NH Brew Fest

This weekend, we'll be pouring Smuttynose beers at the New Hampshire Brew Fest on the grounds of RedHook Brewery here in Portsmouth.  In addition to being a beer festival in our hometown, the event is a fundraiser for the Prescott Park Arts Festival as well as the New England District of the Master Brewer's Association of the Americas.

The Prescott Park Arts Festival is a summer-long program of events.  It encompasses everything from studio art shows and film to theatre and music.  The summer-long art-stravaganza is very friendly for both families and wallets as all it's events are free.  The first edition took place in 1974, making it one of the oldest Portsmouth arts happenings.

The Master Brewer's Association of the America's is one of three technical and educational brewing organizations (the others are in Europe and Japan).  The funds raised will go the New England District's Scholarship Fund.  One scholarship is given out each year and then winner is able to attend either the Brewing and Malting Science course or the Packaging Technology course.  Buying a ticket will ensure a future New England brewer's ability to make more delicious beer for you.  It's kind of like the Stock Market but with a much more predictable outcome.

We'll be pouring 2010 S'Muttonator, 2009 Barleywine, Big A IPA, and Pumpkin Ale.  The VIP session will feature 2009 Wheat Wine.

Paul Barber from the Finestkind IPA label will be on hand as well.

Please come out and join us!

Smuttynose Short Batch #10- Belgian Stout

         If you had eight freshly-emptied whiskey barrels, what would you do?  This is the situation we found ourselves in after we packaged the Ry(e)an Ale.   Sawing them in half and turning them into planters was definitely not an option, so we had to think of a new Short Batch beer.  We didn’t want to do another barrel-aged version of an imperial stout but it was difficult to stop thinking of how tasty the combination of roasted malt, caramel malts, bourbon and oak is.  The obvious choice was to make a Belgian-style stout.  

         Belgian-style stouts aren’t very different than regular imperial stouts.  The most obvious difference is the choice to use a Belgian yeast strain.  Our house American ale yeast leaves a pretty neutral flavor profile but Belgian strains are known for adding very particular flavor profiles from clovey, to fruity to spicy. 

         To accommodate the spicy flavor our Belgian strain contributes, we needed to adjust the flavor profile of the beer by dropping out some of the roasted malt character.  This enables the caramel character to come forward and blend nicely with the bourbon and oak character.

         The challenge was to figure out the volume of beer.  Short batches are always a small portion of the full volume of our brew system.  If we were just going to fill the barrels, then we’d need exactly 424 gallons of beer, which is only about 13.5 brewer’s barrels of volume and there’s no way we could make that small of a batch on our 50-barrel system.  This means we get to release two versions of this beer, a barrel-aged version and a non barrel-aged version.

         The non-barrel-aged version was kegged on 11 June 2010.  The barrel-aged version is still aging at press time.

Stat Box

Malts: 2-Row, Carawheat, Munich, C-120, Chocolate, Roasted Barley, Brown Malt

Hops: Magnum, Glacier

Other Ingredients:  D2 Belgian Candi Syrup

Starting Extract 19° Plato

Finishing Extract 4.2° Plato

50 IBU

Champion Firkin Friday!

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?  We've all heard this philosophical quandry and yet the answer is still profound: the tree doesn't make a sound.  

Well, after Big A IPA was named the Best American Beer at the Great British Beer Festival, we thought it would be best to make a sound in our own town.  

This Friday, September 10, our friends at the Portsmouth Brewery will be hosting a special Firkin Friday.  David Yarrington, Director of Brewing Operations will be tapping a firkin of Big A at the Portsmouth Brewery at 4 PM.  This cask was dry-hopped with Santiam, Simcoe, Centennial, and Cascade hops, the exact same ones that were in the winning cask.

We hope to see you all at the pub on Friday so we can share this special beer with you.   Since Portsmouth Little League didn't have the same success as in years past, we hope that this provides a fun, if slightly more adult alternative to celebrating a hometown champion. 

L'Chaim!

Vunderbar! Short Batch #11

Guten tag!  Short Batch #11 is kegged and ready for delivery!  

Here are Dave's notes about the beer:

Ah, Vunderbar.  So simple.  So elegant.  The impetus of this beer was two-fold.   The first part stemmed from drinking a snot load of Sam Adams Noble Pils this spring.  Great beer.  The other was a visit by Cornelius Faust from Faust Brewery in Germany.  He brewed a pilsner with Tod Mott down at the Portsmouth Brewery that was also quite beautiful.  We, of course, couldn’t possibly let Mott show us up and so had to try our hand at the style.  We’ve made several lagers in the past but this was our first attempt at a beer this delicate.  Luckily, we stole Cornelius’ great idea of boiling the brewing water to soften it before use.  We bumped up the acidulated malt to balance the mash pH and were able to mimic a traditional pilsner quite well.  Hopefully you agree.  Prost.

