Inspired by the black session lagers of the Czech Republic, Notch Černe Pivo is malty, toasty, and infinitely drinkable. While Černe pours black, it trades the high intensity roast and bitterness of a porter or stout for the mellow malty profile of a lager. Think roasty, but think subtle roasty. It also trades the fruitiness of an ale for a cleaner lager aroma, which allows the subtle malt character to come through. Černe Pivo is Czech for “Black Beer”, and is a style wholly indigenous to the Czech Republic, yet with little awareness in the US. I’m not sure why the beer world perceives the Czech Republic as having only one style (Pilsener) when there are dozens. Maybe most of the US beer cognoscenti prefer trips to Belgium instead.

Some Černe (Black) and Tmave (Dark) beers I enjoyed in Prague. And some stinky beer cheese.

Session beer dominates the beer culture in the Czech Republic, although they have different names for these low gravity lagers. Vyčepni Pivo, or “Tap Beer” is widely used referring to a range of styles (Svetle, Černe and more) with modest amounts of alcohol. So when you order a Vyčepni Svetle, you’ll get a light colored lager of about 4% ABV. The other way Czech’s identify session beer is by the measurement of a beer’s gravity before fermentation in degrees Plato. Desítka, or 10, is the name for the lower gravity session lagers, while the stronger lagers are 12, 14  and higher. These numbers do not reflect alcohol percentage, but the amount of malt extract before fermentation begins. This confuses many tourists who boast stories of drinking 10% ABV beers all night, when in fact, it was a classic session with low gravity lagers.

And now the geeky stuff. The intention was to have Notch Černe come in at 4.0% ABV, and that was not quite what happened. Many things impact the final ABV in a beer. Mash temp, mash thickness, malt type, malt amount, yeast selection and attenuation are all factors. Normally we are pretty good at dialing in all these factors, but any new recipe brings uncertainty. By federal law (TTB), we are allowed a variance of 0.3% on our stated ABV (if it reads 4.0 on the label, the range can be 3.7 to 4.3), and we are always well within this range, more often slightly lower than our stated ABV. And that is the case with Černe, as we came in at 3.7%, even though our label and tap states 4.0%. It’s a small variance, but one we thought was worth the time to explain.

We’ll kick things off in style, with stinky cheese, cured pork and half liter glasses of Notch Černe Pivo at the Salty Pig on Thursday December 8th, 5 – 8PM. Stop on by, pay as you go, and experience a little bit of Czech pub culture right here in Boston.

Look for Notch Cerne Pivo in 22 oz bottles by December 8th as well.  Na zdravi!

This Saturday’s Valley Malt event at Meadhall is nothing like Massachusetts has ever seen before. Seven local brewers will showcase beers made with this year’s Massachusetts barley harvest, courtesy of the pioneers at Valley Malt. It is a first year event, but we hope this will become a yearly event, and each year the number of participating brewers will grow, the number of consumers attending will flourish, and the number of beers made with Massachusetts grown barley will be too many to count.

Most importantly, Valley Malt will benefit. Because without them, none of this is possible, as they are the critical link between farmer and brewer. And with that in mind, all profits from this event support Valley Malt’s Brewer Support Agriculture program that encourages Massachusetts farmers to grow our barley.

The event is $50, and you’ll get your fair share of incredible low-mileage beers with food that matches. It’s not a beer dinner, but a brewers social, where you get to chat up, or just listen to, 7 local brewers talk shop. In addition, there will be a panel discussion with brewers and Valley Malt, and you’ll get a little insight on what goes on behind the scenes during growing, malting and brewing. You’ll also walk away with a special tasting glass, and a t-shirt – altruism can be fun! And your $50 stays in the state, rather than paying some guy’s mortgage in San Diego.

The Details:

Saturday, November 5, 4 – 7PM
Meadhall, 4 Cambridge Center, Cambridge MA
Tickets are available through event sponsor DigBoston, and at the Meadhall bar.

The beer styles are wide ranging, the brewers with their own unique viewpoint, and all have a common thread – Massachusetts barley malt. Here’s who’s showing up and serving beer:

Watch City Brewery
Cambridge Brewing Company
Mystic Brewing
Peak Organic
Ipswich Ale Brewery
Wormtown Brewery
Notch Brewing

Notch Saison

With little or no fanfare, as is warranted for a worker’s beer, Notch Saison has been promoted to year round status starting this week. This was always the intent, as Notch Saison is a “courante” saison (everyday saison), but I wanted to test the demand for a saison at a mere 3.8% ABV before putting it in six packs (which carries a hefty cost in packaging). Most of us have only known the stronger and more modern interpretation of the saison, so the success of a lower strength saison was uncertain. But Notch Saison aced the test. So look for it in 22oz bottles and on draft for the rest of the year, with six packs on the way very early in 2012.

