Podcast appearances and mentions of natalie cilurzo

Harry Duke and Natalie Cilurzo Harry Duke is live at Russian River Brewing Co. in Windsor on this special edition of Brew Ha Ha to talk about Pliny the Younger 2025 from the floor of the Russian River Windsor pub. Also today on Brew Ha Ha, Hendrik Verspecht from CuVer Brewing is visiting Steve Jaxon and Herlinda Heras in the studio. That portion of today's show is on this other podcast page, to allow each guest to have their own audio and podcast indexing. Natalie Cilurzo is with Harry to talk about how it's all going. Pliny the Younger is a triple IPA which gets a recipe tweak most years. This year, the addition of Tangier hops brings some orange, grapefruit, tangerine and mango, in addition to other hints of pine resin. It's a little more bitter than last year, which counteracts the fruitiness and elevates the flavor profile. It is remarkably smooth, for 10.4% abv. Pliny the Younger 2025 Release Dates The annual release of Pliny the Younger 2025 this year runs from March 21 to April 3. It will be on tap and in bottles to go until April 3. The wait times today are about 2 hours downtown, and more than 3 hours in Windsor. Natalie and Vinny like to greet the visitors waiting in line and they make a lot of friends. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more. There are visitors from all over the country and some international visitors too. Pliny the Younger's economic impact on Sonoma County is consistently strong. The Chamber of Commerce reports that it brings in several million dollars of extra business every year. Visit our sponsor Pizzaleah in Windsor for the finest pizza menu and the most authentic flavors around!

Natalie with Pliny the Younger 2025. Natalie Cilurzo is back with the first taste of the 2025 Pliny the Younger, on Brew Ha Ha with Steve Jaxon and Herlinda Heras. This will be the 21st release of Pliny the Younger. They used to release in February but during covid they moved it to last march early April. That turned out to be better for a lot of reasons. So this year the dates are March 21 through April 3. They continue to do wholesale distribution to bars and restaurants in February. This helps them get an attraction during the slower winter months. Also, San Francisco Beer Week is coming. Today they are finishing the brewing and bottling and kegging, but the first people to taste it are on this show today. Dan Berger is here as a special guest, and so is Mackenzie Miller, who is the host of Mid-days on the Krush, KRSH. Brew Ha Ha will do a remote broadcast March 27, to be confirmed. The last time we did a remote was when Windsor opened in 2018. Russian River Brewing Co. Hop Water Since many people participate in Dry January, Russian River Brewing Co. produces a Hop Water, which is sparkling water flavored with Citra and Eldorado hops. It's very refreshing. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more. Every year at Valentine's Day they make a beer called Rejection, a dark beer made with Belgian yeast. It is toasty and has coffee flavors. It is 6.1% ABV. Dan Berger describes it as rich without being sweet, perfect for dry January because it finishes dry. It is available on tap only at the two pubs, or to-go in growlers. Then they taste another beer called Docta-Ron, named after a New Zealand hop breeder. It is available in cans and on tap. This is the 21st year of Pliny the Younger. Vinny Cilurzo tweaks the recipe every year and this year the long list of hops used includes a new one. It has an orange-y flavor and makes the 2025 Pliny the Younger, according to Dan Berger, the tastiest one ever. Russian River Brewing Co. is also making a wildfire relief beer called We "heart" LA. A brewery in LA called Common Space started a fund raising beer. Here is their website. The beer is set to be released all at once by all the collaborators on March 7. Now finally it is time to taste the Pliny the Younger 2025. Dan Berger declares it the most amazing beer ever produced. It is over 10% ABV and it is very dry and clear. Amarillo, Citra, Mosaic, Nectaron, Simcoe, Warrior and Tangier. Tangier is a new hop from Washington and they like it for its orange flavors. Dan says the beer has more floral qualities than last year. The Pine flavors definiteliy come from the Simcoe. Dan says this beer is like a great wine, full of complexities and unexpected flavors. They are kegging it tomorrow and it will start going out for distribution on Monday, Feb. 2. Look around at your usual bars and restaurants, look for your usual suspects... Happy hunting! Visit our sponsor Pizzaleah in Windsor for the finest pizza menu and the most authentic flavors around!

Natalie Cilurzo Natalie Cilurzo is back on Brew Ha Ha with Steve Jaxon and Herlinda Heras. Russian River Brewing Co. is celebrating 20 years in Santa Rosa and 6 years at the Windsor location.  The special beer called Pliny for President 2024 is back. Pliny has been running for president every time around since they opened the brewpub. They have quarterly releases of Pliny for President, so this is the last batch until 2028. The beer is very hop forward, featuring Simcoe, Amarillo, Citra, Zumo and Nectaron hops. Pliny is the candidate of the Keg Party. Vinny is known as the Hopfather, and also for his Belgian-inspired sour, barrel aged beers. He grew up in a winery in Temecula where his parents planted the first wine grapes in 1968. He grew up in the vineyard and in the cellar and on the bottling line. Intinction This beer called Intinction, which is dipping bread into wine. It is almost like a Lambrusco, red and bubbly. The grapes are Petite Syrah, which is a dark grape and gives a dark color. The ABV is high because it went through 2 fermentations, it is 10.26%. It won a bronze medal at the Great American Beer Festival. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more. They are installing some new equipment for CO2 recovery from their closed top cylindrical fermentation tanks which will reduce their need to purchase CO2. They also have a wastewater treatment plant. The purple pipes carry this water which is treated water and is used for landscaping. They built their Windsor facility with dual plumbing, so they are ready to make the switch to the purple pipes when the regulations catch up to the new law. Shadow of a Doubt beer is named after the Alfred Hitchcock film which was shot in 1943 in Santa Rosa. The beer is a dark imperial porter. A local graphic designer designed the label. Tonight at dusk they are showing the movie in the beer garden in Windsor.  

In this second installment of our trip to the 2024 Firestone Walker Invitational in Paso Robles, CA. we change things up a bit topic-wise. For this discussion we decided to cover some of the things that breweries do other than beer, like community outreach, partnerships, causes, and involvement in things that their customers care about. So we enlisted Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing in California, DJ MCCready from Mountain Culture in New South Wales, Australia, and Bob Kunz from Highland Park in Los Angeles. Listen in as we discuss it all live from the Firestone Walker Invitational Beer Festival. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There is no new Brew Ha Ha show today, due to travel schedules, so for this week's podcast edition here is an encore show of a visit with Ron Lindenbush from last March. Brew Ha Ha will be back with a new episode next week, Thursday Aug. 1. Cheers! Ron Lindenbusch, Hopland Tap founder and owner, is back again on Brew Ha Ha with Steve Jaxon and Herlinda Heras. He has been on Brew Ha Ha several times, including this episode on July 5, 2018, again on May 28, 2020 along with Natalie Cilurzo, and again on May 6, 2021. These episodes chronicle Ron's career with Lagunitas up to and including the Heineken purchase. Today's live radio show is a triple-header. We have two other guests in the studio along with Ron today. The episode with Cynthia from Homerun Pizza is here. Ryan Frank, brewmaster at Headlands Brewing, also has his own podcast episode on this page. Since he left Lagunitas at the end of a very successful run, Ron Lindenbusch found the perfect location in Hopland to set up the tavern that he always dreamed of. Steve remembers when it was the Hopland Brewery, they had bands including some pretty famous ones. Hopland Tap also does live music. This Saturday the band is Left-Hand Monkey Wrench. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more. On Tap at Museum of Sonoma County Herlinda Heras is helping the Museum of Sonoma County develop its upcoming exhibition ON TAP about the history of brewing in Sonoma County. Ron Lindenbush was with her at the museum today to record some video that will be used in the exhibition. He personally holds a lot of the stories of the history that is the subject of the exhibit. See our sponsor Victory House at Poppy Bank Epicenter online, for their latest viewing and menu options. They are tasting a non-alcoholic beer that Ron makes. It actually tastes like beer. One is called Electro Lime. Ron explains that it is made just like beer, then the alcohol is removed. What remains is a beverage that actually tastes like beer. The non-alcoholic beer scene is completely different than it was ten years ago.

Ron Lindenbusch, Hopland Tap founder and owner, is back again on Brew Ha Ha with Steve Jaxon and Herlinda Heras. He has been on Brew Ha Ha several times, including this episode on July 5, 2018, again on May 28, 2020 along with Natalie Cilurzo, and again on May 6, 2021. These episodes chronicle Ron's career with Lagunitas up to and including the Heineken purchase. We have some other guests in the studio with Ron today. Cynthia Caughie is here, from Homerun Pizza and so is Ryan Frank, brewmaster at Headlands Brewing. Each of their conversations have their own podcast episode, Homerun Pizza here and Headlands Brewing on this page. Since he left Lagunitas at the end of a very successful run, Ron found the perfect location in Hopland to set up the tavern that he always dreamed of. Steve remembers when it was the Hopland Brewery, they had bands including some pretty famous ones. Hopland Tap also does live music. This Saturday the band is Left-Hand Monkey Wrench. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more. Herlinda Heras is helping the Museum of Sonoma County develop its upcoming exhibition ON TAP about the history of brewing in Sonoma County. Ron Lindenbush was with her at the museum today to record some video that will be used in the exhibition. He personally holds a lot of the stories of the history that is the subject of the exhibit. See our sponsor Victory House at Poppy Bank Epicenter online, for their latest viewing and menu options. They are tasting a non-alcoholic beer that Ron makes. It actually tastes like beer. One is called Electro Lime. Ron explains that it is made just like beer, then the alcohol is removed. What remains is a beverage that actually tastes like beer. The non-alcoholic beer scene is completely different than it was ten years ago. Visit Homerun Pizza, home of the Knuckleball! Fresh pizza dough made from scratch daily, la pizza è deliziosa!

