Author: nate.luzod

This past Saturday, they announced two very important set of awards for excellence in brewing. Yesterday, we had the distinct pleasure of attending the 2nd Installment of the San Diego County Craft Brewers Festival and Competition. It was an amazing event featuring over 250 of the best beers to be poured in San Diego at one time. The selection was staggering. I for the life of me can’t remember the last time I attended a County Fair where they were pouring Drie Fontenien, Dogfish, Malhuer and many other great beers. Made me want to sneak off and see if Bessie the Cow was in agreement. MOOOOO would have been confirmation enough. Special Thanks to Tom and Chad for organizing the competition and one of the better selections of beer we will have access to this year.

As part of the San Diego County Fair, there is now a Commercial Craft Brewers Competition. You may recall that last year at this innagural event, we at Port Brewing graced the stage 5 times for our beers. We shared the title along with Firestone Walker for most awards earned. This past May they held the second competition and when the rauch settled, we at Port Brewing had earned 6 ribbons for the 10 beers we entered. With our six awards, we continue to set the competition circuit on fire. Combined with our incredible success at the 2008 World Beer Cup and the 2007 Great American Beer Festival, we are truly pumped by the collective success of our beers. For those who care to know which beers scored well with the judges.

Gold Ribbon- Lost Abbey Serpent’s Stout

Silver Ribbons- Veritas 003, Cable Car, Older Viscosity, Gift of the Magi

Bronze Ribbon- Red Poppy

Not a bad haul for us. Chad also pointed out during the awards ceremony, that when you include the Pizza Port family of beers, we earned a total of 16 Awards. If you throw out the Ribbons for Mead Categories which we didn’t enter, there were 75 Total Ribbons possible. With 16 Ribbons in tote, the Port Brewing family of brewers put their stamp on this event with resounding success.

When I got home last night, I fired up my computer and was surfing the net when I came across the results for the 2008 National American Homebrewer’s Competition. It was staggering! This nationwide competition featured over 5600 entries. To put this in perspective, the 2008 World Beer Cup that just concluded this past April judged some 2800 entries and was the largest Commercial Competition in the World! The Homebrew Competition featured double the number of entries.

I want to take a moment to send a shout out to Julian Shrago. Many of you in Southern California have no doubt crossed paths with Julian here at Port Brewing/ The Lost Abbey. We’re blessed to see Julian and Nigel (his English Bulldog) no less than once a month even though he lives behind the Orange Curtain in the OC.

Julian is one of the best homebrewers any of us know. In fact, Sage calls him the best brewer no one has ever heard of. Me, I think of him as the Great White Hype. I don’t know of too many homebrewers who have as much recognition as Julian does around here. I’m beginning to think that he’s more famous than my ego. In fact, my ego went shopping for a dog today. He mumbled something about needing a four legged co pilot. Silly me. I thought he wanted to bring man’s best friend into our life to chase the cats around the brewery.

Either way, Julian’s award comes with a major kudos from us at The Lost Abbey. You see, Julian won a silver medal in the Belgian and French Ale Category. There were only 317 entries in the category!!! DAMN! That is some kind of competition. It’s been a great weekend for us around the brewery. We went to the San Diego County Fair and were decorated for our excellence in brewing. Our Pizza Port bretheren were rewarded as well. Topping it all off, some of our best friends earned awards at the San Diego County Fair and The National Homebrewers Conference. All in all, I would say it’s an inspiring weekend. Congrats to Julian and my brothers at Pizza Port. A job well done on all fronts.

(late night edit) Just got word that Tovarish Imperial Stout brewed by Julian Shrago was the Best of Show winner at the San Diego County Fair Homebrew competition today. Apparently Julian has a large “S” tatoo on his chest and is afraid of Kryptonite?

