Pumpkins belong to the family of Cucurbitaceae. They are classified to Cucurbita pepo, Cucurbita moschata, Cucurbita maxima and Cucurbita mixta, according to the texture and shape of their stems. Pumpkin is poor in taste and carbohydrates but high in vitamins, especially, provitamin A, antioxidants and minerals, and it is mixed with nutmeg, cinnamon and allspice to improve of its sensory properties. Pumpkin is a vegetable, which is healthy and functional, being rich in phenolic compounds, flavonoids and vitamins, and has a low energy. Pineapple (Ananas comosus L.) belongs to the family Bromeliaceae and is one of the most important commercial
Fancy Pants Sunday: Finnriver Pommeau For Peaks and Pints, nothing beats the gorgeous evocation of apples in a glass of delicious Pommeau on a crisp fall day. Finnriver Farm & Cidery’s Pommeau apple wine goes through all of the stages of apple metamorphosis: it begins as apple juice, which the Chimacum, Washington cidery ferments into an apple wine. They then fortify this wine with their 100 proof apple brandy (distilled from their cider made with organic Pacific Northwest apples and aged two months in American oak). The autumn apple harvest comes in and the must, or fresh unfermented juice, is
Sours get their trademark tartness and sourness from bacteria and wild yeasts — Lactobacillus, Acetobacter, Brettanomyces and other critters — which you wouldn’t find in other styles of beer. Each type of bacteria gives its own trademark flavor and aroma: Lactobacillus has a yogurt tang, Acetobacter has the sourness of vinegar, and Brettanomyces has a barnyard, earthy, or farmhouse aroma. For some of the sour styles, the wild bacteria and yeast come into the beer during an open or spontaneous fermentation, with open vats of wort exposed to the natural air. Other sour styles don’t use open fermentation, but they
Something wonderful has happened with Michigan beer. A gradual loosening of brewing laws has caused the craft beer industry to take off throughout the state. In just a few decades, Michigan now has 330 craft breweries, ranked fourth in the nation, with more opening all the time. In fact, you could argue that, in the last five years, the profile of Michigan craft beer has risen such that, nationally, many regard this as one of the top 10 beer states. From long-timers like Bell’s to award-winning breweries such as Jolly Pumpkin and Founders, brewing has reached a critical mass and
Peaks and Pints Six Pack 9.14.18: Tacoma Teacher Strike Ends You and 2,021 of your fellow Tacoma teachers voted to approve the new contact today. You’re headed back to the classroom Monday. Stop by Peaks and Pints tonight and grab these six craft beers out of our cooler before you go on a cooking and baking spree this weekend. You know that home-cooked meals won’t be a reality again until late June 2019. CAPTAIN OF THE COAST, Pelican Brewing: Captain Of The Coast is back on watch after time spent in Dry Fly Wheat Whiskey Barrels. Pelican’s award-winning MacPelican’s Wee
On sprawling farms clustered around Yakima and Willamette valleys, thousands of green Humulus lupulus vines snake vigorously skyward. A relative of marijuana, these hop plants produce resiny, cone-shaped flowers prized for their use as a bittering agent in beer. October is the traditional time for end-of-the-season harvesting and hops are no exception. That’s good news for beer lovers, as many breweries take advantage of the numerous Pacific Northwest hop farms, creating beers flavored by hops sourced 3-5 hours from the kettle boil. These beers typically have an aroma akin to that of a freshly-mowed lawn and the resinous and deep
MORNING FOAM FOR THURSDAY, SEPT. 13 2018: A seven-taster flight of craft beer news, from the fluffy head all the way to all the sink holes. … With the North Cascades right at their back door, it’s quite fitting that the newest line of IPAs released by the Kulshan Brewing Company be named the Cascade Peaks IPA Series. The most popular beers in the world aren’t necessarily the ones most Americans would expect. Globally, the beer industry sold $661 billion worth of beer in 2017. While craft beer is on the rise, it makes up just a tiny percentage of
Milk stouts originated in Europe in the 1800s. The style emphasizes a malty sweetness with hints of chocolate and caramel. They are sometimes called cream stouts or sweet stouts. Brewers intensified the dark, chocolaty malt body with lactose, the sugar in cow’s milk, hence why they’re more often called milk stouts. Brewer’s yeast can’t ferment lactose into alcohol, so it hangs around to give you a rich mouthfeel and a soft, creamy sweetness, balancing out the bitter and roasted qualities typical of its cousin stouts. Makes sense. Heating milk to very high temperatures, which also has the effect of caramelizing
