In addition to being the Brewmaster of Social Kitchen & Brewery, organizing the San Francisco Brewer’s Guild, and living just a few short blocks from the Elizabeth Street Brewery, Rich Higgins is also a certified Master Cicerone.

He is bringing his knowledge and expertise to the good people of San Francisco starting this month and running through February 13, 2012. You’ve already missed the UK Beer Tradition course but feel free to come over to the ESB for a private session on that in the near future. In the meantime, check out all the other classes and dates below:

World Beer Traditions (http://beertraditions.eventbrite.com)
November 6: UK Beer Tradition
November 13: German Beer Tradition
December 4: Belgian Beer Tradition
January 8: US Beer Tradition

Beer & Food Pairing (http://beerandfood.eventbrite.com)
November 20: Beer & Thanksgiving Food
December 18: Beer & Italian Cuisine from Delarosa Restaurant
January 29: Beer & Superbowl Eats
February 13: Beer & Valentine’s Chocolate & Candy

You can use promotion code “weissbier” to receive a $10 discount for each ticket purchased. Also, discounted 4-class packages are available for a limited time. Tickets cost $55-$65 and are a fundraiser for the non-profit Barbary Coast Conservancy for the American Cocktail.

Classes are on Sundays from 5-7 PM (except the Valentine’s class is on a Monday). I definitely plan on attending a few of these over the next couple of months so maybe I’ll see you there.

Cheers!
Richard.

Thanks to Liz Ryan of The Sycamore for sharing with me.

Cheers!
Richard.

I could stop brewing today and I would still owe a lot of people a great deal of thanks for the amazing ride it has been as a homebrewer since 2003. To my wife for putting up with some of the spills, smells, and “mistakes” brewed in our kitchen and back yard; to Griz, Eric, Andre and the whole crew at SF Brewcraft; to Shaun, Nico, Jesse, Zambo and everyone at 21st Amendment over the past 4 years… I could go on – the list is long.

But I don’t plan on stopping brewing anytime soon. In fact, I think I may just be getting started. But as most of you know, I have a day job down in Campbell, CA that sees me drive 110 miles round trip every day. That’s a lot of time in the car. That’s a lot of time wasted that I could be spending on working on the Elizabeth Street Brewery. However, I have a new group of folks to thank. Primarily Justin, Doc, Tasty, JP, Beevo, Moscow and everyone involved with The Session of the Brewing Network.

I used to work for PodShow before joining eBay so I was exposed to a LOT of independent podcasts devoted to any number of topics – including beer – and I’ve subscribed to quite a few of them for a while now from John Foster’s Beer School to Craft Beer Radio. I always found it difficult to listen to them without a beer in front of me. However, now that I’ve been doing this commute for over 3 years now, I’ve made an effort to ignore those cravings and actually make the most of my time in the car… and not just to listen to JP and Tasty burp at 7:45 in the morning as I drive to work.

For those of you interested in beer and brewing specifically, I highly recommend checking them out. I realized as I was driving in to work this morning, listening to an episode that included an interview with Lucky Bucket Brewing Co, how lucky I am to be able to get value out of what would be normally perceived as a repetitive time-sink. 2 hours in the car every day keeps me away from both my day-job duties (social media & blogging for eBay) and my brewing activities at the Elizabeth Street Brewery.

The Lucky Bucket Brewing conversation was perfect inspiration to get me started on a sluggish Tuesday. I hit the ground running at the office, drafted a couple of posts for work and got ready for our earnings call tomorrow and now, during my lunch break, I’m putting together this post for ESB. The irony of having corporate blogger as one of my primary job descriptions means that I don’t have the energy or time I used to have to devote to this ESB Blog. Let’s hope I keep getting inspired on the commute to and from work so that I can get my beer blogging, education and practical output back to a respectable level.

Cheers to the Brewing Network for making me realize that!

-Richard.

We’ve been hard at work brewing up some special batches of Daddy’s Chocolate Milk and this coming weekend we’ll be pouring our beer somewhere other than “just some f&*king room is some guy’s f&*king house.”

First up is the “Small Batch / Big Thirst” event on Saturday, February 12.

