“Americans are good at taking traditions and fucking with them. That’s what we’re good at.” With that quote, Sam Calagione commanded an uproarious round of applause from a sold out crowd of Dogfish Head Craft Brewery fans.
Dogfish Head Brewery fans lucky enough to score a ticket to the dedicated beer dinner.
The fans were gathered at Flying Saucer sister restaurant, Meddlesome Moth, to enjoy an evening dedicated solely to the Delaware brewery. The Moth dedicated 29 of their taps to Dogfish’s masterfully crafted beer and prepared a multi-course dinner perfectly matching each of Chef David McMillan’s dishes with a Dogfish brew (including rare selections).
Before the dinner started Calagione spoke with the Dallas Morning News GuideLive and Beerknews and then, after a wonderful introduction from Captain Keith, addressed those in attendance.
Calagione spoke about the current state of American indie-craft beer and gave some insight as to what the future holds. Here are some of the highlights:
On what makes American craft beer so special and important:
“Ninety-nine percent of the world genuflects to Reinheitsgebot. We’re hoping to erode that and push the envelope.”
Meddlesome Moth dedicated 29 of its taps to Dogfish Head Brewery.
As to whether the craft beer market is oversaturated and can sustain the current growth rate of 1.7 new breweries opening each day:
“The ones (brewers) that stay successful need to fire on all three cylinders: quality, consistency and being well-differentiated. It doesn’t matter how big you get, as long as you do all three of those things at world-class levels, there is room for many more successful brewers.”
Continuing the discussion on the current state of indie-craft beer:
“…indie-craft is still gaining market share up to 20%, that’s what we as a community should be judged by. Not by the minority of small craft breweries that didn’t care as much about the quality, consistency and being well differentiated as they did about entering our industry and making a bunch of money. Those shouldn’t be the priorities. It should be passion about quality, consistency and well-differentiated beer. Any brewery that has that as their priority will be successful.”
Finally, offering advice for indie-craft brewers:
“Don’t let the tail of money wag the dog of innovation.”
From R-L: Captain Keith, Dogfish Head’s Sam Calagione and Meddlesome Moth’s Beer Director, Matt Quenette
