The DuClaw Real Ale Festival just got bitchier.

Over the past few weeks, we asked you to vote on Twitter on the two firkins we’ll feature at the DuClaw Real Ale Festival Saturday, September 11 in Bel Air, MD.

The winners? Raging Bitch Belgian-Style IPA and Gonzo Imperial Porter. Matt Crow doesn’t like to be told what to do very often, but these selections brought a smile to his face.

Thanks for voting and we’ll see you there!

How many Flying Dog employees does it take to screw in a lightbulb? One.

How many Flying Dog employees does it take to package a special-edition, 750 ml bottle of whiskey barrel-aged Gonzo Imperial Porter? At least seven.

Every 750 ml bottle of Flying Dog is hand-packaged - a lengthy process that is well worth it for the liquid heaven it produces.

First, our brewers transfer the beer (after it’s aged in Stranahans whiskey barrels for at least 180 days) from the barrels into a brite tank. Brite tanks are the last stop for any beer in the brewery because this is where it receives its final quality tests prior to it being packaged.

After the brite tank, the Gonzo is transferred into a portable, 90-gallon vessel called a grundy. Close your eyes and picture R2D2. That’s what a grundy looks like.

Once the beer is in the grundy, our brewers add sugar and yeast to prep the beer for bottle conditioning. (If you don’t know what bottle conditioning is, don’t worry. We’ll revisit that in a minute.)

From the grundy, the beer goes special filler and the bottles are filled, corked, and caged by hand. Don’t believe us? Take a look at these pictures (taken today) of head brewer Bob Malone and his team:

Filling it.

Corking it.

Caging it.

Then, the bottles sit for at least three weeks to condition. During this time, the added yeast eats the sugar to produce a mild carbonation, as opposed to standard forced CO2 carbonation. Once those three weeks are up, the bottles are hand-labeled and (finally) ready for distribution.

One day when we were having a few pints of our Barrel-Aged Gonzo Imperial Porter, we tried to figure out how many days total it took to produce this liquid heaven. That made our heads hurt. So we gave up and continued to drink.

I had a vision of some nerve-rattling geek all covered with matted hair and string-warts showing up in the press office and demanding Scanlan’s press packet. Well…what the hell? We could always load up on acid and spend the day roaming around the clubhouse grounds with big sketch pads, laughing hysterically at the natives and swilling mint juleps so the cops wouldn’t think we’re abnormal. Perhaps even make the act pay: set up an easel with a big sign saying, “Let a Foreign Artist Paint Your Portrait, $10 Each. Do It NOW!

- Hunter S. Thompson on meeting Ralph Steadman for the first time, from “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved”

—

That first encounter between Hunter and Ralph wasn’t far off from Hunter’s prediction, although we don’t think they made any money that weekend off of Ralph’s drawings. If anything (as Hunter wrote), Ralph “was regarded with fear and loathing by nearly anyone who’d seen or even heard about his work.”

The significance of that first meeting 40 years ago goes beyond the now infamous resulting article, “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved.” It represents the birth of Gonzo - a term coined by Boston Globe magazine editor Bill Cardoso, which he claimed is South Boston slang for the last man standing after an all-night drinking marathon. Ralph once said:

“Nobody I have read knows what GONZO is, was, or ever could be, not even Hunter, an if he doesn’t know what it is, I do. I am the only one who does. Gonzo makes you feel GOod rather than BAd, which is BANZO. Pursue BANZO if you must but don’t blame me or even credit me or you will make me sick. GOnzo is GOod. BAnzo is BAd. It is a simple equation.”

From those mace and whiskey-filled days during the Running of the Roses on, Gonzo became the lifestyle of Hunter and Ralph, which have been beautifully illustrated through both sketches and words.

From riding motorcycles to blowing shit up to getting drunk (sometimes simultaneously), Hunter was a long-time co-conspirator of Flying Dog owner George Stranahan and had a profound impact on George’s life. Hunter’s greatest contribution to Flying Dog was introducing George to Ralph, who now illustrates all of our labels.

This past week, we filled oak Stranahans whiskey barrels with our Gonzo Imperial Porter in Hunter and Ralph’s honor. It made us feel good.

For “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved” and more from Hunter S. Thompson, purchase The Great Shark Hunt: Gonzo Papers, Volume 1 on Amazon.

Last Saturday’s 2010 World Beer Cup became the world’s largest commercial beer competition with 3,330 beers entered by 642 breweries in 90 beer style categories.

No stranger to the World Beer Cup, our Vintage 2007 Gonzo Imperial Porter received a Silver Medal in the Aged Beer category. (In 2008, it won a Gold Medal in the American-Style Imperial Stout category.)

Delicious in all forms, as Gonzo Imperial Porter ages, the roasted, coffee notes change to smooth chocolate and toffee flavors, which softens the hop bite. Although alcohol notes are not noticeable in newly packaged Gonzo, they become even less as it ages.

