Saint Arnold Divine Reserve No. 3 Available Beginning October 3rd
Houston Brewery Also Celebrates another Win at Great American Beer Festival
HOUSTON, Oct. 2, 2006 – Beer connoisseurs throughout Texas will be setting their alarm clocks to make sure they get in line early tomorrow, the date of the release of Saint Arnold Divine Reserve No. 3, the next limited edition version of Saint Arnold Divine Reserve. This unique single batch series that is available for a very limited time in Austin, Dallas and Houston. Saint Arnold Divine Reserve is produced by Saint Arnold Brewing Company, the oldest craft brewery in Texas.
The announcement of the launch of Saint Arnold Divine Reserve No. 3 follows the brewery’s win over the weekend of a highly coveted medal at the 2006 Great American Beer Festival (GABF). The brewery won a bronze medal in the German-Style Kölsch category for Saint Arnold Fancy Lawnmower beer. Saint Arnold Brewing has now won 10 GABF medals over the past eight years.
Saint Arnold Divine Reserve features small batches of high-quality, full-flavored beer. Each new batch, with the batch number appearing on the neck label, features a different recipe. Approximately 600 cases of Saint Arnold Divine Reserve No. 3 have been produced.
Saint Arnold Divine Reserve No. 3 is an Imperial or Double IPA (India Pale Ale), an illustration of how the American craft brewing movement is pushing the envelope of beer styles and creating new styles.
“Some call it the radical beer movement, but I prefer to think of it as an effort to explore bigger, stronger, more intense beers,” said Brock Wagner, founder and chief executive officer of Houston-based Saint Arnold Brewing Company. “This Double IPA has more hops, higher alcohol and is a bit lighter in color than a typical IPA because we want the hops to punch through and too much malt tends to mask the powerful bitterness.”
The recipe for Saint Arnold Divine Reserve No. 3 was inspired by the winning entry in the 2006 Big Batch Brew Bash, which is held each year in Houston and is the biggest single-style home brewing competition in the world. Brew Bash winner David Majoras of Lubbock, Texas came up with the concoction and Saint Arnold Brewing tweaked it to increase the size and to make the beer as great as possible while keeping the spirit of the original. Beer recipes do not scale from five gallons to 1,000 gallons linearly.
The recipe includes Maris Otter and Pils as the base malts with a small amount of wheat, some crystal malts as well as honey and molasses, which give the beer a drier, less sweet flavor and contribute other interesting flavor notes. Chinook hops were added for bittering and then Centennial, Cascade and Ahtanum hops were added for flavor and aroma.
“The taste is a pleasant sweetness with a piercing hop bitter that comes through and just keeps coming,” said Wagner. “While it is extremely bitter, it is still a pleasant bitter and surprisingly drinkable – if you happen to be a hophead.”
Saint Arnold Divine Reserve’s alcohol by volume is in the nine to 10 percent range, meaning this is a great beer for sipping in small quantities. It has an original gravity of 1.082 and final gravity of 1.010.
Saint Arnold Divine Reserve No. 3 will hit store shelves on October 3rd. The previous two versions of this beer brand sold out quickly. It is priced between $12.99 and $13.99 per six-pack.
About Saint Arnold Brewing Company
Saint Arnold Brewing’s ten brews are made and sold by the company''s staff of 15 dedicated employees. The brewery is located at 2522 Fairway Park Drive and its free brewery tour and tasting is offered every Saturday at 1:00 P.M. For more information on Saint Arnold''s five year-round and five seasonal beers as well as root beer, log on to http://www.saintarnold.com.
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