On this episode, we start a 3-part series on the history of beer. The first part covers some ancient history starting 13,000 years ago up to the Roman in Britain. We welcome back Dylan Schafer of Mandan, ND's Dialectic Brewing Company to help guide us on our adventure through history.

Cheers!

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History Of Beer- Part 1

SPEAKERS

Connor Brekke, Dylan Schafer

Connor Brekke  00:03

Hello, everyone and welcome back to The Ombibulous the show about alcohol. From beer styles to cocktails, and from local businesses to history, there's a fascinating world to discover. On today's show, we returned to Dialectic Brewing and discuss beer history with Dylan Schafer. This will be a three part miniseries beginning with ancient beer history. I'm your host, Connor brekkie. Let's all raise a glass to, The Ombibulous. 

Connor Brekke  00:04

Hello, everybody. And welcome back to another show. We've got a pretty epic topic to cover, we got a three part series coming up on the history of beer. The first part we're going to go back in time, start with the ancient history, pretty much from basically ancient Israel all the way up to the Romans. And then the next part, we'll be doing kind of the Dark Ages, Middle Ages to the Industrial Revolution. And then after that, you know, modern history for the third part. So first of all, we need to get kind of like a baseline and what exactly beer is. So we are going to talk briefly about what, what is beer today. And then joining me again is Dylan Schafer of Mandan'sialectic Brewing Company. Welcome back.

Connor Brekke  00:34

It's good to be back recording again. I feel like it's been a little while.

Connor Brekke  00:56

It's been hot minute, you know, there's always time. So we are going to dive into this. Beer, today... it means different things to different people, I think. I think everybody has their own conception of what beer is. But basically, it's water, some type of malt grain, and then hops.

Dylan Schafer  01:41

Yeah, and ferment it out with yeast. I mean, at its at its root beer is really fermented malt sugar is whatever fermented grain sugar is kind of, I guess, the broadest definition you could use of it. 

Connor Brekke  01:55

And now as a, as a brewer, does beer have like any other meanings to you? Like, for me, I don't make it I don't have that intimate connection with it. So I wouldn't say it's just something I drink to me. There's, you know, doing this show, it means... I see the craft and I see what goes into it. So it's not just a drink you enjoy to me, there's more kind of value to it to me.

Dylan Schafer  02:17

Oh, absolutely. Like the cultural and social value attributed to beer. I mean, especially in my case, I make my living off making and selling beer. So I guess there's another definition you can use. It's literally how I make my living. But on top of that, I feel like every society and every group has had their own definition for what beer means culturally, to them. It's been something that's been ingrained in human history since... I mean, as

On today's episode, we have a chat with Rachel Praus of Mandan, ND's Thomas And Moriarty's about the surprisingly old history of gelatin shots.

Cheers!

theombibulouspodcast

SPEAKERS

Connor Brekke, Rachel Praus

Connor Brekke  00:05

Hello everyone and welcome back to The Ombibulous, a show where we discuss a variety of topics about alcohol. From beer styles, the brewing process, distillation and spirits, and even liquor laws, there's a fascinating world to discover. On today's episode, we talk about the history of jello shots. Joining me today is Rachel Praus of Thomas and Moriarty's. I'm your host, Connor Brekke. Let's all raise a glass to, The Ombibulous.

Connor Brekke  00:39

All right, everybody, welcome back to the show. I am down here at Thomas and Moriarty's once again, and joining me today is Rachel Praus. 

Rachel Praus  00:47

Hello. 

Connor Brekke  00:48

Helcome to the show. 

Rachel Praus  00:49

Thank you. 

Connor Brekke  00:50

You can find her mixing up some drinks at Thomas and Moriarty's if you want to come in later and taste some of her stuff. But she's got some interesting facts about jello shots. Yes, the wiggly, jiggly stuff of college time jello shots. Believe it or not, there's quite a history to it. We're gonna run through it real quick for y'all.

Rachel Praus  01:10

Yeah, so um, I like it I think it's kind of funny and ironic because I personally am not a fan of jello. It's just not my thing. And I have honestly never had a jello shot, doesn't really pique my fancy. But the history is very interesting. So I thought it'd be fun to talk about.

