From Maine, With Love - An Allagash Brewing Podcast

S1 Episode 4: The Allagash Pink Boots + Team

April 20, 2022 Season 1 Episode 4
From Maine, With Love - An Allagash Brewing Podcast
S1 Episode 4: The Allagash Pink Boots + Team
Show Notes Transcript

 In this one, we interview three members of the Allagash Pink Boots + team: Hannah, Katie, and Leah. You’ll hear how the Pink Boots society empowers and educates women and non-binary people in the fermented beverage industry, the details of our newly released Pink Boots black IPA, plus the definition of “Aroma Dome.”


Brett Willis:

This is from Maine with love an Allagash brewing podcast, where we talk about beer, our community here in Maine and things that generally make us happy. In this episode, we're talking to a few members of the pink boots plus team here at alga about, I mean, all sorts of stuff, really the national pink boots, society hop, blends, the aroma dome and arm wrestling to name a few. So settle in and grab a beer if you have one nearby, because here we go With me today. I've Hannah Johnson, quality spa specialist here at alga. We have, we have Katie Boka brewer and Leah Jones, a beer to market specialist. I'm Brett work on the marketing team here at alga. And, uh, before we start on the, the topic at hand, which is gonna be talking about our pink boots team here at alga and also the kind of pink boots main chapter, uh, I think we might get into a little bit question for you, Hannah. Hey, have you seen any good birds recently?

Hannah Johnson:

Thank you for the question, Brett. Uh, honestly not a ton, a lot of the common yard birds that you tend to see even sometimes during the winter, but I will say that the birds that have stuck around are extra lively this week. So it's getting me really amped<affirmative> it's psych to start looking for some of those migratory birds. The other day, I saw a pair of Cardinals, which was really remark like, you know, especially when everything is like Dr. Andrey right now. It's so amazing to see a male Cardinal with all its red and glory. Totally. Um, but yeah, other than that, a lot of house ES a lot of spare, um, and seagulls,

Brett Willis:

They a lot of seagulls. Oh yeah, yeah. I remember I saw a tree full of Turkey vs. Like outside of the brewery and it looked like, like some sort of a portent of the, be of the future. Something bad was gonna happen cuz it was like 18 Turkey vultures in one tree. But luckily nothing bad happened. I don't think, well, I don't know. It could've been like right before COVID so maybe that was it. You. Yeah.

Hannah Johnson:

Yeah. They, they love to do that. Um, Turkey vs and crows love to, um, brew all together in like the same tree. Uh, I actually recently learned that Portland, Oregon has like a cleanup crew for, um, crows that like to go into the city at night and Bruce and um, they have falconers go out and use a Hawk to, uh, scare off all the crows to prevent so much bird poop.<laugh> on the sidewalks.

Brett Willis:

That's this is, this is the Allagash birding podcast

Hannah Johnson:

I'm telling you. It's the next thing

Brett Willis:

We're we're definitely going to do a birding podcast at some point gets us. It's just gonna have to happen. I'm gonna, we're gonna switch off a birding slightly and say, uh, so this one's for Leah. What is your favorite or go-to walking trail here in Portland.

Leah Jones:

Oh, that's a great question. Um, there's actually not five minutes down the road from here is, uh, Millbrook preserve, which is a really cool nature trail. I have two toddlers, so I am currently stucked to like easy trails mm-hmm<affirmative> uh, but it, it goes alongside the, the Brook down there and it's just really beautiful and peaceful. And then actually less summer I stumbled across, uh, the Raymond community forest, which is like 350 something acres of preserved land. Um, and it has a few like super awesome nature trails that are easy to walk, but then you can also walk up, um, the summit there and it has this beautiful view of Crescent lake. I and um, yeah, so it's just like really beautiful and not far away, which is great for my schedule cuz I don't have time to drive anywhere. It's just like right there. Yeah. Yeah. That's really great. Um, I do a lot of bird watching also while I'm out here really. So Hannah need to borrow you for a day and teach me a few things.

Brett Willis:

All right, Katie, do you have a go-to walking trail? You're a newer resident of Portland.

