Brian Hunt, Moonlight Brewing founder and brewmaster and Shannon Thomas, tasting room and social media manager, are in today with Herlinda Heras and Steve Jaxon. Mark Carpenter is away this week. Brian Hunt started Moonlight Brewing in 1992. He jokes that he needed to support his beer habit and he actually stared home brewing in his bedroom when he was in high school. He had some German friends who helped him too. He graduated from UC Davis brew school in 1980, where Michael Lewis was his brewing instructor. There were 43 brewing companies in the United States then. There are more than that number now in just Sonoma County. He worked for a while at Schlitz in Milwaukee. The guy who had bought Schlitz said, “It don’t matter what I put in the can as long as it has Schlitz on the label.” He […]

Clay Jordan from Speakeasy Ales and Lagers is our guest today on Brew Ha Ha with Steve Jaxon, Mark Carpenter and Herlinda Heras. Herlinda asks Clay Jordan about the business side, and recent news, including their acquisition by a new local entrepreneur. He had to create a parent holding company. So technically they are Hunter’s Point Brewery, after the neighborhood that they occupy in San Francisco. It’s the same beer. They were not bought out by another brewery and the public facing brand is still the same. (The restaurant Speakeasy in Petaluma is not related them, they only share the name.) Clay tells how their main brands are still being brewed, such as Big Daddy and Prohibition Ale, with no changes, and they are also adding new ones. Mark remembers that Big Daddy won a Gold Medal at the GABF one year. Herlinda says […]

Sonoma County Cider Week is coming soon and Ellen Cavalli from Tilted Shed Ciderworks visits Brew Ha Ha today to talk about it. Also in are Ned Lawton from Ethic Ciders and Brad Yarger with Leaky Barell Cider Company. We’ll hear all about Sonoma County Cider Week, August 3-12, 10 days, 10 cideries, 100% awesome! Mark Carpenter likes to tell how he would make a science project for his kids using cider. He would take a bottle of apple cider at the store, add some yeast, put a balloon on the bottle and show the kids how the fermentation produced CO2 in the balloon. Brad talks about the apple varieties that go into his cider, including one rare one called Black Twig. Herlinda mentions that cider is taxed like wine, not beer. Even if many people think cider is sweet, not all of it is […]

Ron Lindenbusch from Lagunitas joins Steve Jaxon, Mark Carpenter and Herlinda Heras in the studio for today’s Brew Ha Ha show, the day after the Independence Day holiday. Herlinda Heras brought some Sumpin’ Easy Ale from Lagunitas and some other lower alcohol beers to her parties yesterday. Steve introduces Ron Lindenbusch from Lagunitas who tells about how they are starting their collaboration with Heineken. Herlinda mentions that when she brought Lagunitas beer to people in Lithuania they were thrilled to have the famous California beer in front of them. Ron mentions that he has been working with several Heineken breweries around the world in different countries. Lagunitas has their amphitheater open this summer for music concerts. Ron has legacy relationships with established bands and newcomers. Go to Lagunitas dot com to find the schedule and register on eventbrite to RSVP to the free events. […]

Dave McLean is back on Brew Ha Ha with Steve Jaxon and Mark Carpenter. Steve opens by mentioning that Dave has sold Magnolia Brewing, which he started in 1997. Also in is Baron Ziegler of Banshee Wines. Dave’s new company is Admiral Malting. They turn raw barley into malt that brewers need to make beer. They use an old traditional practice called floor malting, where they lay it out on the floor. They sell to a lot of local brewers. Until now there has not been access to local barley malt. Mark Carpenter notes that almost all commercial cereals have malted grain, which has more flavor, and that today they will taste some beer from Seismic that used Dave’s malt. It is called Alluvium Pilsner from Seismic Brewery. It just won a Silver Medal at the California State Fair. It will be one of […]

Mark Carpenter and Herlinda Heras will talk about some New Orleans beers that Mark brought in, which his son brought back from there. The folks from Berryessa Brewing Co. were not able to make it in to the studio today, so we will have to reschedule. Mark is drinking a beer called Jucifer from Gnarly Barley, which is good, has a lot of juicy flavor, it’s a hazy IPA. Mark likes the low bitterness with lots of hop flavor and it’s not cloying, it finishes nicely. Herlinda Heras brought a beer back from Provence, France, where she went truffle hunting. Steve asks about truffles and Herlinda explains they are pretty rare and live underground. She got to dig them up. They train dogs to snif out the truffles without eating them. The dogs can smell them from six inches underground. Mark notes that they […]

Tom McCormick, Executive Director, and Leia Bailey, Managing Director of the California Craft Brewers Association are in the studio with Steve Jaxon and Herlinda Heras today. Tom says he was just visiting the construction site of the new Russian River Brewing location in Windsor, where they hope to start brewing in the new tanks in late August and to open to the public in October. Herlinda got back yesterday at midnight from France. She brought a Seismic Liquifaction Kolsch. Tom McCormick is promoting The California Craft Beer Summit which is open to the public for three days, Sept 6 and 7 is the Summit Expo and then Saturday, Sept. 8 is the Summit Beer Festival on the Capital Mall in Sacramento, California. This is the fourth year of the largest beer festival on the west coast. There are two components, the Summit Expo, a big […]

Our guests today are from 101 North Brewing Company, Joel, Jake and JB, one of the partners, all join Steve Jaxon and Mark Carpenter on Brew Ha Ha. Mark Carpenter begins with a taste of their Indigo Pale Ale, then they taste a Dirty Hoppy, a hazy IPA. Mark explains that when Anchor first started making Libery Ale, they had a hard time making it clear. Now, hazy beer has become a thing, breweries are actually courting this haziness. They sometimes add yeast and other grains to produce the haziness. They use pulverized oats and they use New England yeast. Mark finds that among IPAs, the southern California “San Diego” IPAs tend to be one-dimensional, “…very very hoppy and very thin in the body.” These hazy beers have a little more body to go with the hoppiness. They are looking for a balance between malty […]

Natalie Cilurzo of Russian River Brewing Company and Mary Anne McBride, CEO of the Council on Aging are our guests today on Brew Ha Ha with Steve Jaxon and Mark Carpenter. Natalie will give an update on Russian River Brewing’s Windsor construction project and she and Mary Anne McBride will describe their fire recovery relief project for the community. Mark starts with a Little White Lie beer from Russian River, a Belgian white beer, about 5% alcohol. Natalie Cilurzo begins with an update on their construction project in Windsor. They got their bottling line from Italy “…and it came with three Italians and one espresso machine to put it together.” They hope to open between September and October. There are lots of updates with artist renderings and pictures on the website with a live time lapse camera aimed at the site that takes a […]

Herlinda Heras is in the studio with Steve Jaxon today. Mark Carpenter is on vacation in Hawaii and will call in. Regan Long from Local Brewing in San Francisco was expected in the studio today but she remains stuck in traffic. So with a nice bottle of Aquafina water in front of her, Herlinda Heras tells the story of Local Brewing of San Francisco while they wait to see if their guest gets through traffic in time to be on the show. Regan Long is the founder and brew master of Local Brewing, which is about to celebrate its second anniversary. She is one of two women brew masters that Herlinda knows. She used to be a marine biologist who worked on preservation of the Arctic and the Great Barrier Reef. Mark Carpenter calls in on the phone from Hawaii. He made a last-minute decision […]