Tours, tastings and articles - Week 49.

     The week in the brewery was average pace but of course we had some excitement with a few visitors and some unexpected equipment issues. After blogging last week I was able to wrap up an article on the Chinese Craft Beer Scene for The Brewer & Distiller. If you're unfamiliar with this publication it's the monthly trade magazine from the Institute of Brewing and Distilling in the UK (IBD UK). I'm pleased with the content of the article and look forward to seeing the finished 2-3 page article in the magazine come early 2013.

     The week started off fairly normal as we kegged some more TKO IPA and Sucker Punch Pale Ale. This emptied one of the bright tanks and we were able to transfer Ringside Red to the bright tank. We're beginning to brew this beer on a more frequent basis as it's proven to be very popular in the pubs. It's a malt driven lager beer weighing in at 5% ABV featuring some Vienna malt and a small proportion of different caramel malts. The hop bill is European influenced so we have additions of Hersbrucker and Czech Saaz. The taste is complex while still being approachable to people that are only accustomed to pale colored beer. This brand has sold enough that we have designed a standard label for this brand and it looks like this:

     We also brewed more TKO IPA to keep up with demand. I always enjoy brewing this beer as I'm a hophead and the hop aroma while we brew is pretty spectacular. Towards the end of the week our glycol compressor stopped working all the sudden. Luckily it stopped early in the morning before we had begun mashing in the planned brew of the day. Without this compressor we cannot keep the beer tanks cold and cool our wort while transferring to the fermenter. We fixed the compressor that afternoon as our ace mechanic was tied up a bit and in Pudong most of the day. In the meantime I had some visitors at the brewery and was able to show Chase around the brewery and taste some beer with him. He's writing an upcoming article for Hops Magazine (Hops Magazine Online) and will feature Southpaw Winter Warmer as the brew of the season. This is pretty exciting for Boxing Cat Brewery as we enjoy the coverage and of course working with this local trade magazine focusing on beer culture in China. Later in the day a visitor from Taiwan stopped by as she is gathering material and photos for an upcoming book she is publishing on craft beer in China. I'm excited to see Ellaine's finished book although I understand it will be late in 2013. I'll have to buy a copy when it's published and share some details! The social gatherings just kept continuing as I met with Michelle from the Chinese edition of Hops Magazine and some beer enthusiasts visiting from Beijing. Pints were hoisted as we discussed craft beer and the emerging homebrewing culture in China.

     The equipment issue caused a little hiccup in our schedule and kept our tour guests from seeing a live brew in process but these issues are unavoidable. We wrapped up the week by brewing Standing 8 Pilsner and finally kegging some Southpaw Winter Warmer. I've experienced a lot of inquiries regarding our Winter Seasonal beer so I'm happy to report it will begin to pour next week at each location. We were also able to transfer Cat Scratched Celt to the bright beer tank and let it condition for a few days before we release this collaboration beer with The Celt Experience from Wales. This means we'll have two amber beers pouring very soon but they will be completely different as one is lager and the other is a hoppy US West Coast style amber beer. I think this will be fun for our customers having Christmas gatherings soon followed by New Years and Chinese New Years. This time of year there are lots of parties happening.

     I was able to enjoy some US craft beer with a few fellow beer lovers on Friday night and it was a real treat. We shared 9 different beers as the theme was Imperial Stout & Porters. I always appreciate gatherings like this and was thankful Rudy from Kaiba held a table for our impromptu tasting. My favorite beer of the night was Belgian Style Yeti from Great Divide Brewing in the US. Big thanks to Brent for hauling over some bottled beers!

Until next week....May you enjoy some wonderful Christmas Beers!
   
   

Week 48- Another collaboration beer!