Katie Beaucage:

Yeah. I, uh, I moved to Portland last April, right. So I did have the summer to check out a few little spots. Um, I actually had done some volunteering through the Portland parks Conservancy. Cool. And the first volunteer thing I did was a park cleanup at the Riverton trolley park. Yeah. Which is essentially across the street from where we are at alga. And it's such an interesting little gem like apparently in like the early 19 hundreds, it was this like booming like park. Yeah. There was an amusement park in amphitheater, a casino, a, there was a petting zoo. I, I don't know what they didn't have there. I think they had Swan boats. That's amazing. They, they had everything. Um, and there's not much of it still there, but there's still some like cool little stone structures. And I do like going on a nice walk down there every now and then when it's not too buggy. Yeah, yeah. Which it can be a little bit, but certainly can be. Um, and also wolfs neck. I spend some time walking. It was just beautiful.

Brett Willis:

Yeah. Wolfs. Nick is so nice.

Katie Beaucage:

Yeah. I will go like around low tide and bring my extra Tufts and kind of walk out and it's just so beautiful.

Brett Willis:

All right. So to the matter at hand, uh, so I guess the, the kind of the first question I'd love to ask, uh, the three of you is what is the pink boot society?

Katie Beaucage:

Pink Boots society is it's an international organization, uh, a nonprofit and it supports women and non-binary individuals who are employed in the alcohol industry. So that can be beer cider liquor, um, and through membership dues, uh, fundraisers, special events, collaboration brew days, uh, pink boots works to raise money, to provide scholarships for these individuals. Uh, so they can further their education and their careers.

Brett Willis:

That's awesome. So is, is it like, are the scholarships kind of like a really big part of Pink's boots then? It sounds like that's kind of like the, the education is kind of the fundamental part of it or one of the parts.

Katie Beaucage:

Yeah, absolutely. Um, I, let me actually read to you the, uh, the slogan for pink boots, uh, is we are here to assist, inspire encourage women and or non-binary individuals in the fermented and alcoholic beverage industry through education. So really the core of pink boots is to provide education for women so they can further their careers. Um, and scholarships are right there. The center of that,

Brett Willis:

I mean, I feel like just for me, I'm such a proponent of education in beer because I think like, as I've seen kind of from my role in talking with people on social media and kind of seeing stuff out there, it's just like beer is so complicated. It has so much to it. Like, and the three of you are actually a really cool cross section of, of people for sort of in there, there's the brewing aspect of it, that sort of biological, like, you know, a microbiology aspect for Hannah and then for Leah, it's really, how does a beer literally go from idea to execution? And so, but how did you come to join pink boots? Like how did, how did you come of society? Oh

Leah Jones:

Boy. Well, um, let's see. I started at Allagash, uh, about a little over five years ago and Allagash is the first brewery that I've worked for. I've worked in, um, serving beer industry before. Um, but Allagash is the actual first brewery. And when I joined, there was a, a little bit of a buzz going around about this pink boot society and that it's, you know, the society for women to help empower women and, um, encourage them through education. So, you know, naturally I was like, I'm a woman and I wanna learn here in the industry. And so, and so I joined, um, the women that work here at Allagash, we're getting together to talk a, about this collaboration group and then we just started to really love and appreciate that time that we would spend together. Um, cool. You know, and we felt supported within that group. You know, all of us were going through so many different things personally, uh, work wise. Um, there was this big social reckoning happening on social media about, you know, sexism in the industry. And just a lot of us were impacted by that, you know? Um, and so we've really found this ironically virtually safe space to come together and talk about. And we looked forward to our meetings to talk about our collaboration brew and everything, and, um, you know, decided that it, it would be beneficial for all of us to just continue to get together, you know, outside of our annual brew. Um, and so that's sort of how our pig boots plus team developed here in Allagash. Um, and one of our goals as we started talking about that was to,<affirmative> also use our resources here at all, gas being one of the biggest, if not biggest brewery in Maine, um, with, with everything that we have, um, under our hats, you know, to then help support the main pink boots chapter. So that's one of our goals. And for me personally, I, it's very driven to take action and, and really help out and start building the previous chapter leader, Heather Holland from Lin farm brewery, she's still currently involved. She's, um, a great resource, a person that, you know, can lend a hand and, and knowledge and really help guide what has worked in the past. Um, and what hasn't, um, mm-hmm,<affirmative>, we've actually recently developed a, a main chapter leadership team. So it's not just one person driving anything right now. We have, um, a few folks from Allagash. We have Hannah here and Katie who are, um, you know, Hannah is focused on that educational piece and that financial liaison, um, Katie is fo focused on social events. Um, and she also has a great connection with Yakima chief because of her, her time that she spent out there due to the pink boots scholarship. Um, and then we have other members we have Shana from Nonesuch river, Christy Kane from all of pit brewing, which is a, a new brewery in, in, um, in the state. Let's see, we have Courtney castle with good fire brewing. She's also focused on social events, um, Missy Littlefield with rising tide, focusing on educational events. So we have all these, all these people. I don't think I missed anyone. We have all these people working on these individual tasks that I think collectively as we were really go forward, we can build the chapter up and just really give back and get more members. You know, if there's what 160 breweries in the state, I can only imagine how many of those people are women and how many we can, um, you know, start getting together and really drive like what educate events we wanna see, you know, aside from hop sensory and malt sensory and off flavors and brewing, you know, we also want to go through and really identify, um, you know, DEI training, um, and other like HR related, um,<affirmative> training and things like that. So