Connor Brekke  01:32

And I myself, I think I had one... maybe? Doesn't really ring a bell. College was a while ago. 

Rachel Praus  01:38

Right? 

Connor Brekke  01:38

Yeah. So I mean, first of all, Jell-O is a brand name. It's like Kleenex, dumpster Port-O-Poty, it's basically just gelatin. And gelatin has been around for a long time. Let's put it that way. So jello shot is basically take gelatin and then put alcohol in it... 

Connor Brekke  01:57

...and eat it and then you get tipsy and keep going and do whateverl else. So the brand name was coined in 1897... Le Roy, New York by Pearle Bixby Wait. So he basically just used a gelatin, sugar fruit flavored mix, which he patented, which was actually patented back in 1845. You know, again, prior to that it was just whatever gelatin mix you had.

Rachel Praus

On today's episode, we meet with Tyler Mangin and hear the tale of how Icewind Brewing came to be in Mapleton, North Dakota. Cheers!

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SPEAKERS

Tyler Mangin, Connor Brekke

Connor Brekke  00:04

Hello everyone and welcome back to The Ombibulous, a show where we discuss a variety of topics about alcohol. From beer styles, the brewing process, distillation and spirits and even liquor laws, there's a fascinating world to discover. On today's episode, we stopped by Icewind Brewing of Mapleton, North Dakota. Joining me today is Icewind's, Tyler Mangin. I'm your host, Connor Brekke. Let's all raise a glass to, The Ombibulous. 

Connor Brekke  00:37

Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the show. I'm currently here at Icewind Brewing in Mapleton, North Dakota... and joining me today is Mr. Tyler Mangin. Welcome to the show Tyler.

Tyler Mangin  00:48

Hi, Connor. Thanks for having me.

Connor Brekke  00:49

Yeah, thanks for inviting me out here. So you are one of the owners and brewers of Icewind Brewing here in Mapleton, North Dakota, you guys have a lot of really cool stuff. I've made it out here once prior, and most of the stuff I've had is in cans over at DePorres House in Dickinson. So minor shout out to them. But yeah, let's talk Icewind Brewing and a little bit about this place and a little bit about yourself. So how did you get into the world of craft beer?

Tyler Mangin  01:15

So this goes, you know, I would say for me, it kind of started when we used to go... my family used to go skiing out in Montana. And uh, like Red Lodge in Bozeman. They'd always have little breweries that you could stop at. Like Red Red Lodge Brewing. So that's kind of how I got into it. The tap room atmosphere out there was just so much fun. People were... you know, in the town that was kind of like, what are we talking maybe early 2000s? So tap rooms were still pretty rough tt that point, a lot of them, you know?They had that field like you were out in someone's garage or shed and I just enjoyed that atmosphere.

Connor Brekke  01:49

The early 2000s. Yeah, that was... kind of not quite the I call it the beer boom of like, the 2010s and onwards. But I imagine there's still a lot of cool stuff to explore out that way, too?

Tyler Mangin  02:00

Yeah, there wasn't as many breweries. And the beer that kind of got me into craft more than anything else was Deschutes Mirror Pond.

Connor Brekke  02:10

Ah, Deschutes. Yep. Deschutes is good. I hear that a lot from people who get into craft beers. Deschutes is like the one that kind of opened up the spectrum for them a bit.

Tyler Mangin  02:20

Yeah, they're so easy to find. And a lot of the things they have are very approachable and solid beers.

Connor Brekke  02:26

So are you a, North Dakota native then?

Tyler Mangin

Today's episode brings you to Hidden Cave Cidery in Middleton, Wisconsin. We have a talk with Walker Fanning about his innovative ciders and how they came to be. Cheers!

https://www.facebook.com/theombibulouspodcast

SPEAKERS

Walker Fanning, Connor Brekke

Connor Brekke  00:03

Hello everyone and welcome back to The Ombibulous, a show where we discuss a variety of topics about alcohol. From beer styles, the brewing process, distillation and spirits and even liquor laws, there's a fascinating world to discover. On today's episode, we pay a visit to hidden cave cidery of Middleton, Wisconsin. Joining me today is hidden cave cideries Walker Fanning. I'm your host, Connor Brekke. Let's all raise a glass to, The Ombibulous.