Peaks and Pints Six Pack 9.12.18: Mid-week beer treats If you you’re willing to hike in a six-pack of craft beer, by all means, stuff them in your pack before you leave, and when you get to camp, bury them in a creek or a snowbank for a few minutes and cool them down (but make sure they don’t float downstream). And be sure to take your empties with you when you leave. AUTUMN HARVEST, Reuben’s Brews: The hard truth is that pumpkin alone doesn’t taste like much when fermented into beer. Rather, the flavors we think of as “pumpkin”
Peaks and Pints Policy 324: Don’t Give Wildlife Craft Beer Although it’s tempting to give cute squirrels, marmots and pikas a sip of your Wild Ride Brewing Nut Crusher Peanut Butter Porter, you shouldn’t serve the animals. Your generosity causes animals to abandon their natural liquid sources and become dependent on craft beer from hikers; when the hiking season ends, the animals will be strung out. In addition, do you really need squirrels pestering you while you sip this liquid chocolate truffle treat with a strong nuttiness. It goes without saying a serene sunset behind The Enchantments isn’t as special
Summer is in its twilight stage. It starts off gradual, the shifting of sunlight throughout Peaks and Pints’ wall of windows, until one day we realize we have to close the retractable windows. Summer days, as we’re aware, began growing shorter after the solstice on June 21. As June went to July, we barely noticed the sun coming up a bit later and going down earlier. To know that we’ve actually lost about an hour of daylight seems impossible, but there’s no ignoring that the sun is gone by eight p.m. and not up until almost seven a.m. There are
In 2010 — with his Siebel Institute education, training in Germany and Belgium, and degree from Yale tucked under his arm — Ben Edmunds opened Breakside Brewery in the quiet Woodlawn neighborhood of Northeast Portland as a restaurant and nano-sized brewery. Breakside expanded to a 3.5-barrel brewhouse while winning their first medal at the Great American Beer Festival in 2011 where they have earned medals each year since. In late 2013 the brewery expanded operations to Milwaukie, Oregon with a 30-barrel production brewery. In 2014 Breakside was awarded with the highly coveted Gold Medal for American-style IPA at the Great
This year’s celebration of taking apples and pears and making them alcoholic and drinkable is still called “Washington Cider Week,” but for the fruit-flavored purposes of this sprawling festival, “week” has been redefined to encompass 11 days, with a variety of events across the state. The Northwest Cider Association’s eighth annual Washington Cider Week kicked off Sept. 6 with 70-plus events in the state through Sept. 16. Visit washingtonciderweek.org to stay updated on the full list of locations and events. In celebration, Peaks and Pints presents an all-day flight of Washington state cider that we call Peaks and Pints Monday Cider
Peaks and Pints Six Pack 9.9.18: Bobtoberfest, Kaiser Wilhelm II and Juicy Goodness Fall is probably your favorite season. Just a lucky guess. It’s also the most prolific time of the year for seasonal beer releases whether you like them all or not. But a true beer lover will find plenty to enjoy, including the following six beers in Peaks and Pints’ cooler. BOBTOBERFEST, Heater Allen Brewing: This beer is named for owner Rick Allen’s late brother, Bob, the person who sparked his interest in brewing lager beers in general and Oktoberfest beers in particular. Bobtoberfest is bright amber in
Fancy Pants Sunday: Avery Raspberry Truffale It’s a confounding moment in craft beer. The industry is still growing rapidly — 7,000 breweries operating in the United States — and the race is on for differentiation. The problem is that some craft beers have become side shows, such as pastry stouts, or dessert stouts — an excuse to dazzle, titillate or even revolt on social media; look at brewer wearing a funny chef hat with chocolate all over his face! Some brewers talk of processes and of pitfalls of using certain ingredients and wonder at times whether pastry stouts are akin
