Visit Family & Friends in Denver, CO

"That so few now dare to be eccentric marks the chief danger of the time." ~John Stuart Mill

October 6-9: Part of the fun of staying at my sister's house is the opportunity to do things that are not part of our usual life, such as sleeping on an inflatable bed, helping a six- and an eight-year old with their homework and in Jon's case, supervising the meticulous deconstruction of a stereo and cassette player that no longer worked. (Daddy Jan had started the deconstruction project, but retired to his study where he is working on his PhD in Global Information Systems.)

In the photo above, Jake keeps things tidy while Max channels his inner Luke Skywalker with a radio antenna light saber, and Jon pretends to be a robot with a tape-player mouth. In the photo at right, Jon channels his inner Dr. Strangelove with CD laser magnifiers.

My sister is a fabulous cook, so the diet will have to wait until I get home from the trip in eleven days (on October 20th). We babysat on Sunday night so Heidi and her husband Jan could go out to dinner, a rare treat. We taught the boys a new card game, Coloretto. (Cameleon would be a better name for it.)

On Monday we went to visit an old buddy from Eugene, Oregon. Scott Kelly and his girlfriend, Krystyna live in a brand new subdivision called Highlands Ranch. Part of the old working ranch is still working, and Scott showed us their Buffalo herd and some horses.

Krystyna is originally from Poland and is working toward her Registered Nurse degree. Scott is retired from the Navy and works in the pro shop at the local golf course. Krystyna is also a great cook and she had a feast prepared for lunch, including stuffed chicken breasts, mushroom gravy, boiled red potatoes and salad.

The photo at left was taken on their patio. Scott and Krystyna did a good job of getting their very active miniature greyhound, Nova, to behave and pose for the camera.

We didn't have enough time for a hike, so Scott took us on a scenic drive. We stopped on top of the hill that gives Highlands Ranch its name.

A large picnic area occupied the flat top of the hill, and Scott said very few people know it's there. Off the backside of the picnic area are some lovely rock outcroppings overlooking a huge private golf course. The photo below is of Jon & me and you can see the private golf course behind us. Scott hopes to meet the owner someday. He'd love to be invited to one of the private fund-raiser golf tournaments that are held there.
From the other side of the hilltop we had a great view of downtown Denver, about 20 miles away, and the new Denver Tech Center, which is about 12 miles away.

Then back to Heidi's house for dinner, homework, more games with the boys, and more blogging for me.

On Tuesday afternoon we left Heidi's house and moved to the Denver Mariott - City Center, the official hotel of the GABF (Great American Beer Festival), where Jon and I will be judging America's finest beers for the next three days.

Pink Boots at Portsmouth and Drive to Hopkinton

"I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence, I can reach for; perfection is God's business." ~Michael J. Fox

August 29: Today I brewed at Portsmouth Brewery, the sister brewery to Smuttynose. Tod Mott has been Head Brewer there for four years. I've known Tod ever since I met him at the first Redbone's Northwest Beer Festival, which must be more than 12 or maybe even 15 years ago.

In the photo above, Brewmaster/ Owner Peter Egelston leads a worshipful Teri and Tod in honoring a graduated cylinder and hydrometer full of wort. If ya can't be silly on a blog, where can ya be?

Tod came to Portsmouth with a lot of brewing experience under his belt (and a lot of beer fans who love his beer), so Peter was very happy to bring a brewer of Tod's caliber and reputation on board.

Tod has made some nifty changes to bring Portsmouth Brewery into the modern age.

Portsmouth is a JV Northwest 7-barrel system built and installed in 1991. The brewery is built on two levels, and it's crammed into a pretty tight space. Somehow Tod and his Assistant Brewer, Tyler Jones managed to brew over 1,000 barrels last year, which means four batches per week all summer long.

One of Tod's upgrades is shown below right - a stainless chute for the spent grain. In the photo, recent American Brewers Guild graduate and current Portmouth Intern, Bart Ugorowski, is shown pulling the spent mash.

Photo at left, L to R: Tyler, Bart, Teri and Tod.