Connor Brekke  00:36

Hello, everybody and welcome back to another episode. I am in Middleton, Wisconsin, and I am at the Hidden Cave Cidery. Joining me today is Walker Fanning. The head of this amazing facility. Welcome to the show. 

Connor Brekke  00:50

Thank you for inviting me out here. I heard about this place on an NPR show a little while ago and it was like, "oh, I need to get out here really, really soon." ...so... 

Walker Fanning  00:50

Thank you. 

Walker Fanning  01:00

Awesome. 

Connor Brekke  01:01

cider and fall go really well togetherI think. So hidden cave cidery you are located in Middleton, Wisconsin. Let... tell us a little bit about yourself. You're... you make cider here. You make a lot of herbal based ciders. How did you get into the cider industry? 

Walker Fanning  01:18

Yes. So I'm a local Wisconsinite, grew up here, went to school here, and got a degree in agronomy from the UW Madison. And agronomy, for people who don't know, is agriculture for fuel, fiber and feed. But I was always interested in agriculture, more of like specialty crops like fruit crops. And so when I graduated college, I was looking to use my degree and I wanted to do something in fruit crops. And I was looking for a job all summer long, I was having a really hard time because I also wanted something where I could still live in downtown Madison with my friends. And I ended up finding a small apple orchard that had a cidery in the South Madison area, about 30 minutes from where I was hoping to live downtown. 

Walker Fanning  02:17

So they didn't have a job posting up or anything like that. But I decided I would just reach out and ask them if I could volunteer on their farm to learn about the ins and outs of being an orchard assist. And I sent them the email, they invited me out to take a tour of the farm. There were 200 Different apple trees, every single apple tree was a different variety than the last. And they showed me the cidery, I tried dry cider for the first time in my life. I actually turned it away the first time I was offered. He said "do you want to try some ci

On today's episode, we take a trip out to the Nordic countries and discuss Nordic style beer. Be sure to check out our facebook page for photos and the latest updates. Cheers!

https://www.facebook.com/theombibulouspodcast

SPEAKERS

Connor Brekke, Dylan Schafer

Connor Brekke  00:05

Hello everyone and welcome back to The Ombibulous, a show where we discuss a variety of topics about alcohol. From beer styles, the brewing process distillation, and spirits, even liquor laws, there's a fascinating world to discover. On today's episode, we discuss Nordic style beer. Joining me today is Dylan Schafer, owner of Dialectic Brewing Company here in Mandan, North Dakota. I'm your host, Connor Brekke. Let's all raise a glass to, The Ombibulous. 

Connor Brekke  00:40

Welcome back to the show, everybody. I'm joined once again with Mr. Dylan Schafer. Thank you for coming back. 

Dylan Schafer  00:46

Oh, absolutely. 

Connor Brekke  00:47

And we have an interesting treat for everybody. We got a series of... things to talk about. Stuff that I'm very unfamiliar with. But, a lot of good information. Today we're gonna be learning about kind of a, like a Scandinavian style beer outreach. We'll be talking about different countries in Scandinavia, we'll dive into a bit about gruit and Sahti. It'll be a fun ride. So, Dylan, take 'er away.

Dylan Schafer  01:12

Yeah, it is a really, really fun topic to discuss. You don't see a lot of these traditional Scandinavian beers around very much outside of that region. We're actually experimenting with a recipe on it here down at dialectic. So we thought it'd be a good one to dive into. I think first things first, it's really important to note of what exactly we're talking about when we talk about traditional Scandinavian beer. As with a lot of beer around the world, country's borders don't really mean all that much when it comes to beer culture. To some extent it does. But for the most part, the brewing culture existed before a lot of these countries had delineated borders. So, there were just kind of regionally styles of brewing. So generally speaking, when we're talking about the Scandinavian beers, we're going to be diving a little bit into, you know, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, to some extent, this spills over into Finland. Pretty much any of that area of Northern Europe, that's known as that Scandinavian peninsula. There is definitely also some spillover with kind of Russian, German and styles from the Netherlands and Belgium and stuff. Again, it was that region's styles of beers, and there was a lot of spillover and brewing culture in that area.