     The past week turned into another busy week as 2 new beers were released and some out of town visitors were at the brewery. We released a small portion of Bare Knuckle Barleywine to each shop and the response has been terrific so far. I think people are surprised it's served in a wine glass but once they hear that it's 10.2% ABV the smaller serving starts to make sense. The tasting notes from fellow beer lovers include complex flavors of chocolate, raisin, caramel and light coffee. The hop notes are present but over-shadowed by the sticky flavors of the beer. I'm setting a couple barelywine kegs aside to let them age a bit more in our keg cooler. I think the beer will change a bit in the next 2 months. Overall the drinkability of this beer is impressive and has already "kicked" a few people sidewards! I'm super pumped for the barleywine aging away in the used Jim Beam bourbon barrels.

     The first brew of the week was our popular collaboration brew; Yunnan Amber. Carl from Great Leap Brewing came down Tuesday night so we could talk shop and of course drink some beer. I tapped Bare Knuckle Barleywine for him and Leon and of course Leon was rather late to our "meeting". Anyway....Carl and I brewed Yunnan Amber on Wednesday and the brew day was silky smooth. Later that evening we met with a freelance reporter doing an article for Shanghai Daily. We're excited to see the article she presents and get craft beer additional media exposure! I expect the article will run in the next 10 days or so. The beer won't pour until just before Christmas if the schedule unfolds as I expect. If you're not familiar with Yunnan Amber you can read a bit out the beer here: (Yunnan Amber- City Weekend Shanghai) Hopefully the new Great Leap brewpub project opens early in the 2013 and I'll make the trip to Beijing to brew a new collaboration beer with Carl. More fun collaboration brews ahead!

      The remainder of the week we needed to keg some beer including the stout I brewed with Jesse from Harmon Brewing. We kegged Split Decision Stout on Thursday and sent it to the bar on Friday so we would pour the beer for his going away party. In addition we kegged some TKO IPA as our inventory was getting a bit low. This beer is one of our best selling core products and something the expat community often thanks me for. They need their hoppy beers in China! Of course I'm also a fan of hops and often drink this beer. I'm also pleased with our new company logo and all the brand logos. The look is more universal across all beer brands and incorporates some Chinese so it can appeal to a greater audience. A sample of the new TKO label in case you hadn't seen it yet.

     The party for Jesse on Friday night was incredible. It makes me realize how many people know Jesse in this massive city. He will be greatly missed by many friends! The response to Split Decision Stout was great and it was fun to let people know that we brewed the beer together. Essentially it was Jesse's idea and I just put the puzzle pieces together to execute the beer. The overwhelming crowd arrived thirsty Friday night as we ran low on Palisade Lager and the staff decided to tap a keg of Barleywine in its place. Needless to say the party really kicked into high gear!

     On Saturday night another friend from Australia was in town for a beer tasting. Dave is a commercial airline pilot and a fellow craft beer fanatic. He always arrives with luggage full of wonderful beer to share with us. We of course try to reciprocate the offer but our choices are rather limited in Shanghai for bottled beer. The selection was excellent and included great beers like Russian River Redemption and Brewdog Dog A. We didn't crack into all the bottles so his next visit we'll have a massive tasting! Hopefully I can find some good beers over Christmas vacation and contribute! In the meantime I hand bottled some Bruce ChiLee IPA so he could take some back to Sydney and share with his beer mates. It's rather rewarding to spread the craft beer love and I look forward to some Aussies checking this beer into their Untappd (https://untappd.com/) database!

Until next week.....may your glass be full of great craft beer!
   

