assorted Thoughts Provoked by Ranger IPA

"I was a bit surprised by how hazy the beers were overall, even taking into consideration the dry hopping. In fact, we’ve seen plenty of hazy beers in Oregon (not just the ones made with wheat). I guess there is a pun in there about 'partly cloudy...'"

I was reminded of this observation by Stan Hieronymus--made after he passed through Portland last year--when I poured out a bottle of the new Ranger IPA from New Belgium. Because, man, is it clear. Light lager clear. Hawaiian water clear. Cascade Mountain--well, just look:


This contrasts the partly-cloudy pours of our own IPAs, as Stan noted. But I was trying to think--isn't this at the very least a West Coast proclivity? I don't recall being suprised at the clarity of California IPAs. I did a bit of looking about to see if there were regional differences, but photographs are never conclusive. One thing I did notice was how much less interest in IPAs Coloradans seem to evince. In the NW, it's almost a sure bet that a brewery has one IPA (unless they're quirky and offbeat), and many have two, three, or more.

Not so in Colorado. Ranger is New Belgium's debut (not surprising for a brewery devoted to Belgian-style ales). But Breckenridge also recently introduced their first. Oskar Blues has none. Wynkoop, nada. The one really high-profile IPA from Colorado I can think of is Great Divide's Titan. I'm not exactly an expert on Colorado, but my sense is that folks there prefer cleaner, smaller, and less-hoppy beers. They like a good lager, and they like balance. As a consequence, IPAs just aren't that big a deal.

So when we consider Ranger, even though it will be a nationally-distributed beer, we must recognize that it's a Colorado IPA. They're not getting into any arms races over IBUs, funk, or haziness. It is a very clean, crisp beer, with less body and resinous stickiness than we've come to expect. Some of the cues are missing, so NW beer drinkers may not recognize that it tops out at 6.5% and 70 IBUs--but it does. Ranger's different in other ways, too. Even though New Belgium has employed three very common, NW hops--Simcoe, Cascase, and Chinook--they seem to rely on the spicy woodiness of the Chinooks to distinguish the beer. It doesn't have that deeply tangy citrus many local IPAs have. Rather, it's so spicy I got a kind of mustard greens crackle.

It's not going to be for everyone, but I predict Coloradans will love it. It probably won't make a major dent in IPA sales in Beervana, though. We likes our skies and our beer cloudy.
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PHOTOS: BRIDGEPORT IPA BY RELZ, RANGER BY LIFE IS GOOD (PETE)
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Speaking of Branding...

I have a lot of respect for New Belgium Brewing. I respect their green ethos, the love they inspire, and I especially respect their forays into the Belgian wild lands. (Fat Tire?--not so much.) But they have always been a little brand-forward for my tastes, and here is prosecution evidence #312: the video for their new Ranger IPA. I discovered it as I was doing research for a review of the beer--ultimately recoiling from the computer screen. Behold the spectacle:



Playing the rap card for comedy/irony/camp--gotta leave it alone. Just walk away.
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New Belgium La Folie: New World Rodenbach?

Sometimes I approach reviews with trepidation--generally when I'm less familiar with a style than I should be. In the case of La Folie, I am quite familiar with the style--it's perhaps my very favorite, the red beers of Belgium (called variously "Flemish" or "Flanders" or sometimes just "Belgian" reds). The classic beer of the style is Rodenbach, but in Portland, you may be more familiar with Verhaeghe's magnificent Duchesse de Bourgogne or perhaps Roots' or Cascade's Mouton Rouge. But the classic--by a country mile--is Rodenbach. The only other analogue for a beer being so singularly associated with a style is Guinness.

So why would I worry about reviewing La Folie, New Belgium's version of a Flemish red? Because it was brewed by Peter Bouckaert, the man who, until he left Belgium in 1998, used to be the brewmaster at ... Rodenbach. If I weren't a halfwit, I'd call it a new-world classic, a Pierre Celis-like recreation, a sublime beer that all you Rodenbach fiends should go suck down (it was until recently--and may still be--at the Green Dragon). But, as my sticke gaffe ably shows, I am a halfwit. Or better yet, a blogger stricken with "the madness." (Another translation of "folie" is folly, so prepare your barbs.)

La Folie is not Rodenbach. It's just not. Rodenbach has three main beers, and La Folie takes after Grand Cru. It is dry and unsweetened and just about the same strength as the original. It has that same color Rodenbach has, not exactly red but not exactly brown, either. The aroma is sharply sour, and the palate is, too. In fact, this is the problem; it's too sour. Most of the character of the beer derives from this single note, and the lack of complexity was where it fell down for me.

