Brewed Beverage of Choice: A Pint of Buffalo Bill’s Pumpkin Beer
With the new look on a site all my own, I can finally do what many of my friends have been requesting for many a month. The requests were of a wide variety but all centre around one key fermented beverage: BEER.
As a brewer and self professed beer geek I am often asked what my favourite beer is, or asked to give recommendations based on a drinker’s specific pallette, or asked to define the difference between this style and that style. My excitement then takes over and the inquirer, frightened by the excessive amount of foam frothing around my mouth, runs for the hills screaming, “The brewer is mad! The brewer is mad! Run for your life!”
So what am I trying to accomplish with BrewU? After all, there are numerous places on the internet and in print where one can find all the beer and brewing information they would ever need. As an historian, a brewer, a Confucian, and over all student of life, I hope to bring a unique perspective on beer that can be an aide to the everyday folk that read Brewed Musings. Anyone can simple re-produce a flavour profile of a particular style of beer rating point for point what the flavour should be, what the aroma should be, etc. But how does that benefit the drinker?
What I will try to do is bring in some interesting historical notes, personal anecdotes from my days spent brewing, and what I look for in a particular beer, along with the flavour profiles and commercial renditions of particular styles. I wil NOT rate specific beers. My personal pallette is quite different than any of yours. Plus, I open myself up to a vast amount of criticism my frail ego cannot handle. The fun of this is to do the research and studying on your own. Therefore my rating may lead one of you away from the best tasting beer of their lives. Anyway, a five star rated Flemish sour ale would only be useful to Flemish sour ale enthusiasts.
Another function of BrewU is that you can email me at confucianbrewer@confucianbrewer.com with your personal recommendations (there are geographical regions of the U.S. I have yet to hit,) suggestion of topics for me to touch on, or your own personal beer related anecdotes. For me, beer and pubs are the essence of community - one that brings together people of a variety of backgrounds and beliefs under one big roof. I want to share my passion as well as surf the similar passions of others. So we start a new era in Brewed Musings next week with one of my favourite beer styles both to create and consume (especially in the fall): Altbier.
Prost!
the confucian brewer