A Day in the Orange Land

Almost immediately upon arriving to settle in with Urbain, after two days of backbreaking brewery work, I was whisked off to a whole other country. I think it was called “Holland,” or “The Nether-regions.” De Molen, a brewery and restaurant near a collection of cities called Gouda, Utrecht, and Amsterdam, did not hold a festival of cheese, treaties, and THC, but they did host a nice beer festival with one of the world’s greatest lineups of suds. OK, I lied, there were a few cheese platters. And perhaps some THC, who knows.

Yours truly behind the bar

This Borefts Beer Festival brought together Belgian, Dutch, Swedish, and Danish brewers; Struise and Alvinne represented Belgium. De Molen and Emelisse had home-court advantage, Närke Kulturbryggeri batted for Sweden, and Mikkeller carried Denmark’s flag. Glenn and Davy drove me in the Alvinne beerwagon and two additional helpers squeezed in as well; Stephan to my left and Mark to my right. Urbain took his mobile apartment separately.

Davy points to something. Höge's on your left.

Brewers started serving at noon, when only the real hop-heads showed up to pace themselves through the day. A good Dutch representation mingled around the booths, joined by a handful of Brits and a couple Americans. Everyone spoke English with a little cajoling. The atmosphere was relaxed, the day was clear, and De Molen had a food service in action, so folks were fat and happy. I asked for some cheese and they gave me enough to feed an army – and it was good, too! Cheese comes cheap in those parts.

The Mikkeller crew (Greg Gaughan's photo)

Urbain, Glenn and Davy worked their brewmastery on the floor for a while, but when I was relieved from my pouring duties I was able to mingle among the crowd and show off my American accent. Soon, though, I stumbled upon the Närke table. Höge (I think his name was) fit the perfect mold of what I thought a Scandinavian brewer should be. He was short, stocky, sported a wide gray beard and round glasses, and wore a leather cap and vest. All black clothes. His demeanor was far from intimidating, though, and I soon got into a discussion about our mutual disdain for all the heavy beers that are put into huge bottles. He’s pushing for small bottles for his dark, thick concoctions, so we can drink for the taste and not for the buzz! I was able to sample Tanngnjost & Tanngrisnir, a bock beer brewed with juniper clippings and smoked malts. It has quite a history, Höge said it was brewed in better times (before Christianity), and his interpretation was magnificent. Certainly spicy and a bit puckering, it possessed a great malty backbone that blended with the juniper superbly. It was named after Thor’s two goats, and I think the man would’ve been proud. Maybe he would’ve given Höge an honorary degree in godliness, knighted him with the hammer. Other highlights were Närke’s Kaggen Stormaktsporter (both 2007 and 2008), this year’s best beer in the world, Mikkeller’s 黑/Black (I’ve heard one sip in the morning is enough to keep you going until lunch, at least), and Struise’s Dirty Horse. Dirty Horse is a kriek-like beer that Urbain first brewed in 1983. He built a makeshift coolship out of timbers and a tarp and let the wild things do their work, later aging the brew on whole cherries. This particular batch had been aged for four years; it took six hours to disappear.

De Molen's brewroom

And that was about it. The Struise/Alvinne crew had a pleasant sleep at a bed and breakfast and drove the two hours back to the homeland.

Another day, another bottle

The pipes bleed with Black Albert

Hey folks, I think I'll keep posting my entries on this site, too, but don't forget to visit the blog at Struise's website: http://struise.noordhoek.com/eng/index.php?option=com_mojo&Itemid=138

Here's the latest:

It’s been just a week here in Belgium for me, but I’m afraid it’s got me hooked. It’s not just the beer, of course. Well, you could certainly design a Belgian vacation just around beer and I’m sure you’d have a hell of a time – that’s basically where I started – but the people are what make traveling worthwhile. Good beer can be damn good, but it’s also all about enjoying a good beer in great company, and perhaps that’s why Belgium has retained such a strong culture of beer; the Belgian people are some of the friendliest on this sphere of teeming life. They remind me a bit of what I imagine most Midwesterners are like. Any Chicagoans out there?