Connor Brekke  02:24

And as we're talking about Scandinavian brewing, you... again back to the borders didn't really exist back then it was a bunch of different Germanic tribes. You know, there was a bunch of influence and cross culture mixing and beer as an alcoholic beverage as you drink has been around forever. So you know, it's not like it's one specific style. It's, it's this broad spectrum of different things that evolved throughout time in history.

Dylan Schafer 

On today's episode, we bring back Susan Ruud and introduce you to Fargo, North Dakota's Prairie Rose Meadery. Learn a bit about the buisness and how they came to be. We hope you can get a chance to try some of their award winning meads. Cheers!

https://www.prairierosemeadery.com

SPEAKERS

Susan Ruud, Connor Brekke

Connor Brekke  00:04

Hello everyone and welcome back to The Ombibulous, a show where we discuss a variety of topics about alcohol. From beer styles, the brewing process, distillation, spirits and even liquor laws, there's a fascinating world to discover. On today's episode, we learn how Fargo North Dakota's very own Prairie Rose Meadery came to be. Joining me today is Susan Ruud of Fargo, North Dakota's very own Prairie Rose Meadery. I'm your host Connor Brekke. Let's all raise a glass to The Ombibulous. 

Connor Brekke  00:41

Hello, everybody and welcome back to the show. I'm joined once again with Susan from Prairie Rose mediary here in Fargo, North Dakota. Welcome to the show. Thank you for coming back on. We're going to talk about North Dakota mead. The previous episode we talked about what mead is. But, I'm going to introduce you to Susan and Prairie Rose Meadery today. All right, so Susan, let people know who you are and how you got into the mead world.

Susan Ruud  01:09

Hi, I'm Susan Ruud. My husband and I, my husband Bob, and myself have started prairie Rose Meadery. We started making mean I guess at home in the early 90s. I work at, I also work at NDSU in plant pathology. So some friends of mine, we would sit at coffee, coworkers, and they were homebrewers. They made mead. So I would listen to them talking about brewing and. I think I went, went over to their house a few times tried some home beers and some home meads. And from the first second, we tried mead, both my Bob and I absolutely loved mead. I think a week or so after we had our first mead, we had a friend out and he was showing us how to make mead we we sat on our deck and made a batch mead and drink some beers and more mead. And yeah, it was a great time. I remember the date October 12, 1996 my first mead, I only remember that because it was my parents anniversary and the couple that was showing us how to make the mead it was their anniversary. It's kind of fun. 

Susan Ruud  02:20

So we started making mead in 96. Got into home brewing both mead and beer. When I go into hobby I go gung ho so, entered a few competitions and won a few medals, both in beer and mead and and then I joined the American Home Brewers Association and ran for their board. Oh, at that time, it was a board of advisors. And actually I won I don't know how. I actually attribute that to some of my really good homebrewing friends in Kansas City. They had a fairly big club at the time and I went down to some of their competitions. And so I think them and the Minneapolis crowd probably voted for me so I have to thank them because that just got me into many, many years of being immersed in home brewing and meat making all across the US. You go to their conferences, you meet people on the East Coast people on the West Coast, center the country, so I get to know a lot of homebrewers a lot of mead makers, both home and professional and it just grew from there. So I believe I was on that governing... er it was a board of advisors turned into a governing committee for the American homeowners association for almost 20 years

On this eposide, we do a spin off of Belgian Beer and talk about Trappist Beer. We will also be tasting some Trappist Beer from Spencer Brewing out of Massachusetts, USA. Check out his link to watch the tasting on Youtube. https://youtu.be/cghlMZsoX7M

And feel free to check out our Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/theombibulouspodcast for the latest photos, updates, and links to our guests. 

Cheers!

SPEAKERS

Connor Brekke, Dylan Schafer

Connor Brekke  00:04

Hello everyone and welcome back to The Ombibulous, a show where we discuss a variety of topics about alcohol. From beer styles, the brewing process, distillation in spirits and even liquor laws, there's a fascinating world to discover. On today's episode, we talk about Trappist Monk beer. Joining me today is Dylan Shafer, owner of Dialectic Brewing Company here in Mandan, North Dakota. I'm your host, Connor Brekke. Let's all raise a glass to, The Ombibulous.

