Wonder which direction craft beer’s going? Well, it’s not headed in the direction of bland.

Consider this from Pyramid, which I believe is a first-rate mainstream company:

- Pyramid Apricot Weizen beer is the #1 fruit beer in the country and continues to grow at a faster rate than others. Growth rate for 2006 was 32%.

- Pyramid’s ThunderHead India Pale Ale (IPA) is the fastest growing IPA in the nation with 53.6% growth rate.

Also in the news: City Beer Store (1168 Folsom St., San Francisco) held a pre-Oscar night event tonight (Thursday, Feb. 22). The trick is to pair beers with Academy Award-nominated films. Here’s City Beer proprietor Craig Wathen’s pairings:

The Departed: Speakeasy Godfather
Babel: Russian River Supplication
Queen: Old Speckled Hen English Ale
Little Miss Sunshine: Hoppy Face Amber Ale
Letters From Iwo Jima: Hitachino Nest

Not too bad.

I don’t usually run press releases, but I wanted get this up right away. It shows that craft beer sales continued to boom in 2006.

Here’s the media release:
The continuing growth of craft beer entered double digit territory in 2006, with sales by craft brewers up 11.7% by volume for the year. This comes on top of strong growth in each of the prior three years and illustrates the ongoing surge of consumer interest in craft beers.

The Brewers Association estimates 2006 sales by craft brewers at over 6,600,000 barrels (one barrel equals 31 U.S. gallons) up from an adjusted total of just under 6,000,000 barrels in 2005. The increase totals over 690,000 barrels or 9.5 million case-equivalents. For 2006 craft beer posted a retail sales figure of $4.2 billion.

A strong area of distribution for craft beer is grocery, convenience, drug and liquors stores. According to Information Resources Inc. (IRI), “The beer category reaped growth from import (+10.9%) and micro-brew (+16.9%) products, while suffering losses across domestic and non-alcoholic varieties, , the Brewers Association said.

One note of caution: Imports far exceed craft beer sales. The Beer Institute, the Washington-based trade organization, estimatesimports hit 25.9 million barrels in 2006, up about 11 percent for an estimated 13.5 percent market share.

Also, Anheuser-Busch alone sold 102.3 million barrels of beer in 2006, according to A-B’s estimates. That was up 1.2 percent from 2005. Sales of Rolling Rock, Grolsch and Tiger added 0.5 percent of the 1.2 percent.

That gave A-B a 48.4 percent market share, down 0.3 of one percent from 2005.

More from the Brewers Association:

“American tastes are clearly changing thus the demand for more flavorful and diverse beers is exploding,” said Paul Gatza, Director of the Brewers Association, which tabulates industry growth data.

“Craft beer has become a great American success story and today U.S. craft brewers are being watched, emulated and celebrated globally.” stated Julia Herz, Director of Craft Beer Marketing for the Brewers Association. “Demand has become contagious. Craft beer is satisfying the thirst and beer enthusiasm of a continuously growing number of beer drinkers who are seeking flavor, diversity and value.”

Amen to that.

Just poached some fresh salmon in beer, using a recipe I found on the Food Network,
but supplying a different beer. It was, I say modestly, pure dynamite. The best salmon I’ve eaten in many a year.

The recipe calls for “12 ounces beer.” I expect the creator envisioned a BudMillerCoors light lager. Not for me. Peering into my beer refrig, I reached for a Sam Adams Boston Lager. But then I realized that’s a golden pilsner with plenty of hops.

So, instead I picked up a bottle of New Belgium 2 (Degrees) Below**. Not my favorite beer of the winter crop, it has a dry, rough finish and I suspect coriander spicing. But New Belgium says no, it’s made with roast malt, Sterling and Liberty hops, cooled almost to frozen, then more hops were added during fermentation. Hmmm.

Anyway I have several bottles left from a sixer I bought, so I thought, why not. The hops are lost in the taste, so it wouldn’t make the salmon bitter. It was a champion food moment at my house.

Basically, the salmon in poached in the beer on the grill.
My hat’s off to cook Sandra Lee. Great recipe – with my choice of beer. Oh yes, I used a frozen garlic cube rubbed on the salmon and a bit of kosher salt. I cut the amount of brown sugar in half and used only about a half dozen thin slivers of butter. The salmon was wild coho salmon.

Here’s the recipe from the Food Network.
Beer Salmon
Recipe courtesy Sandra Lee
Show: Semi-Homemade Cooking with Sandra Lee
Episode: Weekend Gathering

1 (12-inch) tail piece salmon fillet (about 1 1/2 pounds)
2 teaspoons garlic salt
3 tablespoons brown sugar
4 tablespoons butter, cut into small pieces
1 small red onion, thinly sliced
1 (12-ounce) bottle beer

Preheat grill to medium-high heat.

