2014 Forward Festive-ale
by BradWhile this week's entry isn't our only Mobcraft entry, it might be one of the most unique we've done so far. Every year, Madison has a week-long event filled with conferences, meetups, talks, and open houses, all centered around entrepreneurship. It's called Forward Fest. Every year since 2013, MobCraft has brewed a beer selected by the community to be that year's "Festive-Ale". They bottle a select few of them for festival attendees to garner one way or another.
The 2014 Forward Festive-ale was an orange-peel-cardamom-ginger-blackberry IPA (say that five times fast). This particular bottle is almost 2 years old, and based on my memory of the beer, it had a substantial impact on the beer. It poured super foamy (which made measurement interesting) but was a cloudy, dark amber in color. The initial hoppiness had mellowed, and the cardamom and ginger really started to show through after aging. What was originally a good beer turned out rather delightful.
Prep/Cooking
As mentioned, measuring out the right amount of beer for the batter was a little difficult given how foamy it was, so I erred on the side of having too much liquid. That being said, (possibly due to the headiness) the batter came out much thicker than average, and the ginger aroma and flavor was apparent. So far in the process I had picked up almost none of the orange peel, but the batter started to get orange-ier with more tastes.
Results
The pancakes had an interesting aroma - somewhat spicy, but I couldn't quite place it. Maybe the ginger, maybe the cardamom, maybe a combination. The blackberries hadn't made an appearance thus far and that didn't change at all. The pancakes had a sweet, almost wheaty taste to them, and the ginger was definitely there.
The Decision
This is one of those instances where I'm going to break format. There likely are very few (if any) of these bottles still in existence, so to give recommendations seems silly. The one interesting part I will comment on is adding syrup: Adding syrup gave these pancakes some added sweetness that reminds me of ginger medallions - sweet, sugary, gingery goodness.
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