Week 47- Thanksgiving in Shanghai

     The week in the brewery was a bit slower than last week since we celebrated Thanksgiving in Shanghai and we brewed 3 batches the previous week. I tasted the Barleywine from the bright beer tank (BBT) and I'm very excited to release this beer. When we brewed this beer we used some imported Gula Malacca sugar from Malaysia. If you're unfamiliar with Gula Malacca it's a palm sugar that has a very subtle coconut-lime characteristic. It comes in a little roll and is brown in color. It's an amazing sugar and I thank Kent for introducing me to this sugar and giving me some samples he brought back from his travels. I was lucky to find a few stores in Shanghai that had some stock so I cleared their shelves for them as I needed to use around 8kg for this batch of beer. I've settled into calling this beer Bare Knuckle Barleywine and we'll tap a keg this upcoming week. We'll pour Bare Knuckle Barleywine into a wine glass and charge standard prices for a smaller pour since it's limited release and premium octane at 10.2 % ABV. I find the beer to be deceptively smooth considering the alcohol content and think the Galaxy dry-hop note shines in the nose of the beer. I hope our guests enjoy the fruits of my labor and come back when we release the barrel aged version for Boxing Cat's 5th year anniversary in April! Another special brew in process and we're releasing next week is our Double Chocolate Chili Stout. I brewed this beer with Jesse who is moving back to Seattle in a few weeks time. He'll be joining the family business at Harmon Brewing (http://www.harmonbrewingco.com/) so it was only fitting that we brewed a beer together before he left China. Jesse and I met in February 2011 over beers and we've become great friends and he's been a great supporter of Boxing Cat Brewery and the local craft beer scene. The idea to let Jesse pick a beer style was natural and I walked him through the process of creating a recipe based upon our desired flavors. We essentially collaborated on this beer and spread the word via social media and noticed Beer Advocate retweeted our post to their 327,000 followers. Sweet Sauce!! Jesse had a good time and we put him to work in the brewery. Jesse adding some of the green gold going into the kettle.....

     The finished beer has definite chocolate notes from the dark cocao nibs along with a very slight chili note in the finish of the beer. I suspect some people won't even notice the chili heat as our goal was to have a little flavor flash present where people questioned themselves what they were tasting in the finish. The beer is on the heavier side for a stout and will tip the scales at 7.3% ABV. We used a few different hops in this beer including Styrian Golding and Nelson Sauvin while targeting the IBU's at 45 to help balance the beer. We'll tap the first keg at Yong Fu on Friday for a going away party for Jesse. The name for this beer is Split Decision Stout. This is a boxing term but also reflects the time Jesse has spent in China and his decision to return to the states. He has enjoyed China and part of him wants to stay here but the opportunity to help the brewery back home is fantastic. The craft beer scene in the US is exploding and it's a good time to be involved with an established brewery in the Pacific Northwest. I'm sure Jesse will visit us in Shanghai down the road and I look forward to brewing another beer with him once he gets his brewing boots "wet". Maybe I'll even brew stateside with him when I visit the region in 2013.......

     We kept the brewhouse warm this week as we brewed Right Hook Helles and Mosaic Ale. The decision to brew Mosaic Ale for a second time was easy as it sold very well earlier this Fall. The issue was that I only had enough Mosaic hops for this last batch until the new crop arrives. We'll rebrand this beer as we originally brewed it for Yakima Chief (global hop company) and the China Brew & Beverage 2012 trade show in Beijing. The new name will fall in accordance with our boxing theme and the beer should pour at our shops just before Christmas. A keg of Mosaic Ale that was destined for Brau Beviale in Nuremberg never left Hong Kong so our Cantonese friends poured this beer the other evening. The beer was well received and it's nice to get more people tasting Boxing Cat beers!

    Thanksgiving was this past Thursday and each Boxing Cat location had a huge turkey dinner feast with 2 separate seatings. I attended the late seating at our Sinan Mansions location with friends and we enjoyed ourselves immensely. The food was fantastic and it was great to see so many familiar faces in the festive spirit. The highlight for me was the turkey and also pairing our Spiced Pumpkin Ale with homemade pumpkin pie. Needless to say they worked well together and I had a second helping of pumpkin pie!

I hope everyone else had a wonderful Thanksgiving with friends and family!

Until next week.......
   

Winter Beers are Coming!!