PS, there’s a batch of Tovarish Imperial Stout on tap in Solana Beach at the Pizza Port that Julian brewed with Greg and Yiga sometime last month. It’s tasty…

We just came off a record month for Port Brewing and The Lost Abbey. It felt great! It also means that we have a ton of brewing to do as months like April pretty much kick our collective asses. Everyone put an amazing amount of effort forward and it was rewarding to see us sell so much beer. The problem with record months is that they tend to wipe out inventories. At least this past April did.

So for the entire month of May, we have been playing catch up. As such, it’s required an extraordinary amount of hours and in the struggle to get inventories caught up, Sydney’s 2nd Birthday was all of a sudden upon me. You know the part where I have to stop thinking about beer and find cool gifts for my baby girl?

But having a brewer in training at home means birthday gifts take on a whole new dimension. Sydney is now 2 years old and is almost old enough to understand what is going on. She will certainly understand next year that when mention the word birthday, she can expect all kinds of new and very cool things. I heard Charlie Papazian is putting the finishing touches on “The Joy of Homebrewing for Toddlers.”

This year, Maureen and I decided that we wanted to get Sydney her very own kitchen. I have zero problems with this part of the equation. After all, if she chooses not to be a brewer than maybe she’ll entertain the culinary art and follow in the footsteps of Chef Vince. Dad’s are allowed to dream you know.

Being the instructor and Brewing father that I am, I wanted to get Sydney a really kick ass kitchen. I mean even normal kids can have the standard “My First Kitchen.” Yet, what I was looking for was the Deluxe “My First Beer Enthusiasts Kitchen.” I started with some phone calls to local toy stores.

Me: “Hello, I am looking to see if you have a toy in stock?”

Them: “Sure! Do you know what it’s called?”

Me: Yes, I have a few items. First, do you have any Brewer’s First Kegorators? I am really interested in the 4 tap model with Nitrogen faucet and if possible, I’d like to upgrade to the model with the Beer Engine?”

Them: “Sir? Have you been drinking?”

Me: “That’s Duuh dot com. It’s something I try and do each day.

Them: “I’m not sure I understand!”

Me: “Well, I own a brewery.” What else do you need to know?

Them: “Thanks for the clarification sir. I’m still unsure about this “My first Kegorator you asked for.”

Me: What’s not to understand? I have a brewer in training. She NEEDS this toy. Screw Barney unless of course, he looks like Issac from the Love Boat and knows how to properly slow pour a Guinness.

Them: “Sir, you do realize that we monitor these calls for Quality Assurance?”

Me: “CRAP! That’s right, I told her mom I would take care of the My First Line Cleaning Tank too so that the beers would be of the highest quality. Any chance you have one of those in stock?”

Them: “Sir, have you been drinking?”

Me: “Need I remind you it’s people like you that drive me to drink?”

Them: “Tell your daughter Happy Birthday. Sorry we weren’t of more assistance.”

Me: “You’re too kind.”

We had to buy a plain old ordinary my first kitchen. Sorry Sydney. Daddy tried to get you a better model. So it came time to put it together. I went to the fridge (the adult sized food one) and pulled out a beer. At least some refreshment would help me simmer down from my letdown. I pulled the “My First Kitchen” from its box and began laying out parts on the floor.

One of the boxes had all of the accessories in it. Excited about the possibilities, I tore into the bag looking for miniature cans of Malt Extract, Barley and hops. NOTHING, Nada, Zip! It was obvious that my wife and I had neglected to purchase a properly stocked My First Kitchen. It was lacking all sorts of essential toys for the Homebrewer in Sydney. I picked up the phone and called the local homebrew store.

Me: “Listen, I know this is going to sound crazy but I’m looking for a Junior Homebrew Kit for my 2 year old daughter.”

Them: “Well sir, the government states you must be 21 to consume alcohol but they only require you to be 18 to make it…. Did you say she’s 2?”

Me: “Yeah, you got a problem with that? She loves Malt Liquor and has a penchant for Old Viscosity.”

Them: “Sir, I think I am supposed to take down your number and call child protective services now!”