The Stat Junkie Corner


Weyermann Pilsner Malt
Weyermann Acidulated Malt

Saaz Hops for all hopping

15 IBU, dryhopping at ½ pound per barrel.

5.11% Alcohol by Volume
Starting Extract 10.9° Plato
Terminal Extract 1.9° Plato.


Vunderbar Pils marks a departure from the last few short batches we have brewed.  It's not high in alcohol.  It doesn't use any kind of wild yeast, nor is it barrel-aged.  It's a beer in the classic, if not archetypal, sense of the word.  Best of all, it's blindingly delicious and drinkable.  The low bitterness and moderate body make the beer conducive to some serious elbow bending; we went through five gallons here in less than twenty-four hours. 

After all the kegging was done, we ended up with (27) 15.5-gallon kegs and (60) 5.16-gallon kegs.  Final allocations and destinations have yet to be determined.

We also have designed these swank Vunderbar t-shirts.  Wearing one tells the world "I'm formal, but I like to party," just in German.  Greg Blanchard, our Head Brewer, models one below just before going to the cellar to take some Zahm hits off of BB 8, while blaring side two of the Dio classic, "Holy Diver."

The run is limited and will be on sale soon through our website and retail store.  We'll let you know when they are available through the blog and Facebook/Twitter. 

Isles of Shoals

The Isles of Shoals are a group of islands and tidal ledges about ten miles off the coast of the New Hampshire-Maine border region (Portsmouth, where we are located, is right on the Piscataqua River, which forms the border between the two states). There are nine islands in the chain, five belonging to Maine and four to New Hampshire. The islands have a long history, serving as seasonal fishing camps for Native American populations with the first Europeans arriving in the early 1600's.

The history of the Shoals encompasses a range of people and events so diverse, I'll just make a list: Captain John Smith, the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the legendary pirate Blackbeard, the poet Celia Thaxter, several hotels, an artist colony, a grisly ax murder, a Unitarian-Universalist retreat, and a 2000 film starring Elizabeth Hurley and Sean Penn.

The islands have also been a source of inspiration for our branding. If you've looked at the map above, you'll notice Star Island, Smuttynose Island and as well the name "Shoals." Our logo even boasts a harbor seal, which are commonly found around the backside of Star Island and occasionally in Gosport Harbor.

The Shoals are still a vibrant community now although there are no more incorporated towns.

The Unitarian-Universalist church has a retreat/conference center (http://starisland.org/) on Star Island, which is easily the most developed of the nine islands.

Smuttynose Island is still home to the Samuel Haley house, the structure on our Shoals Pale Ale label. There is also a replica period building next to it which serves as a caretaker's house.

Appledore Island plays host to the University of New Hampshire/Cornell University Marine Sciences lab.

Cedar Island and Lunging Island are privately owned.

Duck Island was once a naval bombing range but is now home to a wildlife sanctuary and a population of harbor seals.

White Island is home to the White Island Lighthouse and the light keeper's cottage. The structures are now currently owned by the State of New Hampshire and in need of some maintenance. A local charity, Lighthouse Kids (http://www.lighthousekids.org/) has been raising funds to restore the light and the keeper's cottage with an ultimate goal of having a museum on site. Please visit their website to learn more about the work they're doing.

Sue Reynolds, a retired teacher and founder of Lighthouse Kids, also runs day-boat trips to the Isles as well as fishing charters on The Uncle Oscar, a converted lobster boat. She was kind enough to take me out to Star Island for a few hours. I had a great picnic lunch on Star Island and snapped some great photos which you'll see below. If you ever need to go to the Shoals, The Uncle Oscar (http://www.uncleoscar.com) provides an excellent experience. Our captain that day, Tom Davis possesses a wealth of information and knowledge about Shoals history and lore and he's not afraid to use it.

On to the photos:

This view from the side of Star Island provides a great vantage point to see the Unitarian-Universalist retreat center. The most interesting part of my visit was the sense of peace and calm you feel when you're on Star. It'd be a great place to get away for a week in the summer. I didn't see any mermaids or bright red beehives though...

The UU folk have great welcome station right on the dock. You can even make reservations to have lunch out there during the summer.

Gosport Chapel, on Star Island, is an austere and charming church. This simple, one-room chapel has such a presence that's apparent from your first step in the door.

The bridges of Portsmouth as seen from the Isles of Shoals. The largest bridge, though it looks like it might from Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, is actually the Route 95 bridge that spans the great Bay and connects New Hampshire to Maine.

Looks like a great place for draft line!

Finally, the obligatory product shot! Two different sides of the Samuel Haley house, brought to you by Smuttynose Brewing Company.

Harvesting Pumpkin Ale

Smuttynose Pumpkin Ale is shipping out to all of our wholesalers and is filtering its way out to retail accounts as we speak. Yep, it's shipping in early August and I can assure you, we're still amazed how early Pumpkin season begins each year.

