Getting the last few drops of Crossroads’ Outrage IPA from the cask.
I’ve been to beer tastings, I’ve been to museums, but I’ve never been to a beer tasting AT a museum.
Well, that trend ended yesterday at the “Hudson Valley Hops” event
at the Albany Institute of History & Art (AIHA). This was an
interesting series of presentations on Albany’s oft-forgotten brewing
history as well as the current state of hop farming and brewing
regulation reform in New York State. Six local breweries were on hand
pouring samples of their beers just as they would at a beer festival.
Patrons received a 4oz tasting glass with the “Hudson Valley Hops” logo
(I have so many of these types of tasting glasses from so many beer
festivals it’s ridiculous).
The brewers’ tables were spread out
around two floors at the AIHA. A few of them were actually hard to find
because of the building’s, uh, peculiar layout (read: idiot me didn’t
pay attention to the signs). I nearly missed getting to try beers from
Keegan Ales, Brown’s, Adirondack, and Crossroads which were in the Rice
House section of the museum. In fact, I got the last few drops of
Crossroads’ cask of their Outrage IPA –>
Albany Pump Station’s “Kick Ass Brown Ale”
with some tasty brownies and cookies.
There were presentations going on in the lecture room on the third
floor throughout the event. The brewers (and volunteers) were pouring
beer on the second and third floors, and there were platters of cheese,
crackers, cookies, brownies, and I think there were some chicken wings
too but I missed those. From what I could tell, the majority of the
crowd was there for the beer, which would explain the long lines and
crowded hallways. I don’t mean that as a criticism, just an observation.
In fact, I spoke with Elizabeth Reiss, AIHA’s Director of Development,
and she said there were about 300 people in attendance this year, which
was a huge jump from the less than 100 patrons they had at last year’s
event. These are the kind of statistics that make beer nerds like me
smile.
I arrived early and spent a good hour or so mingling with the crowd. I was wearing my Albany Brew Crafters sweatshirt
and quite a few people asked me about it. I also finally got to meet
Scott Veltman, who is a brewer for Ommegang. We’ve been friends on
Facebook for a while but had never met in person until this event. We
went to the “after party” at the Lionheart Pub and then grabbed a couple
more beers and some food at the Excelsior Pub (insert your “bromance”
joke here).
As for the presentations, I thought they
were all great. I tried to catch every word from every speaker because I
obviously found the topics interesting, if not fascinating. I’ll
quickly recap and comment on them, but bear in mind this is a
ultra-super-succinct recap of presentations which are essentially
ultra-super-succinct recaps of history themselves:
4:30pm – Craig Gravina talked about his
research of Albany Ale and its 400-year history. A lot of people don’t
know that in the United States’ very early years, Albany was second only
to London in global beer production. Craig’s been documenting Albany
Ale on both his blog and on his Facebook group.
I highly recommend all beer enthusiasts in the Capital District learn
about this history and get involved involved in the project itself.
Craig Gravina speaking on the history of Albany Ale
Craig told me he has a homebrew recipe
which might be a fairly accurate reproduction of the beer, but it hasn’t
been brewed yet. I hope someone will brew it soon, in fact I’ll
volunteer right now. To learn about history is one thing, but to
literally taste the same (or approximate) flavors that our ancestors
tasted is as close as we’ll ever get to time travel.
5:15pm – Kathy Quinn is a descendant of
Ted Quinn of the Quinn & Nolan Brewery – the biggest brewery in the
history of Albany Ale. She spoke about her family’s personal and
professional history. What was so interesting is that she actually just
learned about all this herself fairly recently as her elders moved out
west a long time ago.
6pm – Dietrich Gehring talked about the
current state of hop farming in New York. He runs a hop farm and
described what it entails. He also talked about the Helderberg Hop, a
variety that was pretty much exclusive to New York.
A lesson on hops by Russ Savoy
6:20pm – Russell Savoy of Hennessy Homebrew Emporium gave a quick
lesson on the history of hop farming in upstate New York. Did you know
New York used to be the biggest supplier for hops in the country in the
pre-prohibition years?
6:40pm – Sam Filler discussed some of the
recent changes to brewing regulation in New York. Mr. Filler is a
bureaucrat, so there was, not surprisingly, slurping of the governor’s
policies and proposals. Though it all sounded great, I just kind of
rolled my eyes at this (we’ll get into beer politics another time).
Brown's Brewing Co. of Troy
As for the actual beer being poured at the event, I tried at least
one beer from every brewery and I liked them all. However, I’ve already
had every beer that was there, so there was nothing particularly new or
exclusive except for maybe the Crossroads cask. With the exception of
Keegan Ales, it was nice to see the brewers pouring their own beers and
talking about them with attendees. You don’t tend to see that level of
direct interaction between a manufacturer and the customer in many
industries. It’s what makes craft beer something worth geeking out over
(I’ll continue this discussion next week when I report back on the 2013
Tap New York beer fest).
NOTE: you can also read this blog on the Times Union website here: http://blog.timesunion.com/beer/how-to-drink-beer-in-a-museum-my-experience-at-hudson-valley-hops/879/