Another Reason to Homebrew

Some "non-partisan" group is apparent lobbying Idaho state lawmakers to raise taxes on beer and wine. The increase would raise the beer tax to $0.52 per gallon from $0.15 and the wine tax to $1.56 a gallon from $0.45. The group would have you believe the reasons for the increase noble enough and justified. Of course the increases face opposition and the ire the beer and wine industry. Though, as more states face budgetary shortfalls, it wouldn't be surprising to see other states looking to raise revenue in a similar fashion.

The return of Schlitz

Schlitz Beer is being resurrected by Pabst Brewing, which currently owns the brand, according to an article in the Isthmus, from Madison, Wisconsin. A brief rundown of the article:

• It will currently only be released and have limited distribution in Madison
• The beer is an American Pilsner, and apparently used to be a good one
• Schlitz, along with Budweiser, Miller and Pabst, was once one of the big four American Breweries
  
• It's being brewed with the original recipe, which hasn't been around since the 1960's
• The Schlitz recipe had been changed and by the early 1970's was no longer popular
• Sagging sales and a Labor Dispute forced the company to close in 1981
• Stroh's purchased the brand in 1982, then Pabst in in 1999

Well we can only hope that distribution will be extended future so we can have a taste of beer history. For the full text of the article click here: Schlitz beer returns to Madison

Another Reason to Homebrew

California State Assemblyman Jim Beall introduced bill that would raise the California beer tax from two cents a can to 30 cents per can. OK, so you’re thinking $1.80 is not so bad. Well let me detail the increase another way. The tax increase would actually be approximately 1400% on beer products. By one estimate this would tack on a tax of $44.50 to the price of a keg.

Dan Gordon, co-founder of Gordon Biersch Brewing Company, calculated that the tax on a barrel of beer would go from $6.40 to $89. “We would all be looking for jobs,” he said.¹

The bill seems to have an uphill battle to passage and it seems unlikely to do so since “it would require a two-thirds vote in the Assembly and Senate - and then, because it’s a constitutional amendment, have to be approved by voters.”²

1,2 Zapler, Mike. “Assembly bill would raise beer tax 30 cents per can.” Whittier Daily News 10 April 2008.
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Prohibition Repealed…75 years ago today

Our government cames to its senses and on April 7, 1933 at 12:01am Prohibition was repealed! and we’ve been able to enjoy our most noble and excellent beverage ever since!

There’s a great article online titled The Day the Beer Flowed Again from the LA Time online.

Ready for Tomato Beer?

Tomato-based beer now on shelves
The Yomiuri Shimbun
Yearlong efforts by a Niigata brewery and a Tokyo izakaya pub owner have finally borne fruit: Their tomato-based, low-malt beer is now on the shelves.
Called Tomato Bibere, the reddish brew has a characteristic taste, combining the sweet flavor of a tomato with the bitter taste of hops. One tomato is used in the production of each 330-milliliter bottle.
In July last year, Hirofumi Koda, president of Echigo Beer Co., got a call from Isamu Waki, who runs an izakaya pub in Nakano Ward, Tokyo, asking him to produce a beer made from tomatoes.
The 63-year-old Waki loves to guzzle beer mixed with tomatoes, and for the past 10 years he has been asking breweries around the country to make a tomato-based beer. None of the breweries showed any interest, however.
Waki pinned his last hope on Echigo Beer, which has produced beer from rice, pears and even green tea. "I was overwhelmed by Waki's enthusiasm for the project, so I decided to go for it," said Koda, who himself does not care for tomatoes.
The master brewer aimed at making a healthy drink, so all of the ingredients are organic. Since tomatoes are very fibrous and have a low-sugar content, filtration and fermentation were especially difficult. The first trial product, which took five months to make, was watery and barely tasted of tomatoes. It was vile, Koda admitted.
Koda and Waki tasted various trial versions of the beer by altering the amount of tomatoes and by increasing the sugar content to boost fermentation.
After much trial and error, Koda and Waki were satisifed with the taste of the fifth version of the beer, which was produced in June.
Tomato Bibere is available at some co-op stores, retailers and online shops. A 330-ml bottle retails for 420 yen. For more information, call Echigo Beer at (0120) 72-0640.
(Dec. 11, 2005)

Homebrewing in the News

Dickinson men like their home-brewed beer
An AP Member Exchange Feature By LINDA SAILER
The Dickinson Press
DICKINSON, N.D. - With a toast to the approaching holidays, Jon Stika and Ryan Jilek enjoy glasses of their home-brewed beer.
Stika and Jilek are trying to organize the Heart River Home Brewers.
"We'd like to help people get started. We're always learning something new," said Stika. "It will be real informal. At this stage of the game, we'll see what everybody wants to do."
Stika is an agronomist with the National Resources Conservation Service, while Jilek owns Custom Design. Their careers are different, but they share a common interest in brewing beer.
Jilek started brewing beer about six or seven years ago.
"There's only four ingredients: Hops, barley, water and yeast," he said. "My first batch was kind of a leap of faith."
The men became acquainted through the magazine "Brew Your Own." Jilek noticed Stika's byline on an article about hops. He made a call and they have been friends ever since.
Stika starting brewing in 1992. Besides beer, he makes "sweet mead," a sweet, sparkling wine originally made of honey, water and yeast by the Egyptians.
He started brewing with a beer kit purchased through the Internet.
"With the kit, it's real easy," he said.
His wife, Eve, is content to observe.
"I do very little. It's something he's interested in. I don't even like beer," she said.
Stika prefers to start from scratch with malted barley that's available locally or by mail order.
He's also learned to make the malt by soaking barley, allowing it to sprout and drying it in a food dehydrator.
The beer-brewing process begins with the malted barley and water. It's heated until it looks like oatmeal. The grain is removed and additional water is added to become "wort."
After the wort is boiling, hops are added to balance the sweetness of the liquid. It's cooled and transferred to a primary fermenter with yeast.
"We brew 5 gallons at a time," Stika said. "The whole process of getting it into the fermenter takes about five hours."
The flavor of the beer depends on the grains, hops and flavor of the yeasts used in the recipe. For example, Oatmeal Stout is flavored with roasted barley, chocolate malt, barley and oats.
"The color doesn't affect the alcohol content," Stika said.
Jilek said the sweetness comes when the grain is converted to sugar. He uses a liquid yeast culture to produce the carbon dioxide, which in turn produces the foam.
"It doesn't taste like a bread yeast," he said.
After the beer has been fermented in a glass jug for about a week, it's transferred into another container for further fermentation and to remove the dead yeast. About a month later, it's ready to drink.
Stika stores his beer in kegs. The beer keeps for years in the kegs under pressure of a carbon dioxide tank," he said.
Jilek also bottles the beer. He recently opened a bottle of 2-year-old chokecherry beer stout with an alcohol content of about 6.5. It was fermented on top of a pail of chokecherries.
Depending on what is brewed, the cost of a starter kit varies from $20 to $30.
Jilek said home brewing is not for the heavy beer drinker because it takes time to process. It's for the person who enjoys a good glass of beer with his dinner. He associates the beer with such family traditions as fishing or a fall hunting trip.
Both men have acquired a taste for home-brewed beers. Before drinking a commercial beer, Stika said, "We'd have to get real, real thirsty."