Russian River co-owner Natalie Cilurzo joins the Brewbound Podcast On Location at the California Craft Beer Summit to discuss the 20th anniversary release of Pliny the Younger triple IPA, with festivities starting this weekend. Cilurzo discusses creating an experience that brings back repeat customers, its economic impact and Pliny babies. She also shares the strategy behind the Pliny for President quarterly releases, the growth of lager in the Russian River portfolio and much more.    Calicraft founder and CEO Blaine Landberg and marketing director and brewmaster Thomas Vo share how the brewery is expanding beyond beer with the Bloom line of fruit-forward offerings. They also explore their own-premise expansion strategy and share a wild pre-pandemic story.    Plus, the Brewbound team breaks down the latest news, including layoffs at Cigar City, a new CMO at New Belgium and Deschutes' national plans for non-alcoholic beer. The team also plays Another Round or Tabbing Out on a pricey Voodoo Ranger and Tombstone collab and Hard MTN Dew's attempts to be abducted by aliens.

For the 20th season, I share my favorite, most memorable moments during the Consumed podcast. Featured in this episode: David Walker, Firestone Walker Brewing, Paso Robles Max Montgomery, There Does Not Exist, San Luis Obispo Jack Dyer, Topa Topa Brewing Company, Ventura Vinnie and Natalie Cilurzo, Russian River Brewing, Santa Rosa

There are few businesses I'd travel multiple hours to visit, but Russian River Brewing is one of them—and I am most certainly not alone. Vinnie and Natalie Cilurzo are the minds behind Pliny the Younger, one of the culty-est brews in the world, and one that is only available for a short time each spring. The brewery only makes a certain amount of this perfectly-balanced triple IPA, and only sells it for two weeks in March. People from around the globe line up outside their two locations to wait for the doors to open, and the economic impact on Sonoma County stands at $6.1 million, just for Pliny the Younger week. We talked about Vinnie growing up in a pioneering Temecula winery, how they met when Natalie bought booze for an underaged Vinnie, and the terror they felt that first time Pliny caught the world's attention. I drove to their second location in Windsor for the day to hang out and chat, and the nine hours I spent driving were absolutely worth it. Website: russianriverbrewing.com Instagram: @russianriverbrewingofficial      

Shadow of a Doubt Natalie Cilurzo, co-owner of Russian River Brewing Co. joins Herlinda Heras and Steve Jaxon on Brew Ha Ha to talk about their plans for 2024. 2024 is going to be a big year for Russian River Brewing Co. First, it is their 20th anniversary. They opened on April 3, 2004, on 4th St. in Santa Rosa. They also released the first Pliny the Younger in 2005. The Pliny release dates are now March 22 – April 4. They do wholesale distribution on draft for retail customers in February, still. Pliny the Younger is a super hoppy triple IPA, about 10.25% ABV. It started as a beer they made to drum up some business during the slow season. For several years they did this with no fanfare. But in 2010 people started communicating online, including at sites like RateBeer.com. The beer was rated one of the best beers in the world. Since then, it has grown into an international hit. For more about the 2023 Pliny the Younger, here is Natalie's BHH podcast episode from last February. They do no advertising and its success is 100% consumer driven and they only made two batches at the Santa Rosa pub, so probably about 60 kegs. They always remind their team how important it is not to take its success for granted. It's on tap for two weeks, and people can buy a limited amount. It gets pretty crowded on weekends. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more. Natalie describes the base recipe of Pliny the Younger as Pliny the Elder on steroids. It uses a lot of hops but almost every year there is a tweak to the hops chosen. Shadow of a Doubt They taste Shadow of a Doubt seasonal porter. It's 9.9% and is named after an Alfred Hitchcock film that was shot in Santa Rosa in 1943. One final announcement, Pliny will be running for President again, Pliny for President and Blind Pig for Veep. On December 12, it will be released on tap and then it will be brewed quarterly through election season. Blind Pig Brewing Company was the name of Vinny Cilurzo's first brewery, back in Temecula, California in 1994.

Brew Ha Ha is back, with Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Co. and Jenny Ogston from Victory House at Poppy Bank Epicenter. The Drive with Steve Jaxon is back on the air, on Wine Country Radio 95.5 FM, weekdays 3-6 pm. The Drive is also streaming at TheDrive955.com. Brew Ha Ha is also back on Thursday afternoons on The Drive. Steve Jaxon is hosting today's episode, along with Herlinda Heras. Herlinda Heras is just back from Finland where she was judging the Sahti competition there. She talks about being a judge at competitions around the world. Some are in countries with long beer traditions like Germany, Belgium and Poland. Others, like Portugal, are developing new brewing industries now. In Finland, the Sahti is a traditional brew that dates back to Viking times. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more. Jenny Ogston talks about how the Victory House is set up for the coming football season. They have over 40 TV screens just in the Victory House area of the Poppy Bank Epicenter. Russian River Brewing News Natalie Cilurzo has news about the Russian River Brewing Co. and their dog-friendly location in Windsor. The beer garden is open every day and the pub is open Wednesday through Sunday. The beer garden has lots of shade. They also have a couple of new statues from the Schultz Museum. She got a set, of Peppermint Pattie and Marcie playing frisbee. They are on display in the beer garden. There are pictures on the Russian River Brewing Instagram page. See our sponsor Victory House at Poppy Bank Epicenter online, for their latest viewing and menu options. Line Dancing at Victory House Victory House now had Country line dancing, with free lessons on Tuesday nights and large events on Friday nights with DJs. They also have bingo on Wednesdays with Harry Duke and trivia on Thursdays. Poppy Bank Epicenter has everything from indoor soccer, basketball, volleyball, trampolines and bowling. They also have laser tag, virtual reality and a large arcade with lots of old and new games. They host big events and just had their largest one ever for 1500 guests. There is something to do for the whole family. They used to have axe throwing for about one eight-month period, which was fun and frightening. Russian River Brewing Co. is approaching its twentieth anniversary next year of the downtown Santa Rosa pub. It is also the twentieth anniversary of Pliny the Younger. Natalie talks about a seasonal release called “It takes a lot of great beer to make great wine.” It is a light and refreshing hoppy blonde ale, about 5.25% alcohol. Russian River Brewing Co. is finishing a construction project at the Windsor pub, turning one of their production spaces into a Lager house. They will brew more STS Pils and Velvet Glow Lager. The package will be a 6-pack of 12-ounce cans for the first time, which will be available in November or December. Hop Time Harvest Ale is coming out soon, using all Alexander Valley grown hops. Also, Natalie and Vinny will be making their annual trip to the Pacific Northwest to select hops from this year's harvest. The Fall Season at Epicenter The Fall is a busy season at Epicenter. Victory House is their feature bar, with 24 beers on tap. Half of their beers are locally produced. 25% off arcade games, bowling and more, Monday-Thursday from noon to 6pm, entertainment is 25% off. Kid's Night Out is every second Saturday of the month, and there is live music from local bands on Saturdays. They also have Comedy Night one Friday a month. The also taste another RRBC brew, Hop Father IPA, which is named after one of Vinny's nicknames. Finally, Natalie describes a charity collaboration to benefit Maui that Russian River Brewing Co. is participating in. After the fires that struck the island recently, hundreds of breweries are participating by brewing the special recipe and sen...

This episode features Tara Nurin, author of A Woman's Place Is In the Brewhouse. It was originally recorded on November 4, 2021. The Drive has been on summer vacation and we haven't had new Brew Ha Ha shows. This is the last repeat episode before next week when The Drive returns to live radio, Wine Country Radio 95.5 FM, Mon-Fri 3-6. The first new episode of Brew Ha Ha will be Thursday, August 24. Cheers! Tara Nurin Tara Nurin, author of A Woman's Place Is In The Brewhouse, joins Herlinda Heras and Harry Duke on Brew Ha Ha today. Mark Carpenter is away this week and Harry Duke is sitting in for Steve Jaxon. Tara Nurin is the Forbes magazine beer and spirits business writer. She has been working on this book for four years and she is finally on book tour! She has a book signing event at Russian River Brewing Co. on December 16, 2021. Herlinda suggests she could do a special label beer for the occasion.  Tara describes the book, the first to document the rich history of women in brewing. The book looks at economic, political and religious factors and there are interviews with all the prominent women in the brewing business over the last several decades, such as Natalie Cilurzo, CEO of Russian River Brewing Co. New Albion Most people do not know the whole story about the first new ground-up craft brewery in the US after Prohibition, founded in 1976 in the town of Sonoma, called New Albion. There were two women who worked with the founder Jack McAuliffe, and they did the funding and the accounting. They were hard to get for interviews but Tara met one of them, Susie, and features her story in the book. Tara Nurin will be at Russian River Brewing Co. on December 16, for a book signing of "A Woman's Place Is In The Brewhouse: A forgotten history of alewives, brewsters, witches and CEOs." Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more.   Visit our sponsor The Beverage People / Fermenter's Warehouse for everything you would ever need to make beer and all kinds of other fermented foods and drinks, at home.

We continue the Brew Ha Ha summer vacation with this repeat podcast of an episode from October 5, 2021, all about fresh hops, with Natalie and Vinny Cilurzo, co-owners of Russian River Brewing Co. Cheers! Fresh Hops are front and center today on Brew Ha Ha with Steve Jaxon and Mark Carpenter, as we welcome Vinnie and Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Company. Vinnie and Natalie are the co-owners of Russian River Brewing Co. and they have brought a pack of fresh hops into the studio today. Now is a busy time, the hops are being harvested and there are special hoppy beers being made and enjoyed. (This was recorded during Covid-19 times.) The Russian River Brewing Co. Winds0r location and the Santa Rosa pub are both open. They have been using the parklette on 4th Street, which was done to allow social distancing for Covid precautions, and while they won't be there forever, they are using it and enjoying it for as long as possible. They also have some longer term construction plans to expand in Santa Rosa. Vinnie says that RRBC has brought in a lot of fruit lately, peaches and grape pumice, Syrah and Sauvignon Blanc, which they use in various fruity beers with some sour tartness. They have one called Hop Time, which is on tap and in cans in their brew pubs only. It's the only way to get it. They made a double batch in Santa Rosa. It uses wet hops so it is a bulky job, using locally grown hops from the Crane ranch. RRBC has a sour beer club, only for fans of that style, no hoppy beers. "Next year, we will make Hop Time with barley that Ron and Erica Crane have grown, also. So that will make it a complete local beer," says Vinnie.   Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more.

