Sam Calagione (owner of Dogfish Head Brewery) is starring in a new show coming out on the Discovery Channel entitled ‘BREWED’ coming out this fall. They are going to touch on what goes behind the scenes at the Dogfish Head brewery, the history and culture of beer and then embark on a bit of a beer tour to Rome and New Zealand to research the beers of old. It also apparently covers a bit about their new beer, ‘Bitches Brew‘ (a three part imperial stout, on part honey beer), which sounds very intriguing to say the least.
It sounds like an interesting show. I’m looking forward to watching it. Hopefully it’s better than a five part show I just finished called ‘Men Brewing Badly’. It wasn’t a horrible show, but there wasn’t really any brewing going on and barely and beer talk.
See the article on BeerNews.org for more information.
Homebrew Korea’s first SMaSH-Off festival has come and gone, but not without tasting a lot of great beers over warm discussions. The weather didn’t quite cooperate with us, but Geckos Jukjeon has a great area inside which worked very well.
We sampled nine homebrewed beers and one mystery beer (Cass) which I threw in there to see if people could pick it out of the crowd. Everyone brought lots of beer (too much to drink) and happily shared it with the public and chitchatted homebrewing.
Wamille (Bill Miller) brewed an excellent hoppy, yet well balanced SMaSH beer and walked away with first prize and a 50,000won gift certificate to The Maple Tree Korean BBQ courtesy of 10 Magazine, 2 free beer buffet tickets to Platinum, 2 tickets to see Celcil Beaton‘s exhibition courtesy of 10 Magazine and a case of flip top bottle courtesy of GoodBeer Korea.
Mr. Kim of GoodBeer also brewed a fantastic beer, which placed him second in the contest. Mr. Kim won a 30,000won gift certificate to Cafe Bene and 2 tickets to see Celcil Beaton‘s exhibition both courtesy of 10 Magazine, and 2 free beer buffet tickets to Platinum.
KMac (Katelin MacNair), placed third with her homebrew which threw a strong pine aroma in your face and rounded things out with a nice finish. Kate won 2 free beer buffet tickets to Platinum, 2 tickets to see Celcil Beaton‘s exhibition courtesy of 10 Magazine and a case of flip top bottle courtesy of GoodBeer Korea.
I’d like to say thanks to all of the participants in the SMaSH-Off festival and to everyone who came afterwards for the free samples and homebrew chit chat. Also, a big thanks to 10 Magazine and GoodBeer for donating prizes towards the event. I am already looking forward to the next Homebrew Korea festival.
I have been very curious about what the regulations are on starting a brewpub here in S. Korea. The laws were very strict up to the beginning of this year, where they were finally changed making it much more reasonable. A brewpub equipment supplier here in Korea filled me in on the details…
Basically, the regulations state that you must satisfy ‘equipment volume’ regulations, not production capacity. There are basically four main criteria to meet:
- Your brewhouse (mashing/boiling) capacity is in the range of 250~2500 liters per one brew.
- Fermentation tanks and storage tanks have a total capacity in of 5000 ~ 25,000 liters.
- The equipment area should be separated from the service area.
- Serving taps should be directly connected from the storage or service tanks.
That’s it from what I have been told. That will then qualify you for brewpub status and away you go. Whether there are other hoops to jump through, I’m not sure….my guess is there probably are. From what I have been told (and how I understand it), there are no production criteria to meet; it’s strictly an equipment thing.
Korea needs to develop its beer and brewing industry and from what I have been told, these new regulations should definitely help with that. Starting a brewpub is something that I would really love to do and it doesn’t seem as impossible as it did before. I couldn’t think of a more gratifying thing to do than provide people with great beer. It would be a dream come true!! I’m sure most homebrewers out there are thinking the same thing. Haha!
Ohh…And if you are feeling generous and would like to help fund such an adventure, then please, please, email me!!! :)
This post has been mirrored in the Homebrew Korea Community Forums.
Well, here is an event that I would love to attend but won’t be able to. :(
In Boulder, Colorado from November 5th ~ 7th is the world’s first beer bloggers conference. I’m sure this will be a fantastic weekend for anyone in the beer blogging community with tastings, dinners, speakers, etc. Ohhh…..how I would love to go to this!!! Donations? Sponsors? Hint, hint… :) hahaha.
The conference includes dinner at the Boulder Beer Company and Oskar Blues Brewery, tasting some 12 different beers, and a few evening get togethers.
International Underground is a group of writers looking to tell the unsung story of people and their communities from around the world. This article, the first in a series on ‘The Spirit of Entrepreneurs’, delves into the seemingly closed and restricted world of beer and microbrewing in Korea.
For those with the mildest interest in good beer, it can be hard to reconcile the beverage marketed by a handful of Korean conglomerations as beer, with the actual centuries-old, alcoholic concoction of malt, hops, and water that people the world over know and love. Max, one of the corporate-controlled beer brands in Korea, markets its beer with the slogan, “a delicious idea.” For most beer here, that is as precise a moniker as one could give. Reminiscent of keg beer served to anyone with five bucks in grungy college houses, most Korean beer is, sip-by-skunky-sip, a reminder that better beer waits elsewhere in the world.
Head over to International Underground for an interesting read of the full article; Chaebol vs. The Microbrewer by Greg Boone.