On the production side of things, we're in the middle of autumn and starting to plan for Winter Ale. The beer buying public is very fickle about when they buy seasonal beers. The demand seems to begin earlier each year though most seasons have a certain natural end point that's determined when people decide to stop buying the beer. It's really important for us to get the beer out into the supply channels early, and in large amounts.

This year, filling the supply channels with Pumpkin Ale was much easier. We contracted this year's run to F.X. Matt in Utica, N.Y. Their larger capacity enables us to ship the nearly all of the beer to our wholesalers right out of the gate.

Even if you don't have any pumpkins to carve, or leaves to rake yet; there's no better way to refresh yourself after sharpening your pumpkin carving knife or while watching preseason NFL games.

On a final note, the packaging for this year's six packs looks a little different. The sides of the six pack basket are a bit shorter,the bottles have a slightly different shape and the neck labels wrap the entire way around the bottle. Don't worry, the beer is just as delicious.

Here are some pictures of the new packages:

Bikes, Ballistics, and Beer

Craft brewing has never been a particularly competitive community. Breweries tend to help each other out, sharing tips, tricks, ingredients, and pints with each other. In my mind, this is the most unique and best thing about our community. Despite the harmonious nature of our “industry,” we’ve decided to put our support behind two competitive endeavors; one involving spandex and muscle power and one involving projectiles and pressurized air.

We are the title sponsor for the Portsmouth Criterium. “The Crit” is a bicycle road race that takes place in the heart of downtown Portsmouth, passing right through Market Square. Six different categories of cyclists, ranging from kids to level two professionals, will race around the 1-kilometer, hay bale-lined course. Our owners, Peter and Joanne are avid cyclists and can be seen infrequently, clad in spandex, around the Portsmouth Brewery after a long ride. After all, studies have shown that beer is better than water for replenishing nutrients after strenuous exercise. The Portsmouth Brewery will be hosting a pancake breakfast for the public as well as a private reception for volunteers. For more information, visit The Crit's website.

Our second competition is something so wacky that we couldn’t help but say "yes" when we were approached for sponsorship. American Chunker is a Brookline, NH-based team of engineers and fabricators as well as the name of the world’s first fully automatic, air-powered pumpkin cannon. The team has been working since the middle of November 2009 to design and build a cannon that will launch a pumpkin over a mile and challenge for top honors at the World Championship Punkin’ Chunkin’ in Bridgewater, Delaware November 5-7, 2010. Check out their blog for New England events scheduled during September and October or go cheer them on in Delaware. We'll have more details on our cross promotions soon, so keep an eye on our Facebook page and our monthly email newsletter.

Smuttynose Short Batch Gaps

One of the most intriguing things about the Watergate tapes from Nixon's Oval Office is the 18.5 minute gap. Very few people probably know/knew what was originally on that section of tape. Most everyone else thinks the 18.5 minutes had vital evidence that would have implicated Nixon in the scandal surrounding the break-in. I guess the point I'm trying to make is that incomplete records do people a disservice. I hope to use some of the next blog entries to fill in some of our gaps in the Smuttynose Short Batch Series records. These gaps may not have the national security importance of the Watergate tapes, but I'm sure there are plenty of you out there that want this information and there's really no reason for you to not have it.

We've been brewing Short Batches here since 2006. Here's the official list of releases, complete with keg dates as available. This includes what we have scheduled and in fermenters as of July 7, 2010.

SSB #1) The Gnome -Belgian IPA kegged 3/29/07

SSB #2) Brett and I -Belgian Ale finished with Brettanomyces kegged 10/5/07

SSB #3) Smutt-a-roni -Wild Rice Ale kegged 11/20/07

SSB #4) G-Bock -Experimental Strong Lager kegged 1/22/08

SSB #5) Hopfenweiss -Hoppy German Hefeweizen kegged 1/5/09

SSB #6) Belgian Tripel kegged 5/28/09

Oak SSB #6) Tripel aged in J. Lohr Chardonnay Barrels with Brettanomyces kegged 4/20/10

SSB #7) Strawberry Short Weiss- lactic wheat ale, fermented with Lactobacillus and strawberries, part of an aborted attempt at a Berliner Weisse. kegged 8/5/09

SSB #8) Imperial Stout aged in Apple Brandy barrels kegged 8/19/09

SSB #9) Rouge d'Shire lactic ale aged on raspberries and oak kegged 3/30/10

SSB #10) Belgian Stout kegged 6/11/10

SSB #11) Pilsner kegged TBA

Oak SSB #10) Belgian stout aging in whiskey barrels from the Ry(e)an Ale project. kegged TBA

As time goes by, I'll write more about some of these beers over the next few months. Stay tuned!

Thanks,

JT