1. Especially with my original intention to reach unaffiliated Jews, kosher was even less important. However, as comes up later, when the organized and religious Jewish communities embraced He’brew, it became a priority to make sure everyone had confidence in the certification, so they could in fact include The Chosen Beers in the “sacred rites and rituals” of their lives.
2. My grandmother mentioned she taught Rod Serling, which I never could confirm, though I’ll claim it, since I watched The Twilight Zone marathons religiously every year during my Thanksgiving trips to Los Angeles.
3. Mrs. Kubiak still likes to remind me of a conversation we had near the end of senior year, in which she asked me what I really wanted to be good at. She remembers me responding, “Partying.” Though plausible, and this may be a rationalization, I’m gonna say I likely meant being able to achieve maximum fun and extroverted, interconnected energy (not necessarily boozing), with a group of friends and strangers alike, specifically in an effort to seek truth and beauty… Not simply what I think she assumed was my goal, to merely drink as much as possible, whenever possible. I still like to imagine the moment she heard about the beer company, and thought to herself, “I knew it!” Win-win, I suppose.
4. Recently this bath has been renovated and looks almost fancy and cleaned-up, though at the time it was a very basic stone hut at the bottom of a long rocky path, with no one around but hundreds and hundreds of gravestones painted sky blue as a reference to the Zohar, the book of Jewish mysticism.
5. But best first-dance song EVER… was it on purpose, inside joke, I’m hoping at least a Jesus reference… but turned all our heads at the time: Stephen Stills’ “If you can’t be with the one you love, honey, love the one you’re with.”
6. See Chapter 18 for the one party after thirteen years who thought Genesis Ale was a problem: the pride of Rochester, Genesee Cream Ale.
7. How old are you, Reader? As a generous gift for my high school graduation, Cristi’s dad Mike gave me a top-of-the-line typewriter to take to Stanford. Not kidding. I guess this is my version of the old man crowing, “I remember when a beer cost a nickel and you got a pickled egg on the side for free.”
8. This isn’t even taking into consideration blends from the most recent years of truly connoisseur offerings, such as Geektoberfest, our barrel-aged collaboration with Captain Lawrence and Ithaca for 2010 New York Beer Week, in-house projects such as Vertical Jewbelation, or highly regarded blends from Russian River, Lost Abbey, Allagash, Firestone Walker and more.
9. As I finish this, after many years of threatening to do so, Ken finally sold Anderson Valley. Brewing Co. In a fitting twist, the manager that he’d brought on after his son left, Fal Allen (no relation), who would later be forced to become the heavy for my problems with Ken, looks to be heading back to Boonville to captain the brewery again. Mazel tov and good luck all around. Might be time for a “Big Payback” Collaboration project…
10. Brutal footnote to that specific moment came from Dana Ball, the Brooklyn rep who told me that after four years of us trying to get Genesis Ale into 2nd Avenue Deli, he’d fiiiinally one day discovered that the cleaning guy at a different account also knew the woman who controlled all buying for 2nd Ave. This cleaning guy led Dana to a small door that led to a tiny back office, with an older woman sitting among stacks of paperwork. Dana just had room enough to reach in with one lone bottle of He’brew. She took a quick look at it and said, “OK, send me five cases, and we’ll see how it goes.” Ecstatic, Dana went back to the office to place the order. Literally that week, Brooklyn had sold out of inventory and would get no more. By the time I got back to New York that summer, the Deli was not taking in any new products. Within a couple years it would close the doors of the famed East Village location.
11. My first mistake was to assume the reps would know who was Jewish and to understand that almost every New York City neighborhood has a Jewish community — residents, shoppers, students, or businesspeople. My bigger questionable tactic for this crew was to call He’brew a “Jewish” beer instead of just a great craft beer, or a New York beer, and encourage them to put it anywhere better beer was sold. Over the years, I would learn to appreciate the subtle and not-so-subtle ways to change your angle, depending on your audience — though with a burst of bravado, I figured S.K.I. would see what I saw (and everyone else who’d ever said “You must be killing it in New York”) as enormous potential for a specifically Jewish beer. I won’t know, and am honestly not that worried, whether this strategy limited my potential market. After all, there’s still a dancing Rabbi front and center with Hebrew-esque letters pronouncing it The Chosen Beer — rather purposefully specific branding. Once we started putting out our stronger, more ambitious “extreme” beers, we could truly say that these special offerings could and should go anywhere great craft beer is sold. We fight this particular battle to this day… And the punchline reads: Coming to convert you.
12. Attn: Reader. Please hit the Independent in St Pete and now also in Tampa, spectacular beer spots created with his fantastic wife, Veronica, also of rural Florida bluegrass banjo fame, and tell them I said Yo! Quick aside for pure product placement right here for JB from Mr. Dunderbak’s and Steve at New World who’ve welcomed me year after year with food, treats, and open taps. Nothing but pure fun and homebrew club style love in that posse, and they’ve paid for it ever since by hosting me for years on my annual treks south.