BSA Harvest

Our very limited BSA Harvest is on the shelves, and you may have notice some similarities to the Notch Saison, which was intentional, as I wanted to highlight subtle differences based on source of ingredients. The Massachusetts barley malt is certainly with its own unique flavor, and I think this is really apparent in the BSA. I also used the same yeast strain, but at a much different fermentation temp, so there are subtle and fun differences if you are paying attention. Also, the BSA differs from the saison in hop varieties used (US for the BSA, Europe for the Saison). So have fun trying the two side by side, you can get a sense of how the source of ingredients impacts the flavor and aroma. This is what wine folk call “terroir” (yes, it sounds like uppity wine speak, but it’s for real).

New Beers

By the time BSA starts to disappear, you will be seeing signs of our next limited release around December 1. It’s back to the Czech Republic for our next session beer, and one with a fun back story. It will be designed with the colder months ahead in mind, as we try to debunk the thought that session beers are for summer only.  We will also have another beer from the cask only series in December as well. Look for a British inspired interpretation of a US created trend. Yes, you read that correctly, just wait and you’ll understand. For one last hint, both of these beer will share a common attribute – color.

What about next year’s beers? We will have something new for the spring, a fairly obscure (yes, we are getting good at that) style from Germany, and then we will need a new summer beer, as the Saison has been promoted. Too many ideas for the summer beer, it will be hard to pick. Fun times ahead.

T’s and Tastings

And finally, it is also rumored that Notch will have T-Shirts some 8 months after we launched. I guess that is backwards, and T-Shirts normally come first?  Anyway, we’ll try to get a web store up shortly.

And finally, we have a bunch of store tastings coming up as well. Stop by and we’ll talk shop about our new beers and upcoming releases. See you Friday at Kappy’s Medford, Saturday at Craft Beer Cellar, Sunday at Julios Westboro or Kappy’s RT1!

Valley Malt tour last Winter:

I’ve written about Valley Malt before, in my post the Path to Grodziskie and Time for Worker’s Beer, as Valley Malt wheat is a prominent portion of Notch Saison, and their oak smoked malt has been used in my pilot brews of Grodziskie. Earlier this year, Valley Malt started the Brewery Supported Agriculture (BSA) program, where brewers pre-pay for their grains before the crop is planted, and I jumped in right away. This prepayment model encourages farmers to grow barley (as their income is guaranteed), and the brewer (Notch) has the opportunity to visit the farm and the acre of barley throughout the growing season. It also offers Notch the ability to have the grain malted exactly to our specifications. This is a luxury to an East Coast brewer, as we are typically disconnected from the malt house and farmer. So this year I decided to brew a beer with the grain from the BSA program, what I like to think of as a true harvest beer, and not one in name only.

The Notch barley field in Belchertown, MA in June:

So what of this beer, you ask? Every year there will be a BSA Harvest beer from Notch, and every year it will be different. So when you ask, “Is the BSA Harvest beer different this year?”, the answer will be an emphatic yes (and no tirades from me about Hedonic Adaptation). This year I started in an obvious but cherished place – Belgian farmhouse beers. It just made sense to pull on traditions from farmhouse beers, as those beers used ingredients local to those farmer brewers. I say “pull” because the BSA Harvest is not strict to any stylistic guidelines, just influenced by them. In a season of spiced pumpkin and malty fest beers, I wanted to offer something a little different, and the BSA Harvest is infinitely drinkable, yet with a complex aroma, delicate hop flavor, and of course, a unique Massachusetts malt profile. The barley is the BSA barley malt (known as Scarlett barley), and is augmented with 10% Vermont wheat and 10% Maine rye. The hops are decidedly American in source and character – Sterling, Centennial, Mt Hood – yet contribute a low bitterness and leaning more towards flavor. The yeast is Notch’s favorite saison strain, but fermented at a relatively cool temperature which subdues the yeast character and allows the malt and hop flavor to shine a bit more. I call the style American Farmhouse, which is a made up appellation and just for amusement, but it seems to fit based on the circumstances.