Connor Brekke  00:37

 Welcome back everyone to another wonderful episode of The Ombibulous. I'm back at Dialectic Brewing with Mr. Dylan Shaffer. Thank you for joining me again. 

Dylan Schafer  00:46

Absolutely. 

Connor Brekke  00:47

And then we are going to touch up on an episode we previously did about Belgian ale. We're going to do a spin off on that about... Trappist beer. It's very interesting style beer. It's actually fortunate that the United States actually has a Trappist monastery that brews accredited Trappist beers, so we will be trying that style from Spencer Brewing out of Massachusetts today on the show. So let's let's get into it Trappist beer. In short, Trappist beer is basically just brewed by Trappist monks. I mean, that's that's the short story. Historically, it's been pretty much just for the monks and people who visit. Now it's kind of blown up into other things, but we'll get into that shortly. Currently, there are 14 monasteries, six in Belgium, two in the Netherlands, one each in Austria, Italy, England, France, Spain, and of course the US. And then we can currently produce accredited troposphere as per the international  Trappists Association ITA.

Dylan Schafer  01:55

And us being us having one here in the US we are kind of an outlier because these Trappist monasteries and Trappist beers tend to be very regionally specific so having one in the northeast in the US is... we're kind of an outlier but it's a good thing we have it.

Connor Brekke  02:11

It is a very cool thing. I would figure that of all the places why not the US with such a massive beer scene and everything it's

On this episode, we swing on over to Fargo and talk with Susan Ruud of Prairie Rose Meadery about mead. Be seure to check out our Facebook page for the latest photos and updates. Facebook@theombibulouspodcast

Cheers!

Mead

SPEAKERS

Susan Ruud, Connor Brekke

Connor Brekke  00:03

Hello everyone and welcome back to The Ombibulous, a show where we discuss a variety of topics about alcohol. From beer styles, the brewing process distillation, in spirits, even liquor laws, there's a fascinating world to discover. On today's episode, we learn a bit about the ancient beverage of mead. Joining me today is Susan Ruud of Fargo, North Dakota's very own, Prairie Rose Meadery. I'm your host, Connor brekkie. Let's all raise a glass to The Ombibulous. 

Connor Brekke  00:38

Welcome back to the showroom, buddy. Today I'm joined by Susan Ruud of Prairie Rose Meadery here in Fargo, North Dakota. Welcome to the show. Thank you so much for having me over.

Susan Ruud  00:48

I'm excited to be here. Thanks for inviting me.

Connor Brekke  00:52

And then we're going to talk about one of our... well, my kind of weaknesses here... mead. I love it. It's a... it's a really great beverage. Got a lot of history to it. And yeah, let's have at it. What is mead for the audience?

Susan Ruud  01:07

Well, in its basic sense, mead is fermented honey. So that base of everything is honey. People will call it a honey wine, but where wine is made from grapes or other fruits. Mead is the majority of the fermentable, honey, and then you'll add some other fruit or spice to change it up or fruit and spice or you can do so many things with it.

Connor Brekke  01:26

Yes. And you guys have quite a few different flavors on the menu. But we'll touch on that a bit later here. So it's an old beverage. It's been around for a while.

Susan Ruud  01:36

Yeah, there's probably history of it about a little over 9000 years ago in the pyramids. And then there's conjectural and history of it about 40,000 years ago in Africa. So yeah, very old.

Connor Brekke  01:50

Because we're just looking at some pictures. And there's pottery that dates back from at least 7000 bc in China. So kind of like the proto-mead. I mean, it's a bit different back then. But

Susan Ruud  02:01

hey, well, originally they would have made it probably I mean, they're using natural yeasts. And so might have been a little more sour than ours, it would have been, it would have taken local fruits and spices and stuff and thrown it all into a container along with whatever honey they could find. They would have done that probably Initially, it was originally found by a beehive getting what else tree splitting open or water getting in somehow. And they came along and Oh, hey, let's try this. And oh, that tastes good.

Connor Brekke  02:36

Everybody loves alcohol, that hasn't changed. It's funny how that works. Because Same thing