"Bar Month" at OnMilwaukee is back! For the entire month of March, we're serving up fun articles on bars, clubs and beverages – including guides, the latest trends, bar reviews, the results of our Best of Bars poll and more. Follow along with the #DrinkOnMke hashtag too. Grab a designated driver and dive in!
Late last week, Brooklyn’s Other Half Brewing Company announced All Together, an international collaboration IPA that will raise money to support out of work folks in the craft beer industry.
So far, a few dozen breweries around the world have signed on to all brew the same recipe and package it with the same labels and share the profits with their colleagues in need. Among those who are making the beer are The Fermentorium in Cedarburg and 3 Sheeps in Sheboygan.
(UPDATE: Since this story ran, 1840 Brewing, Hacienda Beer Company and Third Space Brewing have also signed on to make All Together IPA.)
According to Other Half, "It's an effort to raise awareness and provide relief, even in the smallest way, to those who are struggling. We're inviting any and all brewers, from any corner of the planet to participate. The recipe is open source, the artwork is public, and the name is yours to use. The goal is to provide you with the tools to make the beer at the lowest possible cost.
"We ask that a portion of the proceeds go to supporting hospitality professionals in your community. The rest should go to keeping you in business to weather this storm. As much as this is about raising money, this is also an exercise in awareness so that local communities can understand how daily life has been upended for those that rely on social gathering to make a living."
All the resources a brewery needs to make and sell the beer – the recipe, the label design, etc. – can be found on the project website.
The dry-hopped IPA recipe calls for carapils malt from Chiton's Briess Malt, as well as Columbus, Mosaic, Cascade, Simcoe and Citra hops.
Milwaukee's Malteurop is offering participating brewers special pricing on the 2-Row and Dextrin products called for in the recipe to help save on brewers' cost of producing the beer.
The beauty of craft beer is that each iteration of this brew will likely be different in some way.
"Everyone's set up is different," says 3 Sheeps Founder and Brewmaster Grant Pauly. "Depending on your water profile, it may make the beer taste more hoppy and bitter for some, or more smooth and malty for others. Equipment is also a big factor. Does the brewery have a centrifuge? With this being such a large dose rate of hops, how large is their whirlpool?
"For these reasons, I'm looking forward to trying the other breweries' versions of this beer to see and taste those small differences."
Brewers, including 3 Sheeps, may tinker aspects of the recipe to suit their customers' tastes and needs, which they know best.
"We decided to drop the ABV slightly," Pauly says. "With so many people home, we thought having a beer closer to 5.2 percent made more sense because it will let someone enjoy a couple of these throughout an afternoon without things getting away from them.
"I know when I look for a beer right now, I'm tending to seek out those under 5.5 percent so I can enjoy a nice treat and still be productive!"
Pauly says 3 Sheeps expects to have the beer ready in the next few weeks.
"With this just launching this past Monday, we need to source some ingredients and get labels made," he says. "Once we have those in hand, we'll announce the date that this can begin to be purchased."
"It's bigger than raising money and awareness for the hospitality industry, which has been hit particularly hard. It's about being part of a community. Not just the beer community or the hospitality community but our own very special community here in Sheboygan that we are proud to call home. The proceeds from our taproom sales of this beer will stay right here in Sheboygan to aid in efforts to support our friends and neighbors in the hospitality industry."
Meanwhile, The Fermentorium posted, "A portion of the proceeds from the sale of this beer will be commited to the Greater Milwaukee Hospitality Industry (Milwaukee, Waukesha, Ozaukee, and Washington counties)."
"We're hoping (to have it ready) by the end of the month at the latest," adds he brewery's Maggie Skinner.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
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