Clifton Park, NY — No matter how you spell the festival of lights, Shmaltz Brewing is proud to debut its first-ever limited-edition release specifically celebrating all the miracles of the 8 crazy nights: Hanukkah, Chanukah: Pass The Beer┬«. 8 is a miraculous number in Jewish life. Its cultural/religious significance runs the gambit with several holidays spanning 8 days (Chanukah, Passover, Sukkot), a bris (circumcision) taking place on the newborn’s 8th day, and Seinfeld running for 8 years (for more deep shtick, see the 4-pack label listed below). The official Chosen Beer of this holiday season, Hanukkah, Chanukah: Pass The Beer┬« is a Dark Ale brewed with 8 malts, 8 hops, and heats up at 8% ABV. As latkes are frying and the battle royale of dreidels are spinning, Shmaltz offers some much needed light to the impending winter darkness with its latest fermented creation straight from the tanks at their new Upstate New York brewery.
“Isn’t it fitting, that on our 18th anniversary, Shmaltz Brewing would finally come out with our very first Chanukah beer?” says Jeremy Cowan, founder of Shmaltz Brewing Company. “Back in 1996, Chanukah inspired the first batch of He’brew’s Genesis Ale, hand bottled and personally delivered by friends and family to just a few stores from the back of my grandmother’s Volvo. 18 crazy years, 37 states and 5,000 retailers later, we have our very own brewery and the freedom to brew any style of beer when we want, how we want. So this time around we are thrilled to introduce our interpretation of a winter warmer, a true He’brew Celebration Beer and a new holiday tradition to pair with delicious foods and gelt for my favorite drinking season of the year.”
Hanukkah, Chanukah: Pass The Beer┬« will be nationally available in 12 oz bottles in 4-packs starting on November 1, 2014, as well as in this year’s He’brew Gift Pack┬« hitting stores before Thanksgiving.
From the 4-pack label of Hanukkah, Chanukah: Pass The Beer®
8 is a miraculous number in Jewish life. Chanukah, Passover, and Sukkot span 8 days. 8 humans survived the deluge on Noah’s ark. Maimonides delineated 8 levels of tzedakah, (charity). A bris (circumcision) comes on day 8. King Solomon completed the First Temple in the 8th month of the 8th year… “Seinfeld” ran 8 years. Dylan has 8 Grammys; Babs, 8 Golden Globes. Einstein couldn’t write until age 8. Freud, the eldest of 8 children, took 8 years to complete his medical degree. Mel Brooks stole a cap gun from Woolworths at age 8, and “The Producers,” won 8 Outer Critic Circle Awards. Winona Ryder had 8 prescription medications in her purse when arrested for shoplifting. This holiday season we celebrate all the dedicated souls with the chutzpah to rise up and to risk lighting those final precious drops of sacred oil. To the courageous and the curious, the clowns and the creators. To all the Tribe of Shmaltz. To Life! L’Chaim!
About Shmaltz Brewing Company
Ranked in 2013 as one of the “Top 100 Brewers in the World” by RateBeer.com, Shmaltz won 9 Gold and 5 Silver Medals in the World Beer Championships in 2012. A recipient of the “Distinguished Business Award” by the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce, Shmaltz was also included in the “Top 50 Fastest Growing Bay Area Companies” by San Francisco Business Times.
Founder and owner Jeremy Cowan established the company in San Francisco in 1996 with the first 100 cases of He’brew Beer┬« hand bottled and delivered throughout the Bay Area in his Grandmother’s Volvo. He’brew┬« now sells across 37 states, through 40 wholesalers and nearly 5,000 retailers. In 2007, Shmaltz released a new line of craft brewed lagers under the Coney Island┬« banner. The Coney Island brand was recently acquired by Alchemy and Science, a craft beer incubator, owned by Boston Beer (Sam Adams).
After 17 years of being an outspoken cheerleader for contract brewing, Shmaltz recently broke with tradition and opened its own New York State production brewery in Clifton Park, NY, 10 minutes north of Albany’s capital district. Shmaltz’s new home boasts a 50-barrel brewhouse with 20,000 barrels of annual capacity. The new brewery packages 12 and 22 ounce bottles and kegs of their diverse core and seasonal favorites, and hosts fans and beer tourists in their new tasting room for tours, barrel-aged previews, and special releases.
In 2010/11, Cowan published his small business memoir, Craft Beer Bar Mitzvah: How It Took 13 Years, Extreme Jewish Brewing, and Circus Sideshow Freaks to Make Shmaltz Brewing Company an International Success. A free sampling of Chapter One and suggested beer pairings, can be viewed at www.craftbeerbarmitzvah.com. In 2012, Cowan spearheaded the creation of the non-profit New York City Brewers Guild (which manages NYC Beer Week) and served as its Founding President.
Cowan also has presented at the 2013 Craft Brewers Conference, as well as previous Great American Beer Festivals, BevNet’s Brewbound conference, Beer Advocate’s Extreme Beer Festival, the Atlanta and the St. Louis Jewish Book Fairs, and the San Francisco and New York Jewish Museums.
Shmaltz Brewing beers have appeared in such distinguished media outlets as The New York Times, CNN Headline News, Beer Advocate Magazine, NPR’s “Weekend Edition,” Fox Business News, Men’s Health, San Francisco Chronicle, The Jerusalem Report, New York Jewish Week, and Washington Post.
For more information, please visit: www.shmaltzbrewing.com