Societe Brewing Company The Butcher

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Every Man's IPA, The Butcher, The Dandy, tiramisu

It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of Societe Brewing Company. Ever since I met Travis [Smith] and Doug [Constantiner] I knew they’d be making great beer. I’ve slowly sampled my way through all of their available beers (well, except for the new Every Man’s IPA they released this week that is). They have a handful of IPAs — five now by my count, and another four more non-IPAs, three of which are Belgian style beers. I enjoy all of their beers, though I certainly have my favorites (I’m looking at you The Dandy) but it was The Butcher that I had been wanting to try for a while now, but it had alluded me until recently.

It’s been on tap quite a bit, I’ve had a few chances to try it, but The Butcher is a roughly 10% ABV Imperial Stout that I just couldn’t bring myself to order when it’s close to 90 degrees outside. But thankfully it was on the menu, paired with dessert, at The Grill at The Lodge at Torrey Pines beer dinner with Societe Brewing Company and Rough Draft Brewing Company. Dinner took place outside, not far from the coast so by the time dessert rolled around some fog was in the air and the temperature had dropped below 80, making The Butcher more desirable.

The beer was paired with Tiramisu, which had been soaked in The Butcher to add some beer flavor. The pairing wasn’t perfect in my opinion (though no one was complaining, me included). The dessert was sweet, I didn’t really get much flavor from the beer in the Tiramisu, which contrasted pretty drastically with the deliciously roasty beer.

And how big and roasty it is. With all the roastiness it’s reminiscent of coffee and dark chocolate. It’s full and rich but it’s 10% ABV doesn’t show.

With weather like this I’m not sure when I’ll choose to enjoy The Butcher again, but come cooler weather The Butcher will be hard to beat. And while I haven’t heard that they have any specific plans, I imagine some day they’ll put some of The Butcher in some sort of old spirits barrels and it will only get better with age.

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Societe Brewing Co. Grand Opening – June 30th, 2012

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societe brewing co. grand opening, The Apprentice, The Dandy, The Harlot, The Pupil, The Widow

When Societe Brewing Co. opened last month with two beers on tap, The Harlot, a Belgian Pale Ale and The Apprentice, a Strong IPA they called it their soft opening. Since then they’re released a few more beers in their tasting room and kegs have started to get around town. At the end of the month, Saturday June 30th to be exact, they’ll be celebrating their Grand Opening at their Kearney Mesa brewery.

There will be two sessions of 150 people each. Tickets went on sale yesterday and the first session is already sold out. The $5 tickets include entry (no entry without a ticket, no tickets sold the day of) and your first beer. Subsequent beers will be available for purchase. There will be six beers on tap for the Grand Opening, three IPAs, two Belgians and one San Diego Gold. That last style has me curious.

I’ve had tastes of both The Harlot and The Apprentice, both of them are quality beers that I look forward to enjoying more of soon. Since they first opened Societe has released three more beers, The Pupil, a Citra and Nelson hopped IPA that I’ve heard many people compare to an Alpine IPA (let’s face it, Alpine is the gold standard when it comes to clean hop forward IPAs), The Widow, a Belgian Strong Ale and the so-new-I-haven’t-heard-anything-about-it (other than that it’s a 6.4% “San Diego IPA”) The Dandy.

With how fast tickets to the first session sold out I wouldn’t wait to buy tickets for the second session if you’re interested in going. Societe has said on Twitter that they may add a third session on another day if there is enough demand and the two Saturday sessions sell out.

Image: Societe Brewing Co.’s Instagram

News and Photos from the National Homebrewers Conference

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cheesesmith, Doug Constantiner, greg koch, julian brewpub, mitch steele, national homebrewers conference 2011 photos, nhc 2011 photos, peter zien, stone Cherry Chocolate Stout, Stone Japanese Green Tea IPA, tom nickel, travis smith, vince marsaglia

Photos by Chris Hammett
Last weekend’s National Homebrewers Conference brought nearly 2000 homebrewers, professional brewers and other beer lovers to San Diego. The conference included a Pro Brewer’s Night where around forty professional breweries were pouring their beers, Club Night where homebrew clubs from all around the country brought some of their best brews as well as plenty of seminars and panels with subjects ranging from homebrew techniques to topics on going pro and everything in between.

During those seminars a few bits of San Diego beer related news and info were announced.

Peter Zien of AleSmith spoke about cheese making and other food related hobbies. Zien is in the process of opening an artisianal cheese making company to be called CheeseSmith.

A bit more beer related news from Zien was that AleSmith is working on getting label approval for bottles of single origin coffee versions of Speedway Stout. Zien didn’t mention what single origin coffee’s they had in mind, or if this would include bottling the much loved, and previously very-limited draft only Kopi Luwak Speedway Stout, but one can hope.

Doug Constantiner, who is working with Travis Smith (both of whom formerly brewed at The Bruery) to start Societe Brewing Company here in San Diego revealed to NBC San Diego that Societe would be located in Kearney Mesa. No word on the exact location but it will be a nice stop between downtown and some of the breweries farther north. They hope to be open in early to mid 2012.