Brew day grain mash-in, September:

So have fun with this beer. It’s session strength and can allow your fun to last a bit longer. Also, have some Massachusetts pride with this beer. The barley was grown by a Western Massachusetts farmer, malted by a Massachusetts malt house, brewed by a Massachusetts native in a Massachusetts brewery, and delivered by a Massachusetts family owned wholesaler. Where you purchase the beer is up to you – we can only do so much. But take pride in the fact your money goes to each one of those companies I listed, and not some guy on the West Coast (well, except for the hop grower, but next year that all changes too).

Notch BSA Release Party last week:

Look for 22oz bottles to hit the shelves the week of October 10th. Draft will be extremely limited, but we’ll have a few select locations pouring and will update you on the social media channels. Also, be sure to watch out for details on an event November 5th at Meadhall in Cambridge. Six brewers who participated in the Valley Malt BSA program will be serving beers brewed with this BSA malt, including Notch, Wormtown, Cambridge, Peak, Ipswich and Mystic. Valley Malt will be on hand as well, and we hope to make this a yearly event. See you there, or better, tonight!

After a summer vacation, Notch cask was scheduled to return on September 1 with the next beer in the cask only series. The Summer off was partly due to the heat, as cask beer is not top of mind in mid July. But also my host brewery is at full capacity trying to keep up with their own demand in the hotter months. The next cask beer was slated to be a classic Burton Bitter, and what I finally decided on, or backed into, was anything but classic. Bitter is a subtle but beautiful beer style, and the subtly is the key. The beer’s elements must line up in a way that is balanced, yet interesting enough to draw you in for another sip. A few things I planned for in this beer: below 4% ABV; dry / mineral finish from hard water; balanced hop bitterness and flavor; a yeast with a slight sulfur character; and a very light copper color. Which all sounds, and is, very traditional for my favorite regional Bitter style: Burton Bitter.

The subtle complexity of Burton Bitter is something which is certainly out of favor in modern US craft brewing. And this subtle complexity is regularly bashed by beer snobs who like the opposite. As if it’s a binary option, and one can not exist with the other. So I decided to take this in a different direction. I made it even MORE subtle by using non-British ingredients, specifically German malt. As you wrap you head around that insanity, I’ll move on with the story.

I brew my cask only beers at Kennebunkport Brewing Company in Maine. This came about through a long history there, including an apprenticeship in 1993 under brewing lunatic Mike Hall, formerly of Ashvine Brewery in Wales, and now somewhere in the North Michigan peninsula brewing for North Peak. Mike schooled me on cask ale in 93, and when Tremont Brewery was launched in 94, we introduced Boston to real cask ale in 10.8 gallon firkins (not tank conditioned brewpub beer, as with Commonwealth). There was much pain and suffering introducing cask at that time, but it made my love of cask even deeper.

So when I launched Notch, I headed back to Kennebunkport to brew cask only ales. I know the brewing system well, so it’s worth the 2 hour drive. Also, current and long time head brewer Mike Haley is extremely accommodating. While it’s his ship, and he runs it tight, he also allows me incredible flexibility in process. That is as long as I mash in with his technique, which involves a deft hand on a mash shovel. [Edit: there is no rake in this mash tun.] This prevents setting a crappy mash bed, which results in a poor run-off later. And with session beer, there is not a lot of time to set the bed, as the malt mill runs dry pretty quick. I also know that filling 14 firkins (dry hopped, primed and fined) in a brewpub is an ass ache, so I do this myself so I’ll get invited back. So Kennebunkport has become my cask ale brewing outpost.

The brew at Kennebunkport flows something like this -  I develop the recipe and send it to Mike in order to have him check raw materials in inventory. He lets me know what they have in house, and what I need to special order. I special order, and everything gets delivered. I show up on brew day around 7:45AM to mash-in, and the mill is already filled with the malt based on my recipe (100% Weyermann Munich Malt for the Bitter). We check liquor temps, mash in, Mike tells me my technique sucks and I adjust, the mill runs dry, the mash tun is covered and rests for 90 mins (yes, that is one frigging long rest). I sip coffee and catch up with Mike as he tends to his cellar duties.