Using aluminum foil, create an oblong cooking tray (approximately 13 inches by 8 inches by 2 inches) to be placed directly on grill. Place salmon fillet in center of tray. Season first with garlic salt, sprinkle with brown sugar, and then cover with pieces of butter. Top with sliced red onions. Pour beer of choice into tray to just below the highest point of the fillet. Cover tray with aluminum foil to envelope fish completely. Place tray on grill, cover with lid, and grill for approximately 8 minutes or until just cooked through.
Recipe, copyright, the Food Network.

Getting tired of beer labels, thought I’d run this photo of
Alaskan Brewing. A beautiful place, indeed.
Credit: www.bjandtony.com/ 200306Alaska.html

SAN FRANCISCO – I walked out of the 17th or is it the 18th annual Toronado Barleywine Festival Saturday night with my head spinning. I was puzzled. After all, I’d only sampled eight beers and they were three-ounce samples. Hmmm. More in a minute.

This note: The fest continues all week until the beer is gone. If you’re reading this Sunday morning, my advice is go there today, the winners tend to be consumed fast.

Here are the winners of this growing, huge, excellent festival. Toronado proprietor David Keene said in all there were 90 judges (is that right, David?), who spent half a day picking the winners from 54 barleywines.

First Place: Big Nugget 200, Alaskan Brewing, Juneau, Alaska, My tasting notes: A deep copper beer with a thick tan head, toffee aroma. Taste is complex, inititally sweet, but with a growing tartness and warming alcohol. Wow! FOUR STARS. 11 percent alcohol, 75 IBU (International bitterness units). Comparison: Bud, 13 IBU, 5 percent ABV.

Second Place: Angel’s Share, Port Brewing/Lost Abbey, San Marcos.
My tasting notes: An opaque, dark brown, almost still with very little foam, like a real ale, which, of course, it is. Brandy nose from a minimum of six months in brandy barrels. Ahhh the taste. A huge initial sweetness, drowned quickly in a rush of wood, oak, vanilla, brandy and alcohol that fades into a fairly sweet follow with a tang of hops and warmth from the alcohol – 10 percent ABV. FOUR STARS. Best news of the day. This one’s bottled in 750 ml, corked bottles, and can be found as Port Brewing says, “at inspired locations.” For our list of good retail beer outlets in the San Francisco Bay Area, shoot me an e-mail at whatsontap@sbcglobal.net.

Third Place. A tie.

Doggie Claws, Hair of the Dog, Portland, OR. My tasting notes: Brewer Alan Sprints makes this one as his holiday beer. It’s 11.5 percent ABV and 75 IBUs. Hugely sweet from the toffee aroma to the finish with great warming from the alcohol. A real sipper. THREE STARS. ***. It’s great to see this very fine beer recognized by a panel of judges. It’s bottled, but sells out quickly each December.

Anniversary 2004, Uinta Brewing, Salt Lake City, UT. My tasting notes: Another great beer, 9.8 percent alcohol, it’s produced year-round and sold in 12-ounce six packs. Haven’t seen it in the Bay Area, but I’m gonna’ look. Tasting notes: Liquid malty nose, sweet malt taste explodes in your mouth. Sweetness slowly fades into a warming alcohol finish. Wow. THREE STARS.

Also: David Keene said there were five other finalists besides the four winners:

–Arctic Devil, Midnight Sun, Anchorage, AK. It was sold out by the time I got to the Toronado. Some way, I’ve never gotten a taste of this perennial favorite.

–Bourbon Bigfoot, Sierra Nevada, Chico, CA. Another great beer. Sierra Nevada’s Steve Dresler says Jorg Rupf and Lance Winters of St. George Spirits in Alameda, CA. asked Sierra Nevada to make a beer that they planned to distill into a (I guess, a Bourbon-style whiskey) and age in barrels. When the project was finished, Dresler got the barrels, put regular Bigfoot in them. Oh my. Power-Bigfoot. Huge Bourbon nose. The wood and whiskey notes blend nicely with the major hops and malts of regular Bigfoot. This one’s a treat. FOUR STARS.

–Barleywine, Cucapa’ Brewing Co., Mexicali, Baja California Norte, Mexico. I was fascinated by this one, the first-ever finalist from Mexico. It’s a craft brewer operating since 1999 in the border city of Mexicali. The name’s taken from a small band of native people who live along the Colorado River delta, the first humans to inhabit the Mexicali Valley. I tasted this one and loved it: Compared to some of the powerhouses in this festival, it was mellow. The taste is a bit of a shock, dry initially, then with a rising sweetness that lasts into a long follow. An excellent beer, indeed. THREE STARS.