Over the last 500 years, the English have done their fair share of invading the United States. Whereas we appreciate lots of the infrastructure they provided in the early years of the New World, we felt it was only fair to return the favor. Effective this week, we’re excited to announce that two Flying Dog beers have invaded about 300 Tesco stores in the UK (Tesco is the largest retail chain in the UK).

UK members of the People’s Republic of Flying Dog, you can now find our Classic Pale Ale and Gonzo Imperial Porter there!

We talked a little with Rick from Bierenco, our awesome EU distributor, about our award-winning beer being selected by Tesco.

“In short: Tesco runs their Drink Awards. The aim is to allow small drinks producers, who would normally not end up at the buyer’s table, to gain a listing there. Besides a number of regional awards (where a Welsh brewery may win listing in Welsh stores), there are only four national listings. This means the large Tesco stores will all list these beers; smaller shops and specialized ‘to go’ stores won’t.

The four national categories are lager, ale & bitter, porter & stout, and special (like wheat or fruit beer).

Flying Dog Brewery scooped up two of these spots, beating the English on their own turf. (read more about our Victory here)

There were 400 entries to the Tesco Drinks Awards, 240 of which were for beer. Beers were judged from: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Estonia, England, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Mexico, Scotland, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, the United States, and Wales.

The beers are evaluated according the the following criteria

• Appearance, out of 5
• Aroma, out of 5
• Taste, out of 10
• After-taste, out of 5
• Overall, out of 15

We’re as pleased as a dog drinking out of a punch bowl to be available in Tesco stores. If you live in the UK, swing by and pick up some Flying Dog beer, your favorite imported American Craft Beer. If you have friends in the UK, you need to be telling them to go pick up some.

SimplyBeer.com has been conducting a series of “Beer Brawls”, where a group of guys buy a group of similar beers from a group of great American craft breweries. They drink these brews and talk about them in a lengthy podcast.

Episode 15 featured a variety of Hefeweizens from the US and Europe. Our In-Heat Wheat was among the sampled beers and was received quite warmly.

Episode 17 was all about American Porters, and people really loved drinking our Gonzo Imperial Porter, and we can’t say that we blame them! Honestly, though, it wasn’t really fair, as Gonzo destroys the competition pretty much everywhere it’s sampled.

So take a listen to the podcasts over at Simply Beer while you’re working this week. Because if you can’t have beer at work, thinking about beer comes in a close 2nd.

This Friday and Saturday is the World Expo of Beer, which is the largest beer sampling event in Michigan. We’ll be pouring beer at the event, which is at Heritage Park in Frankenmuth, Michigan. One of the cool parts of this festival is that the participating breweries submit beers for competitive judging in advance, and the results of that competition come in before the event. It’s really cool that you can see who wins, and then go drink their beer while you’re there.

Plus it’s cool as hell, because Flying Dog Brewery kicked some ass in the competition.

• Gonzo Imperial Porter: 1st place, Porter Division
• Old Scratch Amber Lager: 2nd place, Amber Hybrid Division
• In-Heat Wheat Hefeweizen: 2nd place, German Wheat/Rye Division

Here’s the entire list of winners.

Are you afraid of commitment?  Like big, bad ass beers?  It’s ok.  Our Baron von Marketing, Chris Rippe has similar issues.

The good news is that we have the perfect fix  - our Canis Major Mixed Pack.  Now you can sample all four of our Canis Major beers in one handy four pack.  Then, once you realize you are ready to profess your true love to Gonzo Imperial Porter, Double Dog Double Pale Ale, Horn Dog Barley Wine or the new (and super tasty) Kerberos Tripel, you can go out and buy a 4-pack of your own.

The even better news is that our Canis Major beers don’t mind if  cheat on them, as long as it’s with someone in the same pack.

Technorati Tags: canis major, flying dog, brewery, extreme beer, craft beer, gonzo imperial porter, kerberos tripel, horn dog barley wine, double dog double pale ale

Fellow members of the People’s Republic of Flying Dog, I bring good tidings. This past weekend, the bi-yearly World Beer Cup was held in San Diego  Just under 3,000 beers from around the world were entered in 91 categories, and Flying Dog Brewery was recognized with two medals:

Gonzo Imperial Porter - Gold Medal, Imperial Stout Category
Old Scratch Amber Lager - Silver Medal, Amber Lager Category

Our Wild Goose Brewery also received a Gold Medal in the English Style IPA category for Wild Goose IPA.

Here’s a picture of our Production Team, Matt Brophy, Bob Malone and Mark Matovich with the awards.  The guy not holding an award is from the Marketing Dept and just trying to take some of the glory.

We’re pleased as punch for the recognition, and are honored to win such prestigious awards. We’d also like to thank you, our loyal drinkers, for lapping up Flying Dog ales for the last 18 years. We couldn’t be where we are today without you guys (and gals).

Technorati Tags: world beer cup, flying dog, craft brewers conference, awards, gonzo imperial porter, old scratch