Me: “So, you don’t have a kit for preschool aged brewers?”

Them: “Sir, we don’t even have one for High School Aged children although it’s not illegal to sell these supplies to 18 year old students. Not that I have mind you.

Me: “DAMN! This is going to be harder than I thought.”

I found myself working through the details of My First Kitchen and I was able to successfully complete the building with nary a problem. Except of course that I just rendered my daughters first kitchen complete and there wasn’t enough beer in it for my liking. I started looking at the cabinets imaging the cupboards loaded with lambics, Barleywine and Stouts. Sydney would dig that. Trust me. She really would.

Seriously,

It’s been almost three months since I blogged last. I’m pretty sure that no one noticed my absence. It’s not like I forgot how to write. It just seemed that everytime I sat down to type, I was exhausted from the brew day or there was something more pressing going on at the brewery that needed my attention.

However, it’s May 9th 2008 and I’m blogging DAMNIT!

So what should I blog about? There’s only about 400 things I need to say. So in no particular order here goes nothing. First and foremost, we’re expanding. Or at the very least, we’re trying to make the building smaller through addition. In the past month, we have added three used tanks from our good friends at Dogfishead. It’s not terribly important but we added a 120 bbl Fermenter a 150 bbl Conditioning tank as well as something known as Elvis.

Tanks for more beer are great. They are wonderful additions to our brewery. What is not a wonderful addition is the plumbing and installation required by all of these massive units. Vince has his work cut out for him in terms of getting these up and running. We also are swapping out the old solenoids left from the original brewery. They suck and our temperature controls need to be upgraded. When it is all said and done, we will have gained so much more control over our fermentations, I think it’s scary.

In February we acquired more oak barrels. Specifically, we added 100 new Brandy barrels and 50 more Bourbon barrels. Since then, we have filled 50 Brandy Barrels of Angel’s Share which we hope to release in time for Christmas. We’ll be filling the other 50 in the next month. This will mean a plethora of Angel’s doing their work all summer long at The Lost Abbey. Sounds divine if you ask me.

Did I mention that we bought a 2nd forklift? Nothing screams you’re growing like another forklift. It’s a real beaut too. 2002 Propane 4 wheel unit with custom rims and low profile tires. I’ve threatened the boys in the brewery that we’re gonna get the interior (read seat) Tijauna tuck and rolled with some sick new paint to match. Green metalic flake anyone? In order to accomodate the barrels, we needed this new lift as we have warehouse space across the street for storage.

A couple of weeks ago, the Craft Brewing World decended on San Diego. It was a chance for every local brewer to do their part and shine. We at Port Brewing hosted so many brewers. It was a special week for us. The highly anticipated Isabelle Proximus was launched. It turned into an amazing beer and we can’t wait to get the barrels reloaded and make more. The beer has been labeled and should see the light of day in late June- just in time for the summer swelter.

Last weekend, we hosted our 2nd Anniversary Party. In true Port Brewing fashion, we rolled out 3 beers for the weekend. The buzz around the brewery seems to be that the Cuvee tastes as good as last year AND don’t even get us started on the 2nd Anniversary Ale. If there’s one place there isn’t a hop shortage, it’s those bottles we filled- 11 pallets worth!

Perhaps the coolest thing we accomplished last weekend was the release of Inferno Ale. I have been dying (not literally) to get this beer (and more importantly) the label done. This has to be one of the most detailed pieces of label art out there. It’s too bad that Seans painting skills get shrunk to such a small scale. It definitely will be one of the coolest shirts we have when it’s all said and done.

I have put a moratorium on new beers for the next few months. Don’t ask me the timeline. I don’t have one. What I do know is that since January of this year, we have launched or brewed Moon Lit Sessions, Shark Attack, Port 2nd Anniversary, Serpent’s Stout, Carvnevale, Inferno, Hildegard’s Saison and Holy Water. It’s time for me to stop imagining and conceptualizing new beers every 20 minutes. I’m having a hard enough time keeping track of where these beers are.

