Pic(k) of the Week: Wary beagle

An awwww pet shot: Ethel Mae, the beagle, has her eye on the cameraman.

As a bonus photograph: a thinner, younger, guiltier Ethel Mae, running away with a shoe.



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Pic(k) of the Week: one in a weekly series of personal photos, often posted on Saturdays.

Clamps & Gaskets: Roundup for 2010 Week 18

Week 18
2 May 2010 - 8 May 2010

• 2010.05.08
  Video lessons on how to pour a beer. There are indeed some bartenders who really DON'T know how to do that properly. http://bit.ly/aAXkl9
• 2010.05.08
  Brewers Association releases 140 beer style categories for year 2010. Includes 'new' American-Style India Black Ale. http://bit.ly/bgAIuO

• 2010.05.08
  Plastic: the future of beer kegs? Photos of one-way, one-use plastic kegs: http://bit.ly/9qVkKv
• 2010.05.08
  Wine flavor chemistry. What makes a #wine grassy [or catty]: http://bit.ly/aaDOhj
• 2010.05.07
  An actual scientific study: Larger Breasts Mean Bigger Tips For Waitresses. http://n.pr/aOZ6Po
• 2010.05.07
  Congressional support for American Craft Beer Week, May 17 - 23. http://bit.ly/bNnj1w
• 2010.05.07
  Study shows less risk of type 2 diabetes for people who drink alcohol in moderation vs. those who abstain. http://bit.ly/bUzGTT

• 2010.05.07
  From a tasting event at the Smithsonian Institute: Does beer or wine pair better with cheese? http://bit.ly/alDYCb [Spoiler alert: it's a tie]
• 2010.05.06
  Why beer bloggers blog about beer. From British beer blogger/author, Pete Brown: http://bit.ly/bnLO5I
• 2010.05.06
  Draft Magazine interviews Beervana’s Jeff Alworth, on why he blogs about beer. http://bit.ly/bq68Qz
• 2010.05.05
  Well-presented argument --NOT against an increase in Maryland beer tax but-- against the SIZE of the proposed tax: http://bit.ly/9dwTbC
• 2010.05.05
  Miller Lite out, Bud Light in, as official beer of National Football League, in 2011. http://bit.ly/9Wtztc
• 2010.05.05
  Suggestions on pairing beer with cheese: http://bit.ly/aywsSN [Except YFGF recommends strong stout -or barleywine- with blue.
• 2010.05.04
  A bill in Congress proposes to undo a Virginia vintner's victory for direct wine shipping: http://bit.ly/aTMzVw

• 2010.05.03
  Room for more beer education. In an online beer review, a writer said a beer had little head retention BECAUSE it was served on draft. That's nonsense!
• 2010.05.02
  Chef Jose Andres And The "Circus of the Mouth" on CBS' 60 Minutes: "The future is vegetables." http://bit.ly/aE6S8C
• 2010.05.02
  How to blog safely (about work or anything else). Via Electronic Frontier Foundation: http://bit.ly/b67rmN
• 2010.05.02
  "American Farmhouse Ales": Local, organic beers from Shooting Creek Brewery in Floyd VA. http://bit.ly/agBBQF

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• Clamps and Gaskets is a weekly wrap-up of stories  not posted at Yours For Good Fermentables.com. Most deal with beer (or wine, or whisky); some do not. But all are brief, and many are re-posts from my Twitter account: twitter.com/cizauskas ... And tardy this week: Clamps & Gaskets is normally posted on Mondays.
• The Clamps and Gaskets graphic was created by Mike Licht at NotionsCapital.

America comes to Max's

American Craft Beer Week will be celebrated 17 - 23 May, at breweries and pubs throughout the US.

From an email, here's what our friends are doing at Baltimore, Maryland's Max's TapHouse:

MAX'S 4TH ANNUAL AMERICAN CRAFT BEER FEST
MAY 17-23, 2010
NO ENTRANCE FEE

Max's will be hosting another American Craft Beer Fest celebrating American Craft Beer Week. We will be featuring over 70 special kegs during this week. We will also have special brewery nights each day.

