millstreambrewing.com

Last night I was at the Field To Family Harvest Dinner at the Izaak Walton League, located just south of Iowa City. This dinner was the culmination of a series of events to celebrate and promote the Slow Food movement in Iowa. Slow food is organization opposed to the fast food culture of modern times and advocates eating local produce and supporting sustainable agriculture.

The Izaak Walton League dining hall is in a very scenic location with a nice view of the river, although I forgot my camera . Preparing the dinner was reknowned chef Odessa Piper from L’Etoile in Madison WI, as well as Kurt and Kim Friese of Devotay. I can attest that the food was very fine indeed!

I was busy serving Johns’ Generations White Ale, Oktoberfest, Warsh Pail Ale, and Root beer. We poured the beer into large wine glasses… something I really liked! For one thing, wine glasses don’t have a flat bottom and so the beer foams much less when poured. Also I think it gives our handcrafted beer the respect that they truly deserve! The Oktoberfest was the most popular, judging by the wieght of the kegs after the event.

I spent some time talking to Sherri Brooks Vinton author of The Real Food Revival. I found there were many parallels between the craft beer movement and the slow food movement. They both are trying to change consumers tastes from mass marketed stuff, to the higher quality local goods. Its seems both movements are making steady, if slow progress. Its really a matter of determination and time, for a grassroots organization to really make a change, especially in face of such entrenched things as radiation sterilized meat and fizzy yellow beer.

I suppose one could say that since beer is a food that it is essentially contained within the slow food movement, except that many of our ingriedents are not local, since they cannot be locally grown. Hallertau hops, for example, are only grown in Germany, and I bet they use many chemicals on them. Odessa Piper gave an excellent speech that essentially said that its important to follow the principle of the slow food, not every detail. Its currently very difficult for someone to use only locally grown produce, but to use some is better than the alternative. She gave the example of taking a frozen pizza, crisping it, and tossing the cut up pieces into a salad of local greens. I found that very enlightening!

Ok so much for philosophy. Also at the event, there were two ladies from the Czech Slovak Musuem of Cedar Rapids. They reminded me that October 7th is their Brewnost Celebration, which is a fund raiser for the musuem. Last year it was a heck of a good time, with plenty of good beer (courtesy of John’s Grocery) and food. I am looking foward to doing it again.