Tom Nickel of O’Brien’s Pub announced that he is working with Vince Marsaglia of Pizza Port to open a brewpub with BBQ food in Julian, CA. According to Taphunter the land in Julian has already been acquired and General’s American Pub, which Nickel was hoping to open in Scripps Ranch is no longer going to happen.

During his talk on collaborations, Greg Koch of Stone Brewing Co. mentioned a few things about their two upcoming collaborations that are in the fermenters now. He said that they’re currently working on getting fermentation restarted on Stone Cherry Chocolate Stout, this year’s AHA Rally Winner brewed at Stone by Mitch Steele, John Togner of Tröegs Brewing Co. and winning homebrewers Jason Fields and Kevin Sheppard. The yeast apparently didn’t like the addition of the cherries. No release date has been planned but Koch said it will be out “at somepoint in the not too distance future”.

He also mentioned that Stone Japanese Green Tea IPA, a collaboration between Stone’s Mitch Steele, Bryan Baird of founder of Numazu, Japan’s Baird Brewing and Toshi Ishii—former Stone brewer and now founder of Guam’s Ishii Brewing Company should be out in early-mid July.

Societe Brewing Co. – Doug Constantiner, The Anonymous Partner

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Doug Constantiner, douglas Constantiner, societe brewing company, travis smith

Last week Travis Smith left The La Jolla Brew House after only a few months on the job and announced that he would be starting a new brewery in San Diego with a partner that was currently anonymous.

Thanks to a commenter’s tip I’ve confirmed that Smith’s partner in Societe Brewing Co. is Doug Constantiner, who currently brews at The Bruery.

Look for more about Constantiner, Smith and Societe Brewing Company in the February issue of West Coaster.

Societe Brewing Company

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brewery rowe, brookston beer bulletin, claudette mannix, pariah ipa, travis smith

Yesterday I mentioned that Travis Smith has left La Jolla Brew House just a few months after he began brewing there with plans to open a new production brewery in San Diego with an as-of-now anonymous, but experienced brewer, partner. There’s been quite a bit of chatter about Smith, La Jolla Brew House and Societe Brewing Co. In addition to the blog post I put up yesterday, Brewery Rowe and Brookston Beer Bulletin both blogged about Smith.

The full story of happened between Smith and the La Jolla Brew House is unclear. According to Smith he left because the La Jolla Brew House did not honor his employment contract because they stopped buying brewing ingredients. Claudette Mannix owner of the La Jolla Brew House cited a conflict of interest with Smith opening his own brewery for the reason they parted ways. In addition to the above reasons given by each party I’ve heard a few more stories from reputable sources that lead me to believe it wasn’t a pretty break up. So La Jolla Brew House will be hiring a new brewer, they’re already accepting resumes, and Travis Smith is moving forward with Societe Brewing Company.

According to Smith, Societe is actively looking for equipment and space with hopes to start construction this summer and to be brewing in 2012.  Smith tells Brookston Beer Bulletin that they have the money to start, and are working on raising more capital. Smith tells me they’ll be brewing “sour beers and IPAs, but no sour IPAs.”

Smith knows a thing or two about both sour beers and IPAs, not only was Pariah IPA, one of the first beers he brewed at La Jolla Brew House fantastic, he has also spent time brewing at both Russian River Brewing Co. and The Bruery.

While Societe Brewing Company is still a long ways out, the prospect of another brewery in San Diego is promising.

Think you know who Smith’s currently anonymous partner in Societe Brewing Company is? Leave a comment below.

San Diego Craft Beer News from the Last Few Weeks

Posts were slow here over the past few weeks, it’s not that nothing happened in the world of craft beer, I just got busy with Christmas, New Year’s and everything else that comes along around this time of year. Below are a few tidbits and little beer related news items that did happen recently.

• Travis Smith became the brewmaster at the La Jolla Brew House just this past fall but as of last Friday he has left. Smith, formerly of The Bruery and Russian River Brewing Co. has plans to open a new production brewery and tasting room in San Diego. Societe Brewing Company is currently in the planning stages and hopes to be brewing by 2012. Smith is partnering with an experienced brewer who at this time is anonymous. A few of Smith’s beers and various guest beers are still on tap at the La Jolla Brew House while they look for a new brewer. I’ll post an update with any new news on La Jolla Brew House or Societe Brewing Company as I get more info.

• Good news for those of you in East County, Main Tap Tavern in El Cajon recently reopened their doors. Main Tap Tavern is one of the better craft beer bars in East County and they rather abruptly shut down a few months ago. Hopefully they have solved whatever problems caused them to close in September and can continue serving up craft beer.

• Most people didn’t know about a strange side effect in the California law preventing breweries from providing marketing help to retailers. Often referred to as “tied-house” laws, this is the reason that many breweries were unable to promote events at bars and restaurants when their beers were on tap. If you ever saw a post by a brewery on Facebook or Twitter with obscure information about a location you could find their beer, this law is what was to blame. I don’t have all the info on the changes to the law, but according to The Bruery’s Facebook Page, this law has been changed and they can now advertise various events going on outside of their own brewery tasting rooms and restaurants. Expect to see more info about special beer releases and beer dinners put out by the breweries. If I can find out more specifics on the law, and more details about what breweries can and cannot do I’ll post an update.