Author Archives: Brian Yaeger

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About Brian Yaeger

Author of beer books "Red, White, & Brew" & "Oregon Breweries" and, soon, "American Doughnut."

Ale Apothecary

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In my first real contribution to Ezra Johnson-Greenough’s New School Beer Blog (Feb. ’13), I decided to sort of workshop the entry I was writing for Oregon Breweries knowing it was a rough draft for the book that wouldn’t be published for nearly two years to come. It also enabled me to publish the story long before the print magazine whose photographer severely delayed my interview with brewer Paul Arney despite my huge time crunch.

The Ale Apothecary will never be a spot on the well-trodden/sloshy Bend Ale Trail. It’s ten miles out of downtown way up in the mountains. There’s no pub. No merch wall. Founder Paul Arney is a man who, after 15 years at Deschutes working his way up to assistant brewmaster, set up his own brewery and has the finished Finnish kuurna to show for it.

Portland Brewing: Rose Hip Gold

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One of the very first breweries in Portland was the eponymous Portland Brewing Co., founded in 1986. Based on the popularity of its MacTarnahan’s Amber Ale, released in 1992, the company name was changed to MacTarnahan’s Brewing Co. From there it gets even more confusing, with ownership tied to Pyramid Brewing, Vermont’s Magic Hat, and New York’s North American Breweries. But the brewery itself never left Portland, and its brand new name reflects that. In 2013, it’s back to Portland Brewing once more! While Mac’s Amber isn’t going anywhere, to commemorate all this old newness, Portland Brewing will be releasing new beers, starting with Rose Hip Gold.

Beer Destination: San Francisco

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BeerAdvcoate, the online forum turned magazine, doesn’t republish the print zine’s content online, but if you have #73, there’s my beer travel story on one of the best beer towns in the world: San Francisco. After the lede, below, I devised an itinerary that stops at musts like the legendary Toronado as well as more intimate nooks like Fat Angel.

Anchor Brewing Co., established in 1896, transformed into America’s original craft brewery in 1965 when Fritz rescued and renovated it, thereby making the SF Bay Area the epicenter of the beer renaissance. Maytag was even ahead of the real food movement, pioneered by Alice Waters who opened groundbreaking Chez Panisse across the bay in Berkeley in 1971.Today, the Bay Area is home to over sixty breweries, and The City itself boasts nine beyond Anchor…and growing. In fact, the SF Brewers Guild decided to bring the contract and gypsy breweries into the fold so now membership stands at fifteen.

Beertown USA: New Orleans

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That I love beer is a given. So when I get to write about beer in combo with my other favorite things, it’s sheer joy. The first time I went to New Orleans I was just 22 years old and happened to discover Dixie Blackened Voodoo, the heritage brewery’s first all-malt beer, just a year earlier. But at 22, my focus on exploring the Big Easy was anything but craft beer-oriented. After visiting again in 2001 to attend Jazz Fest, that’s when my love affair began and it turned into an annual pilgrimage. In fact, I typically find myself there twice a year. I LOVE NEW ORLEANS. Greatest American city! But I felt I may never get to write about it in the context of a beer story until, to use a very poor metaphor given its history, the tide started rising post-Katrina, sparked in some ways as a means of economic recovery. I know that was NOLA’s (New Orleans Lagers & Ales) impetus and they’ve grown into the city (that care forgot)’s largest brewer.

From DRAFT (vol 8.1, 2013), Laissez les bons temps brewler (let the good times brew).

Craft Brewers Gone Nuts

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Thinking about the popular bar snack beer nuts, I pitched this exploration nutty beers to CraftBeer.com (Dec, 2012). Truth in advertising is vital in craft beer culture. There better be fresh hops in our fresh hop beers, real cherries in our krieks, and just as seasonally-relevant, real pumpkin in our field or pumpkin beers. Yet the distinguished British classic, nut brown ale, contains nary a nut.

The name derived from this medium-bodied beer’s use of toasted malted barley as opposed to roasted malt—gives the style its telltale nutty color and flavor.

Golden Valley Brewery Tannen Bomb

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The only logical decision is to drink winter seasonal beers while the getting’s good. Most craft breweries release a “winter warmer” to ward off Jack Frost, a tradition dating back millennia to when agrarians celebrated the solstice by brewing beers made heavier with extra with grains (and perhaps fruits and spices), and religious practitioners believed intoxication aided communion with deities and spirits. Outside Portland in McMinnville, great beers are easily found inside the Golden Valley Brewpub; visit to New Seasons in hopes of picking up a six-pack of Tannen Bomb, so named since it arrives in stores along with Christmas trees and is a veritable malt bomb — 125 lbs. of malts per barrel.

Coalition Brewing Loving Cup Maple Porter

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The leaves were losing their fiery colors, replaced by brown in only slightly varying shades. Nights arrived an hour earlier, giving up a minute of sunshine with each passing day. But before we grabbed our saws to chop down our Christmas trees, we paused to give thanks. Oddly, no one’s cornered the Thanksgiving beer market. Well pilgrim, Coalition Brewing has just the thing.

Brewery co-founder Kiley Hoyt is a Vermont native, so it makes sense Coalition offers a porter brewed with maple syrup. Loving Cup Maple Porter is available year-round at the brewpub, but was being bottled as a seasonal offering for the first time. The British-style porter is on the dry side, offering desirable chocolatiness without being thick or sweet.

Enter the maple syrup.

Oakshire Brewing Big Black Jack Imperial Pumpkin Chocolate Porter

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Pumpkin beers, it turns out, squash all other seasonal styles of beer in popularity, according to the Brewers Association. So it’s no wonder that come October (or earlier) more and more craft breweries offer them, and also no surprise brewers continue to up the creativity level of their creations. While a standard beer works perfectly fine with addition of pumpkin and/or pumpkin pie spices (usually a brown ale or something with a malt bill that can support autumnal flavoring without hops stealing the show), Eugene’s Oakshire Bewing went a step further. Big Black Jack Imperial Pumpkin Chocolate Porter is as complex as its name implies.

Brewets: Brewer-Musician Collaborations

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Brewers are musicians who compose songs made of beer. Put these brewing and musical artists together and the ensuing duets (bruets? brewets?) and the results can be music to your mouth.

Many bands are comprised of a guitar, bass, drums and a singer. Beer is made from hops, malted barley, water and yeast. The similarities between those four instruments and ingredients truly rock!

Think of a beer’s malt bill as the bass, providing the foundation by laying down the rhythm. Hops are analogous to guitars, as top notes keep everything in harmony and are usually flashier. Tempo is the crucial element of any given piece—yet rarely gets the glory—so water plays the role of drums. Finally, what’s a song without a melody, so think of the voice as yeast. Coincidence? Find out in this CraftBeer.com post from Sept 2012.