We’re launching in the Bay Area at the end of the month so we’re working hard to load up on all of our year round releases at this time. Once we’re done with them, we’ll probably lift the moratorium and get back to what we do best- keeping crazy new beers rolling through the brewery. Sounds good to me.

Hopefully we’ll see you soon.

The premise for this Blog was thrown out there by my good friend Stan at Appellationbeer.com. He asked for us to put together a list of 4 people you would invite to dinner and what would you serve them. Clearly, I could write one of these per day and not be done after one month.

But when I got down to it, this is the first one that I wrote. I may work on more as the month goes on. It’s a fun question to say the least.

William Shakespeare– First of all, I feel like I have read enough of his stuff to actually “know” the man. The burning question I have, is did he really pen all those poems and plays. As I have not lately to Padua come, but many of his greatest characters and play were set in Italy, I would offer an Italian Beer- Wayan from Casa Baladin to be served with the first course consisiting of Mixed Green Salad with a Citric Orange Balsamic, sliced apples and candied pecans alongside Maytag Blue Cheese. Italy is home to many great characters like some of Shakespeare’s best and I would love to share my stories of Lorenzo and Theo with him.

Next up would be Adolphus Busch– Lord knows he isn’t the first person that comes to mind when you think beer and food. Maybe it’s his fault. I’m certainly not fond of having to call a beer Czechvar for no good reason. But, I think it would be a challenge to show him that American and Beer don’t mean just his. And lately, I have grown tired of the new AB slogan that touts Budweiser as “The Great American Lager.” As such, I would have to show my new good friend Adolphus the errors of his ways by sharing either a Victory Prima Pils or a Sly Fox Pikeland Pils (it comes in a can so bonus points for that).

With this course, I would serve Baja Style Beer Battered and deep fried Fish Tacos. I believe that these Gentlemen would enjoy a regional specialty dish. The Cilantro on top of the tacos combined with the cheese and beer batter would be a seamless pairing for these two Greater American Lagers.

Third on the list would be Brian Wilson. Every beer dinner needs a neurotic or brooding sort. Who better than Brian Wilson the front man of the Beach Boys? Clearly, his life hit Rock Bottom and he has rebounded. Like many, I am enamored with Pet Sounds and would spin that album during this course so that we could talk nuances and symphonic cord progressions. I would also let William dive into the lyrical mind set of a genius at work from another Genre.

For Dinner, we would have Rack of Lamb. By now, I would hope that Bill Shakespeare was drunk enough to invoke the Falstaffian Muse and allow one of his greatest characters to join us for Merry food and pots of ale. Rack of Lamb would be Rosemary infused and glazed with a light plum sauce. We would have some fingerling potatoes and seasonal roasted root vegetables. It would be a heavy course but certainly one for the senses. The beer would be Lost Abbey 10 Commandments. This dark farmhouse ale is founded on Caramelized raisins, honey and Rosemary and pairs incredibly well with this sort of dish.

Lastly, I would hope to have Thomas Jefferson on hand. It’s no secret that he and George Washington were fans of Ale. I choose Jefferson as I picture him to be one hell of an orator. Beer and food is about conversation. Why wouldn’t you want one of our Fore Fathers there to show them that the foundations of liberty they provided echoes true today in the beers that we produce.

As dinner was incredibly filling, I would skip dessert. And, while I am not a smoker, I would certainly think that Cigars would be in order. This is mostly due to a desire to sit back and watch some incredible writers, thinkers and movers converse about most likely all things not beer. With that in mind, we would offer a selection of beers for the cigars. They would be Sam Adams Utiopias, Dogfishead World Wide Stout and Avery The Beast. Any of these would get us through a long evening of rich dialogue. All of them together could start a revolution. Or maybe they already have?

