Clamps & Gaskets: News Roundup for Weeks 24/25, 2014.

A bi-weekly, non-comprehensive roundup
of news of beer and other things.

Weeks 24/25
8 June - 21 June 2014

• 2014.06.21
  "In 2012, the New York State Legislature adopted a 'farm brewery' law. The bill mandates that small breweries will need to use a minimum 20% of a New York-grown barley product to officially be dubbed a New York beer. The requirement will increment over the years, up to 90% by 2020."
  
  As a result, Cornell University is attempting to develop "New York-friendly" malting barley. The USDA, as well, is conducting similar experiments, near Raleigh, North Carolina.
  —Via Mashable.
  
  
• 2014.06.21
  “Musical composition should bring joy." The great 'hard bop' jazz pianist/composer Horace Silver has died at 85.
  —Via New York Times.
  
  
• 2014.06.19
  Montgomery County, Maryland, one of the few alcohol 'full control jurisdictions' in the United States, will now allow small brewery self-distribution.
  —Via DC Beer.
  
  
• 2014.06.16
  "Some players are in the Hall of Fame. A few are Hall-of-Famers." Tony Guinn —arguably the greatest hitter in Major League Baseball of the last 50 years— has died at age 54.
  —Via New York Times.
  
  
  
  
• 2014.06.14
  The United States flag was officially adopted 14 June 1777. The day is now observed as Flag Day.
  —Via Wikipedia.
  
  
• 2014.06.13
  Did Anheuser-Busch InBev and Miller Coors really 'cave in' to the ingredient-listing demands of the 'Food Babe'? Historian Maureen Ogle calls out Vani Hari's process over product specious bait-and-switch.
  
  
• 2014.06.11
  21st century racketeering. Feedly, a widely-used RSS reader website, was temporarily taken down by a distributed denial of service attack by unknown perpetrators demanding ransom.
  —Via Yahoo News.
  
  
  
  
• 2014.06.10
  The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issues a 'clarification' seemingly backing down from its earlier ban on using wood shelving in 'artisanal' cheesemaking.
  —Via Forbes.
  
  
• 2014.06.09
  A Virginia brewery uses yeast cultured from a fossilized whale bone to brew beer.
  —Via Washington Business Journal.
  
  
• 2014.06.08
  The Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) —the agency of the U.S. government that oversees breweries— exempts over thirty beer ingredients and brewing processes, such as barrel-aging, from reporting requirements.
  —Via Brewbound.
  
  
  
• 2014.06.08
  Brewers Publications releases its newest book on brewing: American Sour Beers: Innovative Techniques for Mixed Fermentations.
  —Written by Washington, D.C.-area homebrewer, Michael Tonsmeire, who blogs at The Mad Fermentationist.
  
  

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Pic(k) of the Week: NoVa Festival Go-ers

'Stitched' together from several digital images, today's Pic(k) of the Week is a panoramic view of attendees at the Northern Virginia Summer Brewfest.

Held over a June weekend at Morven Park, in Leesburg, Virginia, the outdoor event offered festival go-ers the choice of beers from nearly sixty breweries, including many local breweries.

Here's another view:

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#VeggieDag Thursday: Quick links for June 2014

VeggieDag Thursday is an occasional Thursday post
on issues of an animal-free diet, ecology, and the environment.

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Quick links for June 2014

• 25 June 2014:
  McCormick, the maker of Maryland's iconic Old Bay seasoning, mulls move out of Maryland.
  —Via Washington Post.


• 24 June 2014:
  When the state of North Carolina predicted that the ocean would be 39 inches higher by the end of the century, swamping much of the Outer Banks, residents convinced legislators to change the forecast.
  —Via Washington Post.


• 15 June 2014:
  Scientists have discovered evidence discovered of vast reservoirs of water —containing three times the volume of the Earth's oceans— in the mantle, 400 miles beneath the Earth's surface.
  —Via Science.


• 11 June 2014:
  For the first time ever, researchers, in Canada, have discovered antibiotic-resistant bacteria in a food product — raw squid.
  —Via Washington Post.


• 5 June 2014:
  Massive volcanic explosions in Western Australia 500 million years ago may have caused the Cambrian extinction, killing off 50 percent of the world’s species.
  —Via Geology.


• 22 May 2014:
  "The Untold History of Ramen: How Political Crisis in Japan Spawned a Global Food Craze."
  —Via The New Yorker.


