The Scene: Chef JJ's Make it Local

We were invited to Chef JJ's Back Yard by some great friends who are really starting to get into craft beer. It was one of Chef JJ's Make it Local events and for us it was the perfect double-date night! Chef JJ's Back Yard is a fantastic but easy to miss little spot by Brugge in Broadripple. He has an amazing view of the water, and on a beautiful summer day there is no better spot in Indy.

The Make it Local event was a cooking demo on the Green Egg where Cheff JJ used locally sourced meats and cheeses and of course my favorite thing, locally sourced beer.We were welcomed warmly and escorted to his patio. There was room for about 35 or 40 guests in this beautiful and intimate setting. Five breweries participated: Triton, Barley Island, Bier Brewery, Bloomington Brewing Company and Daredevil. The brewer or one of the owners of each of the breweries was there, and they came around and sat with every table of six guests for one course.

The first course was a cheese plate from Goose the Market paired with Triton's Gold Trans Am a light, sessionable golden ale (head brewer John has challenged himself to start making a session beer every season). The beer was crisp and refreshing without any major hop character. Great for a hot summer day. The cheese was amazing and all locally sourced. It was served with some crustinis, an delicious pickled kale, and beer jelly made from the Gold Trans Am. The jelly was awesome. It paired so well with the strong dry flavors of the cheese. It was the right amount of sweetness to balance out every bite. 

The second course was a crab salad. It had roasted greens done on the Egg. The crab was light and bright and the salad had a nice citrus vinaigrette. The salad was paired with Sheet Metal blonde from Barley Island. This light Belgian Wit beer was the winner of the Brew Bracket Wheat event in September of 2012. It was light with just enough sweetness to bring a smile to my face. It went great with the summery salad.

The third course was an amazing steak dish on top of some grilled pickled vegetables paired with Bier's Special K Kolsch. Special K is probably one of my favorite Kolsch beers on the market right now. It is easy drinking but flavorful enough to have its own personality. The steak was amazingly tender. I would normally go with a darker beer that has more body when I am eating a steak, but this worked so well. It helped lighten the heavy red meat and gave it a great summer feel. 

The fourth course was my favorite. It was a shreaded pork and lamb that had some great mexican spices. The meat was big and bold, totally in your face. It had an outstanding avocado mouse on top that helped cool off the meat and brighten the plate. It was paired with Lift Off IPA by Daredevil which is a bright clean West Coast style IPA. It has to be one of the best balanced IPAs that I've every had. The hops marry well with the clean sweet malt to give you one strong flavor.

The fifth course was desert. It was a deconstructed S'more with a roasted whipped marshmallow and chocolate panna cotta. This was paired with a possible one-time-only release beer by Bloomington Brewing Company, Vanilla Stout. It was their stout aged on vanilla beans, and it was delicious. The Little Lady waited all night for this one and was not disappointed. This was probably my favorite beer of the night, but I'm a sucker for anything dark and aged. Plus, after five courses you've had enough beer to get a little more generous with your reviews.

For me the coolest thing about this dinner was having the brewers come sit at your table and talk. When John from Triton came over, he talked primarily about the growing craft community. Triton has recently opened their tap house in Broadripple and now they are working on extending their distribution to IL. Jeff from Barley Island talked about some of the challenges that come with being a brewer in a small town, and dealing with the local politics. We got a great perspective from BBC about the craft beer boom in Indiana. The owner of Bier talked about the competitive brewing that his son Darren, the head brewer, was doing. Lastly we talked to Michael from Daredevil (also in the picture to the right) about the importance of water purity and your taste buds when it comes to beer. (Look for a full post on this later). It was realy cool to get the small group time with the brewers, and the food was amazing.

This is the perfect date night for the true beer geek and a very tolerant date. Cheers!

CANovation: Shrink Wrap Can Sleeves

The 2013 limited release cans of GFJ are real slick!  The need for specialty orders of aluminum cans has been eliminated!  Regular aluminum cans are used sans graphics.  A much cheaper plastic sleeve is then purchased in bulk with the specialty graphic print (see design below).  The plastic sleeve is then slid over the ordinary aluminum can and heat treated to shrink, conform and hold tight to the can.   I know this sounds like nothing, but for breweries this is kinda the next big thing!

Pros: Savings in both time and money.
Cons: Upfront cost of machinery and addition of a few steps to the canning process.  

**It isn't Leaning up the canning process, but the savings over the entire value stream more than make up for the added steps.   

The process is similar to what Nice-Pak Inc. in Mooresville uses in its manufacturing process.  It uses shrink film to not only seal product on the down-lines but also package product for its diverse line of wipes.  Crazy connections in Indiana, I know!

I believe this is the first time I have seen this type of treatment with regards to #craftbeer cans.  I know that Guinness has done the same thing only with their nitro infused bottle line.

This is the first step in overcoming the higher costs of canning beer!  More savings for local brews means more money to invest in new beer ideas!  Keep up the good work Sun King!

Further reading on the benefits of Cans Vs Bottles ->  BREWniversity: Beer Can Benefits

Can Release: July 8, 2013

http://beerpulse.com/2013/06/sun-king-gfj-grapefruit-jungle-ipa-16-ounce-cans-return-in-early-july-568/?utm_source=feedly

Circle City Beer Week 2013

It's officially here- Circle City Beer Week 2013!

This week-long celebration runs from July 13-20 and includes a variety of events. I've just downloaded the app (available on iTunes and for Android) so I can keep track of everything that's going on and make sure I get to see and do as much as possible. You can also like their Facebook page for a full list of events and updates.

The week kicked off with the annual Indiana Brewer's Cup competition. Congratulations to Sun King Brewery for earning the top title of Professional Brewery of the Year! Click here for a list of all the winners in the 23 professional categories. There was also a homebrewers side of the competition. Maybe we'll see the Big Guy on that list in 2014.