Harry Duke & Natalie Cilurzo. While The Drive is on vacation and there is no new BHH show today, here is a reissue of the show from last February 2, with the very first taste of the 2023 Pliny the Younger, featuring special guest Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Co. Enjoy! Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Company joins Brew Ha Ha with the first growler of the Pliny the Younger 2023 edition. Later, the subject changes to SF Beer Week, when Colin McDonald from Hen House Brewing and Gail Williams will also be on. That portion of today's live show will have its own separate podcast page, here. Today's episode of Brew Ha Ha continues a tradition of Russian River Brewing Co. bringing the new Pliny the Younger into the KSRO studios for its first tasting. Here is last year's episode on the same occasion. A Triple IPA Pliny the Younger is a Triple IPA, which means it is a lot hoppier and a little bit higher in alcohol than regular double IPA beers. It is actually a quadruple dry hopped beer. “There is a copious amount of hops in this beer, which gives it that beautiful luscious aroma.” The hops are Simcoe, Amarillo, Chinook, Citra, Mosaic, Nectaron, Warrior and Elixir. Elixir, “the strawberry hop,” was added last year. Nectaron is the new hop for 2023. It brings nectarine and candied citrus fruit flavors. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Click the logo to visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more info. Pliny the Younger's official release will happen from March 24 through April 6. During that time it will be on tap in Santa Rosa and Windsor. Guests will be limited to three 10-oz. pours and bottles will be available too, at the brewery. You can purchase bottles or sit down at the brewery. They started local distribution today and there are hundreds of locations serving it. Rejection is their Valentine's Day Ale. It is on tap and in cans at their two locations. Visit our sponsor Victory House at Poppy Bank Epicenter online, for their latest viewing and menu options.

Throughout the Aughts, craft beer's popularity rose roughly in tandem with social media, and in 2010, the two would collide at Northern California's Russian River Brewing Co. Husband-and-wife team Vince and Natalie Cilurzo opened the taproom one wintry Saturday expecting a low-key day slinging pints and growlers of their triple India pale ale, Pliny the Younger, but what they got instead was one of the first major examples of the craft beer industry's online-ratings hype machine. Joining Taplines is Natalie Cilurzo herself to tell us all about that fateful February when Russian River's fortunes changed for the better—and craft brewing's semi-notorious "line culture" was born. Don't forget to like, review, and subscribe! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Live from the California Craft Beer Summit, the Brewbound team catches up with Russian River's Natalie Cilurzo on the 2023 launch of Pliny the Younger triple IPA, the brewery's shift from sours to lagers and more. Plus, Oak Park Brewing's Rodg Little discusses the Sacramento brewery's mission, the People's beer and much more.

Harry & Natalie. Natalie Cilurzo brings the 2023 Pliny the Younger from Russian River Brewing Co. to Brew Ha Ha with Harry Duke and Herlinda Heras today. This is the 19th presentation of the new Pliny the Younger. This version is a little bit different than the one that premiered in February. The Pliny the Younger base recipe is fairly stable, at about 10.25% ABV, but there is a tweak to the hops and this year that is a new hop from New Zealand called Nectaron. Vinny decided to put a little more bittering hops into the second mix. The hop aroma is brilliant and beautiful and the flavors really shine through. The New Release Schedule In February they did a limited release. The first Friday in February used to be the launch date. Last year they had to postpone distribution due to a Covid outbreak, and what they found out was that their accounts appreciated the rollout this way, so they will continue to release for wholesale, draft only, in February and then in person, on draft and in bottles, for their brewpubs only, in late March. Natalie describes about a four-month process they have to manage for the release event. There is merchandise galore to design and order, the label, packaging, timing and logistics for all that, wristbands, et cetera. There are 28,000 unique wristbands, marked with date and location, with four pull tabs. The first three tabs are redeemable for one 10-ounce pour. The fourth, or B tab, allows the bearer to purchase two bottles to go. A lot of people enjoy the social event, including meeting people in line. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their Windsor location. Click the logo to visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more info. There are usually 20 beers on tap at Russian River Brewing Co. in addition to Pliny the Younger. They are releasing Hopfather IPA and a sour peach beer, tomorrow. Visit our sponsor Victory House at Poppy Bank Epicenter online, for their latest viewing and menu options. Herlinda and Natalie were at the California Craft Brewers Association conference this week. On the last day, the final talk had Natalie, Vinny and Ken Grossman on stage talking about the beer business and then they served a taste of Pliny for everyone, which was a big hit. There is a cheese tasting too, for people waiting in line. The California Artisan Cheese Festival is at the Fairgrounds, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Cowgirl Creamery, Cypress Grove and others will be there.

Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Company joins Brew Ha Ha with the first growler of the Pliny the Younger 2023 edition. Later, the subject changes to SF Beer Week, when Colin McDonald from Hen House Brewing and Gail Williams will also be on. That portion of today's live show will have its own separate podcast page, here. Today's episode of Brew Ha Ha continues a tradition of Russian River Brewing Co. bringing the new Pliny the Younger into the KSRO studios for its first tasting. Here is last year's episode on the same occasion. Pliny the Younger is a Triple IPA, which means it is a lot hoppier and a little bit higher in alcohol than regular double IPA beers. It is actually a quadruple dry hopped beer. “There is a copious amount of hops in this beer, which gives it that beautiful luscious aroma.” The hops are Simcoe, Amarillo, Chinook, Citra, Mosaic, Nectaron, Warrior and Elixir. Elixir, “the strawberry hop,” was added last year. Nectaron is the new hop for 2023. It brings nectarine and candied citrus fruit flavors. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Click the logo to visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more info. Pliny the Younger's official release will happen from March 24 through April 6. It will be on tap in Santa Rosa and Windsor. Guests will be limited to three 10-oz. pours and bottles will be available too, at the brewery. You can purchase bottles or sit down at the brewery. They started local distribution today and there are hundreds of locations serving it. Rejection is their Valentine's Day Ale. It is on tap and in cans at their two locations. Visit our sponsor Victory House at Poppy Bank Epicenter online, for their latest viewing and menu options. 

Bell's Beer is now available in California and John Mallett from Bell's Brewery calls in to Harry Duke and Herlinda Heras on Brew Ha Ha to tell about it. He is an old friend of Vinny and Natalie Cilurzo. They have a history of working together, including founding the Hops Quality Group. Bell's Beer has not been available in California, until now. John is very pleased to be able to get into the northern California market. The brewery has won some of the same awards that Russian River Brewing Co. has won. The brewery has grown steadily since its founding in the 1980s. He has been at Bell's since 2001. Their website tells the whole story of their beers available today, as well as their entire history. They also do a lot of community support and outreach. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Click the logo to visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more info. The Beer Finder on the Bell's website is a search tool that will point you to where to find all of their beers. The page is a database lookup, so you can enter search terms such as location, type of beer, type of retail location and distance from your zip code. The database will then return search results to suggest where to go to get the beer. There are 30 different locations around Sonoma County where Bell's Beer is available. Bottle Barn also has some of their beers. Visit our sponsor Victory House online for their latest viewing and menu options.

It's not possible to tell the story of modern craft beer without Vinnie and Natalie Cilurzo and their famous Russian River Brewing. Join your hosts this week as they give a brief history of this brewery and share how important it has been to their own craft beer journeys. Also, Jason shares his hunt for Bell's and Stephen gets his first tattoo. Beer Tastings - Jason - Blueberry Muffin, Great Notion Brewing, Portland, OR. Style: Tart Pastry Ale Stephen - Feelin' The Flow, Sun Lab Brewing, Miami, FL. Style: American Sour with Tangerine, Plum, and Pomegranate --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

Kevin Scoles & Natalie Cilurzo. Almanac Beer Company's Kevin Scoles and Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Co. join Brew Ha Ha hosts Herlinda Heras and Harry Duke. Kevin is assistant director of sales at Almanac Brewing and Russian River Brewing Co. is a Brew Ha Ha sponsor. They begin with two Russian River Brewing Co. beers. Citra Flash Mob IPA is mostly Citra hop and was just canned this week. Blind Pig IPA is a classic west coast style, a clear beer about 6.4% ABV. Blind Pig is close to Vinny Cilurzo's original recipe started at his original brewery, Blind Pig Brewing Co. in Temecula, which he opened in 1994. Flow Pale Ale Almanac Beer Co. is introducing Flow Pale Ale, their new west coast style pale ale. Herlinda remembers tasting the third R&D batch. It's light bodied, with a clean finish. The Flow Fest on July 9 will be the premiere event. The brewery is located on the old Alameda Naval Air Station. Admiral Malting is their next-door neighbor. Their facility was built in 1938 entirely out of redwood. Their name comes from the Farmer's Almanac, which has been published since 1888. It was known as a history of weather patterns, for farmers. They want the brewery to represent agriculture and the local farmers who produce what goes into the beer, which also ties into their menu. Their motto is, “Beer is agriculture.” The brewery was founded in 2011 to apply farm-to-table principles with beer. They have been in their current facility for the last four years. Kolsch is one of their core beers, the fastest growing beer in their lineup. It is 5% ABV and he calls it their “Sunday lawn mowing beer.” It's a kind of cross between an ale and a lager. They have picnic tables inside and a large outdoor area and food trucks, and free parking. The outdoor space has been a life-saver for them during Covid. Russian River Brewing Co. is open in Santa Rosa on 4th St. and at their big Windsor location. Visit their website for up-to-date hours, menus, beers and more info. Pliny the Younger has a positive economic impact in Sonoma County due to the tourist traffic that it generates. Today Natalie describes some 2022 statistics that show increases that were reported in the Press-Democrat. The 6.1 million dollar impact is a 20% increase over last year. It includes spending on hotels, restaurants, etc. “It means a lot to us,” says Natalie. Kevin describes his journey into beer, which actually started in music. He worked for an guitar and accessory maker, the Ernie Ball company. As a home brewer, he knew he would enjoy working in the brewing business. He started in a distribution company and there, he got to know the two co-founders of Almanac Brewing. About a year ago he began working for them. They are tasting an Adambier, which is a German style, not very well known. It is a strong, dark lager originally from Dortmund. It is 6.7% ABV with a hint of tartness.