Although Portsmouth doesn't have a silo, Tod lessened the heavy grain burden by installing a chain-vey system and lowering the mill half through the floor so the 50-55 lb bags only need to be lifted about knee high. This scenario makes milling and mashing in a lot easier than it used to be.

Still, I say, "Get a silo!" You can read my opinions and dramatization of small efficient (and inefficient) grain handling systems in my 1993 article on Grain Handling here. You'll need Adobe Acrobat to download and read this article.

Portsmouth gifted me a t-shirt and a 22 oz. bottle of Tod's Blueberry Ale, made with real Maine blueberries.

Shortly after lunch I packed up my stuff and followed Tod out to Smuttynose where I revved up the minivan and trailer and followed Tod out to the highway.

Off I drove, heading south toward Hopkinton, Massachusetts, the starting place of the Boston Marathon. That's where my 7th grade friend, Allison lives with her family. Photo above shows Allison and me enjoying her backyard cabana.

Drive: Manchester, NH to Falmouth, ME

"Words are like sheepdogs herding ideas.” ~Daniel Dennett

August 22: Spent most of the day in the lobby of the Super 8 Motel in Manchester, New Hampshire using their free wireless Internet connection and updating my blog.

Then drove to Falmouth, Maine, where former brewer Pete Leavitt lives with his family. I arrived in time for a late grilled chicken dinner with Pete, his wife Marie and their two boys. I stayed with the Leavitts for three nights while I visited breweries in nearby Portland.

The above photo is from Friday night, August 24. The Leavitts were visited by their Rhode Island friends, Geoff Greene, Christy Chase and their two boys. (That makes four young boys in the house. Yikes!) As you can see the grown-ups are enjoying a feast of Lobsters that were steamed in ocean water. Pete and Marie know a thing or two about good food! (Photo above, L to R: Geoff, Christy, Pete and Marie.)

Pete was my Assistant Brewer at Triple Rock Brewing Co. way back in 1989-90. After brewing at Triple Rock and its sister brewery Twenty Tank, Pete attended the Siebel Institute. Then he went on to consult and later opened three locations for Sunday River Brewing / Stone Coast Brewing Co in Maine and New Hampshire. He left brewing about ten years ago, spending time in semi-conductors and wholesale gourmet foods.

Now Pete's smack dab in the middle of an exciting new project: He will open a gourmet foods retail store in early October called Leavitt & Sons Specialty Grocery. Pete plans to sell anything delicious that is smoked, cured, fermented, or aged. That includes all my favorite foods like good beers, wines, cheeses, sausages, and imported yummies like truffle paste. I even got to taste some of the samples Pete and Marie are deciding upon. Yum!

After dinner Pete showed me his business plan. On Friday morning he took me to see the building. De-construction of the interior is currently underway, with reconstruction occuring in September.

Pete located Leavitt & Sons in a stand-alone white building at the corner of Route 1 and Depot Road in Falmouth, an upscale neighborhood of Portland. It looks like a great location with lots of drive-by traffic.

The photo at right shows Pete with the "& Sons" part of Leavitt & Sons. Jake (far right) starts First Grade next week and he's very excited to learn math so he can run the cash register. Jake tells me he can't wait to get his new business cards. He's only six years old. I wonder what his title will be? Jimi (in front) is three. Jimi smiles a lot and isn't too concerned about his business cards just yet.

Pete's got great plans for the store including a show kitchen that will prepare take-home gourmet lunches and dinners. If you like high quality food and beverages, get yourself to 37 Depot Road in Falmouth, just outside of Portland, Maine starting in October.

Coastal Maine Cruise on the Andromeda

"There is only one success - to be able to spend your life in your own way." ~Christopher Morley

August 20: During this entire trip, I've been corresponding with lots of folks via email. Some are friends, some are strangers to me but will become friends. Lots of people have helped me out with ideas of what to do and where to go. For most of my trip I have had to forgo the scenic route in favor of the quickest route. I've also had to forgo the sight-seeing and touristy things that most travelers enjoy in favor of sticking to business and visiting only brewers and breweries. Since I am with Jon for a few days visiting his family, we did a little sight-seeing with help from our family and friends.