While it may not be autumn quite yet, fall craft beer is already hitting the shelves. (If we had a dollar for every person that told us that the real Oktoberfest actually takes place in September in Germany, we’d have a pile of cash higher than a German Alp. We get it; you’ve been to Europe, Griswold.) We would also use that cash to hang onto summer, which means drinking all the radlers. Radlers — also known as shandies — were invented by a Bavarian innkeeper in 1922, who found himself confronted by hordes of thirsty cyclists looking for some
Autumn craft beer doesn’t have to be all about pumpkin pie in a bottle, though Peaks and Pints stands behind many pumpkin beers. Not everyone likes pumpkin beer and the spiced lattes, but you don’t have to slam it. You have to give everyone credit that at least this is seasonal and not being served in the middle of June. And as long as you find a pumpkin beer that is the right balance of cinnamon, nutmeg, and clove with a good malt backbone, why not try it? For those who simply can’t do the pumpkin spice thing, autumn is
Wow, seems like just yesterday Three Magnets Brewing Co. was a newborn brewery, entering our lives. There may be some newer kids on the scene, but Three Magnets still remains one of the best. Evergreen State College alumni Nathan and Sara Reilly, who had been running Darby’s Cafe for nearly a decade in downtown Olympia, opened neighboring Three Magnets in November 2014. They hit the lottery when they hired head brewer and “Local Sourcing Liaison” Pat Jansen, who also hit the lottery with assistant brewer Jeff Stokes. Together, they brewed a wide range of award-winning craft beers. Jansen moved on
MORNING FOAM FOR THURSDAY, SEPT. 6 2018: A seven-taster flight of craft beer news, from the fluffy head all the way to the Cavity Creeps fearing cat. … Every year as summer fades into fall, a new crop of beers starts to pop up in American taprooms. Fresh hop and wet hop beers now regularly sit alongside the dry hopped (and, more recently, double dry hopped) IPAs released by innovative brewers. Servers often encourage you to taste the fresh and dry hop beers as soon as you can because they come but once a year and expire quickly. Why should
After working for a company building farms in developing countries and then earning a master’s degree in environmental policy, Brian Dunn was flying to interview with an agribusiness company when he decided to scrap those plans and open a brewery instead. He grabbed a loan from the city of Denver to open up in what was then a desolate Ballpark neighborhood, and he would begin brewing at 3 a.m. before heading out to peddle his new product to local liquor stores and bars. The year was 1994. The product was Great Divide Brewing Co. That one-man operation grew as American
German beer purity law be-damned, modern brewers can’t be confined by the basic four ingredients of beer: water, barley, hops and yeast. Today’s brewers are visionaries, creative thinkers who want to put weird stuff in their beer and see what happens. We’re not just talking about cocoa nibs and jalapeno peppers here, people. We’re talking about salt, oysters, mango coffee, frozen Hawaiian pizza and money. Yes, paper currency. Peaks and Pints pours five craft beers with off the wall ingredients for our flight today, which we call Craft Beer Crosscut 9.5.18: A Flight of Off The Wall Ingredients. Ninkasi Whiteaker
Peaks and Pints Six Pack 9.4.18: Tastes Like Autumn The leaves are falling. You’ve got a sweater on. Wait … not true. Yet, you can reach for you favorite fall liquid in Peaks and Pints’ cooler. Go with it. … HOLLOW JACK, 2 Towns Ciderhouse: Hollow Jack kicks pumpkin-spiced lattes back into the patch. Made from A brew of fresh-pressed apples, caramelized pumpkin and sweet potatoes, it’s basically fall in a glass. The pumpkin flavor isn’t overwhelming, which is enjoyable and not too sweet. 6.4%, 16.9oz NICE & NAUGHTY, 2 Towns Ciderhouse: Nice & Naughty spiced apple cider is Christmas
On this date in history, 1962, the Beatles, with their new drummer Ringo Starr, went into EMI’s Abbey Road studios in north London to record their first single. The A-side was Love Me Do, one of the least original in John Lennon and Paul McCartney’s burgeoning songbook. Through it ran a harmonica riff played by Lennon and shamelessly cribbed from Bruce Channel’s recent hit, Hey Baby. The lyrics were rudimentary: “Love, love me do … you know I love you … I’ll always be true.” No one then recognized a sound with power to change the world. In honor of