• 22 May 2014:
  Seventeen years after Deborah Madison published her classic "Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone," the chef and author has released the 2nd edition, entitling it, "The New Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone." What's different in the book —and for vegetarian cooking and cuisine— between then and now?
  —Interviewed by Joe Yonan of Washington Post.


• 12 May 2014:
  The history and traditions of Pennsylvania 'Dutch' cooking.
  —Via Washington, D.C.-area homebrewer Tim Artz —and 'amateur' chef (in Washington Post Food).


• 25 April 2014:
  Made of soy and pea protein, flours, fiber, and amaranth and other flavorings, vegetarian faux chicken Beyond Meat fools panelists on Today Show.
  "Most of our fans grew up eating/enjoying animal meat, but due to ethical (or health) reasons, animal meat is not an option."
  —Tweet via @BeyondMeat.
  —Review of product via Slate.

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RECIPES

• Canning sweet-and-sour onion-pickles.
  —Via Mrs. Wheelbarrow (at Washington Post Food). Kathy Barrow's blog (and book): here.


• It's sweet corn season!
  —Grilling, via YFGF.
  —Corn risotto, via Food 52.


• Two recipes for toum, Lebanese-style garlic spread.
  —Via Choosy Beggars.
  —Via Washington Post Food.


• Making 'Bavarian'-style baked pretzels requires ... lye.
  —Via Smitten Kitchen.


• How to make gluten-free seitan with flours of teff, buckwheat, sweet rice, and lentil.
  —Via Happy Herbivore.


• Whole-wheat Indian flatbreads.
  —Via Food Wanderings.


• "A green bean salad to remember Paris by." Haricots verts, artichokes, hazelnuts.
  —Via Joe Yonan (Food Editor, Washington Post).


• Pennsylvania Dutch pepper & cabbage slaw
  —Via Tim Artz (in Washington Post Food).

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Some things come (Tuppers 25K), and some things go (Tuppers Hop Pocket).

For over thirty years, Bob and Ellie Tupper have observed, hosted, interviewed, and introduced the Washington, D.C.-area beer scene. During that time, the husband-and-wife duo has tasted over 24,000 beers from there —and nearly everywhere else— and recorded their observations in handwritten notebooks.

On Wednesday, 2 July, they will taste, and document, in public, their 25,000th beer.

With Lost Rhino Brewing, of Ashburn, Virginia, the Tuppers have collaborated in brewing a "big-hopped" Rye Pale Ale of 7.9% alcohol-by-volume (abv). Called, appropriately, Tuppers' 25K, the beer will be released that evening at the brewery's tap room, draught-only. The Tuppers will meet and greet at 6pm; they'll 'formally' taste the beer, their 25,000th brew, at 7:30. There's no admission charge; one pays as one drinks. But ... sales of souvenir glasses and a percentage of the beer sales will benefit The Reading Connection, an organization that provides books and tutoring for kids in shelters.

In today's parlance, Bob and Ellie —a schoolteacher and scientific editor, by trades, respectively— are 'gypsy' brewers.

In 1994, after already having tasted thousands of beers, they collaborated with Dominion Brewing —then in Ashburn, close to where Lost Rhino is today— to brew a beer as they wanted a beer to taste. The result, Tuppers' Hop Pocket Ale (and, later, joined by Tuppers' Hop Pocket Pils), was considered quite the hop 'bomb' of the day. Kenny Allen¹, then Dominion's head-brewer, brewed Hop Pocket with "extravagant" quantities of whole leaf hops, Mt. Hood predominant. Hop Pocket would go on to become Dominion's top-selling beer, but in 2007, production was halted after Dominion was sold and moved soon thereafter to Delaware. Three years later, in 2010, the beer would be revived at St. George Brewing, in Hampton, Virginia.

Sadly, Tuppers Hop Pocket Ale is, again, no longer in production (never say never?). Bob and Ellie will be tapping the very last keg of it, this Tuesday evening, 24 June, at Mia's Pizzas, in Bethesda, Maryland.

Of course, the following week, the two, quite un-wistfully, will be tapping their newest beer, Tuppers' 25K, at Lost Rhino Brewing.

