Brewing for Special Occasions

Toasting a special occasion with an adult beverage of your choice is a time-honored tradition. Homebrewers, of course, have the advantage of toasting their special events with really special beverages — homemade ones.

But some homebrewers take it to the next level, creating special versions of their favorite homebrews expressly for an important celebration. What better way to breathe life into a party? If the brew tastes good, your skeptical guests will be amazed. It gives everyone something to talk about and something to smile about.

And if you really want to impress your guests, take the time to make a commemorative label. That’s the icing on the cake and provides an instant memento of the occasion.

4 Tips For A Successful Celebration Brew

1. Pick an approachable recipe: This may rankle the sense of adventuresome beer selection that you have finely honed during your years as a homebrewer. But with that caveat, consider your audience.

If you’re brewing for any party attended by a complement of regular folk, consider making them regular beer. That does not mean American light pilsner. Sure, make it tasty, malty, and even a bit hoppy. But if your favorite homebrew is orange-coriander-raspberry-banana-oregano-hemp-chocolate weizen, you might want to consider an alternate recipe.

Consider the ramifications of serving a beer that’s above and beyond the crude tastebuds of those mere mortals who do not practice the brewer’s art. At best they will really love it and praise you as a god — that’s actually happened on at least one occasion. But if you brew them a concoction that makes them flee at top speed from fear, you have not done your guests of honor, yourself, or your hobby any favors. So remember the KISS rule. Keep It Simple!

2. Consider kegging: If you are planning to supply the beer for the party — not just brew souvenirs, it’s easier to deal with double- and triple-size batches if you have made the jump to kegging your own. However, if your aim is to enhance the existing commercial selection of beers on hand, then bottling is appropriate. Of course bottling is de rigueur if you plan to make a commemorative label.

3. Make a commemorative label: Labeling your homebrew is great fun. It’s especially fun for special occasions, when you can decorate a brew with photos and dates appropriate to the occasion.

Beer labels are made in nearly every computer platform available. But do not be discouraged if you are not a computer head. Make one nice label by hand, pasting in photos and other graphics, then have photocopies made for the commemorative brew.

You can use milk for a label adhesive if your bottles are going to stay dry at the party. Just dip the label in some milk, position it on a dry, room-temperature bottle, and smooth it down. After a few hours it will be stuck fast. However, if you plan to immerse your bottles in ice at the celebration, the water will remove the milk-glue labels. For wet environments you should use rubber cement, mounting spray, or some other glue that’s not water soluble.

Also consider the type of printer and inks you use for labels if you plan to ice the bottles down.

You don’t have to stop at labels. Beer mats are also easy to make with a simple computer program or by hand. You can also create small cards that describe the beer in terms of style and flavor as a fun way to educate your guests about what they will be drinking.

4. Plan the Presentation: Don’t put bottles of beer in front of people unless you expect them to drink it. Read on.

Hot Wort

Walt Lewis of Huntington, W. Va., made a batch of beer for Father’s Day. It almost never made it to the bottle because while it was fermenting, his house caught fire!

“It was 4th of July and I had taken the kids to an arts-and-crafts fair about three hours from home. During the fair, I heard my name called on the PA system. When I went to investigate, the front office told me to call my neighbor, John Van Horn. I asked if there was a pay phone nearby. They said ‘call from here,’ not caring that it was long distance. I figured someone was dead!

“I got John’s wife, Cathy, on the line. She told me not to panic, but my house was on fire. I remember her saying, ‘The firemen are here. It’s under control, so don’t drive home like a maniac!’

“Some wiring had shorted out in the kitchen ceiling. The fire started there and crept across the kitchen, unsoldering pipes along the way. That  contributed to the water damage. By the time I got home, the firemen had come and gone and neighbor John had been working like a dog getting the water out of my house and cleaning up. The damage was bad, but the good news is that nobody was hurt and we did not lose a single important or sentimental possession. Not one!”

Including the fermenting beer. Lewis was able to finish the ferment. “It started out Father’s Day Pale Ale. After the fire we started calling it House Fire, Fire Brewed, True Smoked Beer — lots of puns, but we weren’t really serious about naming it.” Drinking it was higher on the agenda. But now they have a jump on naming the beer brewed for the fire’s anniversary.

 

 

Do You Want a Beer? I Do.

A wedding and a special homebrew is a match made in heaven (even if the bride and groom are not). Sure, you’ll be under some pressure to perform, but hey, no one will expect your beer to last nearly as long as the marriage.

If by some stroke of bad luck it turns out to be the worst beer ever made in the history of the world, you can always scrap the plans at the last minute and roll in some barrels of commercial stuff.

And if it’s good, prepare to really wow ’em.