After coffee, I check all the hops that have been delivered for the brew. For the Bitter, it’s Styrian Goldings, one of my favorite hops, which also made its way into Notch Saison. More than that, this is a single hop brew, so this is the only hop being used in Notch Bitter. Well, I open the hops and they flat out suck. They are brown, they are oxidized, they can not be used. Disappointment sets in, and as it turns out, the hop vendor sent the wrong hops. Nice finding that out a few hours before I need to use them. So, I sip more coffee, purge disappointment, and enact Plan B.

There’s always a plan B, and mine was 100% German malt and hops. So I hunt down the Saphir hops already in the brewery, examine the condition (excellent) and recalculate the hop bill to adjust for alpha acids. Plan B is good, but the Notch Bitter just became a MUCH different Bitter. Still hiding disappointment, I begin run-off to the kettle, or as the Brits say, “set taps.”

Munich malt is not a common base malt for many ales, it’s kilned at a slightly high temperature than British pale, but has enough diastatic power to self convert, meaning there are enough enzymes present to convert starches to sugar. Some brewers disagree with this, and always use another malt with Munich to ensure conversation. So as I grabbed the first wort sample (the first flow coming out of the mash tun into the brew kettle), I was anxious. But no problems, sweet wort was flowing into the brew kettle. Fear of a full blown failure was averted.

So the rest of the run-off was smooth, the mash held its own even with an incredibly small mash bed in place (not much grain in this beer). I dug out and cleaned the mash tun while looking for the boil to start. And herein begins the story of why it is really hard for a brewer with any level of experience to walk in the door of another brewery and start brewing, even on a system they know. When I turned on the third burner to the brew kettle, I failed to turn on a small portable fan that helps deliver oxygen to the brew kettle flame. I failed to do this because it’s a small quirk in the brewery that I would never know unless I brewed there everyday. And every brewery has about three dozen small quirks that can really f-up your day. The fan oversight eventually caused all burners to extinguish, and it was about 45 minutes before we caught it and fired up the burners again, this time with more fan. It would be an hour before we got a boil.

With the boil finally on, hops were added per schedule. These are Saphir hops from Germany, my plan B hop. Plan B Bitter would have been a good name for the beer, but I don’t really give Notch beers fanciful names. It seems silly for session beers, which are modest by definition. “Hydration” would have worked well too, but I’ll leave that out there for someone else.

The boil is now complete, the last hop addition is done and the whirlpool is finished. A quick lunch and onto knockout, where yeast pitching and temperature control is the main activity as the wort makes its way from kettle to fermenter (open fermenters here). Everything else goes smoothly for the rest of the day. Gravity is declared, I check the volume to calculate the yield, which was only slightly less than the British pale malt I would have used. Overall I’m pretty happy with the malt so far. But I’m still bitter about the hops, pun intended. I grab my stuff, chat with Mike about fermentation temps and management, then drive the 2 hours home with a fresh coffee.

Based on phone calls with Mike, fermentation finishes right about were I predicted based on the malt and mash temp. So, I gather up my priming sugar and head North again to rack 14 Firkins. I arrive at the brewery to find that only 12 Notch firkins came in from the shipper, when 14 were promised. Not good, not enough. And the whereabouts of my Firkins are still unknown, and this is part of the cask game I loathe. Some brewers use other brewers casks without guilt. Maybe they think they are lost? Surrendered? Cast off? Who knows, but if a Notch cask is filled with another beer, that cask has been stolen. It’s that simple. I have since tracked down one at Deep Ellum (my wholesaler driver ignore it) and a few more at my wholesalers’ warehouses. So I have about 5 MIA, that’s 25% of my cooperage gone in one turn of casks.

To make up for the shortage Mike Haley used 2 of his casks to fill, which will be served at Kennebunkport under an alias, as we dry hopped these differently as to differentiate them from the Notch casks. The rest of the casks I fined, primed and dry hopped with whole leaf Saphir. Two ounces of hops per cask, just for a bit of subtlety. More would have been fun, but a little predictable and it would have masked some of the delicate malt characteristics. After the shive was set to seal the casks, it was followed by a quick roll around the brewery to hydrated the hops and mix in the finings, repeat 13 more times and I’m done. I would have been a shitty soccer player, because my cask foot control has never been slick.

Again, I leave the brewery slightly disappointed, and highly irritated that my brand new, once used casks are already being poached.

