Pink Boots at Smuttynose

"Make it a rule of life never to regret and never to look back. Regret is an appalling waste of energy; you can't build on it; it's only for wallowing in." ~Katherine Mansfield

August 27: I followed Tod out to Smuttynose where he loaded up the red pick-up with grain and hops for the week. Everyone here wears a uniform, so I changed into mine.

I worked with Dan Schubert on the brew, J.T. Thompson and Charlie Ireland in the cellar. Judi Keene collected yeast off the 200 barrel IPA fermenters. Executive Brewer Dave Yarrington kept things flowing smoothly. The photo above was taken in front of Smuttynose's colorfully painted horizontal ex-dairy conditioning tanks.

Photo above, L to R: Charlie, J.T., Teri, Judi, Dave and Dan. Missing from photo, Head Brewer
Greg Blanchard.

Dan brewed a couple of batches of Old Brown Dog today. This beer is named after Peter Egelston's beloved dog, Olive, who he got shortly after opening the Portsmouth Brewery. Smuttynose has beautiful photos and artwork on all of their beer labels, which were arranged by the talented JoAnne, Peter's significant other. I didn't get a chance to meet JoAnne, but I sure enjoyed the fruits of her artistic talents.

In the afternoon, when J.T. got off his shift, he joined me in Smutty's tasting room and tasted all their beers with me. I left at about 2:30 pm, in order to blog and go through emails in the afternoon.

This photo at right shows Smutty's employee basketball hoop. I thought it was a clever use for the silo supports.

I've noticed a few trends among breweries in New England so far, but there are plenty of exceptions to these trends: One is that they call 1/6-barrels logs. I like that. In Eugene we call them "one-sixth barrels" or sometimes "cornies." I think calling them "logs" fits the size and shape of these tall, skinny kegs well. Another trend is that many breweries produce predominantly English-style ales instead of lagers like I found in the Midwest, or American-style ales, like we have back home on the West Coast. A third fairly common trend is that New England brewers are less likely to use their own proprietary yeast strain, and more likely to use the Ringwood yeast strain.

Smuttynose gifted me a pink zip hoodie and a 22 oz. bottle of beer.