So, I’m having a good time with the beer, the buddies, and the bikes. Couchsurfing.com has been both a lifesaver and a friendbooster. Krist, my host in Kortrijk, took me on an 85-kilometer bike ride along part of the Ronde van Vlaanderen, Belgium’s world-famous bike “race” (it’s called something else, like “premier” or “tour” or something more official). The crisp, cool Belgian countryside was comforting in its agrarian stillness and beauty. My ass, however, was not comfortable despite the skin-tight, padded biking garb. In Poperinge I’ve stayed several nights with Wim, a soft-spoken, overly likeable young organic farmer. His hospitability is unbelievable, and his dinner portions are plenty to get me through the heavy days of biking in the rain. I wish I could stay at Wim’s for the whole winter.

I’ve got some more good news. Good news for me and good news for you readers out there, all five of you. The news means I’ll be posting more eye candy for several months to come, so get yourself hungry (or thirsty) for this sweet and spicy commentary. The news is that I’ve almost solidified my schedule until March, and there are some big shots in the mix. My plan is to develop a home base with Urbain, working for Struise on and off when his farmhouse is empty of visitors. When the farm inn is booked, I will jump from brewery to brewery. Glenn and Davy from Picobrouwerij Alvinne have been very welcoming, so I hope to spend more brewing and bottling days with them. I’ll be tagging along with Glenn this weekend to a festival in Zottegem and also at the end of this month near Amsterdam, at a festival De Molen brewery is hosting. In late February I’ll be staying at Glenn’s folks’ home to help Alvinne prepare for the pre-ZBF fizz-fest. Pre-ZBF is the smaller, gourmet, all-star beer festival right before the big ZBF fest in Belgium. Daniel Thiriez, of Brasserie Thiriez in Esquelbecq, France (right across the border), has agreed to host me for the second half of November. Daniel’s beers, so I’ve heard, are of his own brand; he brews them fresh and zippy, full of both French and Belgian farmhouse character. I’ve also met with Nino Bacelle of Brouwerij De Ranke in Dottignies, Belgium. I will be helping out on several occasions over the next few months, though since they only brew once or twice a week I won’t be resting my dome on their pillows. Perhaps couchsurfing will come to my rescue then. Perhaps there will be more breweries to visit: Dutch, Danish, Norwegian, or Swedish. English, Irish, Scottish, or German, too. “Networking” is the new buzzword these days, and the brewing industry is not immune to such trendy business concepts.

The week hasn’t just been an orgy of organizing (though I did lose a whole night of sleep just thinking about my plans). I joined Urbain at Deca again, this time for some cleaning and transferring. We (mostly he) cleaned two conditioning tanks where the Black Albert he brewed recently was pumped for further development. I spent a good ten minutes scrubbing the inside of one tank, all alone in the dark cavern with only my green scrubbie to give the surface a good rubbing. Urbain cleaned another and proceeded to fill both with Black Albert. One tank got a special treatment: five kilograms of the finest Colombian coffee beans was added as an experiment. I’ll keep you updated on that. Urbain’s method of sanitizing the tanks is certainly unique. He insists on using a lovely substance (that old-school science teachers know all too well) to rid the interior of the tanks of any lurking microbe. A pot of the stuff is set on a small propane burner, placed inside the tank, and lit. The door is closed and the substance evaporates, coating the inside and making it clean enough to eat an endive salad on. Or chocolate pudding, if you’re like me. This step is necessary to keep the beer free of infection. Urbain treated me to a delicious sandwich with some reddish mystery meat, accompanied by a solid, earthy Struise Pannepeut. The beer was a meal in itself.