13. At the time I came up with the name, I honestly don’t remember having seen or heard of Avery Brewing’s winter seasonal, Old Jubilation. I just thought Jew B. Elation would provide appropriately shmaltz-y fodder. Sincere apologies to Mr. Avery. As a side note to the footnote, at the launch party for Jewbelation 9 at Falling Rock for GABF, they only had one sixtel of He’brew Jewbelation, so every time I kept trying to order a pitcher of it to share with friends and beer peeps, I kept getting rounds of Avery Jubilation. Do eight pitchers of the wrong beer cover the offense?
14. There were certainly exceptions around the country of many friends that I met along the way who brought Genesis or Messiah in on tap or bottles, who generally loved the quality of the beer — the quality of the shtick enough to cover my butt and do my job for me, hand-selling to their own customers and again giving me support that might otherwise not be completely justified.
15. Though much to our excitement, many of the best regional craft breweries are now starting to introduce ambitious, innovative lagers. There seems to be an interest in truly demolishing the myth that American lagers need to be watered down, adjunct-ridden, and forgettable. Night of the Lagers with Beer Advocate and Manitou Craft Lager Festival — keep it rolling. Let’s make Bud’s claim as “The Great American Lager,” as irrelevant as it is insincere.
16. True story from bartending at Crescent City Brewhouse in New Orleans, circa 1992. This happened almost daily. Guy walks up to the bar: “Hey man, gimme a Bud Light.” Sorry, sir, we make all our own beers here. “Oh. man, no problem. Gimme a Coors Light, then.” No I mean we actually brew all the beers right here on the premises. Can I pour you a pilsner? “I’m really sorry. Just give me a Miller Lite instead.”
17. A quick, vehement written comeback for all those critics/writers/beer pundits lately decrying “extreme” beer and calling for a return to “session” beers as proof of true craftsmanship — and because they get too loaded and can’t drive home. 1. To those of us who simply like robust and flavorful beers better, most session beers are boring; 2. There are already a ton of session beers out there, many brutally bland, though some flavorful, nuanced, and delightful. Why add more?; 3. Session beers will not make anyone other than pub owners any money. Few consumers care enough about a well-balanced, subtle English mild or quaffable bitter to pay a craft-beer premium for it. If one operates a pub (or a brewery that was paid off before the 20th century), then sessions can certainly be useful — go for it. If you have a packaging operation, you already know that the shelves do not need another middle-of-the-road six-pack that your distributor doesn’t want to carry, that you’ll need to sell for $10.99 anyway if you want to have health insurance and a car allowance for your sales reps. This, by the way, is coming from a guy whose fastest growing product is a 5.5% amber lager.
18. Perfect timing for Shmaltz: CIUSA had recently received help from the city of New York to purchase their building, which allowed them to take over the Army Recruiting Center in the front corner on Surf Avenue. They have since expanded the Freak Bar into the previous Coney military outpost and have become our number one account during the summer months, flying through bombers of all our styles. Draft has started to make a more consistent appearance, and we’ve found the perfect home for our craft lager lineup.
19. Of course, he then unfortunately proceeds to get tanked, before his sons find him naked on the floor of his tent. In a rage, or because of predestination or tribal narrative, he blesses two, curses one (Ham, the source of the Canaanites – hmmm, that ain’t kosher), and still manages to live another 350 years, dying at age 950.
20. Also squirreled away for well over a decade, and through several wallet transfers: a business card blessed with a witch’s spell from a long-defunct witchcraft shop in New Orleans, circa 1993; a two-dollar bill offered as a good luck charm from a close temp-job friend; and a fortune cookie from Chinatown tour days reading, “When in doubt, mumble.” (20a)
(20a). Holy shit, I’m putting a footnote to a footnote (sweet): Not to confuse the fortune cookie advice with Lagunitas’s long-standing mantra: Beer speaks, people mumble. Great shtick.
21. When mentioning this to Matt, he remarked, “Yeah, that’s about right. Though since most families are rather dysfunctional anyway, that’s probably why companies try to run like a real business. You know, with rules and stuff.”
22. No longer intent-to-use since we’ve opened Coney Island Brewing Company, the World’s Smallest Brewery. Inaugural batches brewed by Nik Sin the 3 foot 6.66 inch tall self identified rock star midget of the freakshow. One gallon at a time, since 2010.
23. Other delights: “Oy Vey!” Williamsburg Bridge, westbound, at entrance; “Fuggedaboudit!” Gowanus Expressway, westbound, approaching the Verrazano Narrows.
24. What the hell, after everything we’ve been through in all these pages, why not one last footnote to marvel at the great beer scene at the Delachaise, Cure, Lüke, Butcher, Acquistapace’s. We’ve both come a long way in our beer lives — looking forward to more.