crazy times

Hey all,

I feel like it has been forever since I was able to get a post out there to let you know what was going on. So here is the run down.

The Le Chat Noir has been replaced by its American counterpart, Black Cat Stout. Back to the basics on the stout front. The IPA is still giving us trouble so we have on the Smuttynose IPA to tide us over until we have the 5 C's ready, which should be in a few days from now. To round out our German beers we have out on the Alt Bier, which is a malty, heavier bodied, German style ale.

And now I have to get back to cleaning the brew house after Hop harvest II (warrior wet hopped). Going to be another great hop bomb!

Cheers,
Tyler

Octoberfest

Hey all,

Well Oktoberfest starting on the 19th in Munich, so the party is on across the pond! Since the Blueberry is gone we thought what a better time to put out our Octoberfest then right now. So the party is on at the P-brew too. The O'fest is one of the few lagers we do and we did give it its required lagering time of 6 weeks at 32 oF to cold condition (aka Lager). this beer is clean, crisp, flavorful and delicious. Come on in and get one.

On another note IPA is still flying out of the taps. We ran out of our Bottle rocket before the 5 C's was ready so we brought in some Smuttynose IPA. Which is a great beer made by our brethren down the road. For those drooling in anticipation here is the best I can give ya. The 5 C's should be ready middle to end of next week, and the Summit hops should be finished picking right about now and packaged up and shipped next day air tonight. Tomorrow is hop harvest brew day so if you are hop head come in to Portsmouth and I am sure that the whole block around the P-Brew will smell amazing early afternoon. So that means at least 14 days untill the Hop harvest is ready, but I am sure it will be worth the wait :)

Cheers,
Tyler

Boo ya!

Hey all,

Why is everyone hating on the Smoked Dunkelweizen. Rauchbier has been around since the 1500’s. It pairs so well with food. We house smoke our malt with apple wood vs the beech wood for a more rounded smoke flavor. The way the banana and clove interact with the sweet smoke and malt flavors, Yum! Man I am excited for this years Smoked Dunkel.

And who is spreading the nasty rumor that we are not going to make the Hop Harvest? We should be getting in the hops next week. A double batch of wet Warrior and a single batch of wet Summit. Bam! Hop harvest time.

Cheers,
Tyler

P.S. I dyhopped the 5 C’s today so she is almost ready. Man she is already tasting good!

Dunkelweizen

Hey all,

While Zach was honeymooning in Greece we all decided to finish off his honeymoon beer, how fitting. So it is true the Biere de Meile is gone and we replaced it with a Dunkelweizen. This is not the smoked dunkelweizen though. We are brewing that later in the fall. This is a Dark German Wheat beer, so you are going to get the clove spiciness with the maltiness of the dark malts used. We are just prepping you taste buds for the smoked dunkel :)

Cheers,
Tyler

The first annual NH brew fest!

Hey all,

The web site for the first annual NH brew fest is up and running! http://www.brewnh.com You can go check out all the breweries from around the North East that are making an appearance and what they are going to be bringing. Should be a great fest where just a flat rate at the door and no beer tickets involved. Hope to see you there!

Cheers,
Tyler

Yesterday's disaster; today's cleanup

Hi all,

Yesterday, at around two in the afternoon, a metal brace worked itself loose inside the housing of the big rooftop fan that powers our kitchen exhaust. Needless to say, when the spinning fan met the loose piece of metal, the results weren't pretty. Making a sound that could be heard throughout downtown, the fan ripped itself to shreds and came to a clattering halt. Without a functioning exhaust hood, our kitchen, and soon the entire restaurant (crowded with holiday patrons), filled with smoke. Ben, our manager, quickly shut down the grill, opened the doors and windows to air the place out and set about dealing with the situation. But bigger trouble was yet to come.

Built up heat in the kitchen caused one of the fire-suppression sprinklers to open, spraying rusty water all over everyone and everything in our kitchen. The fire alarm sounded and within minutes the FD had arrived and the building was evacuated. Needless to say, everyone's pleasant holiday lunch got cut short, a lot of checks got "comp'ed," all the exposed food in the kitchen had to be thrown away, and we were closed for the rest of the day and evening. What a mess!

Today, our wonderful staff is working hard to put everything back together. The Health Inspector has already signed off on our cleanup and sanitation, which is taking place even as I write. The sprinkler system has been repaired and reset, and Dowling, our mechanical service company, is working to repair the destroyed exhaust fan. If they can locate all the necessary parts, we should be up and running by early evening.

We're choosing to look at the bright side. What else can we do? At least it didn't happen on a Friday evening. Restaurant operators are intimately familiar with Murphy's Law. This time Murphy gave us a (small) break, forcing us to be closed on what is normally one of the quieter days of the season: the Tuesday after Labor Day.

We look forward to serving you this evening!

Cheers,

P-

Prost to Bottle rocket IPA!

Hey all,

Bottle Rocket IPA is back on. I hope you guys enjoyed the 90 min from Dogfish, it is such a great beer. Other beer change is that the Thaizenheimer is gone for another season. We wont see it again until next summer. Our Hefeweizen has replaced it. Now with the Octoberfest in the works and the Hefe on we are ready for fall. So raise your beer stines and welcome in the cooler weather.

Prost!

Tyler

Kate has left the building

Greetings beer lovers, Tod here to fill you in on what is happening here at the brewery. As you may or may not know we found an '09 Kate stashed in a remote corner of the cellar. So, like Kabert, we put on Kate without much fanfare and she only lastred a few hours. Sad face:(- however we have a new batch of Le Chat Noir brewed with a slightly different Belgian yeast strain that produced a lovely dry stout. We also incorporated some cold water coffee extract to heighten the roastiness of the black beauty. I am carbonating Le Chat right now and it should be ready to consume in an hour and a half. I hope everyone is enjoying this fine early fall weather. Have a great Labor Day weekend. Cheers! Todm

RIP Kabert, welcome.....

Hey all,

I guess you guys like the Kabert. It lasted all of one day, as suspected. But as luck would have it we found another keg that might tickle your fancy. 2009 Kate the great is on (I am guessing for one dayas well) so come on in and enjoy it.

Cheers,
Tyler

IPA/RIS

Hey all,

The IPA kicked last night. So we thought we would listen to the blog-o-sphere out there and brought in some Dogfish 90min IPA. So that should get us up to/through the weekend when the Bottle Rocket will be backing up the 90min.

Now, the Oatmeal Stout kicked last night as well and Le Chat Noir is almost ready. We added coffee to this batch to see what that will do so I am excited for this batch to come on. Le Chat needs a few more days to condition and we need a stout on. Some of you out there might remember that about a year ago a group of crazy Belgian brewers came and took over our brewery for the longest brew day of my life. The final product was the most intense wort I have ever seen making only 3 bbls. We tried everything in the book to finish out this beer, but it just didn’t want to completely ferment out and we needed to have our fermenter back. So as an experiment Tod and I brought in every carboy we had at home and blended in some our imperial stout that was in just starting to enter the ripping fermentation stage of its life to these carboys. But we didn’t have 3bbls worth of carboys at home so we ended up dumping most of the Belgian Royal stout. But the carboys took off and finished out the blend of beers almost to completion. So we decided to keg it off and let it age for a year and then bring it out on a day like…well today!

So we have one keg of 2008 Kabert, a Kate the Great/Black Albert imperial stout blend. Its on today, try it let us know what you think.

Cheers,
Tyler