The Alchemist Pub And Brewery

We have two closing dates to announce to help you in what is shaping up to be a hot and thirsty summer.

Saturday, July 4th, we will be closed so the Alchemist staff and families can go out and enjoy themselves celebrating this holiday.

Sunday, August 9th, we will be closed so the Alchemist staff and families can go and celebrate what promises to be the biggest wedding of the season:

Jennifer Elaine King and Kenneth McLean Gardner

are tying the knot that Sunday.  It promises to be quite a day!  Everyone ’round here and across New England is excited, happy and lining up designated drivers.

Our heartfelt congratulations and best wishes go out to our two dear friends.

In the meantime………we’ll continue to brew, pour, and cook so come on in out of the heat.

Believe it or not, it’s already June!! This is a multi-subject blog this time. The first subject is, of course, THE HOPS!!!!  Look at those things!  They should be at the top of the rope sometime in the next three weeks for a total height of 25 feet.

The next subject is all of the tasty beer coming up here at The Alchemist. I’ve just finished carbonating the new batches of Mortal Sin and The Crusher.  They will both be released some time in the next week, so look out for a new tweet announcing the exact time.  We’ve gone ahead and added a little something for your viewing pleasure.  It is the episode of Bugs Bunny from which The Crusher got its’ name.  The name of the short is “Bunny Hugged” and it is as hilarious as ever.  Enjoy…..

I’ve got a new batch of Petit Mutant fermenting as you read this, and I will be making our first 7 barrel batch of gluten free beer this Sunday.  Celia Framboise will be a Belgian-inspired sorghum beer fermented with red raspberries and pomegranate.  Celia IPA will be brewed in a few weeks in time for the Vermont Brewers Festival.  And don’t forget, Rapture will be making a return in July as well.

Lastly, I would like to ask all of you to kindly take the time (about 5 minutes) to go to the following link and fill out the 7 Days Vermont Daisies Reader Picks.  We have never asked our customers to fill out this form, because quite frankly, I always spaced it.  But this year is different and we are on top of it.  The most important categories are 15-Best Brewpub, and 18- Best Apres Ski.  If you’d like to give a nod to our web designer, it is Moosedog Studios of Stowe.

Thank you all for making our little pub such a fun place to be.

I know that I am a terribly inconsistent blogger.  While I do apologize for that, the record will show that my blogging skills are being under-utilized but I have been cooking up some incredible food back at The Alchemist lately.  As I previously prognosticated, the new kitchen would not directly impact you, the customer but it would make it so much easier for me to cook up the food that you all love so much.  Well, I was right.  On the other side of that same hand I hope it does impact you.  In my many years of cooking/working short-order lines/ being a Chef,I have never worked in a kitchen that is so efficient and just flat out fast.  I hope that our new kitchen is making your night out at The Alchemist that much better, because I am enjoying the hell out of cooking in it.There’s just another gratuitous chili picture.  Makes me hungry just thinking about it.

Severed Head Hops

Just wanted to send out a quick announcement.  The Alchemist has joined the 21st century and now has a Twitter page.

I will now be able to keep all of our loyal customers up to date with real-time announcements of fresh batches of beers being released.  ANY time I put on a fresh batch of ANYTHING, you can receive a text message to your mobile phone.  Missed that last cask of Heady Topper?  Didn’t know about the 5 gallon keg of year old Misinformation I released?  Not any more.

All you have to do is go to the following link and sign up to follow our account.  I promise not to annoy you with random messages of self-absorbed bullshit.  This is strictly to be used for notifying beer lovers of fresh beer.

If and when you decide to create an account, you will be able to forward all of my messages to your cell phone by registering your phone in the settings section.  I hope this works flawlessly for everyone.  Just to cover all my bases, I’ve also had a live Twitter feed embedded within our website too.

It should be much easier for us.  And really, isn’t that what matters most…

Alchemist Pub and Brewery on Twitter

p.s. the severed head in this most recent hop photo is for point of reference and scale, and was most definitely not taken from the shallow grave under our kitchen….shhhhhh

Just wanted to send out a quick update on a few things down in the brewery.

Hops: 5/12/09

As you can see, the hops are really taking off.  Probably up to about twelve feet now and growing about 4-6 inches a day.

I just released this years batch of Heathen, and a couple of days ago, I released Sass-Mouth, a Saison-inspired hoppy treat.

The primary reason I put out this new blog is to inform all of my red drinkers that we will be temporarily out of Donovan’s Red. Gasp!!! “What will I drink?” you might ask?  Something else, that’s what you’ll drink.  The process of brewing has an uncanny way of throwing you curve balls, and this is a new one.  Two nights ago I was carbonating the latest batch of Red before I left for the evening, and when I came in yesterday morning, I was STILL carbonating the batch of Red….. SHIT!

The long and short is that I now have to brew a new batch to cut with the horrendously over-carbonated batch in order to come out with two batches of tasty, delicious Donovan’s Red.  So you’ll have your red back in about two weeks.

Other than that, The Crusher is just about done with fermentation and should blow your hoppy socks off.  Stay tuned …..