The casks then sit in a 55 degree room for a week and then transferred and shipped to my wholesaler. During this sitting time, the yeast already present in the beer begins to consume the priming sugar, and creating CO2. And with nowhere to go, the CO2 dissolves into the beer and carbonation is created. That is how it usually works, anyway. I always rack a smaller cask, known as a Pin, to sample before releasing the other casks to the trade. I want to ensure the CO2 levels are correct, and the beer is in proper condition.

I grabbed a pin from Kennebunkport a week later, put it in refrigerated environment to stop any activity for a week and then got ready to tap it (this mimics the other casks process). I would typically hold the cask for 2 weeks at 55, but it’s not my brewery, and 1 week always works well for Kennebunkport’s own casks. The problem is I manage fermentation a little differently than the other beers at Kennebunkport, and this results in my beers having a little less yeast when racked into casks. Yeast controls the rate of cask carbonation (how fast), sugar controls the degree of carbonation (how much). In past brews at Kennebunkport, I had been priming with wort (what the Germans would call speise) and had great results, but the amount required for a whole batch was excessive. Also, the wort did not always match up based on the brew day (you don’t want to prime a bitter with stout). So corn sugar has become my default priming sugar, and I tend to carbonate at a high level (for cask), as I have found that is what I prefer. It worked well with the Notch Mild, so this has been proven out already.

The anticipation of tapping the first cask is always with a bit of wonder. As in, I wonder if this cask carbonated properly?  As soon as you tap a cask, you know exactly what you are dealing with. And this cask was not flat, but it certainly wasn’t at the CO2 level desired. Another sinking feeling, after way too many on this Bitter already. It was a straightforward conclusion, the casks all had an incomplete fermentation during priming. So, it was 15 minutes before a beer fest that I realized an entire batch of beer was not ready for sale. The cask was quietly put to the side and not served that night. And it was at this point I knew Notch Bitter was the beer of the damned.

So, what to do. I had 12 Firkins sitting in my wholesalers cold box, with incomplete conditioning. But it’s September, and the warehouse hovers around 65, so I had the casks pulled out of the cold box (where ale yeast goes dormant) and into the warmer warehouse. Each cask was flipped upside down to get the yeast back into solution, allowing it to finish its job at the right temperature. After a week, the casks are back in the cold box and ready to go, ready for sale on September 15th. It is not always this difficult.

Why so much detail on this beer? It just felt like the time to open up a little on the process of being a brewer without a facility. But it’s just contract brewing, right? Call in your order and ship it to the wholesaler one month later. Well, it’s that way for some. But not for me. I talked about it much more here, this post is long enough.

What about the beer? How did this clash of cultures and brewing techniques finally play out? The process was still British to the core – single temperature infusion mash, open fermentation, Yorkshire ale yeast, and racked into Firkins – but the malt and hops were all German. For the malt I used 100% Weyermann Munich malt which provides a much different malt aroma and flavor than my other go to British pale malts. Better? No, but different, tasty, and friggin expensive. The hops are 100% German Saphir hops. It’s a fairly new hop variety, and similar to the Hallertau Mittlefrueh but with a touch of citrus that works really well when dry hopped in the cask.

The Notch Bitter is a non-traditional take on a Burton Bitter, yet with all the necessary components to still call it one. The beer finishes dry as a bone from the extremely hard water and balanced hop bitterness / flavor. And all things being relative in craft brewing these days, this bitterness is not a bitterness that mimics sucking on an aspirin that seems to be in vogue, it’s just enough to let you know its there. And I’ll leave you with a soap box thought, even though most of you stopped reading this blog post about a 5 paragraphs ago. I think Notch Bitter fits the very basic function of a Bitter, which is to not get in the way of the conversation, or be the conversation. It’s simply a delicious session beer that can be the backbone for a fun afternoon or evening at your local. If you can’t get your head around that, you’ll never get your head around session beer.

Notch Bitter will roll-out September 15, cask only, at fine establishments that serve cask beer. There will be no party, no obligatory tapping the cask photo, or any other special marking of the occasion. But, if you see it, grab it. It won’t last long and you’ll probably never see it again. That’s how we roll with this cask-only series.

This is only the first 12, and the remaining 8 will be shown at the next cask filling. It’s a long story, and I’ll tell it when I release the next Notch cask beer series in about 3 weeks. Writing on a cone shape in a circle pattern proved harder than I thought. My mechanical drawing teacher would not be pleased, and, my photographs were short on artistic flair (or focus), but I had casks to clean and rack. Here are the first 12, and you can look to the comments below for the origins. Two are my own, which is the limit of my creativity and why this contest started in the first place. Overall, great suggestions! Thanks!