It’s Monday, which means Peaks and Pints celebrates the taking of apples and pears and making them alcoholic and drinkable via a cider flight. Today, we focus on Portland, Oregon. While Portland is known for having more breweries than any other city in the world, amazing wines from the nearby Willamette Valley and a host of craft distilleries, the latest beverage trend in town is definitely hard cider. Sure, the city has a penchant for drinking, but maybe also because of Portland’s proximity to some of the world’s best apples that it’s quickly become the place to go for the country’s
Fancy Pants Sunday: Evil Twin Maple Bourbon Barrel-Aged Imperial Mexican Biscotti Toasted Coconut Cake Break Jeppe Jarnit-Bjergsø contract brewed at Westbrook Brewing in South Carolina before moving his Evil Twin Brewing to New York City. As he brewed his Biscotti Break imperial stout with vanilla, almond and coffee he drank Westbrook’s Mexican Cake imperial stout with cocoa nibs, vanilla beans, cinnamon sticks, and fresh habanero peppers. Then one day Biscotti Break met Mexican Cake and they knew it was much more than a hunch. Soon they became the Imperial Mexican Biscotti Cake Break, an imperial stout brewed with coffee, cinnamon,
There are more than 120 different hop varieties used today. To be a true hop fan, the appeal of hops has to be more than just bitterness. Hops offer a range of flavors and aromas that resemble herbs, pine, tropical fruits like grapefruit and tangerine and more. How can you distinguish one hop from another? Hop aroma and flavor can be subtle. And year to year, growing conditions can also affect hop aroma and flavor within a variety. With the arrival of Firestone Walker’s C-Hops Pale Ale on our Western red cedar tap log, we thought it appropriate to offer
Peaks and Pints Six Pack 9.1.18: Labor Day Weekend Craft Beer Celebrated the first Monday of every September, Labor Day honors America’s workers and their many contributions to our nation’s strength, prosperity and well-being. That said, it’s also a great time for friends, family, cookouts and BEER all weekend. Peaks and Pints has a six-pack waiting for you. … BELLWETHER AGED DOUBLE WIT, Breakside Brewery: Imperial wit aged in gin barrels with lime leaves that hits the nose with funky, woody and orange aroma. It’s sour, in a pleasantly puckering sort of way, which is immediately followed by a sugary,
The party began in October 1810, when a great horse race was organized to celebrate the marriage of Crown Prince Ludwig and Princess Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen. Everyone had so much fun that it was held again, and eventually became an annual event, dubbed “Oktoberfest” in 1872. It has since evolved into a 16-day Munich blowout in late September and early October. Oh, to be in that great mass of humanity, dancing to the throbbing polka beats, scarfing down sausage, kraut, and strudel, and most of all, imbibing from the holy grail … er, stein. … You see before refrigeration, fermentation
Son of Fresh Hoptoberfest — Thirty more days of fresh hops and Oktoberfest beers Last September, Peaks and Pints released The Hunt For Fresh Hoptoberfest on the masses, a month-long autumn beer party marrying up two popular seasonal beers — fresh hops and Oktoberfest. Women dressed in lederhosen. Men got fresh … hop beers. Hop farmers and malters began living together — mass hysteria! Meet Son of Fresh Hoptoberfest. That’s right. Peaks and Pints presents a sequel. Son of Fresh Hoptoberfest is not only a worthy successor to the first fresh hop-Oktoberfest mash-up, but even better as we won’t force
Peaks and Pints co-owner Ron Swarner, left, and North End Social Club owner Justin Caillier smell the new Aroma of Tacoma. Photo credit: Asa Bender Three Magnets Brewing cans new Aroma of Tacoma Breathe in, Tacoma. Do you smell that? “It smells an awful lot like happiness,” said Justin Caillier as he dipped his nose into the pile of Nelson Sauvin hops. “It should smell like strong tropical fruit and crushed grapes that mingle with citrus like tangerine and grapefruit,” replied Three Magnets Brewing Head Brewer Jeff Stokes as he checked the vitals of what would
Collaborations between breweries aren’t exactly new, but their results have become a much more common sight in Peaks and Pints’ cooler lately. Collaborations can give brewers a chance to exchange ideas with others and mix their individual house styles. The best collaborations often result in something unique that neither brewery would normally make on its own. Typically, whoever owns the collaboration brewing system and sells the beer sets the rules. Also, when professional brewers collaborate with other professional brewers, the conversations lean toward technical details. When professional brewers collaborate with civilians, the brewing room chatter tends to be more about