Brett Willis:

Right. That's diversity, equity and inclusion, just to make sure I've got it right. Yes.

Hannah Johnson:

I had always heard of pink boots. Um, I joined the industry about eight years ago, working in New Hampshire as a brewer, um, and being in the industry, uh, as a woman I've personally seen or realized the lack of presence of women and non-binary people in the brewing industry. So when I came to Maine, there was a little bit more of a presence of the ch of, of the cause of the organization. And I joined immediately after, uh, starting at alga, which was about five years ago. Um, and I wasn't super involved. Like there wasn't a lot going on at the time and then COVID obviously hits, so that didn't help anything. So, um, just over the past couple years, I've gotten more and more passionate about the cause, and I've just been wanting to spend more time, uh, you know, helping these ladies get the chapter going again. That's awesome.

Katie Beaucage:

Yeah. So I actually joined the, uh, the brewing industry back in late 2017. Mm-hmm<affirmative> in, uh, the Boston area and I, it was the following spring of 2018 that I ended up joining pink boots. It was kind of funny. Um, we had our collaboration brew day, um, which is an, an annual, uh, event that pink boots has. Mm-hmm<affirmative> is a, uh, they partner with Yakima, chief hops and Yakima chief actually provides a special blend of hops, um, which can be purchased by breweries, um, and use it to brew a collaboration beer, uh, with proceeds going back to pink boot society. Um, so I knew that our brewery wanted to plan one of these so we could support. And that was the bigger pushes for me to join. I had heard about pink boots prior, but was still very fresh to the industry. Totally. Um, and then it was maybe a few, couple months later, uh, where I really started to get involved. Um, I was like, great, I'm a member. Now I brew a beer. This is cool. Um, then our Boston chapter had a, uh, an arm wrestling competition and I was like, Ooh, I wanna do that.<laugh>. So that was actually my first opportunity to really like, start getting involved in the Boston chapter and, um, start network and meeting other women who were in Massachusetts and, uh, brewing and, and doing other parts of the industry. Uh, but yeah, I mean, that was kind of my big, all right, doing some arm wrestling and, uh, meet some different people. And it was, it was a great opportunity to start meeting, you know, other women who are in the same position as I am. That's

Brett Willis:

Really cool. Do you still have a passion for arm wrestling?

Katie Beaucage:

<laugh> I do it every now and then.<laugh> very cool. It is. It's a lot of fun. Um, and you know, it's, it is such a fun way to build camaraderie totally. Between the women, which is kind of funny to say, cuz it's it's competition. Yeah. You know? Yeah. But<laugh>, but it is so much fun. The amount of support that you get from one another. Yeah. And, you know, even it was, you know, our, our collaboration brew day, we had a few girls, uh, from the main chapter, uh, practicing some arm wrestling and giving each other, you know, some pointers trying different techniques and it's a lot of fun

Brett Willis:

<laugh> so the three of you are actually really involved with the main chapter at this point. And so I guess I'd just be interested to hear kinda like, what are your roles? What are you doing within the main pink boots chapter? At this point,

Hannah Johnson:

I am as an official title, head of finances, which is just as it sounds, um, I'm keeping an eye on and track of our main chapter funding. So we know who's paid their dues, what money we've raised at various events and how we can use this money for events, recruiting, educational, op opportunities, and more, I've also volunteered to help organize some of these educational events, uh, along with our Katie Beaucage here at Allagash and Missy Littlefield from rising tide. Awesome.