Original Post:

I have 20 new casks that just shipped over from England last week, and they will be filled tomorrow with a brand new beer, a British influenced Dark Mild. This is the first of my one-off cask series that should see Boston area pubs around May 1. More news on that soon, but first up is naming these casks. Really. Each physical cask will have a name. Each cask already has a serial number, a color band, and an embossed Notch logo, but it is somewhat of a silly tradition by some brewers to give names to these casks. I never have done this, and I’ve been brewing cask beer since 1993. The cask in the following photo has been my own personal cask since the mid-90’s, and it is still without a name, but it carries the scars of many breweries. Michael Jackson even drank from it.

So, I’m starting a new tradition, both personal and for Notch, and giving names to these funny looking containers forged from British steel. And YOU are helping me, and we start today. Simply enter the suggested cask names in the comment section on this blog post, and consider it considered. It can be a theme for all 20, or just one name. Or maybe a family of names, or 20 nonsensical names. Anything goes here, the more creative the better. I reserve all rights to slightly modify the names to claim as my own, or to ignore as I see fit. If you do merit a selection, there will be rewards. Beer most likely – not sure of the details yet. But this is for fun, and you will not get rich, maybe not even drunk, off the prize package. I would suggest a few beers while you ponder names for these 10.8 gallon stainless steel vessels used in the production of cask-conditioned ale.

Have fun kids.

And here’s a little history on cask ale in New England.

Why a saison from Notch? It was originally brewed by farmers to slake the thirst of seasonal workers (les saisonniers) in Belgium, but this refreshing beer had a lower alcohol content that is not often seen in today’s modern saison. It’s probably difficult to bale hay while quenching your thirst with a 7% beer, so it is easy to see the appeal of a lower ABV worker’s beer. The worker’s saisons previous to WWI were often referred to as courante saison (everyday saison). We like that. Feel free to consume Notch Saison everyday – it refreshes during or after any summer activity.

And what happened to worker’s saison? As manual labor slowly gave way to machinery, saisons were no longer needed as refreshment, and most farmhouse breweries shut down after WWII. With this shift to automation came the disappearance of these lower alcohol saisons, however, higher alcohol saisons survived and are the most familiar saison to craft beer fans.

Notch returns the saison to its roots not only in alcohol content, but also by using local ingredients much like the Belgian farmhouse brewers. As each farmhouse used ingredients locally available, each saison had its own character. (This is why saisons are not considered a strict style, but a category of beers.) In this locally sourced spirit, the Notch Saison uses wheat malted by Valley Malt in Hadley Massachusetts, and the wheat makes up over 25% of the total grain bill. Eventually, Notch hopes to produce beers with as much locally grown and malted grain as possible, but this is a small first step. Below are photos from last week’s trip to the Notch barley field in Belchertown, MA with Andrea Stanley of Valley Malt. Andrea started the Brewers Supporting Agriculture (BSA) program this year, and this is the field where the Notch barley is growing. It will be harvested in a few weeks, and then make its way into a special beer this Fall.

So, there’s the back story, but how does a lower alcohol saison taste? Refreshing! It has the dry, hoppy finish you expect in a saison, along with the classic spicy saison yeast character. Yet, like all Notch session beers, it is balanced for multiple pints, and is a great hot weather thirst quencher. Or, as always, a great lunch beer where one and done can mean one and back to work. See, it is worker’s beer! More details on the Beers page, but be sure to follow us in the social media world for updates on where to get Notch Saison.

Much of the saison history presented here was referenced and probably butchered (but never cut and paste – it’s not on-line yet…) from the writings of Yvan DeBaets and Phil Markowski as presented in the book “Farmhouse Ales” – it’s a great read, check it out.

Recent Press

Brewbound again – Černé Pivo Reveiw

Notch Harvest Review

Brewbound - High praise for Notch Saison

Esquire Magazine – Picks Notch Pils as a top session beer

Details Magazine – Summer session beer overview, with Notch Session Ale

The Boston Globe – Overview of new Boston area brewers, with a video too.

Drink Craft Beer – Saison review, a really good one.

TheFeast.com with video from the first Saison brew day.

TheStreet.com reports on recent trends in craft brewing – session beer included.

