Ale & Lager Enthusiasts of Saskatchewan (ALES)

How long have you been homebrewing?  How long have you been an ALES member?

I have been home-brewing since about 1982.  My father had retired a few years previously, and I purchased as a gift for him a home-brew kit which included amongst other things, an 8 gallon food grade plastic pail, and a 5 gallon plastic carboy.  My father Leo, who was born in 1906, had some previous home brewing experience in the 1920s, and he still had his original bottle-capper.  He also had a 5 US gallon glass carboy from the old water cooler days.  In any event I thought buying him a brewing kit would be a great gift, it would give him something to do in his retirement, and would give me something to drink, a classic win-win scenario.

My father took to home-brewing in the classic way, and a typical recipe consisted of a can of Gold Medal hopped malt and 4 cups of cane sugar.  We produced beer! - With lots of apple-cidery goodness.  Of course being a farm boy, and knowing that beer came from barley and other grains, I wondered why we couldn't use grain from the farm.  Well of course we couldn't, because grain needed to be malted and mashed and so forth, things that could only happen in big factories and breweries.  So we stuck with the kits, and with time my dad got more experimental buying kits with more malt and different flavours.  But the depression/prohibition era classic of a can of Gold Medal and four cups of cane sugar remained a standard.  As time went by we needed bottles, as my ever frugal father hated to have large sums of money tied up in deposits for commercial beer bottles.

In 1982 the Canada Centre Building at the Exhibition Grounds was still new.  They hosted an Octoberfest there.  The beer served there was a premium import, - Lowenbrau.  It was poured into plastic cups at the bar and the green bottles went back into their six-packs.  The six-packs of now empty beer went back into 24-packs which in turn were stacked neatly in a Lorras Garbage bin awaiting disposal.  Since Lowenbrau was an import there was no deposit on the bottles so they were going to be thrown out.  The day after the Octoberfest I drove my car over, and loaded up 24 two-fours.  My dad and I rinsed the bottles out.  It was a joy as the bottles were fresh, with no mould to deal with.  Also, since the beer was poured into plastic cups the bottles never made it into the customers' hands, meaning that we didn't even have to contend with cigarette buts.  We rinsed the bottles out to stop mould growth, and we now had so many bottles that we capped half of them to keep them clean.  (My ever frugal father had saved once used caps for just such a purpose.  Not good enough to use on a bottle of beer but good enough to keep a bottle clean.)  Thus for many years the green Lowenbrau bottle became our standard home-brew bottle.  I still use them, but in deference to the superiority of brown glass for keeping beer, I use these green bottles for mead.  I still have some bottles capped from 1982!

Time marches on, and my father slowed down.  He eventually had two bad batches, foamers in which you would open the bottle in the sink and it would fill the sink with foam.  Two bad batches in a row broke my father's heart and he quit brewing.  He was in his late eighties at the time.  The brewing equipment stood idle at my parents' home for a few years, but then, with the purchase of a new home in 1993, I had the room to brew, so I became brewer in the family.

I went to Harvest Brewing on Broad Street for my ingredients.  I started with Gold Label and sugar, as Gold Label was then still on the market and was familiar to me.  But I also experimented, using for example the Black Rock Miners' Stout kit which is capable of making a very good stout. (Make sure to use DME or a can of un-hopped malt in place of sugar!)

In October 1999 I was between jobs and saw a sign in the window of Harvest Brewing for part-time help.  I applied, and Ron Thomsen, the owner, hired me.  It wasn't long before I was the manager.  The home-brewing industry is very wine centric, as that is where most of the profit is.  One thing that Harvest Brewing had going for it was a great Home-brewed beer tradition.  The ALES Club had been born there.  There were shelves above the till in the back lined with beer bottles of almost every type of label, antique to modern.  It had beer bottles of kinds of beer I'd never heard of.

More importantly, in the store there were back issues of Zymurgy dating from its original issue in 1978 to the late eighties.  When I wasn't with customers, and I was caught up with cleaning, packaging, and other home-brew store chores, I would improve my product knowledge by reading Zymurgy, and other publications and books.  It was an education, as in many ways 1978 marked the real start of the wave in terms of the craft beer renaissance, and of high quality home-brew.  Reading issues of Zymurgy from 1978 to the present gives one an appreciation of how far public knowledge, and especially home-brewing knowledge has come in that time.

Of course reading Zymurgy, and Charlie Papazian's New Complete Joy of Homebrewing made me a fan of beer, including home-brewed beer.  Other references included C.J.J. Berry's Home Brewed Beers and Stouts, H.E. Bravery's Amateur Wine-making, and Michael Jackson's The Pocket Guide to Beer (the original edition).  Another thing was a previous manager, Mike, had left behind some fabulous samples of things he had brewed in the store.  I was encouraged to try brewing samples myself, and I got into brewing beer including some experimental one gallon all-grain batches.  They turned out well.

About this time both Kelly Deis and Gary Falkenstein, both ALES Club members, were coming into the store occasionally for supplies.  One or the other, or perhaps both, mentioned the ALES Club.  Let me think about that, people who are Enthusiastic about Ales and Lagers?  Where do I join?  On the first Wednesday night of 1999 I joined the ALES Club.  In 2003 I left Harvest Brewing to pursue some opportunities with the military, but I maintained my ALES Club membership becoming president for a year in 2003.  I took the BJCP class in 2003 becoming a certified beer judge.

What do you enjoy about the hobby? The club?

I enjoy my time with the ALES Club.  The ALES Club is an excellent forum for learning about different kinds of beers and meads, different kinds of equipment and techniques, while have an opportunity to sample different styles with friends.  ALES Club events, such as the monthly meetings, the Big Brew Day, Teach a Friend to Home-Brew, and the annual Barbecue are always enjoyable.  Just as importantly, the ALES Club has been a great opportunity to meet new friends while sharing and gaining knowledge.

ALES Club members aren't just knowledgeable about beer.  Members come from a wide variety of backgrounds.  It is possible to get worthwhile advice on a wide range of topics beyond beer making.  I have learned more about hunting, sausage making, cheese making, and great cooking, all from fellow ALES Club members.

I have enjoyed the home-brewing hobby.  It is economical, but more importantly, it allows you to enjoy beverages of a variety and quality that are otherwise unobtainable.

What is your favourite style(s) to brew and drink? Why?

Any final comments?

I am still using the equipment that I gave to my father in 1982, and his capper from the 1920s.  It just goes to show the value and lasting power of some of the equipment in this hobby.