Katie Beaucage:

I, uh, I work mainly on recruitment. I'm kinda like the, the hype women. So I've just been<laugh>. That's great. I've just been doing a lot of, uh, outreach, um, really trying to get different breweries involved and have, you know, more women join. We have so many women working in the beverage industry in Maine. Yeah. Um, who are, you know, not involved in pink boots. And my big focus is trying to reach out to these women. Mm-hmm<affirmative>, uh, get them to join pink boots.

Brett Willis:

Awesome. How about you, Leah?

Leah Jones:

Um, so my title is main chapter leader and what I do with the chapter is sort of organize everybody, um, organize our chapter leadership team meetings, um, try to get pig boots, you know, involved in various different, um, you know, events, you know, we have a few coming, coming down the pipe here. Um, I do all the communications with the national think boots society. I ensure that, you know, folks are, um, welcomed when they join. I also, we really collectively I think work together and, um, bounce a lot of ideas off of each other. You know, there's no like single person doing this, um, currently right now, which is really great.

Brett Willis:

That's really interesting. Like how, how is that relationship between like the main chapter and the national chapter, I guess, like what is, what is the interplay there?

Leah Jones:

No, that's a great question. So the Pink Boots society was founded, um, 15 years ago. Um, you know, and so it was much smaller. Obviously back then, it was like a group of, I think, 60 women in the country. Um, and so now there's many chapters nationwide, but actually worldwide. Um, the main chapter's been around for about five years, I believe, um, the current membership was just under 50 people. Oh, cool. Um, and over the past few years, and of course COVID did not help any of this, but it's, um, it was, it was led by, you know, mainly one, one person, um, with a few people like helping a little bit along the way. Um, again, this is a absolutely a voluntary a position. Yeah. So it's, you know, it's time to the time you dedicate to it is, you know, time that you have to dedicate towards it. Um, and so, you know, once I recently got involved about less than a year ago or so I, I definitely saw potential of how we could grow the main chapter. Um, you know, Maine is, as we all know a, a hotspot for the beer industry, but you know, you know, wine CI as well. Um, you know, and there's so many women working here in, in our community, not, not even like Southern Maine, but in all of me, um, you know, and I just, I felt like there was more potential to really build up the chapter. And with that, it's, it's not one person's job to do that. Right. So we've actually, uh, established this leadership team again with Hannah, Katie, a few other, um, women who are in, um, working at other breweries to, to really focus on each of those areas so that we can hopefully build our, um, in Maine with pink wood society. Um, yeah. And just sort of, you know, get educational opportunities out to the women that are working in the industry, you know, either solely alone in a brewery or, you know, even, you know, this, the society is open up to women who, you know, just work at bars as well. You don't need to work on a tablet. That's cool, uh, to be involved. So people that are working, you know, serving alcohol and things like that. So we're just hoping to really outreach, um, more, more people in our, in our industry. Totally.

Brett Willis:

That, uh, it, it made me think of the question too though. Like what, what is the sort of, what would be success for the three of you? Like what are you hoping to, to help sort of foster through pink boots

Leah Jones:

Over time? We can be collectively this strong unit of, uh, women and non-binary individuals who are working here in Maine. Mm-hmm,<affirmative> not just Southern Maine, but we're, we're at actually hoping to provide these resources, these educational events, these social hours, um, to central and, and Hey, maybe even Northern Maine, but we're looking for that like central spot where we can help everybody in the state, um, and be, be a good safe community, um, with positive energy, with, you know, any sort of educational stuff that, that people wanna do out there. I've, you know, reached out to the chapter, looking for feedback, what do you want out of pink boots and things like that. So we're really just trying to just be a force that, um, you know, women and, and non-binary individuals can resort to in the industry. Um, you know, we're fortunate here at Allagash to be working among many different women, um, and breweries out there are, you know, some of them are a little bit more isolated and alone than that. And, you know, we just wanna open that door and that opportunity for everybody, um, to collectively just get together. We want to have, um, you know, more scheduled educational events, you know, possibly something every six weeks. And then on the other hand, something, you know, maybe social events in between that, um, we definitely want to increase our participation in the collaboration brew day, which is the, the pink boots as, um, you know, biggest fundraiser of the year. Uh, we've had roughly 10 breweries in the day, eight participate on average, um, which has been great. Um, I feel like some brewers are also doing, um, specifically international women's day beers versus pink boots, collaboration BES, which is sure either, you know, help help with the messaging. And that's awesome. And I think we just wanna, um, get behind that a little bit more, um, and, and get some participation forward.

