Brewed Beverage of Choice: A Stange of Kolsch
It began innocently one morning. My mind was aroused whilst reading Thomme Arthur’s latest blog entry. Well, Thomme got the idea from another beer blog, Appellationbeer.com. The premise of the entry was if you could invite four people to dinner, who would invite and what beers would you serve. My mind was famished and began to devour this topic as I rode the train to work and continued while I mashed in.
So, who would I invite? And even more difficult, what beers would I serve them? Of course because my mind is devious it took the question in a different direction because to me the meal is not as important as the beer, the company, and the banter. So I thought of where I would like to enjoy the brew with the said invitees. To be honest, if we were to meet for dinner, it would be at Lakefront Brewery for a good ole fashioned Friday Fish Fry.
My mind ate like a horse for a few hours trying to decide on who, where, and what. The first invitee was easy and obvious: Confucius in the hallowed halls of Westmalle Monastary with a dubbel. The next invitee would be Carl Sandburg at the Map Room in Chicago, Illinois, enjoying a Two Brothers French Country Ale. Obviously Kerouac would be invited. I would like to hang out with Jack in San Francisco while listening to Charlie Parker records sipping a Brother Thelonious. The final invitee is not so obvious. I would like to parade the streets of Dusseldorf hopping from pub to pub drinking the finest and freshest Alts with Daniel Hoan, the former Socialist mayor of Milwaukee. But one person kept popping into my head, my grandfather, Rudolph William “Big Bill” Rittmann.
The other day a friend (am I taking liberties?) and I were discussing our grandparents. Both she and I grew up with only two grandparents. She grew up with one grandfather and one grandmother. I, on the other hand, grew up not having known either of my grandfathers. Oh, I had surrogate grandfathers like our neighbour, Joe Krueger, and Michael Kelley. The latter actually insisted I call him Grandpa.
It is hard to explain but I have always felt a connection with Big Bill despite never actually having met him. I guess there is just comfort in that feeling. It gives me a tie to history. It gives me a solid base. Far too many people take their grandparents and their history for granted which is a shame because it gives us an anchor.
So my dream dinner would be with my grandfather. I would have him over for brats cooked on the grill, in our hands a glass of one of my favourite creations, Kolsch. We would sit on the porch in rocking chairs watching the day go by. I think I will invite Grandpa Kelley too so I can watch the Kraut and the Mick go at it. Plus imagine all the good stories. I may just need to finish the night off with some 2006 Brew4K Weizenbock.
Prost!
the confucian brewer