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NY CRAFT BEER WEEK KICKS OFF FRIDAY!

home_glasses

In just two short days, the citywide celebration of good beer known as New York Craft Beer Week will commence. And along with it, we here at The Brooklyn Brewery will feature our delectables at a number of the city’s best beer bars (and in one instance, a boat).

For your chance to win a NYC Beer Passport, email info@brooklynbrewery.com.

Read below to learn where you can find Brooklyn Brewery during the week:

Friday, September 24: 6PM – 8PM
Amity Hall
80 W. 3rd Street
New York, NY 10012
(212) 677-2290

Sampling of seasonals Oktoberfest and Post Road Pumpkin Ale as well as our current Brewmaster’s Reserve, Brooklyn Detonation Ale. Brooklyn Brewery staff will be in attendance.

Monday, September 27: 6PM – 8PM
Swift
34 E. 4th St
New York, NY 10003
(212) 260-3600

Taste the 2010 Brewmaster’s Reserve lines (Dark Matter, Cookie Jar Porter, Buzz Bomb and Detonation Ale) plus a keg of some vintage 2007 Monster Ale barleywine.

Thursday, September 30: 6PM – 8PM
Pony Bar
637 10th Ave
New York, NY 10036
(212) 586-2707

Brewmaster Garrett Oliver and the Brooklyn brewing staff will enjoy over 8 Brewmaster’s Reserve lines, vintage Black Chocolate Stout and Monster Ale and probably some Big Bottles too. There’ll be over 18 Brooklyn beers all together.

Saturday, October 2: 4:30PM – 6:30PM
Voyage of the IPA
$65/person
For tickets: email reservations@manhattanbysail.com or call (212) 619-0907

Join Garrett Oliver and the brewing team of The Brooklyn Brewery aboard the sailing ship “Clipper City” for a hoppy journey into our brewing past. India Pale Ale, one of the world’s great beer styles, was specifically developed to survive a sea voyage from England to India. Garrett, editor-in-chief of the forthcoming Oxford Companion To Beer, will deliver insight on the matter in a way that only he can. We’ll be pouring Brooklyn East India Pale Ale, BLAST! and Detonation Ale. Also joining the crew will be brewers and beers from some of our favorite brewers: Captain Lawrence, Goose Island and Greenport Harbor Brewing Co.

Saturday, October 2: 3PM – 8PM
Ulysses
95 Pearl Street / 58 Stone Street
New York, NY 10004
(212) 482-0400

Ulysses hosts an Oktoberfest complete with an Oompa Band and large stein-like pours. The bar will feature Brooklyn Oktoberfest along with standard German brews Paulaner, Spaten and Erdinger.

Sunday, October 3: 3PM – 7PM
The First Annual Brewer’s Bash
Eleven Madison Park
11 Madison Ave
New York, NY 10010
(212) 889-0905
$125 per person
For tickets: email beer@elevenmadisonpark.com

NY Craft Beer Week closing party at Danny Meyer’s highly decorated Eleven Madison Park. The event will include six brewmasters, two live bands, specialty beer cocktails, and Chef Daniel’s take on beer-friendly bites. The Bash features craft ales from The Brooklyn Brewery, Allagash, Captain Lawrence, Goose Island, Ommegang and Victory. From 3:45 to 4:30 PM, we’ll have a cask beer tasting on the mezzanine level with Brooklyn’s Garrett Oliver.

THE "COOL UNCLE"

by Tom Callan

photo by Tom Callan

Our favorite borough periodical, The Brooklyn Paper, offers news and opinion on Brooklyn Brewery’s expansion, Hindy’s place in New York’s craft beer legacy and the looming NY Craft Beer Week.

From The Brooklyn Paper

Brooklyn Brewery expansion keeps a-‘head’ of the borough’s beer scene

by Kristen V. Brown

Brooklyn Brewery’s Steve Hindy may not be the father of craft beer in New York City, but he is certainly the cool uncle.

And now, after 23 years in brewing, the former foreign correspondent is about to expand his Williamsburg brewing complex — an announcement that couldn’t be timed more perfectly, what with New York Craft Beer Week about to pop the cork next Friday.

When Hindy’s space becomes operational in December, the brewery will be 14 times larger — able to accommodate more experimental blends as well as produce more of Hindy’s beer in Brooklyn (most is currently produced upstate).

Just as when he worked for the Associated Press, Steve Hindy knows what he’s doing. The rest of the country may be experiencing a downturn — hell, even beer sales were down two percent last year — but Hindy, and the craft beer movement of which he is at the vanguard, is certainly experiencing a boom. Craft beer sales rose seven percent last year, and Hindy’s sales were up 20 percent, he said, riding a wave of growing appreciate for fuller-flavored suds.

So Brooklyn Brewery is the ultimate 15-year overnight success — and perfectly located in a borough that has had a long history with brewing.

In the 19th century, German immigrants brought a taste for good beer to New York — and from 1870 until the 1950s, Brooklyn was one of the largest producers of beer in the country. The borough was once home to 48 breweries, but by the time Hindy and partner Tom Potter founded Brooklyn Brewery in 1987, there wasn’t a single successful commercial brewery left.

It seems odd today, but Hindy and Potter struggled in their quest to bring “good beer” to New York, as bar owners were skeptical of the full-flavored lager.

(read more)

SERIOUSLY CATCHING ON IN ENGLAND

lager draught

The James Clay gang, our importers in the U.K., were in town this week. Of course there was lots to talk about and good beer to taste. Coincidentally, this article in The Independent touting Clay’s success in distributing our beer also surfaced this week. Brooklyn Brewery is being recognized as a player in the reemergence of the beer scene in Great Britain.