Brewers and restaurants all over the city and into the suburbs are celebrating craft beer throughout the rest of this week. There are lots of events to choose from that include dinners, tap take-overs, new collaborations, and limited edition releases. There's something for everyone even remotely interested in craft beer happening this week. It's the kind of event that makes you want to clone yourself so that you can be everywhere.

Closing out the week is the Indiana Microbrewers Festival on the 20th, in Broadripple. The website is up with a list of breweries and the beers that will featured. Look for us there!

Sun King 4th Anniversary Limited Releases

The Releases were:

Port Barrel Aged Wee Mac with Cherries:The Big Guy: This thing was almost a sour beer. It was soooo freaking good. This was also the most limited of the releases. We were probably the first 20 people on our side of the bar to get some, and we weren't able to get a glass for everyone. The cherries gave it a beautiful sweet and sour fruit flavor, that sat really well on the bready backdrop of the Wee Mac. The port barrel aging helped smooth it all out and really made it outstandingly well balanced. It is a Five Heads!!!

Batch 777: Touched by an Angel:

O-Dawg:  A Belgian Tripel that weighs in at 10% ABV.  Fantastic sweet banana notes.  Fizzy sweet body with a little boosey heat.  Finishes dry with a tart pucker.  Others noted that when it warmed up their respective ratings began to fall off, I did not taste this happening to my beer.  Must have been their cups?  Great limited release.  An astonished five heads.   

Afternoon Delight:

The Big Guy: Afternoon Delight was a Dunkle Bock, meaning dark bock beer. It was an excellent robustly dark German style lager.It had nice dark roasty notes with some serious sweetness. There was a great combination of coffee and toffee and a little bit of oak. This was a great limited release and I give it a solid four heads!

Batch 333: Velvet Fog: See our review

Jungle Room: See our review

Sun King Anniversary Party

Over the weekend we had the opportunity to celebrate with a pretty big crew down at Sun King in honor of their fourth anniversary. We all know how much the Big Guy and I like Sun King, so it was no surprise that we bought our tickets early.

Picture live music(Luella and the Sun, Saint Paul and the Broken Bones, Sturgill Simpson), food trucks (Mac Genie, Spice Box, Scratch Truck), tons of people, and limited releases of Sun King beer tapped every hour. It was great. The tappings inlcuded Grapefruit Jungle, Port Barrel Aged Wee Mac with Cherries, 777, Afternoon Delight, and Velvet Fog.

Of the beers tapped, the Port Barrel Aged Wee Mac was the standout for me. In general Wee Mac is my go-to Sun King brew, so having it with this twist was definitely fun. The flavors were rich, but not overly heavy and the port balanced well with the maltiness Wee Mac already has, almost finishing like a sour or a flanders. The aromas were a bit boozier than the regular version, but nothing that would make you want to put the glass down without taking a sip.Check out tomorrow's post for more details on all of the limited release beers.

  

Favorite band of the night, definitely Saint Paul and the Broken Bones. Not at all the voice I expected to hear when looking at the lead singer. I was blown away. Favorite food truck, Scratch Truck for sure. How can you go wrong with a grilled cheese sandwich that has short ribs inside? You can't.

Cheers to many more anniversaries to come!

The Big Guy: Damn it was a great time! I showed up with great friends, and I made some new friends while I was there. I totally got hit with a brewmance or two. We got our first beer really quickly. The second one scared me. The line was getting insanely long. Our new buddy Daniel was in line for almost 30 minutes trying to get some more Grapefruit Jungle. Luckily right after he finished up they opened a new spot selling cans and GFJ on tap. There were some awesome food trucks at the party. I love Scratch Truck and their Scratch Burger is outstanding.

I totally fell in love with Saint Paul and the Broken Bones. They were just a great band to watch and listen to. They reminded me of the old school R&B that the Blues Brothers put out. O-Dawg was pretty upset about how Sun King handled the limited releases. They were definitely more limited than I thought they would be, but we were aggressive and upfront. Most of us got a glass of everything they had on tap. I will let O go into his problems with the releases.

O-Dawg:
Being constructive for next year's SKV Anniversary Party:

-More bathrooms.  I hit the head once in the beginning of the night and that was it.  Boy was that a good thing!  The Big Guy had to make multiple trips and got mired down in the dilemma of the evening "Should I go now?  What if I miss a tapping?!" Lines were a little long.

-More taps.  As stated previously, the emergency second tap station was erected just in time!  It dispersed a line that was threatening to wrap its way to the Beer ticket booth and strangle the fun out of the event.  High-fives for Sun King's quick thinking and ingenuity under pressure, but why wasn't it there to begin with?

-Limited Releases.  I have waffled back and forth on this one going from a VIP ticket sales to keeping it for everyone.  In the end, I vote for everyone with an eye on modifying the process so more people get a taste.  More quantity made in preparation or a limit on the quantity poured per cup.  No one likes feeling left out after standing in a line for an extended amount of time, no matter if you are within reach of the taps or towards the back of the line.

High Fives to keep up next year:

-Responsiveness.  As the night wore on Sun King's Staff & Volunteers were trying to keep up with the event.  Additional taps were had, pours altered, and anticipation of the hourly releases were prepped for to keep things moving.  Rocky starts aside, keep it up guys'n gals!

-Food Trucks.  No seriously...  The diverse food selection and support for the local small business food trucks is a win win in my book.  The only thing for me that would have made the event an eleven would have been Der Pretzel Wagon being there!

-Live Music.  I always feel like it isn't a party unless you have a band playing.  None of the bands on the schedule disappointed.  All of them brought their A-Game!