BREWERY NIGHT LINE UP:
Monday 17-Troegs/Ommegang
Tuesday 18-Heavy Seas/Brewers Art
Wednesday 19-Harpoon/Victory
Thursday 20-Flying Dog
Friday 21-The Bruery/Lagunitas/Oskar Blues/Boulder/Great Divide/Weyerbacher
Saturday 22-Stillwater Ales/Oliver's/Evolution
Sunday 23-Smuttynose/Allagash

THE DRAFT BEERS LIST 90% DONE.As always beers may change due to things out of our control
Allagash Victor
Allagash White
Allagash Victoria
Avery Samuels
Boulder Cold Hop(Nitro)
Brewers Art Charm City Sour Cherry
Brewers Art Ozzy
Brewers Art Tiny Tim
Brewers Art Taurus
Evolution Haymaker
Evolution Summer Session
Flying Dog Barrel Aged Gonzo
Flying Dog Coffee Stout
Flying Dog Heller Hound Old Ale
Flying Dog Horn Dog(Nitro)
Great Divide Dunkel Weiss
Harpoon Leviathan Imperial IPA
Harpoon Raspberry UFO
Harpoon 100 Barrel Single Hop ESB
Heavy Seas Barrel Aged Below Decks
Hebrew Rejewvenator 2008
North Coast Brother Thelonious
Oliver's Cherry Blossom
Oliver's Hot Money Love
Ommegang Triple Perfection
Schlafly Dry Hopped APA
Schlafly Kolsch
Smuttynose Barleywine
Smuttynose Hanami
Smuttynose Imperial Stout
Smuttynose Maibock
Smuttynose Rouge
Southern Tier 2xipa
Southern Tier Oak Unearthly
Southern Tier Pale
Stillwater Cellar Door
Stillwater Stateside Saison
The Bruery Trade Winds Triple
Troegs Special
Troegs Special
Unita Barleywine 2008
Victory Altbier
Victory Citra
Victory Saaz Braumeister Pils
Victory St Boisterous
Victory Throwback lager
Weyerbacher India
Plus a bunch special kegs---------------

CASKS
Victory Storm King Stout
Troegs Java Head
Stillwater Cellar Door
Stillwater /Oliver's Collaboration
Oskar Blues Gubna
Heavy Seas Barrel Aged Below Decks
Flying Dog Raging Bitch
Evolution Lot #6
Plus a few others.......

Pic(k) of the Week: Beer Diary

Pictured: the beer journal of Joe Gold —long-time Baltimore, Maryland, beer maven— his day-by-day stories of the first ever Baltimore Beer Week, which he organized and founded in 2009.

Bonus pic: the man and his diary. Joe has recently signed on with Victory Brewing of Pennsylvania as its Area Sales Manager for Maryland and Virginia.



Baltimore Beer Week 2010 will run October 7-17. Hmmm? That's eleven days, hon!

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Pic(k) of the Week: one in a weekly series of personal photos, often posted on Saturdays.

Feeling Good Libations: Secco opens in Richmond, Va.

We interrupt the regularly scheduled Yours For Good Fermentables to bring you this news flash:

Funny, how after two years of planning, paying rent on an empty space, crunching numbers, planning some more, paying a lot more, crunching more numbers, filling out dozens of logic-defying/mind-numbing governmental forms, drinking a hell of a lot [of wine], filing endless applications, "engaging" city hall (in that unresolved, Korean DMZ sort of way), hiring awesome people and then convincing them to wait months for a job, selling everything I own, borrowing against my soul/leveraging the rest and putting EVERYTHING on a spreadsheet (an unnatural act) it all comes down to 15 freaking days!?!!?!

Julia Battaglini wrote that on 14 April. Her prediction was off by only 7 days. Yesterday —Friday 7 May 2010— she opened Secco Wine Bar for business.

Here's what I wrote almost a year ago:

So you want to open a bar?

Apply pockets of indebted money, gobs of time, catch-22 frustrations ... and inspired lunacy.

Julia Battaglini owns a wine/beer/cheese shop in the Careytown district of Richmond, Virginia. For nearly two years, she's been transforming the old building next door into a shiny-new wine bar.

The first year was background: financing, and permits, and paying rent on an empty building. Now, she's demolishing, rehabbing, remodeling, re-doing.

Of the more than two dozen by-the-glass offerings at Secco, only a handful are priced above $10, with more than half available for $6 or less. Food for the 'small-plates' menu is locally sourced where possible, and almost exclusively from family-owned or small farms.



And, fear not, good beer fans. Julia is also a member of your club. Secco has bottled Belgians and craft drafts.

Congratulations, and good libations! We need more places like this and more of this encompassing zeitgeist, rather than all of those silly, pleasure-thwarting wine-versus-beer wars.

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• Two prior-to-opening reviews here and here.
• Pre-opening photo set: here.
• The planning, frustrations, joys, and construction ... as blogged: here.