We haven't had a chance to play 'gypsy' for a while, so it was really fun being back in a brewhouse again. Favio Garcia [brewmaster and co-owner at Lost Rhino, who had also once worked at Dominion Brewing] is a blast to work with. We were standing in the hop room saying, "There're some xxx hops. Let's use some of those." So, Favio tossed Mount Hood, Amarillo, Cascade, and Azacca [a new variety] in the kettle, adding a good dose of Mount Hood and Amarillo at knockout, and then a bunch of Crystal and Mount Hood in the hop-back. The rye was coming through very nicely when we had some out of the fermenter last week. Rye can be husky and edgy, but it seemed to oddly temper the big hops. We'll see what happens when fermentation's done.

Bob reports that Tuppers' 25K is but the prototype for an even 'bigger' beer. Come this fall, he and Ellie will again be collaborating with the brewery, but on "Mother Tupper's Back of the Cupboard Imperial Rye PA" (say that 5 times quickly!), "a 9.4% abv, 94 IBUs liverbreaker," named and 'spec'd' for Bob's 94 year old mother. A 50-barrel batch, it will be packaged in draught and in 22-ounce bottles.

Some things come, and some things go. Farewell, Hop Pocket; greetings, Tuppers' 25K and Mother Tupper's. But a question remains: when will the Tuppers ever get around to publishing the tasting notes for those twenty-five thousand beers?

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Pic(k) of the Week: The Perfect Bite 2014

These whimsical morsels are Perpetual Goatstoppers: seedless red grapes wrapped with chèvre (soft goat cheese), studded with candied ginger, and encrusted with ... Post Cereal Burstin' Berry Poppin' Pebbles (!), a breakfast version of Pop Rocks, a CO2-infused fruit-flavored candy that 'pops' in your mouth.

They were created by Perry Soulos —cheesemonger at Arrowine, a wine, beer, and cheese shop in Arlington, Virginia— as a "perfect bite" for his first place finish at the 1st West Coast Cheesemonger Invitational Championship, held in San Francisco, California, in January 2014.

In one of eight rounds of the competition, contestants had sixty minutes in which to put together a dish, from one pre-determined cheese. Soulos' was goat cheese; he named his confection, 'Goatstoppers,' in a nod to the fictional Everlasting Gobstoppers of Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: candies that change colors and flavors, and can never be finished.

Several months after the competition, Soulos recreated his goat-cheese 'truffles' at an 'after-hours' beer-and-cheese tasting at his Arlington, Virginia, shop. And, one could taste why he had won. As crazy as Perpetual Goatstoppers might have sounded, they weren't. Soulos had successfully mashed-up the tang of goat cheese with contrasting textures (soft cheese, popping candy), shots of gingered sweet and spice, and a frisson shot of grape juice.

As the evening began, folk tasted three 'unadorned' sheep's milk cheeses and six beers: a Belgian sour gueuze, an English oak-aged barleywine, a German hefe-weizen, a Trappist tripel, a Trappist-brewed brettanomyces beer, and a Spanish 'craft' beer.

I mentioned the affinity of cheese for beer. How serving a California Cabernet Sauvignon with a cheese is like pouring jam on the cheese. How, at the very least, beer is a wash with cheese; it doesn't fight it. How, at its best, beer shares with cheese the flavors of kitchen, field, and 'funky' fermentation.

It was Soulos, however, who had the best line of the evening. "With cheese, wine is an a**hole. Beer is a friend."

The 'stunner' of the evening was the 'craft' beer from Spain, La Socarrada —a Valencian ale brewed and infused with rosemary and rosemary honey. Tried with the goat-cheesed Goatstoppers, flavors of sweet and savory popped in the mouth as if one had bitten into a pod of cardamom.

And, you too can make Perpetual Goatstoppers at home. Soulos has graciously shared his recipe. Serve the beers. Amaze your friends!

INGREDIENTS

• 8 oz Chèvre Goat Cheese
• 2 oz candied ginger, finely chopped
• 2 1/2 cups Burstin' Berry Poppin' Pebbles (or Pop Rocks)
• 1 bunch red seedless grapes

INSTRUCTIONS

• Wash and de-stem red grapes.
• In large zip-lock bag, combine 2 oz. of crushed candied ginger and the cereal. Lightly crush into small pieces.
• Pinch off a small amount of chevre, and slightly flatten out to make a small indentation for the grape.
• Place grape in center of goat cheese, and work the cheese completely around the grape, to create a small cheese ball. Repeat.
• Roll cheese balls in ginger and cereal mixture until evenly coated.

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