One of those friends is fellow brewer, Bill Jenkins, Brewmaster at Big Time Brewing Co. in Seattle. You may have noticed a photo of Bill on my post about the Washington Cask Festival last March. Bill grew up in Maine and got me in touch with his parents, Julie and Bill Sr. who live in Southwest Harbor in another part of Mount Desert Island. Jon and I headed to their house on this clear and sunny morning.

The Jenkins took us to Bass Harbor where they dock their 32 foot powerboat. The Andromeda is no ordinary waterski-type powerboat. It is a pleasure cruiser built on a lobster boat hull with sleeping quarters and a "head" below deck. Jon took the photo at the top of this post of Julie, me and Bill.

Bill got out his navigational chart books and his laptop-powered GPS navigational charts. We motored slowly over to Swans Island. Jon is really into boats and powerboats so he kept Bill company in the cabin.

Bill let Jon steer the boat for awhile (photo above right). He even let me steer for awhile. I tried to avoid running over any lobsterpot bouys, but the tide dragged me off course a bit and I ran one over but it wasn't harmed.

Mostly, Julie and I sat in the back of the boat enjoying the fresh air and sunshine. The wind was low and the waves were small. It was the most beautiful day for a pleasure cruise. We saw thousands of lobster bouys and several working lobster boats hauling up their catch. We watched the eider ducks dipping into the waves and one lost butterfly flying in no particular direction. Bill and Julie showed us two lighthouses and we all had a marvelous time.

Jon and I wanted to be back at his brother's house by 2:00 pm, and Bill timed the ride perfectly to be docked back in Bass Harbor by 11:45 am.

Then the Jenkins took us to Bass Harbor's Thurston Lobster Pound for a lobster lunch. (Photo above left.) The lobsters we ate there were probably the freshest either Jon or I had ever eaten. The whole time we were there, we watched the lobster boats arrive to unload their morning's catch. There seemed to be one boat waiting while the previous one unloaded at the dock. We watched five boats unload. How fresh can you get?

On the way back to Bill and Julie's house, we stopped at Southwest Harbor's little liquor store. In Maine they sell beer as well as wine at the liquor stores. Just to the right of the front door was a huge selection of New England, local, and imported beer. Who would have guessed that a seemingly small provincial town like Southwest Harbor would have such an excellent selection of beer? Photo of one of the shelves above right.

Jon and I got lost and found an all-organic market in a tiny old fashioned roadside store and picked up a pint of Maine's famous tiny wild blueberries. They have a much more intense blueberry flavor than Oregon's beautiful but less flavorful giant cultivated blueberries.

My buddy Carolyn came home from YMCA camp and we spent several hours playing games from Aunt Teri's game bin. Joel and Carolyn picked fresh chives and garlic from their garden and Joel cooked up chive-garlic hamburgers for dinner. It was a pretty full day.

A Visit to Sleepy Hollow

"The ornament of a house is the friends who frequent it." ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

July 19-20: Sleepy Hollow is a town in Illinois that nobody heard of and most people think I made up. I didn't, but somebody else made it up in the 1950's out of corn fields. It's a suburb of wide-open lawns and spacious ranch and bi-level houses, all within easy commuter train distance of Chicago. My college roommate Joy and her family have lived here for about 15 years.

While Joy and her neighbor Jill and I visited some breweries in Chicago, her husband Steve took their son and visiting California friends to the Chicago Blues Museum and to the graves of some famous blues musicians. It's amazing what you can find on the Internet: Steve got the grave locations at http://www.deadbluesguys.com/. Afterwards we all met up at Pizzaria Due in downtown Chicago, to partake of some authentic deep dish pizza. (Photo above, L to R: Joy, Pat, Scott, Andrew, Teri, Casey, Jill, and Steve.)