My meeting with Nino of De Ranke was, as it is with many brewers, more than just a meeting. Nino, a stylish man with stylish tastes and stylish hospitality, brought me from his home to the brewery for a tour and tasting. I guess when I say stylish I mean classy but workmanlike. His beers perfectly reflect his character: clean and smooth, robust yet refined. We made our way through the aromatic Guldenburg, solidly hoppy and characterful XX Bitter, caramelly Noir de Dottignies, bitter Christmas brew Père Noel, and the Cuvée and Kriek De Ranke, two blended beers using a young De Ranke beer and a lambic from the Girardin brewery – the kriek is aged on whole cherries. After our rendezvous at the spotless and ingeniously designed brewery (it’s brand new but designed in a very traditional way), Nino brought me back to his home and bought us some real Belgian fries. We ate with his wife and had a nice visit, replete with mayonnaises and sauces in pastels of red, green, and yellow; I could’ve replicated a Monet on the kitchen wall, but for some reason I didn’t. Anyway, fries are treated differently over here.

Yesterday was another, shorter day at Alvinne. Davy and I worked the bottling line, filling bottle after bottle with their tripel and a “smoky bock” beer brewed specifically for the De Molen festival on Halloween. Davy fed the bottles and caps into the machine and I packed them into boxes and crates for all the happy customers. Tomorrow I’ll be back for another brew day and then Glenn and I are off to the Zottegem festival before I head back to France. But for now, I’m taking a day off, lounging in a sleeping bag and being thankful that I’m dry. Be back soon.
-Owen

Finally, a few photos!

At Alvinne: Davy, left, and Urbain, looking a bit blurry in the morning (or is that the photo?)

Deca Brewery, where Urbain conducts his magic. Ten points if you can find him.

Evidence of the mash at Alvinne. If you look closely, past the big face, you can see whole hops in the mash. This adds an even further hop presence to Pipedream.

Grey Fox 2K9

The Northeast's premier bluegrass festival, Grey Fox, recently transpired among the rolling Catskills of New York state, and I and my brother were fortunate patrons (or volunteers, rather) of this fine festival that just finished its 32nd year. This was my fourth time going, third time volunteering, and 47th time taking time off of work this summer to do something fun at the expense of saving money for my trip to Europe. Ah, well. I got to work on my tan, and that's all that really matters.

Us staffers were up close

I realize that some of you, at least one of you, have not even heard of bluegrass music. I am appalled, but I'm too lazy here to give a scholarly background of the music, but I'll take a couple sentences to explain. Bluegrass, as a genre, essentially evolved from the old-time musical and vocal traditions of rural America in the early 20th century. Figures such as Bill Monroe, the Stanley Brothers, Flatt and Scruggs, and others are considered to be the most influential in founding and developing the music, which I like to think of as a cleaner, tighter, more modern version of old-time string band music. Today, bluegrass has taken some routes that have roots in country and jazz, the latter being improvisational solos and complex musical twists and turns that keep the music interesting for the players (but sometimes confusing and disagreeable for the listeners, in my opinion). I go for the real, hard-drivin' original stuff. Anyway, that's bluegrass, and you can imagine that a bluegrass festival attracts some characters. Can't say I'm not one of them, but folks just let it all out for these things. You see plenty of extravagant RVs (loud-as-hell generators included), tattoos, straw hats, beer koozies, facial hair, and yes, white people. Will and I at least made an effort to improve the melanin discrepancy by getting some sun but, alas, the honkies prevailed. Bluegrass, though, is certainly a more progressive music than most, especially its close counterpart country, and several artists including Peter Rowan and Tim O'Brien played political songs. There was even a group, The Maybelles, that boasted a gay female bass player who wrote and played a song with the title of something like "My Little Christian Girlfriend." Of course, on the other end of the spectrum, Ricky Skaggs spent a good amount of time preaching the gospel in the hopes of converting any weak-willed listeners right there at the festival.

Crooked Still

Will and I worked the morning shifts, preparing and serving breakfast to the crew and performers, which meant that we got the whole rest of the days to ourselves. We spent some time exploring the charm of Oak Hills, NY, riding bikes or going for a jog and ending our tours with a few refreshing swims in a nearby creek. Then we'd head back to the festival grounds, slather on some sunblock and prepare for a day of nonstop pickin'. There were too many great performers to list them all, but a few notable shows came from the Kruger Brothers, a Swiss duo who compose beautiful tunes and can play the classics at supersonic speeds (check out this video), Crooked Still, the funky, soulful group of young musicians from up around the Northeast, Mountain Heart, the almost pop superstars of the bluegrass world,

Mountain Heart (this banjo player has no fingers on his left hand)

Marty Stuart and his Fabulous Superlatives, a quirky and very showy group that is allowed to sport tight leather and frou-frou hairdos because they're f*cking great,

Marty Stuart

and Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder, great musicians who play the stuff as it really should be played, most of the time: straightforward and unbelievably crisp.