Brett Willis:

Yeah. I mean, that's awesome. Mm-hmm,<affirmative>, that's awesome. It just makes me think too, of the, sort of how the, the pandemic seemed to underscore the power of community, where it was like, you, you kind of forgot how nice it was just to be around other people in similar situation as you were in. And so I think that that's just awesome to build that consistency and, and, you know, have a place that people can, uh, uh, rely on, you know, of the community. So, yep.

Leah Jones:

Sounds awesome. Absolutely. There was definitely the, the last two years, I think really triggered something inside me, especially of like this need for unity and community. Um, and hopefully we can bring that to the table over the next few years as we slowly move along here, but

Brett Willis:

Totally, that's awesome. Kind of backing up a little bit, I guess, Katie, could you talk a little bit about that Yakima achieve scholarship because you took part in that I believe,

Katie Beaucage:

Yeah. Last year yak, I had a scholarship called the Yakima chief experiential scholarship and so five pink boots members, myself being one of them, uh, were able to go out to Yakima valley and Yakima chief is amazing. They put us all up in this cute little Villa, nice, um, and a really cute spot. And, um, Kelly lo Meer of Yakima, chief, she is a field marketing specialist. She spent the four days of us kind of driving us around to visit different farms. We got so much, we went to Yakima chief, we got to visit the aroma dome and do sensory classes, which was super fun. Also getting to learn just so much about the sensory process and see how a place like Yakima does it. Cool. You really so cool. Um, we got to see processing facilities and we got to go to Yakima, chief ranches. Nice. Uh, learned about, um, you know, how different hops are propagated, how different strains are created. Um, it really was so much activity packed into like four days and it was just, it was a really, really a great trip and also getting to see Yakima valley at the beginning of harvest, right. Was so much buzz and excitement in the air. Everyone's just, you know, they work towards that all year that, and then they have this few week window where it is just like, you know, complete madness, everyone as, you know, tour groups coming through, you know, all the like harvesting equipment is running. Uh, it was a really, really great trip and also got being able to connect with those four other women who got the scholarship was such a great experience. So we're also in close contact with each other. And that's

Brett Willis:

Also, that was gonna be my kind of follow up question was, are you still talking with them? That's really, that's great.

Katie Beaucage:

Yeah. Yeah. A few of, a few of them actually got to go to the pink boots national conference in February. Um, and they were like sending us pictures the whole time, like, oh, look who I ran into.<laugh>

Brett Willis:

That's awesome. I mean, I guess just as a brief aside too, like, can you kind of talk about the significance of the Yakima valley for hops?

Katie Beaucage:

Absolutely. Um, Yakima valley is one of the most fertile places like, um, agriculturally in the country for hops to be grown. Um, so most of the hops that you're gonna see in brewing of almost any size, um, they're going to be coming from the Yakima area. Sure. Um, of Washington state. Okay. Um, or they'll be coming from, um, probably from, uh, Europe. We get a lot of European hops are popular too, but if you're looking at any American hops, those are for the most part going to be coming from, of course there's like smaller hop farms that are scattered around the country, but a bulk of the hops that you are seeing in most of your beers in the USA are coming straight from Yakima valley,

Brett Willis:

Also aroma dome. What a name is that? Their name?

Katie Beaucage:

Yeah, that's their name for? Okay. It's funny. They're like tomorrow we're going to the aroma dome and I'm like,<laugh> What is that

Brett Willis:

Sounds a little intimidating,

Katie Beaucage:

You know, it is, but the aroma dome is really cool. It is, uh, it's just their like sensory, uh, lab. It's, it's very cool. It's very state of the art. Um, it, I, it was really special that we got to go tour it as well. Super fun.

Brett Willis:

So I guess speaking of hops, that kinda leads into, um, upward movement, the, a beer we just recently brew. Yeah. How, how did that beer come to be?