Event: SMALL BATCH / BIG THIRST
Date/Time: Saturday, Feb. 12th 2pm – 6pm
Location: Truc Stop, 246 Ritch Street, SF
Breweries (beers):
Pac Brew Lab (Hibiscus Saison, TBD);
Elizabeth Street Brewery (Daddy’s Chocolate Milk);
Mill Valley Beerworks (Botanical, TBD);
SFBG (Imperial Common);
Speakeasy (Imperial Coffee Porter);
Lagunitas (Hop High);
Muddy Puddle (Squirrel’s Blood, Belgique RyePA, TBD), more brewers to come!
Admission: 21 and over only; drink tickets for sale with all proceeds going to charity. Donations encouraged!

We’re really excited to see new folks out and about all celebrating craft beer!

7×7 Magazine has even made it one of their “top picks” for SF Beer Week.

See you Saturday afternoon!

Cheers!
Richard.

Cheers!
Richard.

A Tall, Cold Pint of NightLife
All about how beer is brewed with music by DJ Kramer and Tamo
July 15th, 6:00 pm – 9:00 pm

There’s nothing better on a summer night than a tall, cold glass of beer. Have you ever wondered how beer is brewed? What ‘hops’ are? What the difference between a lager and a pilsner is? Join some of the San Francisco Bay Area’s best microbreweries and beer experts, including San Francisco Brewcraft, MateVeza, Bison Brewing, Social Kitchen and Brewery, Elizabeth Street Brewery and others, to learn all about the art of brewing beer. All of these great beers will be available for sale tonight at NightLife.

Full details regarding the event can be found HERE. Hope to see you there!

Cheers,
Richard.

Apparently not…

That’s right folks, our little homebrewpub in our basement managed to snag Best Microbrewery of 2010 in SF Weekly. A true honor for us considering we’re not selling any beer yet.

Best Microbrewery – 2010
Elizabeth Street Brewery

Every month or so, Richard and Alyson Brewer-Hay invite friends, neighbors, and beer lovers in general to drop by their Noe Valley home and sample the brews they’ve been cooking up in 5- and 10-gallon batches since 2003. A few years back, their rumpus room was converted into a pub for the reality program. This friendly wood-and-brick nook, decorated with framed photos, armchairs, a dartboard, and many many beer bottles, is the ideal setting to enjoy free samples of Quincy’s Winter Warmer porter; Auntie Ben’s unfiltered, ultrahoppy IPA; Mummy’s Double Honey ale; or Daddy’s Chocolate Milk, a rich and creamy stout crafted from four varieties of malt, including chocolate. Brewing updates and information on the next open house are available via the ESB Web site or Twitter: @ESBale.

2010 has truly been a surreal year for the ESB. The 21st Amendment collaboration brew we made that took gold at World Beer Cup and now this.

My commitment and promise to all the folks that have enjoyed a beer at ESB over the past few years is that this will not be distracting, nor will it take away from the ultimate goal: a true family brewpub in San Francisco.

Thanks for your continued support and we can’t wait to welcome you into our wee homebrewpub over the Summer.

Cheers!
Richard.

Cheers!
Richard.

All,
Well, I’m still feeling numb from the whole experience in Chicago last week but the capper to it all was that the Imperial ESB called “Imperial Jack” named after my late Grandfather, that I brewed with the good folks at 21st Amendment Brewery, won Gold in the Other Strong Beer category at the World Beer Cup 2010 Awards Dinner. You can see the brew day report HERE.

It was such a shock at the time that neither Allie nor I were able to fumble the video camera quickly enough to capture the moment on film. However, you can check out pictures from the evening here.

I am traveling for work this week but have a number of other videos I can share with you soon. For now, enjoy the pics. You can read the 21st Amendment blog post, HERE. The plan is to brew it again during the week of April 26, so look for it in May at the 21st Amendment in San Francisco.

Cheers!
RIchard.

Shaun and Richard brewing the Imperial Jack, January 14, 2010:

Shaun and Richard back home with the Gold:

Enjoy and Cheers!
Richard.

P.S. Yes – that is the old intro music for the Chicago Bulls