Rodenbach, which is the sourest of the Flemish Reds I've tried, is not solely sour. It has a rich complexity that includes sweet fruit notes, dry tannins, and a very severe, tart-dry finish. Both beers are way beyond the pale for most Americans, even those who like a nice weisse or even a sweetish fruit lambic. But for those who delight in the funk, like cheeseheads and their limburger, Rodenbach is wonderfully complex. Compared to it, New Belgium is atonal. (To really go out on a limb, I'll add that I find New Belgium's beer more acetic and less lactic than Rodenbach, and I think this is the issue. Perhaps all the qualities are there somewhere, but they were, at least in the pint I tried, overwhelmed by the sharp acetic souring. As a result, I give it a 4.5 on the Sour-o-meter.)

Obviously Bouckaert knows how to brew a Flemish red. How then does his fall shy of Rodenbach's? I won't guess except to add this observation. A key feature of the Rodenbach method involves its famous wooden tuns. These ancient vessels (the oldest is 150 years) are alive with wild buggies. It is they that define Rodenbach, a beer that starts out rather mundanely, with regular saccharomyces cerevisiae (ale) yeast. It picks up the funk from the barrels, some of which date back to the period, in the 19th century, when Rodenbach was spontaneously fermented. Those wild yeasts came from a different Belgium--a pre-industrial country far richer in fruit trees (on which reside brettanomyces) and far lower in industrial gunk.

Bouckaert has no access to 150-year-old barrels. He has to try to mimic the character of Rodenbach by other means. Of all the New Belgium beers I've tried, La Folie is the one that most impresses me--it's not a slightly safer version of the original, as are so many of New Belgium's Flemish re-interpretations. Bouckaert has gone for it. It is well-appreciated by beer geeks, who appreciate the effort. But to me, La Folie is too sharp and too young--by maybe a hundred years.

Have you tried La Folie? Your thoughts?



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PHOTO: EMERALD CITY SUPERTASTERS / link

Fat Tire Amber Ale- New Belgium Brewing

I really yearn to like New Belgium's beers. The labels are pretty, the styles are interesting, the company is philanthropic and green, and they have a Belgian brewer. Alas, that makes them a lot like Starbucks*--cool company, poor brew. I've worked my way through most of their beers in the past few years, and I'm always disappointed. They are underwhelming echoes of the classic styles they were inspired by.

But New Belgium didn't found its craft brewing empire on their interpretation of Frambozen or Abbey Ale. It is the company that Fat Tire built, and the company will be riding Fat Tire, good or ill, to the end. In 2005, New Belgium was the 13th largest brewery in the country, and the third-largest craft brewer, making about 33% more beer than Widmer, Oregon's largest. That's a lot of Fat Tire.

Sometime in the past three or four years, New Belgium decided it wanted a piece of Oregon's market, and it spent an enormous amount of money trying to get shelf and tap space. It appears the effort has been only partly successful--after displacing regional ambers for a time, New Belgium has given back a lot of shelf space and tap handles to Full Sail and Mactarnahan's. They may do decent business, but I don't think Oregon is the pot of gold NB hoped.

But before we get to the review, let me confess that I've always found this beer insipid and have, I think far from uniquely, taken to calling it "Flat Tire." I am, nevertheless, a trained beer-tasting professional and when I sat down to taste this beer, wiped my biases clean.**

Tasting Notes
Fat Tire pours out a brackish amber, with a quickly-dissipating head. The color is honey/amber, but strangely murky, as if by hop haze (foolsgold, of course). I pick up the briefest caramelly malt note in the nose, with possibly a hint of citrus.

Malt is Fat Tire's central flavor, backed by a creamy mouthfeel. Hops add a single flavor note, the same citrus you might detect in the nose, which draw out the sweetness of the malt. That's really all there is. If the brewery is like Starbucks, then Fat Tire is like that Charlie Sheen sitcom--a perfectly mainstream product without the character to inspire love or hate. It is a wholly inoffensive beer. What more to say?

The label promises that the beer's "appeal is in its feat of balance: toasty, biscuit-like malt flavors coasting in equalibrium with hoppy freshness." A friend of mine sitting at the table as I took notes offered a rebuttal: "it's weird and tinny and stale and gross. It would not be a beer I'd be proud of."

The truth lies somewhere between: Fat Tire will satisfy none of the beer drinkers who find delight in robust, characterful, hoppy Oregon beers. (The brewer, Peter Bouckaert, in describing how to brew a clone of this beer to Brew Your Own magazine, cautioned: "don't use Cascade or other overpowering hops." Cascades, gentle and aromatic, are the most common and beloved hops in Oregon ales.) But neither will they dump out their bottle.

It's a beer of a kind that get brewed across the globe: a mainstream product so lacking in character you forget you're drinking it.

Stats
Unavailable. Apparently Bouckaert regards his recipe as a state secret. He can keep it.

Rating
(very) average.
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*Starbucks, for those who think their nine million stores are only a soul-destroying yuppie huts, is actually a cool company. They give their workers benefits and buy coffee from farmers. Sadly, their product is a thin gruel of over-roasted bitterness.

**No, I don't believe it, either.