Act Now! Before it’s too late.

taken from http://www.sylb.org/
Proposed Increase of Federal Excise Tax a Serious Threat to Small Brewers and Your Beer Choice – Contact Your Senators Now. Small brewers are facing an imminent and extremely serious threat to their businesses. The consequences of remaining silent have the very real potential of reducing your choice of beer and dramatically increasing the price of any beer that you purchase.

The Senate Finance Committee in Washington, DC is currently considering a proposal to increase and equalize the excise tax for alcohol beverages as part of healthcare reform deliberations. This proposal would triple the excise tax for 4.5% ABV beer and impose even higher excise tax rates for higher ABV beers.

We need you to speak out now. Today or tomorrow at the latest.
More info at the link below including a link to contact your senator.
http://www.sylb.org/excisetax.html

Summer is almost upon us.

Summer is almost upon us and as we all know Rochester explodes with fun things to do. I think the beer scene is definitely getting better around here with numerous tastings, beer dinners, tours and fests now happening monthly if not weekly, if only I could get out to more of them! Speaking of that Victory Brewing Co. Beer Festival at Monty’s Krown is this Saturday the 6th and it sounds like a great time, they will be featuring an array of draught and cask Victory beers. Time: 4 p.m. – close. There is no admission fee* for early entry. Pay as you go – Pints will be $2.50 (what a deal.) There will be live music starting at 10pm from BML, Grime Time and Electric Noodle. *There will cover charge of $3 for those hanging out/coming later for the music.

There will also be Rochester Beer Advocate Pub Crawl, Saturday – July 18, 2009 at 4pm it ends at 11pm the Pub Crawl will hit the  Beer Bars In East End and on Monroe Avenue.

I was sorry to hear the Hartmanns Old World Sausage is leaving Rochester for Canandaigua, OK to be honest I was pissed they were leaving Rochester behind for Canandiagua until I heard that they indeed planned on keeping the their original location open on N. Clinton Ave. until they were broken into. Anyone who’s been to that location has seen that that neighborhood is falling apart at the seams and Hartmanns is yet another victim of the ‘hood. Thank god we still have Swan Market to get our German food and sausage fix. I was fortunate to enjoy one of the last glasses of Rohrbach Alt a few weeks during my lunch at Swan Market brewed by the talented Bruce Lish, unfortunately there will no more of Alt or any other of Bruce’s Rohrbach brews since he is no longer working for Rohrbach, I hope he pops up somewhere else in town because I know I’m not the only one that will be missing his brews. Bruce, if you need a drinking buddy or someone to sample some of you homebrew let me know and I’ll send you my references?

I cannot thank Salvatore Fantauzzo and his partners in business enough for purchasing the historic Donuts Delite building in Rochester on Culver Road at Empire Blvd. & Clifford Ave. As big fans of mid-century architecture my wife and me have been fearful of this Rochester landmark being knocked down or turned into a Walgreens ever since it closed in 2005. It makes me very happy to hear that this awesome building will be restored and turned into Salvatore’s Pizzerias flagship location. They plan on opening by July 4th, 2009 and is inviting past owners and staff to the historic re-opening. They plan on now offering breakfast and donut’s of course along with Salvatore’s usual menu. I also heard rumor of getting some of the original owners familly donut recipes. Sound like a great plan!

12 Horse Breweriana Show this Saturday

I would like to invite everyone to the 12 Horse Brewery Collectible Club’s first annual breweriana show this Saturday May 2 from 9am-3pm. Admission is FREE! It’s at the Knights of Columbus Hall at 70 Barrett Drive, Webster, NY 14580.

We have put a lot of work into planning this show and are very happy that all of our dealer tables have sold out. There will be a large amount of interesting brewery memorabilia on display and for sale. There is also a cash bar for refreshments. There will also be raffle giveaways.

I have always been a collector from the toys I coveted as a child to the baseball and comic books of my youth. I think breweriana was a natural progression for me. Obviously I love beer and being a graphic designer I’ve always had a great appreciation/love for vintage advertising. The problem for me was that great examples of vintage advertisng/signs etc. are very expensive and it always frustrated me that the examples I liked were out of my price range. Then one day my wife brought me home a beer tray she got in box lot at an local auction and something just clicked. A lot of beer collectibles are fairly affordable depending on scarcity, pre-prohibition being the rarest and more expensive items. I am quite amusing how each collector I meet has specific love for a certain category or type brewery items. Some people primarily just collect old cans, some just cork lined bottle caps, some love the beer serving trays or coasters. Some will just collect items from a certian city or region.

Beer + Vintage Adversting + a love for Rochester History = Breweriana!

So I  began scowering flea markets and ebay and to my delight these neat items were always right under my nose. I still wonder why I hadn’t noticed them earlier. So now I have modest collection of stuff mostly centering around Rochester Breweries, in particular I  love Tam O’shanter Brewery items and Genesee items, particulary 12 Horse stuff  from the thirties is a favorite. When we moved into our mid-century house I was delighted to see 1950’s style bar in the basement just begging to display my stuff which I quickly coined Tamo’s Speakeasy. So if you have love for beer and an appreciation for vintage advertising I say come check out our show I think you’d enjoy it and maybe you’ll get the collecting bug. Perhaps I will post some my items in the future if there any interest in seeing them?