Old Man Skaggs

And to add icing to the acoustic cake, Will and I had the pleasure of meeting and giving a ride to the Albany train station to two lovely Danes. Sigrid Hasling and her daughter, Marie, were visiting the States for the first time and decided to hop from NYC to Grey Fox for a little vacation within a vacation. We drove them to the station after the festival and shared facts about our respective educational systems and demography; you know, the usual dialogue that's exchanged between Danish tourists and US citizens. Marie is a grad student in Copenhagen, and I'm looking forward to perhaps making a stop in the city if I can find a brewery farm somewhere in the green pastures of Denmark (which may be very likely, actually).

That's it for tonight, ladies and gents. Soon I'll be posting updates about my brewskies and other tantalizing tidbits, so keep your appetite well whetted. Oh, and to clarify about last post's title: I was going to explain it in that post, but I forgot. Must've been a head-scratcher for you all. I was just remarking to Noah, the baker I work for, about the monsoon that we're experiencing this summer, and he replied with, "Yeah, it might be the summer without...", after which I thought he would finish with "a summer" or something. Instead, he said "tomatoes". I didn't ask him why he said tomatoes, but I thought it sounded funny. Maybe tomatoes abhor rain? We will never know...

Hey, this blog isn't all hot air

Songs of Yore

After last weekend's debauchery, I found it fitting to spend this past weekend at a mellow folk festival filled with fun-loving fifty-somethings. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday were spent at the Old Songs Festival in Voorheesville, NY, just a hop over the Green Mountains and through a couple of tired upstate New York towns. The festival is attended by a small but close-knit community of folk music lovers and features a variety of performers from all over the country (and world). My family and a handful of other southwestern NH friends have been going since my hair was peculiarly, youthfully blond (well, actually, before I even had hair). It's a great time: there are enough performers that anyone even remotely appreciative of traditional music (Irish, American, African, Indian, etc.) could find something of interest, and the atmosphere is relaxed, convivial, and usually humid.

I was particularly excited for Bua, a group of Midwesterners who play traditional Irish music. Their sound is rich, even, smooth, and joyous for the tunes; Brían O'hAírt's (Brian Hart) sean-nós singing is breathtakingly delicate and gorgeous. Sean-nós is the traditional, "old-style" of Irish singing, usually done in the Gaelic language, and Brian has mastered the language both for speech and song. I was able to attend a brief workshop on Irish flute playing with a couple members of Bua and though I contributed mostly toots and screeches I was inspired by their playing and encouragement. When I get a little better, I'll post a recording of a tune or two. Here's a blurry photo of the guys at a show during which the power went out, so they played acoustically:


Another highlight was the Saturday and Sunday morning Sacred Harp, or shape note, sings. Shape note is a style of singing popularized in the mid-1800s. I don't know too much about its history, but the lyrical matter is suffocatingly religious (albeit pleasingly poetic). That, however, is its only drawback. The name refers to the method of transcribing the notes in the music as shapes: triangle for fa, circle for sol, square for la, and diamond for mi. This system was developed to make music reading easier for those who, well, didn't know how to read music. I think it was developed in the South, probably in rural areas as a church and social activity, and thus it picked up a lot of emotion and southern punch. Many songs are hard-driving (for folk music) while others are beautifully subtle and full, but all are sung with a certain power that makes singing them infinitely gratifying and, sadly, much more interesting when you're singing than when you're listening as a by-stander. Most shape note sings these days involve large groups and conventions (maybe because of its scarcity as a form of singing), but this makes the experience quite powerful. Shape note is sung in four-part harmony and I belt out my shiny pearls of vibrations as a bass. Go men. Here's a snapshot of our morning sing, being lead by Peter Amidon:


Well, that about does 'er. Wraps 'er all up. Camping was, eh, fun I suppose. I still consider a warm, dry, soft bed as one of the greater things in life, and the weather was wholly uncooperative. Drizzle, downpour, drizzle, blistering sun, downpour, goosebumply wind. Cool clouds, though:


Tune in soon for a bit about the bakery I'm working at and a story from my mom's traveling experience that resonates with my own feelings and expectations.
Yours,
Owen

Festifull of Beer

So this past weekend I volunteered at the American Craft Beer Festival put on by BeerAdvocate.com, a website and magazine dedicated to spreading the word about good beer. Well, they spread more than word. They spread beer, too, all over the floors of the Seaport World Trade Center in Boston. That's where I spent a couple of afternoons hauling ice, moving kegs, dumping buckets of "slop" (a harmless, slurpy mixture of beer and rinse water), and taking out the trash for several thousand festival attendees. I won't bore you with romanticized narrations of my volunteer duties, but needless to say it involved a lot of standing and smelling like stale beer.

If you've never been to a beer "festival", I suggest you attend one. Just one, though. One's enough. It's exactly as you'd picture it: this one had booths from 75 breweries (serving over 250 different beers) lined up in a giant open space packed with eager imbibers that roam the floor, line up for samples, and slowly (or quickly, depending on your size and/or drinking rate) become louder, less inhibited, and more likely to stumble and bump into each other. The fests I have experience with usually have multiple sessions, each around 3.5 hours long, and allow unlimited sampling in 2 oz. serving cups. It's a lot of fun, of course, as long as you pace yourself (eat a sizable meal beforehand) and appreciate many different styles of beer. And there's usually a lot of really, really tasty beer. You may even have a brewer pour you a beer.

As a volunteer, I was able to sample a surprising amount of the good stuff. Due to venue rules, we weren't allowed to drink on the floor, so periodically we'd grab a sample and have to sulk back behind the curtains for some secret drinking. I now can somewhat sympathize with smokers. Among some of the stellar brews I sampled were a few mind-blowing ones worth mentioning. Surly Brewing had a Russian Imperial Stout simply called "Darkness," which is thick and black as ink and tastes like alcoholic molasses. Foothills Brewing also had a RIS called "Sexual Chocolate" (brewed with cocoa), and the sample I tasted had been aged in oak bourbon barrels. Brooklyn Brewery offered a fruity, spicy Belgian-style beer called "Cuvee de Cardoz," brewed with a healthy amount of anise. All of the beers I tried stole the show from anything else I consumed during the fests, including peanut butter crackers, granola bars, slim jims, and bathroom water.

Oh, and people! I saw a number of familiar and famous faces. Erica Reisman and I enjoyed some lamb and chicken slamwiches at a place called Flour. Erica also attended one of the sessions and was looking like she was enjoying herself quite a bit. The legendary Colin Mahoney made a tall appearance, and I also got to see Alec Pinkham and Julie Cap-low! on the festival floor. My childhood (and current) friends Lyra and Larsson Burch and Jessie Beecher were spectacular in their hosting and Taboo abilities.

Present at the fest were some celebrities in the brewing world. You will probably have no idea nor any interest in these people, but I'll mention them for my own gratification. In the picture you can see me with Jason Alstrom, co-founder of the BeerAdvocate empire. Brewers and presidents from respectable establishments were also present, from Harpoon to Otter Creek/Wolaver's to Odell.

All in all, it was a rewarding experience. I wouldn't be telling the whole truth, though, if I didn't mention that, after observing (and participating in) a weekend of beer saturation, I felt more than a bit of both physical and mental fatigue. I enjoy beer, of course, and I enjoy trying different kinds of beer. But when perhaps a year's worth of sampling different kinds of beers is crammed into a weekend, the ritual loses its enjoyment. To me, a high-quality beer is meant to be enjoyed singularly and slowly. That is why I suggest attending just one or a few beer fests. Get the feel for them, try a few new or special brews, but realize that enjoying just one or a couple at a concert or with friends at a cookout is usually a more satisfying experience. Cheers, nonetheless!