From The Independent (UK)

by Will Hawkes

British beer is enjoying a remarkable renaissance. There are now 767 breweries in the UK, more than at any time since the Second World War. According to Camra, 78 new breweries have opened in the past 12 months (and although a fair few have closed, too, there are still 56 more now than this time last year). Last month’s Great British Beer Festival was bursting at the seams with interesting ales and happy drinkers. Beer lovers in this country have never had it so good.

Maybe, maybe not. The growing popularity of American beers in the UK suggests that things are not quite so rosy. The innovative, hop-heavy character of Yank beers is clearly filling a gap in the market, a gap that British brewers have failed to fill.

One American beer that no serious bar in the capital appears able to do without is Brooklyn Lager, which has grown hugely in popularity over the past two or three years. The man who brews it, Garrett Oliver, is a long-term friend of British brewing, having learnt to love beer over here in the early eighties – but he feels the scene on this side of the Atlantic is nothing like as exciting as it should be.

(read more)

OLD BEER DISCOVERED. REALLY OLD BEER.

shipwreck_hunting

From The A.P.

STOCKHOLM (AP) — Divers who found what’s believed to be the world’s oldest drinkable champagne say they have also discovered two-centuries-old bottles of beer at a shipwreck in the Baltic Sea. Bjorn Haggblom, a spokesman for the researchers, says they found a handful of beer bottles this week while salvaging champagne discovered near the Aland Islands in July. He said researchers who tried drops of the dark, foamy liquid liked the taste of it. Swedish beer expert Goran Winbergh questioned whether it would still be drinkable because beer is perishable. The shipwreck is believed to be from the early 19th century. Haggblom said the oldest drinkable beer previously recorded dates from 1869.

Associated Press

If it was at the bottom of the sea the odds are it’s been kept pretty cold. It’s probably pretty dark down there too. And certainly no air is getting in those bottles. Could it be drinkable?

SPEND A BUNCH OF MONEY ON A PARADISE WEEKEND IN MAINE (SRSLY, IT LOOKS AWESOME)

maine butcher

maine cooking maine beets

Our buddies from The Meat Hook are headin’ north for their 2nd Annual Maine Event. Check it out!

“The 2nd Annual Maine Event”: A Week of Butchering, Shucking, Roasting, Smoking, Pickling, Preserving and Distilling on the Coast of Maine

Join chefs Tom Mylan and Brent Young from “The Meat Hook,” Dennis Spina and Millicent Souris from “The Roebling Tea Room” and Annemarie Ahearn and Ladleah Dunn from “Salt Water Farm” for this year’s Maine Event. From an al fresco version of Mylan’s popular pig butchering class to an afternoon of blueberry picking and pie making to a tour of a local dairy farm and cheese making class, as well as an authentic lobster bake, the week will be a riotous celebration of local food and the art of preserving the bounty of summer.

For a full list of classes, activities and ticket purchase go here and scroll down a bit.


Also, BAMCinemaFEST Begins Tomorrow

Marisa and John act like they are interested in each other
(above) Marisa and John act like they are interested in each other

…

We are film fanatics. We are the beer sponsor. We are excited for BAM’s annual film festival, beginning tomorrow, Wednesday, June 9th. If you get Opening Night tickets you’ll be treated to a buzzy film AND an important-feeling afterparty featuring oodles of Brooklyn Brand beer, John C Reilly and Marisa Tomei.

Another option is emailing info@brooklynbrewery.com for a chance to win a pair of VIP passes to the 12-day festival.

Trust BrooklynBased.net to give you the scoop on this year’s BAMCinemaFEST below:

The second installment of BAMcinemaFEST returns this week with an amazing slate of shorts and features, director appearances, live music, and 16 New York premieres, even more than last year.

The Duplass Brothers’ hilarious film Cyrus, a hit at Sundance, opens the festival this Wednesday in the BAM Howard Gilman Opera House. It stars Marisa Tomei and John C. Reilly (who will both be at the screening) as an unlikely couple whose only stumbling block is Tomei’s son Cyrus, played bySuperbad star Jonah Hill. A free after party follows, fueled by Brooklyn Brewery beer, Macallan scotch, and ton of food, all free.

That’s just one of the hot tickets in the eclectic 12-day festival. The 20 features and 16 short films emphasize up-and-coming voices like emerging director Matt Porterfield, whose acclaimed debut Hamilton was called one of the decade’s top films by The New Yorker. His follow-up, Putty Hill, which screens this Sunday June 13, is about the family and friends of a young Baltimore man who OD’s on heroin.

(read more)

Garrett Discusses Beard Nomination With Draft Magazine

james_beard

From Draft Magazine

We got a chance to check in with Garrett Oliver, brewmaster and vice president at Brooklyn Brewery, regarding his nomination for Outstanding Wine and Spirits Professional from the James Beard Foundation. Oliver is responsible for every aspect of beer production at the brewery, and obviously he’s doing something right: Over the past 20 years, he’s has won countless awards, many internationally, and published several books (including James Beard Award nominated and International Association of Culinary Professional’s Cookbook Award winner, “The Brewmaster’s Table”), serves as editor-in-chief of “The Oxford Companion to Beer,” and hosted over 600 beer tastings and beer dinners in nine countries. He was also a founding member of Slow Food USA and an international counselor to the global, grassroots organization to “counteract fast food and fast life” for five years. And in 2003, Brooklyn Brewery became the first New York company to begin to use 100 percent wind energy to operate their business. In other words, he’s been busy.”

Read the full interview, conducted by Noah Davis, here.