Peaks and Pints Six Pack 8.30.18: Beer Firm of Whipper, Oatis and Futz Here are six beer suggestions from the Peaks and Pints cooler. … 30 YEAR WHIPPER, Urban Family Brewing: In rock climbing, a whipper is an especially hard or dynamic fall where the rope is weighed by a significant load. Vertical World — America’s First Climbing Gym and Urban Family’s neighbor — opened a little more than 30 years ago. By some sort of mathematical equation, 30 Year Whipper, a collaboration with Vertical World, is an oak fermented sour ale with raspberries and cherries. 5.4%, 500ml HOPPORTUNITY KNOCKS
Like “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” at Forever 21 and candy corn at 7-Eleven, pumpkin beer arrives earlier and earlier every year. Before the leaves turn yellow and it’s time to start wearing grey socks with Birkenstocks again, many of the most sought-after brands’ pumpkin beers will be long gone. That means restaurants and bars that don’t have a place to store extra kegs for a month or two are out of luck if they want to serve this seasonal specialty in the proper season. That makes the beer industry surprisingly similar to fashion: When you’re still wearing your
Peaks and Pints Six Pack 8.29.18: Potpourri of Craft Beer When you can’t turn on the nightly news without hearing yourself utter, “What fresh hell is this?” it just may be time to go back to the basics and find some common ground on which we can all agree. It’s time to construct a six-pack and get the hell outta Dodge. Here are six craft beer options resting in Peaks and Pints cooler. … IMPERIAL PUMPKIN PORTER, Alaskan Brewing: Good grief. The nose is pumpkin and heavy pie allspice with caramel, roast, brown sugar, dark caramel, doughy yeast and hints
Interestingly, Cascade was a hybrid hop that sat dormant on the shelf for a while. Cascade originated from an open seed collection in 1956 including an English Fuggle, a Russian Serebrianker hop and an unknown male. Named for the Cascade Mountain Range, Cascade hops were released to the public in 1972. Flavors of pine, citrus, and floral undertones give these beers their life and personality. And a moderate alpha level (think bitterness) lends them their versatility as both aroma and bittering hop. In addition to its appealing flavor qualities, Cascade has a resistance to downy mildew, the single most devastating
Interstate 5 is the main highway of America’s West Coast, running parallel to the Pacific Ocean and U.S. Route 99, from Mexico to Canada. The major states I-5 goes through include California, Oregon and Washington. It runs through some pretty cool cities too: Seattle, Portland, Sacramento, Los Angeles and San Diego. It also happens to be the only continuous Interstate highway to touch the borders of both Canada and Mexico. Sprinkled along the I-5 corridor are some of America’s craft breweries. Peaks and Pints picked five to include in our beer flight today, Craft Beer Crosscut 8.28.18: A Flight of
Peaks and Pints Six-Pack 8.27.18: Mainstream Pop Song, Blueberry Dojo and more The kids are weeping, the nights are getting cooler, and there are moments here and there when it just plain feels like autumn. That’s right: Summer is almost over, and aside from a lot of binge-watching various Netflix series in front of the A/C unit, you just don’t have much to show for it. But it’s not too late: Get you butt to Peaks and Pints, load up your cooler with these six treasures and getaway! BLUEBERRY DOJO, Aslan Brewing: Zen out with this saison style ale brewed
It’s National Whiskey Sour Day. You know how to celebrate — with a craft beer flight at Peaks and Pints. There are craft beers, there are cocktails, and there are craft beer cocktails. Then, there are also beers that taste like cocktails. When beer is your job, you don’t necessarily want to go home and drink more beer. So it’s no shocker that on his or her down time, brewers like a stiff cocktail — which has led to craft beers that taste like cocktails; what a vicious, delicious cycle this is. The base is beer (usually, but not always,
Originally thought to have been first sighted in London, the first known mention of Indian PaleAle was in an advertisement in an Australian newspaper in 1829. The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser ran an ad that mentions “East India pale ale.” The ad didn’t mention what brewery the beer was coming from. That London rumor comes because of the beer export business that was going on in England in the early 1800s. Hops were reportedly added to the beer so that it was able to make the journey to India and still be worth drinking when it arrived.
