All about beer
I have insomnia tonight, so I thought I’d give myself a little project to keep myself occupied until I start slumping in front of the keyboard. This weekend, I’m going to a gaming convention with my college buddies up in venerable Schenectady, New York.
I feel a bit guilty that I went and consumed my second John Harvard’s growler, even after my friend Martin (also attending the gaming convention) suggested I save it for consumption at the con.
So, I thought I’d try and locate a few brew pubs in the Schenectady/ Albany area on the chance of aquiring a new growler of some sort. What I found is a fascinating cache of knowledge about beer. I figure I’d post a bunch of links that I’va been storing away and new ones I found tonight.
First, the history of various beers is chronicled on Wikipedia with surprising detail. First, check out the entry on Beer itself. Don’t stop there, find out about how IPA got started. Or, learn about the different styles of beer, like a Porter, Ale (like my favorite, Sierra Nevada Pale Ale), Lager (see popular brands, like Samuel Adams), Pilsener (think Budweiser), and Stout. Did I miss any?
So, in Schenectady, we can search for brew pubs near Schenectady. This yields a number of results. I can take these results and get driving directions to/from my hotel.
So then I check out one of t hese brew pubs and they wind up having a delightful writeup about beer and how it is generally mishandled in most beer distributors. So I learned that,
“A common myth is that cycling beer from cold to warm and back to cold temperatures will damage its flavor. This is only true in that warm temperatures are bad for beer. Keeping beer cool is always good for the preservation of its flavor.”
Like any checmical reaction, the breakdown of a beer is accelerated by higher temperatures. As the link states, beers don’t last forever, they are a “perishible food.”
One of he more interesting facts in the fresh beer article is that,
“While some beer styles will benefit from extended aging, the majority reach peak flavor about six weeks after brew day. There is little we can do to protect beer from time, other than accelerate it to near light speed to reap the benefits of time dilation.”
Golly, the author is also a physicist!
Another interesting fact:
“The above process takes a few weeks to perform, and is done by people called maltsters. Samuel Adams, the revolutionary war figure, was actually a maltster, not a brewer as some claim. Maltsters are wonderful people, because they enable the brewer to make beer.”
You can also read about “adjuncts” which is basically food for the yeast to do it’s job. The author claims that,
“Adjuncts cannot be used in Germany, because of their ancient beer tax law, the Reinheitsgebot (pronounced, rIn hIts ga bOt). Many of America's craft brewers, including the C.H. Evans Brewing Company, refrain from using adjuncts when brewing German-style beers.”
If I wanted to visit the Evans brew pub, I should go there before I go to my hotel. This map make that pretty clear considering I’m traveling North of 87.
Wish me luck!
Now playing: - EGC Clambake for September 30, 2005