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Brooklyn Brewery Releases Backbreaker While Bacon-Beer Supply Dwindles

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A while back, a good month before the “bacon fat candle” hit the scene, we brought word that Garrett Oliver, brewmaster at the soon-to-expand Brooklyn Brewery, had created bacon beer. It was taunting and daunting enough that some of the precious few 21 cases of so-called Reinschweinsgebot were being squandered on a $350 dinner at Per Se, but now the Atlanta Journal-Constitution tells us Oliver is doing a bacon-beer tasting with Tom Colicchio — in Georgia! Okay, fine, he just did one at the New York location of Craft, too, but still: How can he divert precious bacon-beer supplies south of the Mason-Dixon? (Another case is destined for Allan Benton, the Tennessee ham man who provided the bacon fat.) We were so distressed about this that we called Oliver to find out when he’ll next give New Yorkers a taste.

Turns out that tomorrow he’ll be pairing the bacon beer and others with dishes by David Colston of Prime Meats. But Oliver believes the dinner is sold out, so you might not even want to bother e-mailing music@fotpnyc.com for details about the dinner’s secret townhouse location (suggested donation: $100). As for what’s on the radar after that: nada. Oliver says he’s not sure how many cases are left, but he doesn’t have any further events lined up. Instead, he’s focusing on the release, in a week and a half, of Backbreaker, a strong British-style ale that began in Norfolk, England, this summer with the 150-year-old method of “floor malting,” wherein malt is soaked and laid out on a floor to sprout (over the course of five days, brewers control the temperature and the germination of the malt by running a 70-pound wrought-iron rake through it). Compared to modern malting, this method yields a malt with a rounder, softer, deeper flavor.

Anyway, here’s something to attend while you pray for Oliver to find a way to release bacon beer to the general public: Serious Eats has a nice look at Resto’s Monday-night Belgian-beer dinners.

Brooklyn Brewery Releases Backbreaker While Bacon-Beer Supply Dwindles