–John Barleycorn 2006, Mad River, Blue Lake, CA.,

–Old Bluehair, Big Sky, Missoula, MT.

And finally, back to the beer I drank. I figured it out, eight three-ounce samples of beer that was all above 9 percent, one was 11 percent, another almost 11 percent alcohol. A regular California table wine’s about 12.5 percent. So doing a bit of ersatz algebra, I’m guessing I had the equivalent of about five glasses of wine.

Thank God I took BART. Saludos companeros.

Hey look. Even bloggers get the flu. I’ve been down for four days, managed to crawl into work today (Saturday) at 7:30 a.m., but by afternoon I was just dead and I DID NOT MAKE IT TO THE BISTRO’S DOUBLE IPA Fest in Hayward today.

Hell and damn. It’s about my all-time favorite fest. Love them hops.

Just talked to Allison Cook at the Bistro and got the winners, chosen from a list of 50 Double IPAs by a panel of professional judges in a lengthy blind tasting Saturday morning.

Here are the results:

Gold Medal Winner: Ballast Point double IPA, Ballast Point Brewing, San Diego.

Silver Medal: Pliny the Elder, Russian River Brewing, Santa Rosa, CA.

Bronze: Hop Stoopid, Lagunitas Brewing, Petaluma, CA.

Honorable Mention: White Knuckle Double IPA, Marin Brewing Co., Larkspur, CA.

People’s Choice: Pliny the Younger, Russian River, Santa Rosa.

The place was packed, Allison , who was holding down the bar tonight, said. The good news is the beer is still flowing. Vic Kralj, Bistro proprietor, will keep all the IPAs on tap until they’re gone.

Hint: Go to Hayward this afternoon. The Bistro’s at 1001 B St. in downtown Hayward.

OK, I’ve been under the weather with the flu for the last four days, but I’m coming out of the fog. Lots of things happening in the beer world. But something great’s happening here in the San Francisco East Bay tomorrow: The Bistro’s Double IPA Fest.

It’s the kickoff for the Bay Area Beerapalooza. This column ran two weeks ago in MediaNews papers:

Beer Season in February? Why Not?

FEBRUARY is the dark heart of winter — and even here in the Bay Area, where the sun usually shines, however coldly, historically it’s a lousy time to drink beer. No wonder. Who wants to drink a light, fizzy lager when there’s frost on the lawn or a cold, gray rain’s blowing off the bay?

The craft beer movement, which mostly eschews light and fizzy, has changed that in a big way. Nowhere is that more obvious than in the Bay Area, In fact, we’ve become a destination for beer lovers around the world.

David Keene behind the bar at the Toronado.

It all began with the annual Barleywine Festival at the Toronado, a San Francisco bar that’s truly a mecca for those of us who like beer. Sometime back around 1990, proprietor David Keene noticed that he had several barleywines on tap. These beers are so strong that they’re approaching the strength of table wine, which averages about 12 percent alcohol by volume.
Why not have a little festival, he thought. Why not? It grew from there. This year, which David reckons is about the 17th or 18th annual, he expects upwards of 50 barleywines, from West Coast craft brewers, from the East and the Midwest and abroad. There’s professional judging, and beers remain on tap until they’re gone.

The next step in the transformation of February into a strong beer wonder-month happened in Hayward. Vic Kralj, proprietor of The Bistro, has a similar story, but with a different beer. Kralj says he began receiving so many over-the-top, uber-hoppy, uber-strong entries to his annual India Pale Ale festival that he decided to hold a separate fest: The Double IPA Festival. Like the Toronado’s Barleywine festival, it was a shot heard’round the brewing world.

Credit for the third element to our beery Bay Area festival goes to Tom Dalldorf and his Hayward-based Celebrator Beer News, the national, bi-monthly publication covering the craft beer movement. He noticed all the beer-filled events around the Bay Area in February — nearly every brewpub and good-beer tavern has events planned — and coined a word for it.

It is, he proclaimed, a “Beerapalooza.”

And to cap the month, the Celebrator holds its own Beerapalooza anniversary party-beer blast after most of the other major events. One warning: All of these events feature strong beer. Bring along a designated driver or plan to take public transit or a cab. Interested? Here’s a list of major events:

- Feb. 1 through Feb. 28, fifth annual Strong Beer Month. There’s strong beer wherever you can usually find good beer in the Bay Area this month — at brewpubs and taverns. But Shaun O’Sullivan, co-founder and head brewer at 21st Amendment Restaurant and Brewery, 563 2nd St., San Francisco, and Dave McLean, founder and head brewer at Magnolia Brewery & Restaurant, 1398 Haight St., San Francisco, have made it their own. Each has brewed five strong beers. The idea is to visit each pub repeatedly during February, sample all 10 brews and win a prize. I have no idea what the prize might be. I’m not sure they do. I know there are special glasses and yes, T-shirts. I talked to Dave and Shaun the other night at the Toronado. They said the whole idea of strong beer month, beerapalooza and the fests have turned business around in February.