Serious Eats gives Notch Session Pils a top rating among stiff competition

Brewbound reviews Notch Session Pils (“…tons of flavor for 4.0% ABV”)

Draft Magazine – 10 session spots for session beer – including Boston for Notch

Mass Beverage Journal’s session beer story by Lew Bryson (“I think it’s got tons of flavor. Period. It’s a great Czech-type pils.”)

Drink Craft Beer reviews Notch Session Pils (“…best Pilsner we’ve ever tasted”)

Brew England reviews Notch Session Pils (“…very enjoyable beer in which I highly recommend…”)

Food and Wine: Trendspotting Includes Notch and our Western Mass comrade High and Mighty

Advertising Age: The New Drinking Session A look at session beers (and some non-session calling themselves such)

Boston.com: The Steady Growth of Session Beer A look at session beer, with some fudging of ABVs…

Salem News: Finding a Niche A full story on Notch!

Weekly Dig: The Authority on Session Beer The Dig crowned me the “authority” on Session Beer. Cool.

The Session Beer Project: Lew Bryson gives an overview of the trade session at NERAX - This discussion is not going away.

Metro West Daily News: The Beer Nut: Settle down with a Notch Session Calling it like I see it with Norman.

Boston Herald’s Kerry Byrne: Shouts out on the Pils Kerry’s being too kind.

And the Herald’s Kerry Byrne again: Bottle Release Party With the Herald’s help, we sold out the release party.

Brewbound: A chat about Notch, Session Beer, and my old man status in the beer industry

Completely Conspicious: Part 1 An interview with Jay Kumar at my local pub, the Pig’s Eye. My part starts at 8:00 mins in. It’s like sitting and having a beer with us.

Completely Conspicious: Part 2 An interview with Jay Kumar things get a little off topic as we get later into the evening as the beer flowed freely.

I brew these beers for Jason Waddleton, the owner of the Haven, for a few reasons. One, it’s a lot of fun to brew these Scottish inspired beers. While I have a long history of brewing English beers, Scottish beers never hit my radar. So it’s been a learning experience researching and understanding Scottish beers. The one thing that really interested me was that so many Scottish beers were session beers, yet the US consumer thinks of the high alcohol “Scotch Ale” when they think Scotland. So this is a chance to explore other Scottish beers of a more modest background.

I also like to brew these Haven beers because of Jason. He has been a huge Notch supporter and “all in” with me from day one. I am very loyal to those who first believed in me and my love of session beer. And when you are an underdog, you find like minded folk and support them. So when Jason asked me about brewing a beer for the Haven, I jumped. And I didn’t want to brew just one beer all the time. First, I need to beg other breweries for a slot where I can brew these beers, so I couldn’t guarantee a constant supply. And second, it’s a lot more fun to offer the Haven’s customers something new and different each time.

The first beer was the 70 Shilling, which was a fantastically malty, slightly roasty, Scottish Ale. It didn’t last long. Now we introduce the Heather Ale. Why Heather Ale? Little did I know, heather has a long and storied past in Scottish brewing history, and I was excited to work with heather (heather tips, really). In the brewery where I brewed the Heather Ale (Kennebunkport Brewing Company, where I apprenticed in ‘93), we have a piece of equipment called a hop back. This hop back allowed me to steep the heather like a tea, and at the exact time and temperature I required. And for those who don’t know heather, just think herbal tea. It balances very well with the hop flavor and slight roasted Amber malt, yet the heather character won’t hit you over the head. But, once you find it, you realize you would like to hang with it for a few pints. Just like all great session beers, it’s made for multiple pints, and if you’ve been to the Haven you know you want to extend your time there.  See you Thursday!

Heather Ale description:

The Heather Ale combines the malt profile of a Scottish Ale with the hop flavor of a British Bitter, and balances these elements with a background of Heather aroma and flavor. A pound of heather per barrel was used in the brewing of the beer, but the Heather provides a subtle complexity. Heather provides a tea like aroma that balance the Amber malt, and the herbal flavor of Heather balances with the British hop flavor.

The Heather Ale is unfiltered, yet with great clarity, and has a light chestnut color. The heather tips were grown and harvested in Scotland, and used as a late kettle and hop back addition. And at 4.3% ABV, a wonderful Scottish inspired session ale.

Malt:     British Pale, Amber, Crystal, Munich, Oats
Hops:    Kent Goldings, Willamette
Yeast:   British Ale
ABV:    4.3%