“You made this beer? You’re a god,” was the comment from one guest, a college pal of the bride and groom at the wedding of Kate McDougall and Trevor Jones. Kate is the daughter of homebrewer John McDougall of Rochester, Minn. “That was the best quote I recall,” says John, who was inspired to brew for Kate’s special day by his other daughter.

“She went to a wedding where they served bad mead and challenged me to make some decent brew for Kate. I considered mead, since I also keep bees and they make lots of honey. But in the end I decided to do a ‘Caledonian Lager’ in honor of our heritage. The groom wore a kilt, by the way, and a piper from MacAlister College played for the ceremony,” he says.

Kate’s day was a beautiful sunny one in June. McDougall made 10 gallons of beer, enhancing a selection including commercial beer, private label cabernet sauvignon, and California chardonnay. “My beer was gone long before the other stuff. I wish I had made more. Even the wine drinkers were repeat samplers. It was an unqualified success and it sure made old Dad feel good,” McDougall recalls.

“The groom, too, loved the beer. We approve mightily of him!” he says.

 

Wedding Wheat

Ron Wrucke of Middletown, N.J., brewed up a batch of wheat beer for the wedding of his youngest daughter, Stacy.

“The wedding was, from my perspective, a monster. Big, lots of invitations, young partying crowd. Of course we invited some old people, but the partying adjective still applied,” says Wrucke.

He made a batch of American Wheat. “I wanted something fairly light — dark brews seem to intimidate the ‘Silver Bullet’ crowd — yet a little different than the norm. I used regular ale yeast for a regular beer taste without cloves or bananas. I also kept the bittering level pretty low, in the mid-20s. To me it was a little bland, but it was a good choice considering the target audience.”

To ensure it was well conditioned in time for the wedding, Wrucke allowed eight weeks in the bottle. “It was pretty clear, for a wheat, and poured up with a nice head. In retrospect it was an excellent brew,” he says.

Wrucke learned an important lesson in special-event brewing: Don’t put beer in front of people unless you want them to drink it. Afraid the beer would be less than a hit, he envisioned having stacks of it left over after the wedding. He tried

to give away the first round as party favors at the Friday night groom’s dinner. His plan was for folks to take it home, chill it, and enjoy it at their convenience.

“I stood up to tell them about homebrew, how to pour it to avoid sediment, use a glass, don’t pour it all.

“Next thing I know, someone pulled out a Swiss army knife, popped the top, and took a big swig from the bottle. He pronounced ‘Hey, this is great stuff,’” Wrucke laughs. With that went his well-laid party-favor plans. “I don’t think any of those bottles left the restaurant with their tops on. And the brew wasn’t even cold!”

Wrucke served the rest of the beer — properly chilled — at the post-reception party, held in a hotel room. “They must have liked it because by the end of the night, it was all gone,” he says.

On Sunday Wrucke and his wife got their first chance to relax. “There was one beer left, in my kitchen fridge. I made motions toward it and my wife said, ‘Don’t you dare drink that. I’m saving it.’ It’s still sitting in the fridge. One of these days I’m going to drink it, fill the bottle with water, and recap it!” Wrucke says.

 

 

Beer College

Father and son brewers Bill and Bryan Raughley of Fairfax County, Va., brewed a batch of ale when Bill’s second son, Chris, graduated from Virginia Tech.

“It was actually Dad’s idea, but I agreed immediately and we went to work,” Bryan says. They made a batch of their ESB but toned down the hops a bit. “We did this for Chris’ sake. He does not like hoppy beer. He’s more of a raspberry wheat kind of guy, so we tweaked our recipe to his liking.

“The cool thing about making beer for a special event is that it introduces the idea of homebrewing to people who may not have ever heard about it otherwise. Some of the people who tried Chris’ beer were amazed that beer could be made at home. People who never gave it any thought never realized how much effort goes in to even the average can of beer. And they liked it!”

Bryan says his brother enjoyed the whole experience. “Chris really appreciated that Dad and I took the time and effort to make him a batch of brew. A custom beer — sporting Chris’ mugshot on the bottles — really let him know that he was the center of attention for the day.”

 

 

Fish Tales

Bill Vannerson of McHenry, Ill., is not just a homebrewer but a lover of tropical fish.This past Memorial Day, Vannerson went to a tropical fish convention in St. Louis hosted by the AKA, the American Killifish Association.

“Killifish are colorful little fish that are rarely seen in pet stores. They are distributed among hobbyists by people who collect them in the wild, sometimes in remote jungles and savannas.

“Most collectors trade fish for fish. But when I wanted to get started with killifish, I had none to trade, so I made a deal to trade some fish for some homebrew, Bombay Billy’s India Pale Ale,” says Vannerson.

“The person with whom I had arranged the trade is from Syracuse. He ended up sharing my beer with other members of his local killifish club, the Upper New York Killifish Association (UNYKA). They were ecstatic!