The Palisade, named for an American hop variety that is related to the German Tettnanger, is a proprietary hop owned by Yakima Chief. It is an extremely vigorous hop, unlike Tettnanger, with rather high yields. When harvested early in the season, Palisade has a gentle, pleasant aroma that blends well with beers having a delicate flavor profile, but when harvested later Palisade becomes rather aggressive and pungent. On average, Palisade shows a range of tropical fruit aromatics and is sometimes reminiscent of mango, with notes of apricot and freshly cut grass. Today, Peaks and Pints feature Palisade hops in our
Scoured out of the earth by the Vashon Glacier 13,500 years ago, Seattle’s Interbay neighborhood was a marshy area between what would come to be called Salmon Bay and Smith’s Cove. Native Americans of the Shilshole tribe made their permanent home on the north side of Salmon Bay, a salt water extension of Puget Sound. The settlement consisted of cedar long houses that sheltered several dozen people during winters. Summers, the family groups scattered and camped along the shores and in the uplands fishing and hunting. The Interbay area was a rich source of shellfish and waterfowl. Today, a transcontinental
TACOMA PREFUNK MONDAY AUGUST 20 2018: Fort George 3-Way IPA and Han Solo PREFUNK: Astoria’s Fort George Brewery has brewed 3-Way IPA since 2013, featuring two different craft brewery collaborators every year. This year, Holy Mountain Brewing Co. and Modern Times Beer shared ideas and techniques with Chris Nemlowill of Fort George Brewery, and after 6.66 people brewed six batches, presto(!) — the final 2018 Fort George 3-Way IPA landed in early June. And it keeps landing. Fort George has continued to brew the hazy IPA with lots of herbal and dank hop notes, green onion, chives and some light
In common American usage, raw apple juice that has not been filtered to remove pulp or sediment is referred to as “fresh cider” or “sweet cider.” The term “apple juice” indicates the juice has been filtered to remove solids. Fermented apple juice is called “hard cider.” In Europe, all non-fermented apple juice is referred to as “juice,” and fermented apple juice is referred to as “cider.” Worldwide, cider varies in alcohol content from less than 3 percent alcohol by volume (ABV) as found in French cidre doux, to 8.5 percent ABV or above in traditional English ciders. New tax legislation passed
“I Survived The Drive to Broken Top Tailhead.” That’s my brilliant T-shirt idea after hiking the Broken Top Trail yesterday. The T-shirt design doesn’t focus on the beautiful 360-degree view at the top nor the pristine No Name Lake that nestles against the mountain’s eastern slope. Nope. The 4-mile road to the trailhead requires a high-clearance four-wheel drive capable of slogging through some deep ruts and steep pitches. My head smashed into my Jeep numerous times. Food decorated the floor mats. The rough access and short seasonal window of opportunity makes this the to Broken Top Crater all the more