Leah Jones:

Sure. Um, well, we've done a few pink boots blend brew in the past here at alga, but they've always been on a really small scale, like, um, our pilot system, which is about one barrel of beer and we really only put it into kegs and into the tasting room. So last year, or I believe it was last year, Leah took the lead and got a small group of ladies here at<inaudible> together to come up with some recipes using the 20, 21 Pink Boots society hop b lend, which is something that they do every year. U m, they come up with a hop blend, which K atie can give more detail about this, but, u h, they come up with a hop b lend and they sell it to breweries all around the world for them to come up with a h op blend beer. U m, and the proceeds can go back to p ink boots or some of it can go back to other organizations that support women, u m, it's really whatever you w anna do with it. Um, and we came together and came up with some recipes, with a few people on the pilot team. Um, and we used, obviously used the pink boots. Hopland had some hop sensory training with Patrick, who's the head of our R and D team here at alga. And we came up with official recipes. We brewed them. Um, and then after they were all, you know, done for my, and put into packaging or put into kegs, we did a tasting on both beers and took boats on which recipe we like the best. And then we worked towards scaling it up to our 30 barrel brew house, which was this year and we are putting it into cans and some into kegs, which will be released in the tasting room. Um, Katie and Leah, you can feel free to add on to that as well if I missed anything.

Brett Willis:

Yeah. I feel like the natural question is what were the two, what were the two beers that you almost landed on? Or I guess what were the two options that you had?

Leah Jones:

Yes. So we landed on a black IPA, um, which mighty delicious. Yes. Um, you know, it was a style that we felt was, should be making a comeback. It's not widely known or back over a year ago when we were first developing these recipes, they were, um, very few and far between. Um, and then we also felt that the hot blend would do well in, you know, like an abbey-style red, which is, you know, a style, another favorite that we have around here. So, um, we brewed both and both were actually quite tasty, but at the end of the day, we decided we really loved the, how the blend interacted with the, the black IPA and, and went with that one. So, uh, we took that pilot recipe that we served in the tasting room, um, back in early 2021. Um, fine tuned it a little bit and brewed it on our 30 barrel system right before international women's day, this year. So, um, collaboration brew day for the Pink Boots society is generally held right around international women's day. Um, breweries all over the country. I think there were over 500 plus participants actually all over the world, um, this year, um, brewing right around international women's day. Um, mostly with that hot blend. So it was really cool that like all of these beer have something in common. Yeah. You know, they, don't not every single one, but most of them do. Um, and it's a great way to, to raise money and awareness in general to the, the, to the pinks food society.

Brett Willis:

So that, that brew day was so good. That was like, I feel like one of the first days, at least for me, like post Omicron surge stuff of like, we were at the brewery around people, there was like a little cheeseboard. It was just like a very joyous occasion.

Leah Jones:

It was a great day. I mean, we had most of the women that work at Allagash here on site together at the same time, you know, pretty much touching elbow, which hasn't been a thing for a while. Um, you know, we all got to participate in some fashion, whether it be, you know, adding hops, weighing hops, um, we milked some of the, the malts and things like that. Um, you know, and we had people from each department, you know, people that work out in our tasting out on the brew deck, um, Hannah did the yeast propagation, you know, weeks prior. So the yeast I went into that beer was, um, you know, thanks to Hannah. And then I believe actually Claire dry hopped the beer a week or two later when that was ready. So, um, yeah, we're looking to package it next week. Oh, wow. And Monica, who is our packaging supervisor on one of the shifts she's gonna be out there, you know, helping package the beer. So all around, like our women were involved and we're really excited to see that. And it was great to have what felt like a normal day here finally at the brewery to celebrate, um, that thing knew, um, yeah, we had food brought in from tandem, which is a local female owned bakery down the road. And it was delicious. Um, elbow brought in a meat and cheese board, you

Brett Willis:

Know, on, on a board that she had made that she, she also is a woodworker.

Leah Jones:

Crazy. Exactly. Yep.

Brett Willis:

Uh, yeah, I mean, this is a total aside and we don't even have to include this, but the, did you hear that tandem got like one of the top 25 best, um, uh, coffee shops in the world from the financial times?

Leah Jones:

Um, that is a me

Brett Willis:

Pretty nuts. I mean, I don't know good for them that cheddar cheddar jalapeno biscuit.

Leah Jones:

I had like four of those that morning and<laugh>, I wasn't upset about it. They're so delicious.

Brett Willis:

Yeah. No, that's awesome. It's, that's so cool to hear how all the process was, you know, women, uh, you know, guiding that, so cool.