It used to be a slow month, Shaun says. No more. He told me one of his specials, a Belgian-style strong ale, was blended with 10 gallons of Lindemans Framboise, a Belgian lambic ale, made with wild yeast and fresh raspberries. The Lindemans had first been aged in an oak barrel. Whew.
Strong beer here

- Feb. 10, seventh annual Double IPA Fest, The Bistro, 1001 B St., Hayward, 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Music, food. Outdoor patio, tent. $20 admission buys five tastings. Call (510) 886-8525 or visit http://www.the-bistro.com. There will be professional judging and medals will be awarded.

- Feb. 14, Beerapalooza Beer and Cheese Tasting, Rogue Ales Public House, 673 Union St., San Francisco. Craft beers, some rare and unusual, paired with craft cheese from Northern California cheesemakers by Sheana Davis of the Epicurean Connection, Sonoma. Doors open 5 p.m., pairing begins at 6. Tickets: $30 advance, $35 at door, if tickets remain. Call (415) 362-7880 for reservations. Hint: This event is becoming extremely popular and most likely will sell out, so if you’re interested, make a reservation now.

- Feb. 16, Beer and Chocolate Dinner, Cathedral Hill Hotel, San Francisco. This one’s sold out. A first for beer chef Bruce Paton, whose regular beer dinners have become increasingly famous. To get on the mailing list so you don’t miss the next dinner, e-mail Bruce at bpaton@cathedralhillhotel.com. Late word: Bruce says the dinner is sold out. Damn.

- Feb. 17, Toronado Barleywine Fest, 547 Haight St., San Francisco, 10 a.m. until closing, and onward during the week until the beer runs out. Beers are listed on a chalkboard, pay by the glass. No cover. Hint: This is a total mob scene. Best to come late or on Sunday. However, the fest is professionally judged and the beers of the top five winners tend to go fast. Call (415) 863-2276 or visit http://www.toronado.com.

- Feb. 18, Celebrator Beer News 19th Anniversary Party, Trumer Pils Brewery, 1404 4th St., Berkeley, 4-8 p.m. At least 15 breweries will be pouring beer, live music, including the Anchor Brewery band, Cajun and barbecue food. Free shuttle will run continuously to and from the Shattuck Avenue BART station, $40. For tickets call (800) 439-BEER.

This is starting to look like an Anheuser-Busch-Budweiser blog…But I can’t help it. The big Bud’s been busy indeed and it’s no wonder their profits are up 31 percent for 2006. Domestic sales of A-B beers rose 1.1 percent. That’s tiny, but consider the volume: 22.3 million barrels or 48.4 percent of the entire U.S. beer market.

Also, they cut deals across the world to import InBev beers (includes Stella Artois and , plus all beers from Grolsch, Kirin, Tiger and the Czech Budweiser, sold here as Czechvar. A-B also bought historic Rolling Rock, closed the Latrobe, PA. brewery and began brewing Rolling Rock in Newark. The company also owns a large share of Grupo Modelo, which makes Corona, among other beers, and Harpin, a brewery in China.

This exquisite photo of a glass
of Budvar Budweiser was
taken by European
photographer Daniel Zolli.

The list of breweries owned, or partly owned by Anheuser-Busch goes on and on. Here’s a link. to their most recent financial report,

ELSEWHERE IN BUDVILLE…ALL BARLEY MICHELOB

A-B is about to announce that they’re revising the formula of its Michelob beers. No more rice. Beginning fairly soon, Michelob and Michelob Amber, and I guess, Michelob Light will be 100 barley malt. According to the company, that’s the way Michelob was when they introduced the brand the first time in 1896: A 100 percent barley-malt pilsner.

The brand was reintroduced in 1961 and I tried it as a very young beer drinker about then and was underwhelmed. I’ve always been underwhelmed with Michelob. Too dry. Not enough body. Anyway, here’s hoping.

I have two samples in my beer refrigerator and will try them sometime this weekend and let ‘ya know.

FINALLY…DIGG THIS…BUD-TV

Anheuser Busch on Monday plans to launch “BUD-TV.” The site is already up

According to MarketWatch “Bud.TV will offer original comedy skits, performers and writers from “Saturday Night Live” appearing in original series, and short movies. Visitors will be encouraged to send in some of their own video, too.”

“ Tony Ponturo, vice president of global media and sports marketing at Anheuser Busch (BUD said he had to take the risk of Bud.TV. “If we don’t start playing in this digital game now,” he said, “we’re going to be playing catch-up for a long time. And this is an industry that can’t afford catch-up.”