On this episode of the Brew Ha Ha podcast, Tara Nurin calls in from Minneapolis, Minnesota, to report on the Craft Brewers Conference and Brew Expo America. She writes about the business of beverage and spirits for Forbes magazine. She has recently published a book, A Woman's Place Is In The Brewhouse, which Herlinda reports has surpassed 10,000 sales on that big website that people buy stuff from, and she is also thee most frequent guest ever to appear on Brew Ha Ha. Tara Nurin tells the story starting with the great relief everyone felt, to be around friends and colleagues again. Natalie Cilurzo was the keynote speaker and people are coming away with a good feeling about it all. Herlinda mentions that Bart Watson, economist for the Brewer's Association, has published some data that looks good even after the pandemic. Tara tells of people who opened breweries in 2019 and 2020 who tell about surviving and growing their businesses. There were a lot of pessimistic predictions but in the end more breweries made it than they thought would, at first. Tara is also working with NZ Hops, which means New Zealand-grown hops. Meagan Andersen was on last year on this episode, to talk about NZ Hops. Among the many types of hops they sell, they have one called Nectaron® that was developed after a 17-year R&D process. There was a poll of brewers who voted this the most popular hops that they would like to get. There are some proud and happy 5th generation farmers in New Zealand now. NZ Hops is also selling a new hop oil product that is very easy to ship and is also "super-sustainable." Instead of shipping a box of pellets, they ship a box of vials, which is much easier.

Natalie Cilurzo is in today with Harry Duke and Herlinda Heras for the debut of Pliny the Younger, the incredibly popular and world-renowned beer from Russian River Brewing Company. They are also working on an international collaboration with a Ukrainian brewery, part of an international call to action, to breweries to brew this beer and donate the proceeds to Ukrainian refugee relief. RRBC is releasing theirs on April 1 along with a special brewing of their Defenestration beer. All of the proceeds are going to humanitarian efforts for Ukraine. The strong golden ale will be relatively low alcohol, and the other will be higher in alcohol and hoppier. This year they brewed Pliny the Younger but they had to hold it back due to public health concerns. The recipe it the same as last year's edition, with a total of ten different varieties of hops. Elixir is a French hop, with a spicy, citrus-y berry note. They think it adds an interesting strawberry note to the beer this year. Otherwise, it has typical Russian River Brewing Co. characteristics, very dry with a balanced finish, deceptively smooth. Natalie says that this feels like “a typical Covid wedding” that has been postponed a few times but it is finally in motion. They have even been able to hire back a couple of tour guides and they also have a self-guided tour. The postponement has been a blessing in disguise since they are better prepared this time. “Cheers to resilience and perseverance, and to beer keeping the world going around and friendship through beer.” –Herlinda Heras Pliny the Younger is golden and has a nice white head and a dry finish. There are rules for the public serving of Pliny the Younger in the pub and they are almost the same as last time, except the time limit is two and a half hours, down from three hours, previously. They wanted to have a little more time to clean the places between guests, and also to keep the line moving. They also limit everyone to three 10-oz. pours. Natalie recommends that if people are tasting other beers, they should have them first, and have some food, before trying Pliny the Younger. This is a seated food and beverage experience and Pliny is such a significant beer that you mustn't expect your palette to be able to deal with other brews after tasting it. The only way to get bottles is to wait in line for your allotment. The dates are March 25 through April 7, daily at both pubs, 11am to 10pm. They are allocating a certain amount of beer for each day, based on their estimate of daily need. Only on rare occasions have they run out of either draft or bottles on a busy Saturday. Some folks are already on line now. They had trouble once in 2010 with counterfeit wristbands so now they have custom made ones that are more secure. Herlinda Heras points out that this event is recognized as ann important driver for tourist activity in the area. The Sonoma County EDB (Economic Development Board) has estimated the total economic impact in 2020 of more than $5 million dollars. Natalie says that she and Vinny are most proud of that fact.

To kick off Season 2: Episode 29 ATB welcomed one of the biggest names in craft beer, Natalie Cilurzo of Russian River Brewing.  Natalie and her husband Vinny recently signed up to help the people of Ukraine by joining Pravda Brewing in the Victory Beer Series and brewing their version of Putin Huylo.  Natalie was a great guest and ATB was blessed to have her commit some time to come on the podcast.Following Natalie's interview, Rob from Hazeboiz called in to discuss kids at the brewery.  Why would we give an entire segment to an argument as old as time in the craft beer world?  Well it just so happens that one of ATB's favorite local breweries, Twin Elephant, was recently called out by some unruly Chad on the interwebs.   Simply stated, we had to take the opportunity to defend a top notch local business and take a few cheap shots at the clown who brought this train wreck upon himself.We hope you all enjoy this week's episode!  Thank you for tuning in!

Harry Duke, Matt Carpenter and Herlinda Heras have two guests today on Brew Ha Ha, Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Co. and Martin Voigt, the leading beer blogger from Austria are both here today. First, we welcome a new sponsor to Brew Ha Ha. Visit Santa Rosa is sponsoring Brew Ha Ha this month with the Santa Rosa Beer Passport initiative. There is a list of participating breweries at their website Visit Santa Rosa dot com. The Santa Rosa Beer Passport is your guide to explore the world-class craft beer scene in Santa Rosa. Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Co. joins us in the studio today because normally, today they would be gearing up for their 18th annual Pliny the Younger release. However they have decided to postpone that this year, because of the surge in Omicron cases. The new release dates are March 25 to April 7.  Despite the fact that they were conceived to run simultaneously, the Pliny the Younger postponement will not affect the 2022 Santa Rosa Beer Passport program, which will continue as scheduled in the month of FeBREWary. Martin Voigt is visiting again from Austria. He went to northern California to visit some breweries, including North Coast Brewing and Anderson Valley Brewing and there are others still to visit. Martin Voigt began writing about beer when he wrote about being a German who moved to Austria and got to know the beer there. People were interested in his writing, then a friend introduced him to video blogging, which he decided to do. It's the only video blog in Austria about beer. Martin brought a Vienna lager, considered to be the first modern lager, first brewed in 1841. He says that Austria always had small local breweries that served their local communities. It is lightly hopped and has a dry clean finish. Next they open a Russian River Row Two Hill 56 which is hopped with Simcoe hops, which tends to have citrus, pine and resiny flavors. The name is an address where the hops came from. These hops give the beer a fabulous aroma. Then they taste a beer called Falco, from the only brewery in the Vienna city limits. Brew Ha Ha is sponsored by the Santa Rosa branch of Yoga Six located in Coddingtown Center.

Tara Nurin, author of A Woman's Place Is In The Brewhouse, joins Herlinda Heras and Harry Duke on Brew Ha Ha today. Mark Carpenter is away this week and Harry Duke is sitting in for Steve Jaxon. Tara Nurin is the Forbes magazine beer and spirits business writer. She has been working on this book for four years and she is finally on book tour! She has a book signing event at Russian River Brewing Co. on December 16, 2021. Herlinda suggests she could do a special label beer for the occasion.  Tara describes the book, the first to document the rich history of women in brewing. The book looks at economic, political and religious factors and there are interviews with all the prominent women in the brewing business over the last several decades, such as Natalie Cilurzo, CEO of Russian River Brewing Co. Most people do not know the whole story about the first new ground-up craft brewery in the US after Prohibition, founded in 1976 in the town of Sonoma, called New Albion. There were two women who worked with the founder Jack McAuliffe, and they did the funding and the accounting. They were hard to get for interviews but Tara met one of them, Susie, and features her story in the book. Tara Nurin will be at Russian River Brewing Co. on December 16, for a book signing of "A Woman's Place Is In The Brewhouse: A forgotten history of alewives, brewsters, witches and CEOs." Brew Ha Ha is sponsored by the Santa Rosa branch of Yoga Six located in Coddingtown Center.

Fresh Hops are front and center today on Brew Ha Ha with Steve Jaxon and Mark Carpenter, as we welcome Vinnie and Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Company. Vinnie and Natalie are the co-owners of Russian River Brewing Co. and they have brought a pack of fresh hops into the studio today. Now is a busy time, the hops are being harvested and there are special hoppy beers being made and enjoyed. The Russian River Brewing Co. Winds0r location and the Santa Rosa pub are both open. They have been using the parklette on 4th Street, which was done to allow social distancing for Covid precautions, and while they won't be there forever, they are using it and enjoying it for as long as possible. They also have some longer term construction plans to expand in Santa Rosa. Vinnie says that RRBC has brought in a lot of fruit lately, peaches and grape pumice, Syrah and Sauvignon Blanc, which they use in various fruity beers with some sour tartness. They have one called Hop Time, which is on tap and in cans in their brew pubs only. It's the only way to get it. They made a double batch in Santa Rosa. It uses wet hops so it is a bulky job, using locally grown hops from the Crane ranch. RRBC has a sour beer club, only for fans of that style, no hoppy beers. "Next year, we will make Hop Time with barley that Ron and Erica Crane have grown, also. So that will make it a complete local beer," says Vinnie.  

