Hop Session and the Dustbin of History
When we sold Tremont Ale, I didn’t hang onto much memorabilia. I try to live lean, and packing away a bunch of crap for nostalgia value was not on my mind at the time. Most items were sent to the dustbin. However, I did keep two medals from the 1997 Chicago Real Ale Festival, and their place on a hook inside my office closet does not reflect how much they mean to me. We took home two medals that year in Chicago for our cask Tremont IPA and cask Tremont Old Scratch Barleywine (6.4% and 9.0% ABV respectively!). I may not brew high ABV beer anymore, but cask conditioned ale is still a passion.
These medals also meant a great deal to the brewery and my then Tremont partner, Alex Reveliotty. Why? We dug cask, and were early evangelists for its brewing and distribution in Boston in the early 90’s. The medals were recognition for what some felt was a Don Quixote endeavor. When Alex first envisioned a Boston brewery, it was to be a cask only brewery. Not a brewpub (like the late Commonwealth), but a distributing cask brewery to Boston pubs – a pretty cool concept in 2010, but this was 1993. Recognizing that this was an idea clearly ahead of its time, we released cask and kegs with our first batch. But, we did spend the early years educating anyone who would listen, and introduced Boston to the first regularly distributed cask beer in 1994, at pubs such as Doyles, Cornwalls and Redbones.
Things have changed. Cask conditioned beer has come so far in the past 20 years, it’s hard to remember Boston without it. The NERAX festival started in the mid 90’s, and has been key in educating and creating demand for cask beer in New England. Cask from around the world floods into Boston on a regular basis, and if you look at NERAX’s page, you’ll see the number of outlets have expanded greatly. All of this makes me very, very happy.
Cask will always be a big part of Notch, as lower alcohol beers (or “lower gravity” for the geek in you) shine when cask conditioned. And we have a bit of a run right now on Hop Session Cask, with tappings around town this week and next. Deep Ellum was the first on board to tap Hop Session Cask this past Wednesday, but also look for casks at the Haven (one night only), and Redbones (two casks on deck), and another location to be leaked shortly.
The cask conditioned version of Hop Session is a little different from what you will find on draft taps. It is a true presentation of session ale – naturally carbonated and served at cellar temp. Where session ale was born of Brit pub culture, it is also traditionally served cask-conditioned. Once you’ve tried cask session ale, you’ll understand why hanging around in the pub all day is grand idea.
A little twist on the Hop Session Cask is the dry hopping. The predominate hops in Hop Session are Simcoe and Amarillo, along with a touch of Mt Hood, but I chose to dry hop in the cask with 100% Mt Hood. Why? The Mt Hood hops were in fantastic condition - extremely floral, grassy, delicate – and a wonderful play off the pine and citric notes of the Simcoe and Amarillo. I also think that Mt Hood has been forgotten in the new wave of hybrid hop varieties. It was time to show the new school that the old school could bring the heat.
Enough nostalgia and geek… if you want to learn more about cask, or hops, the links are your’s for the clicking. If you want to talk more about Hop Session Cask, check out one of our events.