With three friends visiting from California and a visiting Brewmaster, Joy and Steve threw a barbeque and all the neighbors came over. I took the opportunity to educate the suburbans about the glories of Belgian beers, hoppy beers, and wood-aged beers. After food and beer everybody enjoyed a spontaneous blues jam with Andrew on blues harp and Scott on guitar (photo below). These guys really rocked out and everybody sang along. Who ever said the suburbs were boring?

A Visit to Avery, Left Hand, and Oskar Blues

"I am seduced by travel." ~Charles Kuralt

June 25: A long day of driving and brewery visits. Started out the morning at Avery Brewing Co. in Boulder. (Photo above: Steve Breezley and Adam Avery.) Steve gave Jon and me a custom tour of Avery's patchworked and ever-growing brewery. It's an inside joke that Avery will be moving to a purpose-built new building in two years. They've been saying that for many years now.

Steve's tour ended in the new tasting room. We got to try some of their experimental beers from wooden casks including a version of Salvation, Avery's Belgian Golden Ale, that had been aged in a Sauvignon Blanc keg. Hearty, tart, and tasty. I've been waiting for somebody to experiment with white wine kegs. If Avery hadn't done it, I'd have to do it. I still might do it if I get the chance. A big thanks to Steve and Adam for loading us up with a mixed case of Avery's finest. White Rascal Wit was great on such a hot day.

Next stop was Left Hand Brewing Company in Longmont. (Photo at right: Joe Schiraldi and Andy Brown) Joe and Andy tag-teamed on a tour because Joe was busy with his filter. We got to taste several beers including a nice Milk Stout.
Time for lunch, so a stop at the Pump House Brewery, also in Longmont. The brewer wasn't in, but we ran into Greg Nowatzki (photo left) of Las Vegas.

Greg and I were featured on the 2002 GABF (Great American Beer Festival) program that aired on the Food Channel. Even though we were both on the same film, we had never met, but I recognized him sitting at the bar. Of course Greg had his 3-ring binder listing every beer he'd ever tasted. In 2002 he was up to over 4,000 beers, now he is up to over 9,000 beers. It turns out that Greg is a fellow Wisconsinite - originally from Madison.

Left the Pump House Brewery and returned to our van and trailer to find that Longmont's Finest had left us a ticket. Notice the nice diagram in the lower left corner showing how we had parked and taken up three parking spots. (Gee officer, we could have taken five spaces, but we were trying to be courteous.)

Next it was off to Oskar Blues in Lyons. When I first sent out the notice that I was departing on this trip, marketing man Marty Jones called me to make sure I had received his email invite. Marty couldn't meet us today, but brewers Mike and Eric gave us a tour. (Photo at left: Eric Huber and Mike Hall.) I'd been wanting to see their canning operation for a long time. Note the pallets of cans stacked behind Eric and Mike in the photo.

Both Oskar Blues and Left Hand had a neat contraption outside their breweries that I'd never seen before: A big wheeled spent grain dumper. (Photo at right.) Seems like a good idea to me.

Last was the drive up hill to Estes Park to visit Jon's old pal, Baby Kay and her family. Baby Kay is all grown up now, and so are her two babies. Dave grilled burgers, and we sat outside on a balmy summer eve on the edge of Rocky Mountain National Park in their back yard and enjoyed a few of the beers we'd collected. What a nice end to a brewery-filled day!

(Photo at right: Maddy, Kay, Dave, Teri, Jon and Mica.)

San Francisco Bay Area Friends

"Friendship makes prosperity more shining and lessens adversity by dividing and sharing it." ~Marcus Tullius Cicero

June 10: After a morning of organizing Big Buddy (my trailer), I met my former coworker buddy Ann at her home in San Leandro. She took me to lunch at Horatio's on the waterfront, and we had a lovely view of the marina while enjoying our seafood-themed brunch. Then we walked it off by circling the marina. Ann is from Michigan, and with me being a Wisconsinite, we mentally surfed that Midwesterner wavelength. It was fun catching up.

