Column: Like brownies that get you drunk

Talk about it

I recently finished brewing my second batch of homemade beer. If I know my brewing history, I believe it was about this time in his career a young Silas P. Budweiser decided to dedicate himself to the production of mediocre beer to be sold to sports fans and guys who like looking at women in skimpy outfits.

Also, horses. He started to really get into big horses.

I don’t actually know if there was a Silas Budweiser, but it sounds right. I am more confident of the identity of brewing magnate Malcolm NaturalLight, whose work is best known among college students.

None of this has anything to do with my own brewing. But from time to time I like to use this space to inform.

My current batch of beer is something called a saison, which is a french farmhouse-style ale. Which is the kind of thing people make when they want to pretend they know more than you do about beer. Sophisticated tasters will tell you it has a spicy flavor and a mouth feel that is unmistakably wet.

People have asked if I enjoy brewing. I do, although at this point that mostly just means that I like drinking beer, and this is a moderately cheaper way of acquiring that beer. The process I use now isn’t much more complicated than boiling up a bunch of ingredients that come in a box, then putting the mixture that results into a big glass bottle and waiting for the beer fairies to add the alcohol.

Admittedly, I’m less well versed on the chemistry of brewing than I am on the industry’s history.

I’ve compared the kind of brewing I do now to baking brownies from a box mix. It’s a pretty fair analogy, I think, only the brownies take a month to bake and they get you drunk.

To tell you the truth, if Betty Crocker had just responded to all my letters I probably wouldn’t have gotten into this hobby in the first place.

Maybe I would have, though. Home brewing as a hobby is really taking off. According to the New York Times, it’s a full-blown trend, with some serious practitioners dropping $6,000 or more on equipment. Some of the brewers profiled have built British-style pubs in their homes, presumably because it makes everything feel more authentic. I keep my brewing equipment in a Rubbermaid tub in a closet, but I have some pretty nice coasters.

I also have labels, thanks to my dad and my step-mother. They declare my beer the product of NRH Brewing Company, which is nice. But I’m not sure it’s in my best interest for people to be able to trace anything back to me. I’m only two batches in. There are still a few kinks to work out.

I don’t know what will come of this brewing hobby. Maybe I’ll become Minnesota’s next big microbrewer. Maybe I’ll give it all up tomorrow to dedicate more time to a new hobby. Maybe beekeeping.

One thing seems certain, though: I need a really big horse.

Tags: opinion, commentary, farmington, government