It's a busy show today, as Megan Anderson and Tara Nurin both join Herlinda Heras, who is back from a three-week trip to Estonia and Finland. Tara Nurin writes about the business of beverages and spirits for Forbes magazine, from her home base in Camden, New Jersey. Megan Anderson is the representative of New Zealand hops growers. Herlinda was in Finland judging the national beer competition and the national Sahti competition. She was the first American judge in either competition. Sahti is the Finnish national home brew. Herlinda describes the Finnish habit of taking a sauna (which they pronounce “SOW-na” not “SAW-na” as English speakers tend to say) and then plunging into the cold lake and going back and forth between the sauna and the lake. Steve says, “No, thank you!” Herlinda says it got rid of her jet lag pretty quickly. It's the cleanest country she has ever been to. They have free health care for everyone. Car registration and traffic fines are scaled by income. They have very clean water and their lager beers tasted clean and delicious and so were the Baltic Porters. Herlinda also visited Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. New Zealand hops have a special reputation among beer fans. Her organization is a cooperative of twenty-seven growers. They have been growing hops in this reagion of New Zealand for 150 years. They grow some of the best hops in the world, such as Nelson Sauvin and Riwaka. Megan is here to promote a new one, called Nectaron. Some of their hops have trademarked and registered names. See them all here at the NZ Hops website. Some have exotic names derived from other languages such as Moutere (which seems derived from French where it would be “moo-TER”). They say “MOO-ter-ee.” One is called Mouteka. Nectaron is named for Dr. Ron Bitzen, a botanist who worked on hops his entire career and who created Nectaron out of 12 years of R&D. Nelson Sauvin was created from their breeding program and released in 2000. It's a very distinctive hop.  They have limited supply, 1800 acres, and they are under 1% of the world supply, but they have special qualities. Sahti is one of the oldest styles of alcoholic beverage in Europe, and does not use hops because when it was developed they did not use hops. They use juniper as a flavoring. Herlinda found that the Sahti brews she was judging were quite similar and she had to find a way to differentiate among them. Also, it is not carbonated. Next week she will bring some to this show, to taste with Mark Carpenter. Tara Nurin has just published her book, A Woman's Place Is In The Brewhouse: A forgotten history of alewives, witches, brewsters and CEOs. She has her first official book event Sunday at Urban Roots Brewery in Sacramento, California. She is planning another book signing with Russian River Brewing Co., probably for December. Lagunitas Stereohopic IPA uses hop oil. I small bottle of hop oil can flavor a large batch and ultimately much more efficient use of water. Megan points out that the botanists spend a lot of time “chasing flavors” and she credits the impetus of the craft beer industry for pushing the demand for better more interesting hops. Megan Anderson's first job in the beer market was at Samual Adams, as a beer salesperson and trainer, for ten years. Megan moved to Idaho to work for a hop company called Mill 95. There, she met some New Zealanders. She found a company in Kalamazoo, Michigan that makes a hop oil. Then she met Totally Natural Solutions, that produces a totally natural hop oil. Her dream job materialized with the New Zealand hop growers offered her a job. In New Zealand there are some 5th and 6th generations of children growing hops in the fields of their family farms. In 2010 she started a home brew club and one of the members was Jack McAuliffe, the founder of New Albion. It was the first new brewery founded here after Prohibition. They made the first American pale ale. Natalie Cilurzo is in Tara's book,

Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Co. in the studio with Herlinda Heras and Steve Jaxon on Brew Ha Ha today. Everyone is happy to see each other again after a year apart due to Coronovirus restrictions. Natalie says their Santa Rosa location is still using their park space out in front and they are open daily from 11am to 9:30pm, and Windsor is open Wednesday through Sunday from 11am to 8pm. The Windsor beer garden is back in action since the meal requirement has been removed. Steve says that if you’ve never been to the Windsor location, you have to see it. There are beautiful pictures of it on the website that Natalie shot herself. After having to lay off staff, they are happy to have been able to call many of them back. During the pandemic Vinnie Cilurzo was experimenting with recipes and started a beer club. She brought a sour peach beer. Natalie tells the story of how they were able to buy 2000 pounds of peaches after the Wallridge fire. They got hit hard and evacuated. The fruit already-harvested fruit would otherwise have gone to farmers’ markets and restaurants which were all closed, and they needed to evacuate. They were happy to buy them and they used them to make this amazing beer. She made this Peach Ale, Pêche means peach in French, and that is how this style is known in Belgium. They also made a beer to commemorate George Segal who lived in Sonoma County and passed away recently in Santa Rosa at the age of 87. He lived in Graton half of each year, his son owns two local restaurants, Underwood and Willow Wood. George Segal’s father was a hop broker in New York long ago. He sold Sonoma County cluster hops to big brewers. They still raise hops on Segal ranch in Grand View, Washington. John Sr. was selling hops to Anchor since the ‘70s. Mark Carpenter could tell about that but his first grandchild, a daughter, was born today so Mark is with his family today. Congratulations, Mark. The Segal beer did not pass their QC test yesterday, so they are not releasing it today, but they are brewing it again tomorrow and in two weeks they will have it again, and she’ll bring it in to let Mark talk about it. It’s called Segal Select, a pale ale made with 100% Segal Ranch hops, Cascade, Chinook, Centennial and Comet. Herlinda mentions that today is Earth Day and asks Natalie about sustainability practices at RRBC. These practices are easier to install at first in something new. It was a Greenfield project, which means you purchase a piece of property that has had nothing on it. It was a horse ranch. They have 4 acres of protected wetlands on the property. All the water that runs off the property goes into the wetlands. There are no storm drains on the property. They also have a wastewater treatment plant where they treat all their brewing effluent. They also do reverse osmosis and use the water not for drinking but for any other purposes like washsdowns of tanks. They recapture about 75% of brewing effluent. They have “purple pipe” treated wastewater. Their plumbing is set up to convert to purple pipe as soon as the supply is available.

Sandro Tamburin, brewer at Old Possum Brewing Co. and Scott Bice from Redwood Hill Farms are both are back on Brew Ha Ha with Steve Jaxon today. Sandro Tamburin comes from Trieste, Italy, and spent time in Dallas Texas in the restaurant business before coming to California to study at Davis and to make beer and wine. Scott Bice's family operates Redwood Hill Farms, a great producer of goat cheese and other products of goat's milk. They also have started growing hops and since this is hops season the wet hopped beers are appearing. To make wet hopped beer, you have to get the fresh hops into the vat as soon as possible.  Russian River is making their Hop Time Harvest beer, a wet hopped beer. "Every time you buy from a small business, the owner does a little dance."  - Sandro Tamburin Sandro says that their aged goat cheese reminds him of Grana Padano. They taste some goat cheeses with the wet hopped beer. Sandro describes the brewing process. The Old Possum beers are available at many local shops and restaurants. Natalie Cilurzo also joins us on the phone, for an update on Russian River Brewing Company's operations during and within Coronavirus restrictions, from their Santa Rosa and Windsor locations. She also describes picking hops today at Crane Ranch and Redwood Hill Farms. They got some fresh hops to add wet hops to the kettle in the Santa Rosa brewery. It's called Hop Time Harvest Ale, it's 100% wet hopped. The downtown pub is open daily from 11-8 for pick-up orders. Visit the website for the menu and call (707) 545-BEER to order for delivery in and around Santa Rosa. They are all wearing masks, keeping distance and sanitizing everything so they have a safe environment. They are able to ship beer directly to customers but only inside California.

Leaders from Dogfish Head Craft Brewery, Russian River Brewing Company, Green Bench Brewing Co. and Hopewell Brewing Co. share how their breweries have operated since the COVID-19 pandemic upended the beer industry in mid-March. Panelists include Dogfish Head co-founder Sam Calagione, Russian River co-owner Natalie Cilurzo, Green Bench co-owner and head brewer Khris Johnson and Hopewell co-founder Samantha Lee. The group discusses running their businesses in volatile conditions, maintaining company culture for employees, and offering consumers high-quality products in hospitable environments during the pandemic.

Black is Beautiful is the cooperative fund raising recipe from Marcus Baskerville of Weathered Soul Brewing in Austin, Texas. Natalie Cilurzo calls in to talk to Steve Jaxon and Herlinda Heras today on Brew Ha Ha. Black is Beautiful now has over 1000 participants and they will taste and describe Russian River Brewing Co.'s version of it today. Natalie describes how the city of Santa Rosa has closed five blocks of 4th Street downtown, from now until October 15, so that restaurants, including the Russian River Brewing Co. downtown Santa Rosa location, can provide additional outdoor seating with social distancing. There is a little parklet in front of their place. Bayside Church donated their time and materials to build parklets for the restaurants that wanted them. Natalie really appreciates that effort. In Windsor, Russian River Brewing Co. is closed for dining and open for beer and food take-out. They do have tables and chairs out in front so people can bring their take-out outside and have it there, but the beer garden is closed for the time being. Their third batch of Pliny for President 2020 has been released. Herlinda gave some to John O'Hurley, the famous actor who played Peterman on Seinfeld, there in the studio. As they taste the Black is Beautiful ale, Natalie describes it as thick and rich, an Imperial Stout that is "definitely not for the faint of heart." Russian River Brewing Co. has also released their edition of the Black is Beautiful project. That's the recipe that Marcus Baskerville of Weathered Soul Brewing has launched. Marcus was on Brew Ha Ha a few weeks ago, on June 11, to describe it. He invites brewers to use the beer to raise money for their choice of local causes. Russian River Brewing Co. has chosen to support Legal Aid of Sonoma County and The California Innocence Project. Pliny runs for President every four years on the Keg Party ticket, this is his fourth campaign. They thought it would be a beer they could use to celebrate reopening, but since reopening is postponed, it's for shelter in place now and they are releasing it in cans now. California customers can order it or get it at the breweries. It is a double dry hop. It has a bright, fruity citrussy beer. She gets grapefruit and citronella. It's based on Pliny the Elder but "even better." Gabe Jackson from the Beverage People was going to come in but is busy. Herlinda will be curing olives this Fall, with help from The Beverage People. Herlinda says Gabe wanted the audience to know that they are available to give you advice about what you will be doing with their equipment. Visit the Beverage People dot com.  Of course we're going into apple and wine season and they have equipment for cider and winemaking. You can order anything you need and pick it up at the store or have it delivered.  

