Beer, Bars & Brewers #2

In this week’s Beers, Bars & Brewers nitrogen makes a comeback. Pop a cold one and join us! Also we’ve got a few other news for you.

London’s Hackney Brewery is turning bread into beer, Bud Light is trying to reach a new demographic with a “cool, new, young, hip, insert-key-marketing-word-here” advertisement strategy, Stone Brewing Co. introduces its Stone Pataskala Red X IPA, and Sam Adams gets into the nitro game. Cheers!

Hackney Brewery turns Bread into Beer

Taking a page out of ol’ Jeso’s book, except this time we’re going for a hoppier drink than wine. East London’s Hackney Brewery is using surplus bread that they’ve gathered from bakeries and delis across London to brew “Toast Ale” by slicing, toasting, and mashing the crumbs before brewing it with malted barley, hops, and yeast. The drinks business notes that the beer was launched last week “priced at £3 a bottle, with all profits going to Feedback, a charity that aims to halve food waste in the UK by 2030”.

Feedback founder Tristram Stuart happened upon a similar project like this in Brussels and then pitched the idea to the Hackney Brewery. Jon Swain, of the brewery, said “The important thing for us was to create a beer that tasted good and stood up against other craft beers. We worked hard to brew a beer that wasn’t just a fad but something that people could enjoy and would have a significant impact”.

Bud Light is making drastic changes to capture American millennials

Bud Light is vamping up its image and using comedians like Amy Schumer and that-dude-who-was-in-that-one-movie-with-the-girl-from-grey’s-anatomy to reach the oh so elusive demographic: the millennial. Business Insider reports that even though “Bud Light continues to make up about 18% to 19% of Anheuser-Busch InBev’s US business, the brand’s sales have significantly slipped in recent years as the power of craft beer grows”. Bud Light wants to modernize the brand’s sense of humor by launching their “Raise One to Right Now” campaign with Amy Schumer and Seth Rogen. The overhaul is completed with a redesigned can which “features a new logo, cut the color red, and returned the “AB” crest to labels after 14 years off of the packaging”. One can expect more experiential marketing techniques from AbInBev in the coming months

Stone Brewing Co. Introduces Stone Pataskala Red X IPA

Stone Brewing just announced the introduction of Stone Pataskala Red X IPA, which is a red IPA brewed with newly available Red X malt from Germany-based BESTMALZ. Brewmaster Mitch Steele first learned about Red X malt through homebrew circles and wanted to experiment with it. The Full Pint notes that “the special German malt variety is typically reserved for German amber lagers, Irish red ales and other mildly hopped beers and is known for creating a deep crimson hue”. Avid Stone fans might notice that the Stone Pataskala Red X IPA was first produced as a small batch beer to support the extracurricular and educational program of a high school in Greg Koch’s hometown of Pataskala. Back in September of 2015 more than $10,000 was raised for the Watkins Memorial High School Band Boosters and Ally’s Warriors of Stone Foundation.

The red IPA is said to have a “upfront fruity and piney aroma, transcending into stone fruit flavor and pleasingly lingering bitterness” and “should be enjoyed within the 90-day ‘enjoy by’ date printed on the bottle neck”. The beer will be available in limited quantities as a seasonal release through May.

Nitrogen Adds a new Element to Sam Adams Beer

After Guinness, Sam Adams is jumping on the nitrogen bandwagon. The Boston Globe’s Gary Dzen writes that a few Boston bars have a couple of nitrogen taps on which different beers are rotated but that portable nitrogen beers are rare, and usually “limited to English beers like Boddington’s Pub Ale and American craft one-offs like Oskar Blues Old Chub NITRO” because it’s difficult to get the nitrogen into the can. Sam Adams three new nitro beers (Nitro White Ale, Nitro IPA, and Nitro Coffee Stout) use a “tiny widget called a nitrogenator activates as soon as the can opens, pushing gas through the beer with a crack, whoosh, gurgle”.

Founder Jim Koch reveals that they “experimented with different options — bottles and cans with and without nitrogenators. But we ultimately felt the can with the nitrogenator delivered the best drinking experience”. Before settling on the three aforementioned styles, Samuel Adams considered 50 other beer types. Author Dzen says the Nitro IPA is his least favorite but speaks highly of the Nitro White Ale which “is a summer milkshake, an enjoyable, orange-y brew I’d happily drink again”. Color us intrigued.