The Magic of Brewing at Craft Beer Festival

Ask Jim Blair about beer, and his normally calm lawyer’s demeanor gives way as he talks about engineering, swirling bits of yeast in jars, alchemy and magic. He weaves a tale of craftsmen shaping exotic elixirs, of local artisans contributing to the economy, something far different than what many imagine on hearing the word beer. The only relationship that six pack of Coors Light bears to the concoctions he describes is the word beer. It’s approximately the same as that between McDonald’s and Chez Panisse: they’re both restaurants, but that’s where the similarity ends. The subject that has Jim excited is the Spring 2011 Bay Area Craft Beer Festival, held this Saturday April 9, at the Waterfront Park’s Cannery District. It’s the second edition of the event, back for a return engagement after last year’s successful premier. I had the opportunity to sit down with Jim and Leanne Peterson, Executive Director of Downtown Martinez, to learn more about the festival, and the exotic offerings in store for attendees.

When asked about where the idea for the festival came from, Jim credits Leanne. She said that it came from a few places; one was that she has long wanted to recruit a brew-pub to the downtown area.

“My husband is a home brewer, and I happened to go with him to the Monterey Beer Festival about three years ago. While I was standing in a very long line” she says, “I looked around and I realized it was the perfect thing to bring to Martinez. From there, I contacted Jim and asked him what he thought. He was already involved in another similar festival, so I knew he had an interest. He was game so we put together a really good team and put the first one together in four or five months. That was in October, last year.”

The first Bay Area Craft Beer Festival drew over 1,000 people, from as far away as Ukiah. A survey showed the festival is popular enough that Saturday’s event will be followed by a second one in October.

I asked them about the growing number of beer festivals and similar events, notably the one in neighboring Pleasant Hill last year. “I’m on the Blues and Brews committee in Pleasant Hill, so I helped organize that one” Jim said. “I’m on the Board of Directors for the Pleasant Hill Chamber of Commerce. I’m involved in both communities, and I live here in Martinez. But the emphasis there (in Pleasant Hill) is more focused on music, and ours will be on introducing craft beer to a larger audience.”  Jim went to law school in Portland Oregon, which he says has a vibrant craft brewing community. The area has 62 breweries; n contrast, central Contra Costa, with about the same population, has three brew-pubs, and two breweries.

“I come from a real strong beer scene, and wanted to recreate that here. I’ve been a home brewer for over twenty years. Craft beer drinkers tend to be educated, they tend to be thinkers.   There’s a lot of science involved in brewing. There’s also a lot of art, and if you bring the two together you get a lot of creatively minded people, and we wanted to create something that would draw that type of person to downtown Martinez. We wanted to expose more people to downtown Martinez and to craft beer, so we thought it was a perfect fit.” He adds “Our mission statement is that we help our neighbors build community through the magic elixir of beer.”

While beer production in general has been flat or declining recently, craft beer is growing, even during the recession.  “In the seventies, we were down to less than fifty brewers in America” says Jim. “We’re up to sixteen hundred now. Of that number, maybe ninety-five percent is less than ten thousand barrels (per year), the craft brewers. They’re small family owned operations that employ local people and return money to the local economy. Just like a baker, that brings something high quality to the local community, that’s what we’re doing.”

“At the festival we’ll have thirty plus breweries, with more than sixty different tastes. There are more flavor profiles available to beer than there are for wine. And we’re trying to introduce people to that. We’re similar to Napa years ago, when people were discovering that, hey, we have some very good wines here.” He likes to point out that many who take pride in drinking traditional American brands like Budweiser, Coors or Miller are mistaken in their patriotism. Budweiser is owned by a Belgian company, while Miller and Coors are owned by a South African firm. “When you buy one of my beers, the money is going back into the local economy; it’s employing local people, that are going to spend money in the local economy. So who’s really American?”

Leanne and Jim emphasize that the festival is not a place that encourages over indulgence, no matter how enticing the beers may be, that they want people to drink responsibly. And they don’t want people drinking and driving, so they are running shuttles from the North Concord BART station. “That’s one of the things that made last year’s festival a success” said Jim. “Last year people came from as far away as Ukiah, and stayed with friends, then made the journey via BART.  Shuttles ran a couple of hours after the festival ended, so that people could take advantage of the restaurants downtown. We’re doing the same this year.”

Concord’s Ale Industries and Black Diamond Brewing Company will be among the more than thirty breweries. Food will be available from Pacifica Pizza, Haute Stuff,  Roxx on Main, and Taqueria Los Toros; and musical entertainment will be supplied by the bands Mostly Sonny,  Garageland Rodeo, and The Billy Martini Show. KOFY TV 20, planning a brew based reality television show, will also be there, as will the Brewing Network.  It all kicks off at 1 o’clock on Saturday, and runs until 5 (details at the website).

“If Martinez became a place to come to and really experience craft brewing, that would be great. There’s a lot of engineering in brewing, but there’s also an art to it” Jim says. “I refer to it as alchemy, because there’s so much that’s magical about it.”

We expect to be enchanted.