Over the weekend, we rolled out the 2007 Brandy Barrel Aged bottling of The Angel’s Share. Since we first released this beer in November of 2006, it has become a media darling, an online tradeable commodity and for some, a profit center. Some beers just have all the luck I suppose.

Many of our most passionate fans and locals have been eagerly awaiting the 2007 version as their 2006 stocks have been depleted. For this years batch, we extended the contact time on the oak by 2 months and we used the Brandy Barrels from the first batch a second time. These freshly emptied barrels will now be moving sideways into our Cuvee program where we hope to gain some more complexity from the newly emptied barrels and their spiritous remains. It’s good news for Cuvee fans as more barrels equals more bottles each year.

I’m going to keep this blog way shorter than most. Essentially, I am exhausted from the weekend and don’t feel too much like writing. Yet, I wanted to make a point to thank everyone (in print) who volunteered for the weekend to help us successfully release the 2007 bottling.

Here’s the most important details for consumers then:

The 2007 Brandy Barrrel Aged Angel’s Share yielded 173 cases of 12 x 750ml cork finished bottles. This years batch can be delineated from last years batch through the inclusion of Copper Foil on the labels. All of our barrel aged beers will now include Foiling enabling consumers to buy with confidence. Next year, in 2008, we will begin Vintage dating our specialty releases as well.

This past weekend we sold 15 case of beer to our Patron Saints locally. These were picked up on Friday. We also sold 16 cases to our non San Diego base Patron Saints through our e commerce on Friday as well. On Saturday, we sold 75 cases of The Angel’s Share to the general population. The doors opened at 10AM and by 2 PM. We were out of beer. We also have reserved 28 cases from our Barrel Aged Beer tasting that we did back in September. Each ticket holder from that night got to reserve their 6 bottles of The Angel’s Share without having to worry about standing in line.

All told we have 134 cases that have been spoken for. We also will be selling two cases each to some of the better specialty beer bars in San Diego. This will take us to about 150 cases for this release. The other 23 cases will be used for promotional work and beer dinners and our brewers cellar. It’s simply amazing to me that so much beer can disappear so quickly. But it did. And, it would not have done so without the help of our amazing volunteer(s) at the brewery.

I wanted to finish today by taking some time to thank all those people who helped us make Saturday a spirited and uneventful release. Prior to the release on Saturday Mary Jo and our Webmaster David compiled Excel files allowing us to categorize and supply Patron Saints with beer. David also executed the online sales flawlessly.

On Saturday morning, I was first met at the brewery by Damian and Lona. You should all know who Lona is, as she was the one who logged everyone in. Damian personally stacked all 75 cases in the lobby and then assisted in making like Santa on Christmas day.

Tim showed up next and made sure that we were ready to roll during the crush of the morning. He also alerted me to the ebay post on the bottles from this release. Mary Jo and Adam showed up a few minutes later and I walked them through the system I had prepped, hoping it would handle the long day ahead. They were soon joined on the front line by Terri and Sage. Many of you should thank the “beer fairy” and Angel who slung beers all day. Gina rolled in shortly thereafter and we had a crew in place to handle it all.

When we opened the doors at 10AM I didn’t know if we had enough staff to handle the eager consumers. After about 1/2 hour it was easy to see that our preparation was paying off. All told, it took most people less than an hour of standing in line to get their beer. We kept meticulous counts on who was buying, how many beers they were buying and throughout it all, our concern was always the people at the back of the line.

I’m proud of our system and the way it worked. It isn’t rocket science or FBI tight. But it’s a system that we now know works and we can improve on. Yet, the reason I wrote this post is that I’m frankly veryproud of everyone who busted their ass on Saturday to ensure a smooth operation. There were only three “true paid” employees working the release that day. But, everyone else working isn’t doing it for money. Nope, they love beer. And that’s exactly the kind of help any young company needs. So next time we release something special, take a look around and spend a moment to say thanks to the people helping you. We all need a little beer Karma from time to time. Even the elves at Christmas time.