Blog
Baird Brewing Company – Seasonal Beers
Baird Brewing Company
Last year during our Beer Fest, we introduced two beers from Baird Brewing Company. The Wabi Sabi and the Angry Brown Ale on draft. We just received shipment of the Wabi Sabi and the Carpenters Mikan Ale in bottles. We only have a limited amount of them so come by before they’re sold out!
The Carpenters Mikan Ale
From Baird Brewing Company
This year (2016) marks the sixth annual release of The Carpenters Mikan Ale. As the name suggests, it is an ale made with fresh mikans (a tangerine-like Japanese fruit). We receive the mikans as a gift from the Heda orchard of our carpenter friend, partner and mentor Mitsuo Nagakura. It would not be an exaggeration to say that he is the complete embodiment of the dedicated, uncompromising and passionate Japanese craftsmen whom we so respect and whom we strive to emulate. The Carpenters Mikan Ale is our modest attempt to pay tribute to Nagakura-san as well as to all great Japanese craftsmen.
The 2006 Carpenters Mikan Ale is both piquantly tart and satiatingly sweet. Loads of freshly peeled and crushed mikans (70 Kg in this 500 liter batch) are added to the wort at the completion of boiling. The beer is dry-hopped in the conditioning tank with additions of the citrusy American hop Cascade. The beer has a fairly high original gravity (15.7 Plato) and thus sports a sneakingly potent alcohol punch (approximately 6.1% by volume).
Wabi Sabi
From Baird Brewing Company
Wabi-Sabi is a uniquely Japanese and hybrid version of the craft beer world’s two most popular styles: Pale Ale and IPA. Local Japanese wasabi and green tea are combined deftly with several varieties of herbal-character hops. The flavor is bold, yet underpinned by a ‘quiet simplicity and subdued refinement.’
In this beautifully nuanced, Japanese esthetic-influenced ale, we marry in the conditioning tank ample dosages of earthy-herbal dry hops (Hersbrucker, Styrian Golding, Santiam) with deft additions of whole leaf Shizuoka green tea.