Savor was two weekends ago, and of course I was there. Together with Steph (my sister), Tim (her husband), and Mel (my girlfriend), we pounded the floors of the Andrew Mellon Auditorium in Washington D.C. until they crumbled under the weight of our thundering enthusiasm, which was an unfair thing for us to do. The building literally fell to rubble.
For the uninitiated, Savor, which was held for the very first time this year, is like an upscale craft brew fest, with special emphasis placed on food and beer pairings. There were 48 breweries present, each exhibiting two of their finest beers. Each beer was paired with one of 30-40 appetizers and desserts.
The typical frat boys and their light-lager sipping blonde girlfriends were nowhere to be seen. The crowds, the noise, the heat — no concern of ours. The traditional pace of waiting in a line, getting a pour, and then hightailing it to the next line while you drank it gave way to a relaxed, thoughtful afternoon of meandering. This event was about far more than sampling unfamiliar brews; every fest I’ve been to prior has handled that just fine. Savor was about appreciation.
The exhibitors almost always had their brewmasters and brewmistresses present at their tables. Craft brewing bigwigs like Sam Calagione of Dogfish Head and Garrett Oliver of The Brooklyn Brewery were there to man their company’s taps. There were even more than a few company presidents there (Mel and I actually spent a good ten minutes talking to the president of Stoudt’s without realizing who she was). Because of this, it was generally perfectly reasonable to ask the person serving your beer, “What can you tell me about this?” and get a detailed answer. This contrasted from most fests where the servers are usually just lower-level employees of the breweries — I made sure to ask every server about what he or she was pouring for me, and very close to all of them had something interesting to say.
The event was incredibly social. For someone like me, who doesn’t tend to do well around strangers, to be in the mood to go around shaking hands with random people and saying such things as “hi,” there needs to be some kind of magic in the air. Okay, maybe I was a little loose from all the beer and food, but you could see on every face in that hall that everybody, brewer and attendee alike, was extremely happy and excited to be there.
It made for a fantastic tasting routine. Spot a beer you want to try, and then wait in no more than a one- or two-person line to get it. Have a few words with the exhibitor while you sip, pick up the food pairing, and finally retreat to one of the nearby tables to enjoy and discuss every tiny detail of the experience with your fellows before moving on to the next one:
“The oak is a lot more subtle than I expected. It’s almost velvety. Ooh, yeah, you’re right, the vanilla notes come out a lot more after you take a bite of the brownie. Is that coriander? It really compliments the duck. Oh, look, it’s Charlie Papazian. Eep! It’s Charlie Papazian!”
Did I neglect to mention?
The High Imperial Granddaddy of homebrewing, Charlie Papazian could be seen all afternoon, wandering the floor, sampling this and that, and basically being his unassuming little self when Steph skipped up to him with her hand out, squeaking, “Hi! I’m Stephanie! I’ve read all your books!”
His response: “Mmf… Muh mouf iff fuww…” This basically made Steph’s weekend.
To most other people, he was just another guy with a STAFF badge on. Those who understood the man’s importance, however, were in for a treat. Getting to stand around and shoot the breeze with possibly the most important person in modern brewing is hard to describe. You could tell that Charlie was having a great time, perfectly content to spend his day eating, drinking, and chatting, and we were all too happy to indulge him.
I think it goes without saying that photos were in order.
Charlie with Steph and Tim. He was relaxed. He was not worried.
And now with me and Mel. Interesting side note: I said, “It’s an honor to meet you,” when I shook Charlie’s hand. I’d never said that to anyone before.
What Savor accomplished above all else was to open, or at least further proliferate, the greater discussion of beer’s place in fine cuisine. Right now, the dialog doesn’t extend far beyond the beer snobs like us, and while Savor won’t have done much to spread the word directly, the people who made the trip to D.C. came away armed with new passion and education with which to create new snobs. Craft beer is a bigger world now because of Savor.
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