Natalie Cilurzo, president of Russian River Brewing, talks about how COVID-19 impacted the brewery, how they're loving direct to consumer shipping, and the Pliny for President campaign.

Natalie Cilurzo and Ron Lindenbusch join Steve Jaxon and Herlinda Heras today on the Brew Ha Ha podcast. Natalie is co-owner of Russian River Brewing Company, with her husband Vinny Cilurzo. Ron Lindenbusch was one of the key people working with Tony Magee at Lagunitas Brewing Co. Russian River Brewing Co. is open for take-out food and beverage service. Their 4th Street Santa Rosa Brewpub is open and they are also continuing this service at their Windsor location. Since the Coronavirus restrictions are still in place, although less strict than before. They can operate 11:30am to 7:30pm in Windsor and 11am to 8pm on 4th Street. You can visit their website then call (707) 545-BEER to place your order. Herlinda introduces the Pliny The Elder for President 2020 beer, in cans. Natalie says this is a Pliny with a twist, it's hoppier. They just canned it for the very first time the other day. They will release it on June 15 and they plan to have it throughout the election cycle. They sold out on line in 45 minutes and within a few hours at the brewpub. Pliny runs for President every 4 years on the Keg Party ticket. The Windsor location is open every day now. "At this point in time, like the last few months, I've realized, that what I really want to do is just hang out in a bar." -Ron Lindenbusch Ron Lindenbusch is back on Brew Ha Ha. He has Hopland Tap in Hopland, CA, which is a dream come true. Ron is emphatic about the imperative right now. "Listen to your health officer. Read the news. Read what's going on and do it." They were just able to open their beer garden last weekend. They are lucky, they have a lot of space and they can keep people 6 feet apart. People are happy to get out again and he is doing everything he can to stay safe. "It's just a weird time." Herlinda was there last Sunday and it was so nice to be outside and have some Frickles, fried pickle chips. There are many different beers and they will be doing music soon. Ron is involved in the return of Red Tail Ale. "It set the tone for the whole damned thing. (...) Red Tail was first." Wolf House Brewing in Cloverdale is brewing it. Hopland Tap is open Thursday through Sunday from 12 noon to 7pm, for now, at first. Check the Hopland Tap website for updated hours. Ron tells about how he met Tony Magee at the beginning and they had a great partnership, working for him for 25 years at Lagunitas. Steve Jaxon remembers the old Hopland Brewery and now Hopland Tap is its reincarnation. There will be some live music there as soon as possible. He has great musicians who are eager to get out and play.

Russian River Brewing Company has special takeout offers for customers during Coronavirus confinement and Natalie Cilurzo is on the phone to tell Steve Jaxon and Herlinda Heras about it all, on the Brew Ha Ha podcast today. Their downtown Santa Rosa pub on 4th Street in Santa Rosa, the Russian River Brewing Co. The downtown pub is open daily from 11-8 for pick-up orders. Visit the website for the menu and call (707) 545-BEER to order for delivery in and around Santa Rosa. They are all wearing masks, keeping distance and sanitizing everything so they have a safe environment. They are able to ship beer directly to customers but only inside California. They are also shipping bottles to supermarkets and grocery stores, so business is still down but not by as much as they feared at first. Steve Jaxon reads the report that Pliny the Younger brought in a record 5.1 million dollars to the local economy in February 2020, according to the headline. Here is the news in a May 14, 2020 article in the Press Democrat. Natalie was reluctant to inquire about this year's results due to the extraordinary situation. She expresses her gratitude to the fans. She also says they hope to keep the experience smooth running so that people don't have to wait so much. The Windsor location made it possible to put Pliny the Younger with its superior equipment. Is it too early to plan 2021 Pliny the Younger? Yes, although whatever happens it will be different. Natalie says, "I can't imaging having large gatherings not only approved, but appropriate. We are worried about the safety of our customers... As time goes on I'm sure we'll come up with some creative things to do." Asked about the prospects for reopening, Natalie says that the brewery is required to serve food with alcohol, their license is not to serve alcohol alone. So if the rules restrict restaurants, that will have to adjust to make that practical.

Today on Brew Ha Ha, Natalie Cilurzo is here from Russian River Brewing Co., with some bottles of this year’s Pliny the Younger, one day before the public release, which is tomorrow, Friday February 7, 2020. Brew Ha Ha and The Drive are pleased to host the Pliny the Younger unveiling again as we did last year at this time. This is the first year that this beer will be put in bottles. Pliny the Younger is their rarest and most sought-after beer. They decided that this was the year to put it in bottles, although they will only be sold in the brewpubs and none for distribution. There is only a certain amount every day. People came last year from 40 different states and 17 different countries, for the Pliny the Younger release. Customers can only get two bottles per person per day. Their new Windsor facility is larger and has ample parking, for those who are planning a trip. Herlinda asks Natalie to recap what is Pliny the Younger. It is a triple IPA, this is its 16th year. Vinny Cilurzo wanted to take their Pliny the Elder recipe, their flagship double IPA, and increase the malt, alcohol and hops. She is pouring this beer from their Windsor facility, made with open top fermentation, which creates softer beers. This is 10.25% alcohol. Steve and Mark agree that you wouldn’t think it is that strong, because of its great flavor. There are 8 different hop varieties, such as Simcoe and Amarillo. This year they added two new ones, Mosaic and Nelson Sauvin. It is very dry, and Natalie notes that this is a characteristic of Russian River beers. Mark Carpenter agrees that it's a fabulous beer, well-balanced, you can taste the alcohol but it's not overpowering, nor are the hops. When the World Discovered Pliny the Younger Russian River Brewing Company has several other beers, including a couple that are also being released today. This particular beer started as a February release in 2005. In 2010, the day that Vinny came to the brewery to open the doors at 7am, there was a line of people outside the brewpub, which there had never seen before. They were there before 7am for a noon opening, for Pliny the Younger, and told Vinny that Joe Tucker of RateBeer.com had rated it the best beer in the world. This was the very beginning of social media networking intersecting with craft brewing. Suddenly, there was a pilgrimage to their brewery. She remembers the day vividly. Every single person bought their limit. They sold all the beer in 8 hours. (A growler is a half gallon bottle.) They never pushed it, it just got recognized. She doesn't buy advertising and it's really consumer-driven. They are making this recipe in both of their locations and the two batches are slightly different. Mark Carpenter agrees that it is difficult to get exactly the same results from a beer recipe made in different locations. The downtown pub is open from 11am to midnight every day. The Windsor location is open from 11am to 10pm during the week (Sunday through Thursday) and until 11pm on Friday and Saturday. Natalie also mentions that they reclaim 75% of the water they use and they use reclaimed water for their landscaping.

