The proprietor of Malt & Vine (the bottle shop in Redmond that shipped everything to me), Doug, even called right after I received the package. He had gotten a FedEx alert that the package had been delivered and called to make sure everything arrived in tact. Now that is good customer service.

Some of the newly arrived brews are in our main fridge. I figured these would be the first to go, so I put the lower-alcohol beers up here. The heavier stuff went downstairs.

Some of the new beers have been stashed into our small wine fridge (we ran out of wine bottles, so it is currently packed with beer bottles – three from this venture and three that have been in there for months). You can see the big bottle of Dogfish Head Fort on display. I tried to put the large bottles in this location (since the fridge was made specifically to fit 750ml bottles).

The last of the stash is in “the beer fridge” along with my homebrew. The hoses that are visible in the foreground of the picture, hanging in front of the impressive selection of bottles, are the tubes that carry sweet homebrew from the kegs to the taps.

So I’ve finally made up my mind about Malt & Vine: they are awesome. I still need to give their shop a rating on RateBeer.com (as well as several of the other places I visited while in Seattle). Doug told me that if I wanted to order more to just call him. I asked if they could ship to Pennsylvania (a friend of mine lives there and recently inquired as to whether I knew of good mail-order brew shops), and the answer was “not really.”

Apparently they can only ship to Pennsylvania if shipping directly to a retailer. So if my friend can get chummy with the management of his favorite retailer, he may be able to convince them to accept packages on his behalf for brews that are unavailable to the retailer. On the top of the list of those brews are the beers from Hair of the Dog, which are generally not available outside of the Pacific Northwest.

They gave me a quote on shipping, and I paid over the phone with a credit card. They told me that the shipper expects transit to take five days, and that they would try to get it out today (if not today then tomorrow). That means I should have my prize sometime early next week.

Also, my Peach Ale really took off. Fermentation was not only visibly noticeable but quite vigorous after less than twelve hours – despite the fact that the yeast were nearly three months old (usually older [i.e. less fresh] yeast exhibit a greater lag time between pitching and active fermentation). I should be able to rack it over the peaches this weekend.

At that same time (if not sooner) I will be racking the Farmhouse Ale into its secondary fermentor. It is still trodding along slowly – bubbles still emerging from its fermentation lock, although slowly and infrequently. I hope that means that it will attenuate well since I was shooting for a somewhat dry beer with that recipe. I even used Belgian candi sugar in the grist to aid in the effort of a dry and light-bodied product, but only time will tell.

As crazy as it may sound (with two brews in kegs and two more on the way currently in fermentors), I am already getting excited about my next brew: Hump’s Best Bitter. This will be my version of an ESB (Extra Special Bitter) – using traditional English ingredients (English Maris Otter malt, English hop varieties, and English ale yeast) but hopped a little more than typical, authentic ESBs. I’m hoping for a nice cross between an ESB and an American Pale Ale.

I’ve realized this year that I am a full-blown hop-head. I’ve always liked bitterness and hops in beer. But this year I’ve really come to appreciate hoppy beers more than before. I used to disdain the American Pale Ale and IPA styles because every microbrewery, including less-than-stellar chain brewpubs, offered them. They all tasted the same to me. But my palate is a little more distinguishing these days, and I find that I can detect nuances in these styles that have reignited a new passion within me for these hoppy treasures. Sure, most microbreweries, including chain brewpubs, offer one of these beers, and it is generally a straight-forward and fairly unimaginative offering. But if they have the right balance with a firm hop presence and a decent malt backbone then I’ll probably enjoy it nevertheless.

And so, this year, I have had cravings to make hoppy ales that I’ve never had before. This next batch, the Best Bitter, will be my third one this year! That is a lot considering I’d only made four of them in the previous seven years (one of which hardly counts because it didn’t turn out very hoppy or very good).

The day after returning, I took it upon myself to brew some beer. I actually purchased all of the ingredients a week ago, before I left for Seattle, with precisely the intention of brewing it up when I was back in town. This beer should be very appropriate for the state of Georgia: Hump’s Peachy Ale. Currently it is just a Belgian specialty ale. But once it is done with its primary fermentation I will be adding eight pounds of peaches to it!

For those that may be curious, I’ll provide a brief recap of the beer-friendly destinations that I visited while in the Seattle area.