Great deal on Victory at BOTW!

I don’t know about you but there’s been less green in my pocket lately when I’m beer shopping, not too mention the recent rise in beer prices. In particular Victory’s beer at my local grocery store has climbed to around $17+ for a 12 pak sampler (not that it’s not worth it). So today when I was picking up a gift (Butternuts Sampler 12 pak – highly recommended) for a buddy at Beers of the World in Win/Jeff Plaza I was pleasently surprised by the Victory Sampler end cap display exclaiming SALE $10.99! Wow what a great deal, a full $8.00 off the regular price, so I couldn’t resist scooping one up, that is almost as much as you’ll pay for a single flavor 6 pak! I also finally got my hands on Troegs Nuget Nectar, six pack ($12.69) and am anxiously looking forward to trying it… Speaking of trying it: head over to the Rohrbach Restaurant and wraps you lips around their Oatmeal Stout on the nitros tap line it’s lovely, but unfortunately not available in growlers. I assume that’s because the nitros would cause it to foam to much on the growler fill? So I had to take home a delicous growler of the Vanilla Porter instead. Incredible drinkability with hints of coffee and a very nice restrained, smooth vanilla finish and Mrs. CreamAleDrinker even liked it and has been asking for more since we finished it off. That’s a first..

High Falls new drinking buddy?

There is an article regarding the High Falls Brewery buyout on the D & C’s site (about time the published something), makes me feel a little better about what might happen but who really knows. I guess we’ll just have to clutch our Cream Ales and see what happens. I also just recently heard they are now contract brewing Narragansett.

High Falls Brewing may take on partner

The Powers Building 1904 Rochester, NY

Exceptional vintage photograph of downtown showing the The Powers Building. I love all bikes parked on the sidewalk and the uncongested streets. Thankfully this building has survived all these years too bad the Trolley’s haven’t. Jump over to Shorpy to see it full size.

Say it ain’t true! : (

As reported in the local news and in the Wall Street Journal the High Falls Brewery is in the final stages of being bought out by the KPS Capital Partners LP, a private-equity firm. They are also hoping to buy of all things Labatt (LaCrap) USA from Anheuser-Busch InBev and per U.S. regulations would have to have own a brewery to produce Labatt’s in order to buy it…. I think I’d rather see the brewery fall into the river gorge rather than start brewing Labatt’s. I don’t see how this could be a good thing and would expect some of their brands to be eliminated by KPS since they are known for scooping up trouble companies and doing what’s necessary to get them on track. I hope this doesn’t result in any job losses for the brewery. Will this be the end of Genesee as we know it? Hopefully not but I think major changes are inevitable. So friends please raise a can in rememberance of this fine brewery and Rochester icon.

There are several good articles about this on local new sites:
10 NBC
Rochester Home Page (with video)

Neko Case’s “PEOPLE GOT A LOTTA NERVE” – Blog it for a Worthwhile Cause

Although I don’t usually pester my fellow CreamAleDrinkers with my eccentric musical taste I couldn’t resist blogging this for a worthwile cause (and how can you not Love Neko Case?): Today, we are especially happy to bring you “People Got A Lotta Nerve,” the first single from Neko Case’s forthcoming album Middle Cyclone (out March 3), because for every blog that reposts the song and/or iLike user who adds it to their profile, Neko Case and ANTI- will make a cash donation to Best Friends Animal Society.

Check out Neko’s song on the Best Friends Facebook page or our MySpace blog.

Download the song here.

Cream Ale Drinkers: New Facebook Group

I recently created a Cream Ale Drinkers group on facebook. So if your on Facebook why not join?
Here’s the link.

2 Great Tasting Events the week!

Lovin’cup brew-ha ha

Wednesday, January 14th at 8:00pm
Beat the winter blues at the cup! learn more about the beer by tasting it. Featuring a guided tour by Ryan Greenway from Great Lakes and Erik Ward of Lovin’Cup tickets on sale 1/2/09!
(You may want to make sure tickets are still available)

10 buckaroos for food and drink. (and fun.) 2 bucks off if your an Rit student or faculty!
Lovin’cup is located at 300 Park Point Drive, corner of John and Jefferson!

Wednesday Drink Specials!!!
Buy one, get one 1/2 off Pabst Blue Ribbon
$2.00 Genny Cream Ale (OH YEAH!)

Note: for those of you who haven’t had the pleasure of trying “Great Lakes Brewing Co.” beer yet you are in for a treat, these guys are making some GREAT beer!

ALSO:

Beer School

Monty’s Korner 7pm ($5 charge for the tasting and food)
Those fine chaps over at http://beercraftsite.com/ host beer school. Rumor is that Chris Troegner, co-principal of Harrisburg’s Troegs Brewery, will be on hand as your guided through a selection of newly-available Troegs beers.

Troegs is one of the most respected indie breweries in the country. Come to Monty’s Korner in Rochester at 7pm for some deliciousness. Being a PA boy myself I hope I can make it.