After a thorough review of SF Bay Area maps, it was off to Foster City where I lived when I worked as a financial systems COBOL programmer in the 1980's. Met up with some of my old pals who still live in the area. Camped near Steve's house. Steve and his girlfriend Jennifer cooked up a feast of marinated grilled chicken, strawberry spinach salad, and asparagus. I provided the beer and root beer for the feast. Aggie and Dan brought their kids Rachel and Sean, and also fruit salad and cheesecake. (No we didn't eat their kids - somebody had to take the photo!) It was really fun to reminisce about our youth and former careers.

L to R: Aggie, Dan, Teri, Jennifer and Steve

The next morning Jennifer and I went on a power-walk tour of Foster City, then I drove to Hayward to visit Tom Dalldorf at the Celebrator Beer Newspaper offices.

P.S. Thank you to Tom for letting me plug into his wireless and spend several hours working on photos and blogs.

A Visit to Triple Rock, My Old Home Brewery

"People don't take trips. Trips take people." ~John Steinbeck

L to R: Teri, Karen and Jerry
June 8-9: Drove from Sierra Nevada to Auburn, California to visit Jon’s Aunt Karen & Uncle Jerry. Parked on a flat spot a block away. Aunt Karen did my laundry and I had Uncle Jerry’s homemade chicken soup for dinner, then blogged 4 posts and went to bed. Up at 7:00 am and off to the Edelweiss with Jerry and Karen for a hearty breakfast. A gas fill-up and then on my way to Berkeley. It was Saturday morning without traffic so I made good time.

Parked at Trumer Braueri for the day/night, and Brewmaster Lars Larson came out to greet me. It was chance he was there, and I got a quick tour of his expanded Briggs brewery and a photo. Lars is happy making a lot of Pilsner these days, but his background includes brewing ales at Bridgeport in Portland, Oregon. And you know how serious and kinda scary Lars looks in Trumer’s ads? He actually smiles a lot and is very friendly in person.

Lars Larson at Trumer Brauerei

Then I had an hour to kill, so I arranged the trailer (Big Buddy) as a mini-office so I can work on trip planning tonight.

My old boss, Reid Martin picked me up for lunch. Reid and his brother John opened Triple Rock under the name Roaring Rock in 1986. It was the first brewery in California to have serving tanks, possibly the first brewpub anywhere to have them. (Hey everybody, if I get your stories wrong, just email me the correct version and I’ll update the associated blog post.)

Reid’s seven-year old daughter Kendall joined us for lunch. She was more interested in my dill pickle than her unsauced chicken wings. My green chili-mushroom burger with salad was great. So were Christian Kazakoff’s ales, especially the stout.

Triple Rock was déjà vu for me, as it looked almost exactly the same as when I was Head Brewer there in 1989-90, but not quite. Reid and I caught up on what’s been happening while Kendall mastered her crayon technique. It was great to see Reid. I appreciate that he and John gave me the opportunity to work for them in 1989, as Triple Rock really launched my brewing career. Every good thing I’ve done since then has stemmed from the training and experience I gained at Triple Rock. It was fun to notice that Brewer Christian Kazakoff’s Titanium Ale was completely different from my original recipe that I developed in 1990. Such is common with brewpubs and successions of brewers. It’s still a great name and slogan… Titanium Ale: Strong yet Light.

L to R: Grant, Teri, Kendall, Reid
Grant Johnston, Brewmaster at Black Diamond joined us after lunch. Grant was my buddy back in my Berkeley days. Local homebrewer and beer friend Dave Suurballe and his wife Honoria also joined us. Reid was kind enough to take care of our bill, and he gifted me a t-shirt. We did exactly what beer was designed for: We sat there and chatted and enjoyed each other’s company for several hours.

Grant and I commented that at the beer festivals and professional conferences where brewers run into each other, it seems we never have enough time to just plunk down and enjoy a few beers over a few hours of conversation. The same topic had come up with Rod Kucera of Mia & Pia’s in Klamath Falls. Thus, part of the impetus for my trip: To sit with none of the pressing requirements of our hurry-up world; to sit with nothing better to do than drink a few pints and enjoy a few hours in good company. After all, what could be better than that?

L to R: Teri, Grant, Dave and Honoria