   
     This week has been incredibly busy and included a few fun surprises. It started off fairly normal but I was introduced to a traveling brewer from The Celt Experience in Wales (www.celtexperience.com) and some new "plans" started evolving rather quickly. I was able to meet Tom Newman Monday night as he popped by the Sinan Mansions location along with Frank Li from Just Beer. It was nice to meet a traveling brewer in Shanghai and get to know a bit more about his recently launched "Celt" products in the local market. I could tell Tom was very excited to be in China for the first time although he was fighting some jet lag. Tom was thoroughly impressed with the Mikkeller beer collaboration, Bruce ChiLee IPA (http://www.jingdaily.com/) The Chinese Green Chili flavor was intriguing and something entirely new to him. We tucked in a couple of pints before he decided it was time to get some rest since he'd been awake for nearly 24 hours. The next day I received a message from him to see if we could do a collaboration brew while he was in town. His schedule for Friday was wide open so I managed to re-arrange our production schedule a bit and squeeze in a 3rd brew of the week. A new collaboration beer was being born right away! We arranged to meet up the following day to discuss some ideas for the brew and decided upon a Red Ale with some juicy & fruity notes from American hops. The beer would have a sexy red hue and carry a vary distinctive flavor & aroma by blending a few different US hop varieties. The alcohol would be a bit higher but not over the top so we settled on a beer of 5.8% ABV. I gave Tom an insight to the US hops I had in stock and he was very surprised while being intrigued with one particular variety he had never used; Mosaic hops. So we put together a recipe based upon our ideas and arranged the brew for Friday. Game on for a new collaboration beer!

     Meanwhile back at the brewery we had just brewed Southpaw Winter Warmer for the first time since Winter has arrived and more importantly the Fall Seasonal, Spiced Pumpkin Ale, was going fast with Thanksgiving approaching. Hopefully I have timed everything well so the transition is seamless between the two seasonal selections. Of course there are a few other beers in production to help fill the gap if needed; Double Chocolate Chili Stout and our first Barleywine as well. In addition 400 liters of King Louie Imperial Stout aging in bourbon barrels since March is tasting mighty fine so I'll move that beer from wood in the next week or two. Yes, I've been a busy brewer and some fun beers for the impending cold season are on the horizon.

     So back to the collaboration beer- Tom and Frank arrived to the brewery early Friday morning and we begun mashing in our hoppy red ale. It was nice to have some visitors to the brewery and talk shop with Tom during the day. His brewery is also very simple in design although it's a bit bigger at 65 hl in brewlength. The idea is that we'll brew 10 hl in Shanghai and Tom will brew the same recipe when he returns to his brewery in Wales. We'll pour the beer at both BCB Shanghai locations and he'll have enough volume to pour in Wales but also get some into the greater London market. Awesome!

     We evaluated the wort during the brew day and nailed the color and flavor specs we targeted. I pulled some Mosiac hops for Tom to check out and he was blown away by the tropical fruitiness of this hop variety. The massive note of pineapple was fantastic! The blend of hops we have chosen for this brew will provide some excellent flavor and aroma to this beer while the malt backbone can stand up to the 80 IBU's targeted for the finished beer. Needless to say we're both excited for this beer!

     The beer specs:

• Malts- Pilsner, Vienna, CaraAmber, Wheat and Roasted Barley
• Hops- Chinook, Centennial, Mosaic and Citra
• Parameters- 15 Plato Original Gravity, 80 IBU's, 5.8% ABV, 35 EBC in Color

This is a picture from the brew day. Not sure of the name as it might be called different on each continent.....

     I'll post some tasting notes as the beer ferments. In the meantime we'll brew some standard products in the brewery next week to maintain inventory of Right Hook Helles and TKO IPA. Some new beers are pouring at each shop including "Catcher" Rye IPA. This beer was brewed last year for Mark & Cate for their wedding on 11/11/11. We brewed the beer again this year to comemorate their 1st year wedding anniversary. It's tasting great and gives us with 3 IPA's available- TKO IPA, Bruce ChiLee IPA and "Catcher" Rye IPA. I hope you hopheads enjoy these while they last.....I know I will:-)

Until next time.....