Craft Brew News 11/8/19Federal Judge: MillerCoors Withheld Marketing Materials in Stone Brewing LawsuitA federal magistrate judge last Thursday filed a report and recommendation order largely siding with Stone Brewing’s claims that MillerCoors did not provide all available marketing materials for its Keystone brand during the lawsuit’s discovery phase.Although U.S. Magistrate Judge Linda Lopez declined to impose sanctions requested by Stone against MillerCoors, she did grant a partial award of monetary sanctions to the San Diego-headquartered craft brewery.Stone Brewing filed the lawsuit against MillerCoors in February 2018 in response to new Keystone Light packaging and advertising that featured the words “Key” and “Stone” separated in prominent, capitalized letters. MillerCoors has maintained in its defense that it has used “Stone” and “Stones” in reference to Keystone products dating back to the brand’s debut in 1989.In light of this finding, Lopez recommended that Stone receive a partial payout of its $420,476.63 in legal fees, and Stone be allowed to update its expert reports to include the additional evidence.Craft Beverage Modernization and Tax Reform Act Reaches Record 315 Co-SponsorsA bill to extend federal excise tax (FET) relief has garnered a record number of co-sponsors following a day of action coordinated by the Beer Institute (BI), Brewers Association (BA) and other alcoholic beverage trade groups.The Craft Beverage Modernization and Tax Reform Act (CBMTRA) reached 315 co-sponsors in the U.S. House of Representatives and 73 in the U.S. Senate; In addition to the BA and BI, the bill’s other supporters include the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States, American Craft Spirits Association, Wine Institute, Wine America, the U.S. Association of Cider Makers and the American Mead Makers Association.BA president and CEO Bob Pease said in the release “The widespread bipartisan support the Craft Beverage Modernization and Tax Reform Act has received to date is amazing and America’s craft beer industry is grateful to our many champions in Congress,”. “This legislation has played an integral role in providing financial certainty to more than 7,700 small and independent brewers coast to coast since its enaction in 2017.” Brewers who produce fewer than two million barrels annually pay $3.50 per barrel for their first 60,000 barrels and $7 per barrel after that. Of the bill’s 315 co-sponsors, 159 are Democrats and 156 are Republicans, nearly a 50/50 split between the parties. These 315 co-sponsors make up 72% of the House’s 435 members.Russian River Brews Sonoma Pride to Support FirefightersRussian River is brewing a Sonoma Pride IPL after a wildfire forced the evacuation of the popular Windsor, California, craft brewery last week.Russian River co-founder Natalie Cilurzo told Brewbound that Sonoma Pride will be available next month at both the Windsor and Santa Rosa breweries and proceeds will support a yet-to-be-determined charity that supports firefighters. The beer will be on draft and in bottles with commemorative labels, which will also adorn T-shirts.The Kincade Fire started on October 23 near Geyserville, about 15 miles from Russian River’s Windsor location.Russian River was closed after the towns of Windsor and Healdsburg were evacuated on October 26. The brewery was closed for eight days while evacuation orders were in place, and gas to the property was shut off. The brewery finally reopened on October 31, although staff was unable to brew or operate its kitchen until gas was restored.The Kincade Fire was 80% contained as of Monday, after burning nearly 78,000 acres and claiming 374 buildings, according to NPR.In a video on Facebook, Russian River co-founder Vinnie Cilurzo announced that he and his team brewed a new version of Sonoma Pride.In 2017, the Cilurzos worked with 50 other breweries to raise more than $1.1 million for wildfire relief efforts in Sonoma and Napa counties.(Allo Gilinsky The Craft Beer Concierge – Russian River Tour Guide)Four Loko’s 12% ABV Hard Seltzer Hits Retailers; Anheuser-Busch to Launch Bud Light Seltzer in Q1Phusion Projects officially rolled out its first Four Loko branded hard seltzer to retailers today, after going viral on social media over the summer.Four Loko Hard Seltzer’s first flavor, black cherry, checks in at 12% alcohol by volume (ABV) and is sold in 23.5 oz. single-serve cans. More flavors will launch next spring, a spokeswoman said. Phusion Projects touted the product as “the hardest hard seltzer in the universe,” according to the company’s website and the caption of the Instagram post announcing its debut.On the other end of the spectrum, Craft Brew Alliance’s pH Experiment launched Pacer, a 2% ABV hard seltzer, over the summer.The hard seltzer category has generated $1.2 billion in sales year-to-date through October 5, according to market research firm Nielsen. The category crossed the $1 billion threshold in August. Hard seltzer sales could be triple that size over the next three years, according to a report from Rabobank beverage analyst Jim Watson.A-B announced today that Bud Light Seltzer will launch in the first quarter of 2020 in four flavors: Black Cherry, Lemon Lime, Strawberry and Mango. Each flavor checks in at 5% ABV and contains 100 calories, 2 grams of carbs and fewer than 1 gram of sugar. The product was teased during the world’s largest beer manufacturer’s third-quarter earnings call on October 25.Bud Light Seltzer will come in variety 12-packs, single flavor 12-packs and 25 oz. single-serve cans.Craft Beer Storm Website: www.craftbeerstorm.com If your Company, Hotel or Restaurant wants to book a CraftBeer Weekend or Craft Beer Evening for your guests or employees send an email to Michael@craftbeerstorm.com Subscribe to Craft Beer Storm Podcast iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/craft-beer-storm/id1438117278?mt=2Support ACS In NYC MarathonI signed up for the NYC Marathon through the American Cancer Society and I am aiming to raise $32,000 ($3,200 Minimum X 10X) - please follow link below to donate what you can - $25, $50, $30K! - Onward... - Here is link –http://main.acsevents.org/site/TR?fr_id=94035&pg=personal&px=49477898&fbclid=IwAR2mBEvhF1wMA_BbHPhkavichNSFrE9Y9gi2RVZzfQ_4Da5Sht7gvH9rY_k*** A Top 20 Podcast in Food on iTunes ***Michael Potorti is the Host of Craft Beer Storm and Founder/Brewer at Beara Brewing Co. in Portsmouth, NH*** Interested in starting your own brewery? Our Portsmouth, NH TURNKEY facility is for sale! Follow link for more info:https://www.neren.com/Listing/2800-Lafayette-Rd-12A/5cdda2dabf34cb9150a7faebMichael PotortiFounder/BrewerHost of "Craft Beer Storm" Podcastmichael@craftbeerstorm.commichael@bearairishbrew.com*** Come visit our brewery for some delicious local craft brew! ***Beara Brewing Co.2800 Lafayette RoadPortsmouth, NH 03801Tel. (857) 342-3272 www.bearairishbrew.com Like us onInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/bearairishbrew/?hl=enFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/BearaIrishBrewingCo Twitter: https://twitter.com/BearaIrishBrew Linked In: https://www.linkedin.com/in/beara-brewing-co-30776075/**LISTEN to our Craft Beer Storm Podcast and share with a friend**Craft Beer Storm Podcast iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/craft-beer-storm/id1438117278Craft Beer Storm You Tube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCp3PVuCGmywNWlGFh0N0ukg?view_as=subscriberCraft Beer Storm Podcast Stitcher: https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/podcast-center-la-2/craft-beer-stormCraft Beer Storm Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/craftbeerstorm/Craft Beer Storm Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/michaelpotorti/

Our guests on Brew Ha Ha this week talk about how the people of Sonoma County have rallied to help each other through the fires and their aftermath. Please consider making a donation to the Red Cross which has done so much to help Sonoma County again this year. Amy Levin of St. Florian's Brewery is our guest on Brew Ha Ha this week with Steve Jaxon and Herlinda Heras, while Mark Carpenter is still traveling. St. Florian is the patron saint of firefighters. Amy's husband Aron is a firefighter and they are the owners of St. Florian's Brewery. Also in the studio today is Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Co. St. Florian's Brewery and Russian River Brewing Co. are neighbors in Windsor. The Levins founded the brewery about seven years ago and they have always donated 5% of their profits to fire-related and community-based organizations. There are a lot of news crews in the area covering the fires and many of them are hanging out at Russian River Brewing in Windsor. Once the evacuations were lifted, they needed a day to clean up the place. This has been a rough week in Sonoma County. The first beer they make after they get back up and running will be a special edition of Sonoma Pride beer. They won't be licensing it as they did in 2017. This beer will be bottled and available at their two breweries. From that they will make a large donation to a charity that Amy and Aron will help them choose. Amy expresses gratitude for the family of first responders. There is some damage to St. Florian's Brewery and Amy has been working on it herself, since her husband Aron is still busy fighting fires, so Natalie offers some workers from her brewery to help Amy's. Russian River has a generator so they had their own power and did not lose any beer.

The Session crew heads up to Windsor, CA to broadcast live from the all new Russian River Brewing Company! Vinnie and Natalie Cilurzo invited us to their spectacular new brewery for a day of tours, fun and incredible beer. To round out the day, we set up in the entirely unique, and so so cool, Koelschip room. Vinnie and Natalie custom built this room to create spontaneously fermented beer, and even filled it with wort that day so that one day in the future (maybe 2-3 years) we will have a Brewing Network, spontaneously fermented, Koelschip beer! Tune in and learn all about the new brewery and so much more. Plus, one of our favorite parts of the day was when we made Beardy do a blind taste test of a Russian River hazy beer AND a Russian River clear beer. After all the comments about his dislike of the hazy style, tune in and find out if he can really taste the difference... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Vinnie and Natalie Cilurzo are here to celebrate the 15th anniversary of Russian River Brewing Company in their Santa Rosa location. Steve and Vinny tell the story how Vinny was running the brewery at Korbel, as a consultant. Then they opened another brewery at Lake Sonoma Winery which is now Sbragia. But in 2002 Korbel decided to get out of the beer business and Vinny wanted to keep the brewery going so he traded his severance for the Russian River name and raised $750k. That is how they started. The rest of the show is the rest of the story. (34 min)

In episode 22 of the Brewbound Podcast, Russian River Brewing co-owner Natalie Cilurzo sits down for a wide-ranging conversation that examines the process of managing debt, buying out investors, building a $50 million brewery, exploring industry trends and more. Also in this episode: Brewbound editors Chris Furnari and Justin Kendall discuss Anheuser-Busch’s Super Bowl LIII commercials and Sierra Nevada’s first-ever acquisition. They also give their Warm Shelf/Cold Box nominations of the week, and play a game of “Did Andy Crouch Tweet That?” Show Notes: 0:00 – 14:40: Furnari and Kendall introduce episode 22, discuss Super Bowl commercials and Sierra Nevada’s first-ever acquisition. 14:40 – 58:00: Furnari interviews Cilurzo 58:00 – 1:12:47: Furnari and Kendall share their takeaways from the interview and rundown segments

Today on Brew Ha Ha, we meet Uichi Kiuchi the founder and brewmaster of Hitachino Nest Beer. Naoko Kiuchi, his daughter, is also here to talk about her work in marketing Hitachino Nest Beer. Pete Foppiano is sitting in for Steve Jaxon today on this special Tuesday edition of Brew Ha Ha. Mark Carpenter introduces today's guests by telling how Herlinda Heras invited him at the last minute to visit some breweries with today's guests from Japan. It's the kind of day that makes him glad he's a brewer. Vinny Cilurzo at Russian River Brewing showed them the new Windsor facility. By the way, Vinny and Natalie Cilurzo will be in the studio on January 31 with the ONLY growler to leave the facility with the new Pliny the Younger. Uichi Kiuchi's family has made sake for 200 years but 30 years ago he felt frustrated with the sake business so he started making beer. He used to visit California to play golf and visit wineries. Once he tasted a micro brew and was surprised that this kind of beer was becoming popular and he became interested in making beer. The sake business was hard, you could make good sake and still not have good sales. In 1994 the Japanese brewing law changed in ways that allowed small brewers to open. His parents were opposed at first but after one month they said yes. Naoko Kiuchi just graduated in marketing and will work for her family's company. They have an upscale pub in San Francisco with 10 of their family's sake, and their beers, and they import Wagyu Beef from Japan. She will be doing events at their San Francisco location for sake, beer and soba noodles. Uichi has a soba restaurant in Japan and he would like to introduce soba culture to California. Soba is made from buckwheat flour and water. They serve them cold in the summer time. Their San Francisco restaurant offers Wagyu beef and American beef and Uichi Kiuchi says you can sample the difference in taste and in price. Uichi Kiuchi remembers tasting Anchor Beer on a visit to California in the 1980s. Hitachino Nest Beer makes a Red Rice Beer that Mark says had nice color and great body. They visited Russian River Brewing in Windsor where they saw the new cool ship, which Mark and Herlinda describe. Uichi says that the white beer is their flagship brand but they brew a lot of other flavors.

