Brewery Rowe: Looking back on 30 years of beer-writing

Decades ago, I jotted down a comment by Greg Koch, co-founder of Stone Brewing. The exact quote is buried in a mountain of notebooks, but I recall he spoke of the “beer journey,” the long excursion beer fans undergo over the course of a lifetime.

In my own beer journey, a critical passage came in 1996, a year after this column, Brewery Rowe,  was born. I blasted a new beer, Stone IPA. I won’t unearth the entire ill-considered review here — better it remain buried — but one phrase sticks in my mind. I ripped the brew for tackling my taste buds with a “hops hammerlock.”

The morning this screed appeared in print, I entered the office to find a scathing voicemail — not from Koch or anyone at Stone, but from Tomme Arthur, then the brewmaster at Pizza Port in Solana Beach.

Chastened but also intrigued, I returned the call and learned a key lesson. It’s not enough, Arthur said, for a critic to “like” or “dislike” a beer. As in any other art form, beer must be judged by standards set by the craft’s best practitioners.

IPAs, especially West Coast IPAs — IPAs come in different varieties? news to this rookie critic! — are meant to be bitter. Criticizing Stone IPA for its bitterness is like slamming the Mona Lisa for her enigmatic smile.

Arthur later schooled me in the wonders of Belgian beers, now bringing those ideas to vibrant life at his brewery, The Lost Abbey. He was incredibly generous with his time, but not uniquely so. Koch spent hours trying to convert me to the radical, boundary-pushing vision his team brought to IPAs, Russian Imperial Stouts and the notorious high-octane dark ale dubbed the Arrogant Bastard.

I heard a strong counter-argument from Karl Strauss. The genial German émigré and legendary brewer loaned his name and many of his recipes to Chris Kramer, a relative, and Matt Rattner, the co-creators San Diego’s oldest existing brewery, Karl Strauss Brewing Co.

At a beer dinner 30 years ago, the grand old man expounded on the secrets of his craft. With his Bavarian accent and Old World charm, he laid down the law: brewing required a sterile brewhouse; top-quality ingredients; patience for beer to properly develop; and a color-within-the-margins respect for tradition.

The then-emerging crop of hop-heavy IPAs?

“Brewers fall in love with hops,” Strauss said, “and then they want more hops, more hops, more hops.”

Breaching the castle

Karl Strauss, the brewery, eventually embraced craft beer’s emerging obsession with hops, hop varieties, hop-centric beers.

Karl Strauss, the man, never did — not to my knowledge, at least — and he was not entirely wrong. American brewers briefly engaged in a hops arms race, competing to see who could design the bitterest brews. Many, perhaps by design, were undrinkable.

While IPAs remain hugely popular, stomach-turning bitter bombs fell out of fashion. In fact, some of the best-selling beers now are “juicy” or “hazy” IPAs, unfiltered ales with a cloying sweetness.

While I now enjoy Stone IPA and other enthusiastically-but-not-insanely hopped brews, my beer journey took a wide detour around the — yeccch! — hazies.

And I traveled on, discovering unexpected places and unanticipated joys: AleSmith’s Speedway Stout, dark, deep and complex; fruity, salted Goses from the now-defunct Council Brewing; crisp, tightly-focused lagers Doug Hasker made for Gordon Biersch and makes for Puesto; Lost Abbey’s genre-defying, barrel-aged Cuvee de Tomme. These and many others expanded my definition of “beer.”

My journey even led to a village in West Flanders. Late one night, I was escorted into the 19th-century headquarters of a fabled Belgian brewery, Rodenbach. Descending into the basement, I found row after row of enormous wooden barrels, foeders, each large enough to bathe a Brabant plow horse.

I weaved through the dimly-lit labyrinth of barrels, drawn to the long bar where a range of tart beers was poured until nearly midnight. On this enchanted night, as on days in Denver for the Great American Beer Festival, the castle of beer had been breached. A cache of brilliant and varied treasures lay at my feet — and, even better, landed in my glass.

As I was saying …

Beer is often miscast as a simple beverage for simple minds. I found that it can be as simple or as complex as you like.

Another misconception: craft beer is a fad, fading away. Start-up breweries becoming $1 billion enterprises in a decade or less? True, that manic era is gone.

But this summer, I visited independent breweries in New England, the Pacific Northwest and California. Without exception, all appeared to be — hey, I’m not a forensic accountant — prospering.

Musings aside, it’s time to return to our regularly scheduled column and that aforementioned saison from Monkless, a small Oregon brewery.

How to describe it? I’ll just say it was perfect.

Perfect for the time: A warm midsummer evening softened by a cool breeze.

Perfect for the place: The rooftop of our hotel, watching the sun set behind snow-dusted peaks in the Cascade Range.

Perfect for the mood: Content and happy, eager to get on with life.

That’s when a realization hit me.

I didn’t need to jot down descriptions of this beer, noting its alcohol content, flavor profile, the ways it respects — or subverts — brewing’s traditions. I just savored the saison.

That was, and will be, enough.

The Last Call

Monday: Help me conclude Brewery Rowe’s 30 years over a pint or two at Blind Lady Ale House. From 6 p.m. until whenever, I’ll be there to meet friends, family, co-workers, readers and members of the brewing tribes. You’ve been valued fellow travelers on this journey and I’d love to see you there at 3416 Adams Ave., San Diego.

Quick Sips: Fond Farewell Edition

Beer: Samaritans Saison

From: Monkless Belgian Ales…

… We interrupt this regularly scheduled column, to bring you the following announcement:

This is the final installment of Brewery Rowe. After 30 years of drinking beer and writing about that marvelous beverage, it’s time to move on to other writing projects, travel and grandchildren.

Consider this a break-up note. Oh, and beer? It’s me, not you.

I’ve had a blast exploring ales, lagers and those who brew them, then sharing my findings with you, the reader.

I’m grateful to the Union-Tribune for providing my scribblings a home and to my editors, all of whom supplied support and guidance. From Margaret King, who oversaw Brewery Rowe’s first drafts, to Pam Kragen, my current shepherd, they’ve managed to be both refreshing and sobering.