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Category Archives: Pittsburgh

East End is grateful for volunteers. We’re grateful for barleywine.

Posted March 22, 2018 • 0 comment

And everyone is grateful for Gratitude. Especially on Gratitude Day.

East End’s mostly-annual release of its Gratitude barleywine started more than a decade ago, as a way for the then-young brewery to thank its customers.

These days, Gratitude release day is a full-fledged Pittsburgh beer holiday, the first day of its kind around here, with the possible exception of the yearly release of Penn’s St. Nikolaus Bock.Customers line up for bottles of the fresh Gratitude, to both drink now and to stow away for a few years. And they also show up to get their hands on vintage bottles that have been stashed away by the brewery for special occasions.

What’s the big deal? Like other barleywines, Gratitude is a big beer, and because of its ingredients and its alcohol, it ages extremely well; after a few years, some of the flavors that are more prominent in the younger versions — especially the hops that are easy to find when Gratitude is fresh — drop away, revealing a complex liquid that often reminds me of a rich brandy. East End owner Scott Smith said his favorite versions of the beer come in two varieties — as fresh as possible or aged four or more years.

But the production that is Gratitude Day doesn’t come without some extra work. When the beer is ready — it is bottle conditioned, on top of spending a lot of extra time in fermentation tanks — a team of volunteers show up at the brewery to label the bottles and dip them in a colored wax — green this year — specific to the vintage.

And this year, there was a new twist: a return to a few of the paper-labeled 750 ml bottles that were a hallmark of Gratitude releases past. That meant that this year’s volunteers got some first-hand experience with the sloppy wheat paste used to make that paper stick.

It’s not all bad, though — they get a pizza lunch for their trouble and, besides the folks who actually work at the brewery, they get the first tastes of the brand-new vintage. And that’s definitely something to be thankful for.

This year’s Gratitude Day is Saturday, March 24, at the brewery in Larimer. Both styles of bottles of the new barleywine will be available, as well as verticals, barrel-aged Gratitude in 16-ounce cans and flights on tap. Details are available here.

Big thanks to my friends at Stewards of Beer for the photos of the volunteers prepping Gratitude bottles.

Category: Pittsburgh | Tags: barleywine, barrel aging, breweries, packaging, seasonal beer, special release

Talking beer and bourbon with Lew Bryson

Posted March 8, 2018 • 0 comment

Lew Bryson knows Pittsburgh liquids.

He may be a native of the Philly area, but Bryson, who splits his professional time writing about whiskey and beer, has spent a significant amount of time here, attending school at Carnegie Mellon and haunting some of our great old beer bars, like Chiodo’s Tavern in Homestead.

And even though his roots remain in the eastern side of the state, Bryson is here a lot, often enough that he knows what our breweries have to offer and how they stack up against the rest of the country. And he pretty much wrote the book on tasting whiskey (no, really — he wrote the book on tasting whiskey), so he knows what our craft distillers are up to as well.

Bryson was in town recently to share pours of a treat from Marker’s Mark: a Private Select blend he worked on with a few other spirits writers who, collectively, were known as the curmudgeons (seriously — it says so right on the bottle). And while we discussed the process of picking out differently prepared barrel staves that were used to give their bourbon some heft, we also took a little time to discuss the scene in Pittsburgh and how we’re buying and consuming our beer these days.

As promised in the show: find Bryson on Twitter. He’s got a few more bottles of that special Maker’s to share, so pay attention, and you might get a taste for yourself.

Category: Pittsburgh, Region | Tags: beer bar, tap room, whiskey

Filling your last-minute gift list … with beer

Posted December 21, 2017 • 0 comment

Sure, Christmas is just a few days away. But if you’re shopping for beer people, you still have plenty of time.

Here — I’ll prove it:

I took a quick trip around town to talk to some of my favorite beer folks to get some suggestions for locally brewed beer that would make great last-minute — or last-second — gifts. The only stipulation: the subjects couldn’t pick a beer they made.

There are pales and IPAs. There are some holiday-season favorites. And there are styles from all over the globe, all brewed right here at home.

Whether you’re shopping for a friend or you’re looking for something special for your holiday weekend, we’re fortunate to have all of these options — and many, many more. Enjoy your holiday weekend, boys and girls … and enjoy it with some Pittsburgh-brewed craft beer.

Category: Allegheny County, Pittsburgh | Tags: Belgian beer, Christmas beer, india pale ale, millvale, Russian imperial stout, seasonal beer, sharpsburg, winter warmer

The time has come for 11th Hour

Posted August 31, 2017 • 0 comment

It’s been a long time coming. But 11th Hour Brewing has finally opened its doors.

Not in the North Hills. And not in a Downtown location near the convention center. Those spots didn’t work out … and they’re part of the reason why it’s taken Matt and Keana McMahon a bit longer than usual to officially get started.

They don’t have to dwell on that now; in fact, there’s no time to think about everything that’s led them to this weekend, when the brewery officially opened up in a Lawrenceville building that started as a schoolhouse for German immigrants and later served as industrial space. There’s a 20-barrel brewhouse behind the bar and a long taproom that looks out over Charlotte Street through a series of garage doors. And there are clocks everywhere; just don’t count on them being correct more than twice a day … you know, at 11.

From the beginning, 11th Hour has been a family affair, and that was evident this week when I stopped in. Keana and her son, assistant brewer Justin Strzelczyk Jr., were cleaning up for a industry-and-friends soft opening that evening, while Dan McMahon, Matt’s father, continued some carpentry work. Matt’s brother Mark also did construction work and was behind the bar during the soft opening, along with Keana’s daughter Sabrina. And Matt’s sister Brie, a public relations professional, has pitched in with promoting the brewery. That’s made the long road a bit easier, Matt said.

Just how long is that road? I had my first taste of his jalapeno IPA, if I recall correctly, on an early cruise of the Commonwealth Press Beer Barge. It seems impossible that 11th Hour could be the city’s newest brewery … because they’ve been at festivals and events for years.

“But this is different,” Matt said, as he took a breather during the soft opening. “We’ve always been welcomed and accepted, but I haven’t really felt like I was fully a part of the community until now, when we finally have a place of our own. We’ve been doing this forever, but now it finally seems real.”

Post-Gazette coverage of 11th Hour Brewing:

Category: Pittsburgh | Tags: brewpubs, Lawrenceville

Extra: Farewell to the Beerman

Posted August 1, 2017 • 0 comment

A commemorative run of Oskar Blues G’Knight imperial IPA, with a label printed in honor of Tony Knipling.

Even now, days later, it’s a difficult thing to write: Tony Knipling died last week.

To say that Tony was a longtime craft beer rep at Vecenie Distributing Co. in Millvale is accurate. And completely inadequate.

He sold his own brands, sure. But nearly everything he did — from being one of the longest members of the Three Rivers Alliance of Serious Homebrewers to the long-running Craft Beer School series with the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust — helped sell better beer in the broadest sense. He was one of the first people in town to do it and I don’t think there’s any question that he reached more people with that message than anyone else in town.

After calling hours for Tony and his family on Sunday, a bunch of us met at East End’s taproom in the Strip to have a beer or two and talk about what we would remember most about the Beerman. This is easily the longest video I’ve ever posted here, but the memory of Tony Knipling is absolutely worth the time.

Category: Pittsburgh, Region | Tags: beer festival, distributors, fest beer, india pale ale, lagers, the beerman