The Humble Gourmand

Label by Drew Art Carlisle

Tuesday, November 4th, 11:28pm EST: Champagne corks went flying into the night as CNN called the election for Barack Obama.

Tuesday, November 4th, 11:34pm EST: one final bottle of The Audacity of Hops was cracked open and passed around as I finally saw the news that let me believe it: the headline at foxnews.com said just two, non-snarky words, “President Obama.”

For those out there who haven’t read up on your specialty nanobrewery-produced election night beers, The Audacity of Hops was my entry into that niche category. I started thinking about brewing a commemorative beer back in primary season (oh, the memories…) so I had several different contingency plans depending on how the electorate voted. There could have been a Hillary RodhAmber Ale, or, on the other side of the aisle, Mike Huckabeer, or perhaps Ron Paulaner. Good thing we dodged the Sarah Pale Ale, and I’m guessing maybe 729 Americans in total would want to drink the Greenest Doppelbock around, Ralph Naderator. Another 34 would quaff a (Step Up To The) Bob Barr.

Yet one candidate stood out from the rest. And just one terrible pun could be made about him. Thus was born, “The Audacity of Hops.”

It started as a twinkle in my eye, a mere chuckle at the wordplay. Then the concept grew by leaps and bounds, as I searched for the correct mix of ingredients to ensure it to be appealing to Young and Old, Republicans and Democrats, Men and Women, and all Colors of the Rainbow. Oh, and it had to taste good, too.

So I set off scouring the country, and ultimately the world, to find those ingredients. How to represent Barack Obama through beer? Well, it was obvious that it had to have malt, the backbone of beer, so I added even amounts of dark malt and pale malt to give it a beautiful brown color. Victory malt, a specially-kilned variety of barley, also had a place. For good measure, I threw in a couple of pounds of corn sugar, from Kansas and Illinois. There had to be hops, so Challenger and Progress seemed like logical choices.

Then, how to symbolize Obama’s global origins? A blend of coffees from Kenya, Indonesia, and Hawaii, roasted by my own dad (Beans From My Father?) The water is all filtered tap water from the District of Columbia, my home and now that of President-Elect Obama.

There were 51 bottles in all, representing the 50 states plus DC. Yes, each label is numbered, and yes, I’ve set aside #50 for president-elect Obama if he ever wants to stop by for a beer.

Due to the astonishing interest and support I’ve gotten for this project, I’m considering a sequel – to quote a fellow blogger, a “Four More Beers!” type of thing. I hope to have The Audacity of Hops: InaugurAle 2009 out to celebrate the momentous occasion in January, so keep an eye on this space for details!

*Label created by Drew Art Carlisle, an MFA candidate in graphic design.*

1. Nancy

   October 28 2:09 p.m. 1

   Did you know that there is an anti-Obama ad on your site right now? 2:09 pm Tuesday Oct. 28th

2. Sam

   October 28 4:10 p.m. 2

   Yeah, those Google ads sure are mischievous!

3. Lizzy

   October 28 4:28 p.m. 3

   The Beans from my Father really make the beer! Hope the victory malt fulfill their title.

4. Mel

   October 30 2:48 p.m. 4

   Now it is an anti McCain Palin ad (2:27PM, 10/30/08).

5. Alison

   October 31 11:23 a.m. 5

   At least we are fair and balanced with advertising!

6. Ed

   November 1 5:02 p.m. 6

   Recipe?

7. Sam

   November 3 10:58 a.m. 7

   Ed - if you send me your email at sam@humblegourmand.com I can give you the recipe. Thanks for your interest!

8. Addie

   November 4 11:26 a.m. 8

   What a great article! It is so well written and every detail is just so clever. Here's to both the brew and you! Bravo!
   

9. Sweetie

   November 4 12:13 p.m. 9

   The combination of your beer and the fact that Ben & Jerry's is giving out free cones to voters today really makes me want to consider voting today, maybe.

10. Anderson

    November 5 10:56 a.m. 10

    best idea EVER.

11. Matt Hendry

    November 9 5:40 p.m. 11

    Can you publish the recipe for this beer under a Creative Commons license like the FREE Beer project .

12. Sam

    November 10 11:57 a.m. 12

    Addie - Thanks so much! I've certainly put a lot of thinking into it all.

    Sweetie - Yeah, we Vermonters sure know how to encourage civic engagement...

    Anderson - Thanks!

    Matt - I'll look into this. I didn't know about the project but it looks interesting!

13. Javier

    November 17 8:24 p.m. 13

    As a beer-lover from Brooklyn, I can tell you I was doing the tour of the Brooklyn Brewery yesterday and, all I could think was: will the Audacity of Hops ever be sold in NYC? If you take a page out of the founder of Brooklyn Brew, maybe you should ditch para-legal and get into brewing! Good luck with inaugurAle 2009!

14. Sam

    December 4 1:39 p.m. 14

    Javier - I'd love to be able to sell AoH in New York! For now, though, I think it will be a DC-only thing ... liquor licensing, crossing state lines, etc.

    You should come down for Inauguration, though - I'm trying to figure out some sort of distribution for the four batches I'm currently brewing. Check back to this website closer to January 20 for updates.

    Thanks for your support!

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