Leah Jones:

Yeah. And then, and, um, the label itself was actually designed by a local artist, Rachel Gloria Adams, who we've done work with before in the past, um, for another collaboration brew that we did. Um, but she just, you know, we sat down and told her a little bit about the beer, told her a little bit about our team and she just went to work and designed this beautiful label. I can't wait to see it on the cans. Yeah. Um, that really, it just resonated with, with every everything that we're shooting for, with the beer, but also the reason behind why we're brewing and releasing the beer as well. But the beer name, upward movement was an idea by our new England sales manager. Um, Carrie D who felt that a, you know, women in general women in this industry are really trying to make strides mm-hmm<affirmative>. And we feel like, especially over the past few years, we've been doing that. And, um, it also links to, you know, all gas and what's unique about, you know, our namesake of Allagash, the waterway act flows Northeast a little bit. So like, we felt like that name resonated not only with alga, but our goal here of, you know, movement. So super cool to<laugh> to just have it all, like we have our hands in a lot of this beer release.

Brett Willis:

No, that was awesome. I mean, I feel like there's, there's so much interesting, like there's so many cool aspects to that beer, just how it all came together and also how it tastes. It's a very good beer. Um, yeah,

Leah Jones:

It's very tasty. It's it's, you know, a little bit, it's got a nice, like medium body, super easy to drink. Um, it's definitely noticed out in any way, um, the hop blend, I think paired very nicely with this one.

Brett Willis:

So actually you, you mentioned the hop blend, actually. Katie, could you talk a little bit more about that hop blend?

Katie Beaucage:

So the hop blend, um, we actually use the hop blend from the previous year, um, because this was a scaled up batch of our pilot recipe. Um, we wanted to stay with the same hot blend. Um, so the blend is actually 30% cashmere, uh, 10% attanum 10% Citra, 30% Loral and 20% Sabro. Um, and it's a fun process, uh, getting to actually select the ingredients that go into the blend. So, um, and it's a, it's a cool process that Yakima chief sets up for all the, uh, breweries pretty much, um, breweries that have participated in the past. They'll kind of see which chapters have good participation and they'll send out different samples, just hop samples from the current season. The chapters we'll put together, usually like a chapter meeting where they'll take all of the different hops that they receive from Yakima Chief and they a hop rub and sensory of them. Um, and then those chapters are able to give their feedback of which hops they'd like to see in the annual blend.

Brett Willis:

So I guess for this like hop blend, if you could, if you could point it at a particular direction, would you say it's more citrusy? Is it more tropical? Is it piney? Like, is it kind of a mix of all those three or different flavors?

Katie Beaucage:

I would say I there's a lot of citrus coming out of this one. Um, some notes of like a little bit piney cool. And a little bit tropical definitely

Brett Willis:

Sounds very good. I, I, well, I know it, it tastes good. I tried it when it was on tap, uh, in the tasting room. Um, so yeah, I'm mean, I guess, just to go over it one more time, uh, you know, if people want to get involved in pink boots, you email that email address it. What was the email address again?

Leah Jones:

pinkbootssociety.org. I would direct people to go there because then they can find all the membership info on the website. Um, and it's easier to remember than I think

Brett Willis:

The other, the email address. Okay, cool. Yeah. So if people want to get involved, then the best way to do it is go to pinkbootssociety.org. Uh, there's a lot of information about how to join, uh, what membership entails, everything else like that.

Leah Jones:

We are also on Instagram and Facebook. So, um, check us out there. PinkbootssocietyMaine, PBSMaine.

Brett Willis:

Awesome. Is there anything else that the three of you, like anything else that I, that we missed, that we should talk about?

Leah Jones:

It was a fun dress rehearsal. I can't wait to do the real one.<laugh> Um, I don't

Brett Willis:

The dress rehearsal nature is what makes it fun.<laugh> Well, thank you so much to all three of you for, for, uh, joining us and talking about pink boots. This is awesome. Yeah.

Leah Jones:

Thank you. Thank you for having us appreciate it. It's a lot of fun.

Brett Willis:

And for our listeners, if you have anything that you want to ask us, anything that you're interested in hearing us talk about, please let us know. Podcast@allagash.com would love to hear any and all feedback. This has been an analog brewing production.

Speaker 4:

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