Mark Carpenter and Herlinda Heras are both back from their recent travels. Mark was in Finland and Poland and Herlinda was at Oktoberfest in Munich, Germany. Mark tells about a pub in Helsinki that has real English ale. He also visited Poland, to see some famous horses in Eastern Poland. There is a book called The Perfect Horse which is about this horse farm. He brought some beers back, including an English style ale from Poland. He enjoyed Warsaw and learned that it had been completely destroyed in World War II and restored in the old style after that. His local guide showed him all the good local beers. Mark describes a kind of traditional Finnish beer that he drinks when he is there. Then, the vast majority of beer in Poland is lager from major breweries. But there are hundreds of local brands. Herlinda also mentions there are a lot of Baltic Porters there. A friend of his from Romania met him in Krakow. His friend found that Krakow was even less expensive than Bucharest, Romania. Mark notes that they also drink an Italian aperitivo called Aperol, with sparkling water, in Poland. Herlinda tells about Oktoberfest in Munich, which she attended on a last-minute opportunity. It was her first time at Oktoberfest and she highly recommends it. Steve says that he knows Oktoberfest from the Chevy Chase movie and Mark says it wasn't a bad representation of what happens there. The city of Munich has about 2 million people and they get 7.2 million people for Oktoberfest. Herlinda says "it's insane" how much food and beer there is. The locals really embrace it. Herlinda brought an Oktoberfest glass, called a Maß, which holds about a liter of beer. At the end they get a phone call from Natalie Cilurzo up at Russian River Brewing Co. Steve, Herlinda and Mark will be doing Brew Ha Ha live from the new RRB Windsor location next week.

Ken Grossman, founder of Sierra Nevada Brewing Company, and Vinnie & Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing are all in the studio today with Mark Carpenter and Herlinda Heras. Steve Jaxon is away and Pete Foppiano is sitting in for him today. Mark Carpenter introduces today’s guest, his old friend and colleague in the beer business, Ken Grossman, founder of Sierra Nevada Brewing Company. He started Sierra Nevada in 1980. He made his first batch of pale ale then. He had aspirations to be one of the new small brewers in America. At the time there were only about 40 small brewers in the country. A lot of breweries were started back then and it was a challenge to get a distributor to carry a new beer. Mark asks Ken Grossman about Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. Ken just gave a talk a few weeks ago and he studied his old notes for his first commercial pale ale. They actually brewed some IPAs when he was home brewing in the early 70s. He tested an IPA and thought it was too strong. His pale ale, at 38 bitterness units, was too strong for people’s tastes at first. Now it is successful because he balances the hops and malt just right. It’s the genesis of what happened later in craft brewing. Beer drinkers appreciate balanced flavors. Sierra Nevada Pale Ale is bottle-conditioned. Herlinda asks what that means. Ken tells that in 1980 he built his facilities himself. They did not have a pressurized tank. So the beer’s final carbonation takes place in the bottle in a 5 week process of aging to develop the carbonation. There are few breweries that practice this. Ken remembers buying some filtering equipment from Anchor when Mark worked there. Pete asks about the evolution of consumer tastes. He comes from the wine industry which has seen changes in tastes. What about beer? Ken says that the domestic lagers were nowhere near as bitter as the new craft beers. They produce beer in the 60 tp 80 bitterness units, which is quite high compared to back then. Also, there are more hop varieties in circulation. The US hop crop was dominated by the cluster variety, for its bitterness and not for aroma. Now, America produces most of the strong aromatic hops. Mark says that America is the brewing leader today, we used to go abroad to learn, and now they are coming here. Herlinda asks Ken to describe how they made an agreement with a small German brewer interested in exploration and expansion. They are doing their fourth collaboration now with a German company Weinstephan, coming here to learn IPA and Ken learned an Octoberfest beer from them. Ken is a self-taught engineer who built a lot of his own equipment. They have just opened a bottle of Brux, a collaboration between Russian River Brewing Company and Sierra Nevada. Brux is a Belgian-inspired beer. They added a wild yeast to give it a fruitiness and spiciness. Most beer should be consumed fresh but this is a beer that can be aged because the yeast is fermenting very slowly. Normally the hop-heavy IPAs shouldn't age, as the aroma and flavors will degrade. Dark beers based on malt body will do better if aged. Ken tells about his daughter Sierra who has been working in the brewery since she was a child and his son is also involved in the company. He has had opportunities to sell his business but he says he had a passion about beer from an early age and he enjoys the work so if he can pass it on to the next generation, that's great. But it is an interesting time in the US brewing market. The craft brewing segment is the only segment that has seen growth in the beer business, so the big companies have been buying. Vinny Cilurzo says that Sierra Nevada is part of his inspiration for his own company.

Natalie Cilurzo from Russian River Brewing Co. is back on the program today, along with Peter from Stumptown Brewery and JC Fluger with J Christopher Rubs. Steve Jaxon, Mark Carpenter and Herlinda Heras mention Wilibees in Petaluma and Santa Rosa as a great place to taste a great varieties of beer and whiskey. Tuesdays they have tacos, Saturday they have bands. Peter tells about their 16th annual Russian River Revival and Cook-Off on Saturday August 18, from 1-5 PM under the bridge at Monte Rio Beach. Natalie Cilurzo is back on Brew Ha Ha. Today she was a keynote speaker at the CFO of the Year awards in San Francisco. She brought a beer called “It takes a lot of great beer to make great wine” that Russian River Brewing Company makes. Natalie says that all during harvest, the workers like a cold beer (or six). This beer changes a little bit every year, either a lager or an ale. It’s low alcohol and brewed to be refreshing. It’s available in bottles and on tap at their tasting room. Mark Carpenter says that the Pale Ales have lots of subtle flavors and beautiful aromas while being lighter in alcohol. Natalie also brought their spontaneously fermented beer. It’s naturally fermented. They don’t add any yeast. They use a large wide flat tank, called a cool ship. They let it sit overnight and whatever ambient yeast is in the room is all it gets. It’s a bit sour, although this is very balanced. This one is Vinny Cilurzo’s favorite batch. They will have one big cool ship on the east side of the new brewery. This will allow them to take this style of beer to the next level. The 4th Annual California Craft Beer Summit in Sacramento will be in early September. Natalie is on the Board of Directors of the CCBA. There will be speakers, an expo hall, like a trade show, then it ends with a beer festival on the steps of the Capitol. It has grown every year and attracts guests from abroad. Greg Cook from Stone Brewing Company in San Diego will be the keynote speaker. Anyone can come to the trade show. It’s great for “civilian” drinkers who want to learn about brewing. Mark Carpenter spoke at it a few years ago, with Fritz Maytag (who founded Anchor Brewing). JC Fluger is also in today. His Jay Christopher Company was founded in 2015. He makes spice rubs. He started the project a little over 10 years ago. He noticed that when shopping for meat seasonings, most started with salt or sugar. He didn’t like that so he made his own and got good at it. He would bring his samples to his friends in the neighborhood and they were a hit.

Russian River Brewing Company is back on The Session and we couldn't be happier! For the first time ever Natalie Cilurzo joins Vinnie in our studio and we're so happy to have her. The dynamic duo spend a ton of time with us talking about all thing Russian River, including their all new production brewery, currently under construction. We also dive into a few of the RR beers we've come to know and love, and a couple we haven't talked about before. As always, Vinnie dishes out gems of brewing knowledge throughout the show, and Natalie talks about what takes place behind the scenes to build Russian River to where they want it to be, now, and into the future. Learn about what to expect from the new brewery as well as techniques that span sour, dry hop. malt, cool ships, lagers and more! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A Show about Beer and the Culture Around it!

Season 3, Episode 38 – This week, we’re on the floor of the expo at the California Craft Beer Summit in Sacramento, California, talking to some rad beer industry peeps. This week’s post was written in collaboration with the lovely Yvonne England.  Hey y’all! Guess that we did?! We went to Sacramento! (Have you watched our road trip video yet?) Make Beer Clear Again… This week, we went to the California Craft Beer Summit and had the opportunity to talk to a bunch of amazing beer people on the floor of the event. There were so many great breweries and beer peeps in attendance. We couldn’t talk to them all, but we know you’ll love the folks we did get! First on the list was Miss Franny FullPint, of The Full Pint. She’s also the Executive Director of the Los Angeles County Brewers Guild (Get. It. Girl!). She’s badass. Just know that. Then we dropped acid…knowledge with Jeffers Richardson, of Firestone Walker Barrelworks, and learned what the hell Titratable Acidity is. Yeah, that’s a thing, and Jeffers explains it. We then interviewed Brandon Hernández, Chief Marketing Officer at Societe Brewing Company and Editor at Large of West Coaster Magazine, not to be confused with West Coasters Magazine, the best roller coaster review you’ll ever read! Patrick Rue of The Bruery and Henry Nguyen of Monkish Brewing Company Next you hear us with Patrick Rue, from The Bruery. Our SoCal duders will know this fine gentleman from his tiny little start-up in the OC. Just kidding! It’s one of the fastest growing breweries around…AND our own Matt Becker used to brew there!  Natalie Cilurzo, President of Russian River Brewing Company, also graced us with an interview. It was so dope! She was dope! Get ready for dopeness! (b-t dubs, the Russian River sour pilsner that was on tap at the festival was DOPE. SO. MUCH. DOPENESS.) Finally, we interviewed the wonderfully brilliant and knowledgable Julia Herz, of the Brewers Association. Julia knows her shit when it comes to the brewing industry, and also knows a thing or two about pairing beer with food. She even wrote a book about it! Beer Geeks! We had a blast at the California Craft Beer Summit. Like, for real. The expo was great and the fest on Saturday was well run with many spectacular California breweries pouring their brews. It was also really cool being literally down the street from the California State Capitol, drinking California craft brews! It was a fun road trip, followed by fun times with awesome beer people. We hope you enjoy these interviews as much as we did. We lived. We learned. We talked beer. We drank beer! BREW THE SHIT OUT OF IT, CALIFORNIA. Direct audio: MP3 Subscribe: iTunes: Audio / Video RSS: Audio / Video Google Play Music Stitcher YouTube (Videos) Support the show: Patreon PayPal 4B Social Media: Facebook Twitter Instagram tumblr Flickr Snapchat Email 4B: feedback@fourbrewers.com 4B Theme Song: The Sleeping Sea King