• Redhook Ale Brewery – Woodinville, WA (sampled 5 brews)
• Rock Bottom – Bellevue, WA (sampled 8 brews) – This destination was an accident. Our intended destination was not suitable with our son in tow (as it turns out, Brouwer’s Cafe is a bar, not a restaurant). After driving around, searching in vain for something else, we ended up, anti-climactically, at this mediocre, franchise brewpub
• Pyramid Alehouse – Seattle, WA (sampled 10 brews)
• Bottleworks Beer Store – Seattle, WA (purchased 10 beers, 4 of which were consumed in Seattle)
• Elysian Brewing Public House – Seattle, WA (sampled 5 brews)
• Issaquah Brewhouse – Issaquah, WA (sampled 8 brews)
• Malt & Vine Beer and Wine Specialty Shop – Redmond, WA (purchased 15 beers, 2 of which were consumed in Seattle)
• Taphouse Grill – Bellevue, WA (sampled 4 brews)

I’m still not sure what I think about Malt and Vine. The folks working there were super-nice and very knowledgeable. Furthermore, they offered to ship my stuff back home to me in Georgia. I was surprised that they could legally ship to Georgia, but they said after going through lots of paperwork that they are legal to do so (unlike most beer-of-the-month and wine-of-the-month clubs).

You may ask “Why on Earth are you unsure? It sounds great!”

I’m scared of a potential fraud case here. They told me that they would get in touch with me today (being Monday) after I dropped off stuff with them on Friday for them to ship to me here in Georgia. I sent them an e-mail, left them a voicemail, and even spoke with one of them today (the woman I spoke with told me that the guy that works there would call me back). But still nothing. And here it is, 10:30pm (7:30pm Pacific time – and they’re supposedly open until 9pm), and when I call now their phone goes straight to voicemail.

I know I’m probably being paranoid and that everything will work out. But I have close to $200 in fine wine and beer sitting in their store, and they aren’t returning my e-mails or phone calls. That makes me nervous. So when I found out what the deal is, then I’ll be sure that I like the place (or sure that I don’t – but I’m trying to keep my hopes up).

The brews I bought and already sampled while in Seattle were all unique experiences:

• Dogfish Head 120-Minute Imperial IPA
• Hair of the Dog Adam
• Avery “The Beast” Grand Cru Ale
• Dogfish Head Festina Pêche
• Stone India Pale Ale
• Stone Ruination IPA

The last one, Stone’s Ruination IPA, was definitely the best of this group. “Wow” is the best word that describes it. That also happens to be the only word to describe Dogfish Head’s completely over-the-top 120-Minute IPA.

The beers that will (hopefully) soon be shipped to me:

• Avery Fourteen
• Avery Mephistopheles Stout
• Avery Samael’s Oak-Aged Ale
• Deschutes Obsidian Stout
• Dogfish Head Fort
• Dogfish Head Olde School Barleywine
• Dogfish Head Raison D’Extra
• Dogfish Head World Wide Stout
• Elysian Bifrost Winter Ale
• Elysian Dragonstooth Stout
• Full Sail Sun of Spot IPA
• Hair of the Dog Doggie Claws
• Hair of the Dog Fred
• Hair of the Dog Ruth
• Rogue Old Crustacean – 2002 Vintage
• Stone Arrogant Bastard
• Stone Old Guardian
• Stone Vertical Epic 07/07/07
• Unibroue Chambly Noir

Other beers they had that looked tempting were Unibroue’s La Terrible and their 16 (sixteenth anniversary brew). But neither of them are over 14% so hopefully they will be available here in Georgia soon.

On a side note, the Blissful Bock is now on tap at Hump’s (aka my basement). Now that it is carbonated, I’m quite pleased with it. It is not a particularly complex beer, but it wasn’t meant to be. It is a beautiful gold in color, it has a strong aroma of fresh, rising bread, and it is very malty with an earthy and somewhat fruity hop bitterness (thanks to the use of Glacier hops instead of a noble variety).

I brewed a Farmhouse Ale the other week, and I have, quite appropriately, dubbed it Hump’s Farmhouse Ale. I used one of Wyeast’s VSS varieties (short for “Very Special Strain”): 3726 – Farmhouse Ale Yeast (somehow fitting, eh?). I’ll rack it to the secondary before leaving for vacation on Sunday. I also plan on going to the homebrew store on Saturday to get supplies for Hump’s Peachy Ale – a Belgian-style specialty beer made with lots of fresh peaches. I’ll need to hit the store this upcoming Saturday in order to brew on Sunday the 12^th because we don’t get back into town until late evening on the 11^th. I’m hoping to grab another VSS yeast for the peach brew: Wyeast 3822 – Ingelmunster Ale Yeast.