Open Forum in The Villages, Florida
This weekly podcast will cover in detail, people, clubs and activities here in The Villages, Florida. Each show will run 10-30 minutes. Become a Supporter of this show for $3/month. Supporters will have access to all episodes. Our newest Supporters will get a Shout-out during a show.
Open Forum in The Villages, Florida
The Craft Beer Odyssey: Joe Mongan's Journey through Homebrewing and the Renaissance of Ancient Ales
Embark on a spirited exploration into the nuanced universe of craft beer with our special guest Joe Mongan from The Villages, Florida. We're not just sipping on hops and barley; we're delving into a culture rich in tradition and taste. Joe, with his extensive experience in home brewing, guides us through the distinct characteristics that set craft beer apart from its commercial cousins. He illuminates the meticulous selection of ingredients and the small-batch process that culminates in a symphony of flavors, ranging from the light and refreshing session beers to the deep and complex stouts. Our conversation travels through Joe's own brewing adventures and his commitment to sharing the craft beer gospel with enthusiasts and novices alike.
Stimulate your senses as we recount the creation of the Hyperbalique IPA, a craft beer that defies convention by marrying the crispness of a Brut IPA with the creamy sweetness of a milk stout. Though it's yet to grace retail shelves, its debut at local taps caused quite a stir. We tap into the essence of beer innovation while also pouring over Dr. Craig Curtis's insights on how moderate craft beer indulgence may indeed be more than just a delightful pastime—it could offer a toast to our health. Our discourse wades into the potential benefits of moderate alcohol consumption, as suggested by recent studies, and the joy that responsibly savoring these artisanal brews can bring.
Our episode closes on a reflective note, pondering the reemergence of ancient beer styles thanks to dedicated brewers like Herdman. These passionate souls are not merely brewing—they're time-traveling with their recipes, resurrecting long-forgotten ales for our modern palates. Joe shares his expertise on brewing across diverse climates and the crucial role water quality plays in crafting a pint worth raising. The conversation paints a picture of a thriving brewing community eager to expand their ranks, contribute to local events, and offer their craft to charitable causes. Amidst the tales of camaraderie and creativity, we invite you to raise a glass to the community and the continuing evolution of craft beer.
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Open Forum in The Villages, Florida is Produced & Directed by Mike Roth
A new episode will be released most Fridays at 9 AM
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If you know a Villager who should appear on the show, please contact us at: mike@rothvoice.com
Welcome to the Open Forum in the Villages Florida podcast. In this show we talk to leaders in the community, leaders of clubs and interesting folks who live here in the villages to give perspectives of what is happening here in the villages Florida. We are a listener. Supported podcast. There will be shoutouts for supporters and episodes One note from the heart.
Mike Roth:Hello, dear listeners, I'm thrilled to share our passion project with you Podcast that brings joy, knowledge and inspiration. Creating it is a labor of love, even though it demands more time than I can easily spare. But hey, time isn't something that we can buy back right Now. Here's where you come in, the unsung hero. You can help us keep the podcast alive and thriving Ow by becoming a supporter. You can make a small monthly contribution. Visit our website, open forum in the villages, floridacom, and click on the supporter box. Even a humble $3 to $10 a month makes a difference. And guess what? You can cancel anytime, no strings attached, Free and priceless. Thank you. Your support means the world to us. Stay curious, stay inspired and keep those headphones on.
Emily:If you have a book that you would like to turn into an audiobook, let us know via email to mike@rothvoice. com. Hope you enjoy today's show.
Mike Roth:This is Mike Roth on open forum in the villages, florida. I'm here today with Joe Mogan. Joe, thanks for joining me.
Joe Mongan:Yeah, thank you for searching me out in the villages and inviting me to come on a podcast. I think these podcasts are always a good thing to do for people to listen to.
Mike Roth:Right, I think there aren't enough podcasts like this. In the villages, joe runs a club dedicated to beer or craft beer.
Joe Mongan:Yeah, craft beer. There's a difference between beer and craft beer. A lot of people, probably in our age groups, are just used to drinking beer, but we're trying to get out the word about craft beer, which is totally different kind of style of beer.
Mike Roth:So how long have you run the craft beer club?
Joe Mongan:The craft beer club started in May of 21. So coming up here in a lesson a few weeks. By the time this show goes live, the club will be three years old. So good.
Joe Mongan:How many members do you have in the craft beer club? We currently have 400 members and we have 35 or so on the wait list currently. So we're trying to see if we can increase membership, but we have to go to the members and see if they're willing to do that or we're going to keep it at a cap on our membership right now.
Mike Roth:Interesting, interesting. There are only a few clubs here in the villages that are cap, second honeymooners and the New Jersey club. Are they going to do what I can think of?
Joe Mongan:Yeah, it all depends what you consider where you want to keep a good membership and the quality of what you can provide your members. You got to give them something that keeps them coming back. You can say you have a thousand members, but how many people are actually active? And our club strives to have most everybody active. And if you can't get into an event but you're strive every morning or every time you're in that when the event goes live and you can never get into the event, then you're not getting much for your membership. So we started to keep it to a level that everybody has an opportunity.
Mike Roth:I'm glad to hear people want to show up. Joe first, why don't you tell our listeners what the difference is between beer and craft?
Joe Mongan:beer. Beer is probably what most people consider it's mass produced. It's mass produced on gallon by gallon. So I'm not going to throw out a few names there, because I would the advisors.
Joe Mongan:I guess you can say in the middle of the course, and all the big boys that do millions and gallons and advertise like crazy. Craft beer is more generating toward the smaller breweries and I don't offhand currently know what the levels are, but it's more quality ingredients, lesser of a product, but most people consider it like they're more informal kind of beers. Are not I guess that's probably not the right word to use as informal. The small batch the small batch beers.
Joe Mongan:But the people that do small batches can afford to put some more expensive adjuncts and stuff in their beers to make different beers that you can't get readily available in the big market because it becomes too expensive Stuff. Would that be like a lot of fruits, actual real fruit, instead of using extracts and beers, because a lot of the cheap way to go and if you do a lot of things with a beer you can put extracts in there, but they that gives you a like an alcohol kind of indifferent bite to the beer. So we're craft beers. Most generally they will use the actual real fruit product, which makes a huge difference.
Warren:Mm-hmm but it's more expensive.
Joe Mongan:Right that's what money is not everything all the time when you're trying to do a beer that most people can't get old and what percentage of alcohol is in the craft beer? Craft beer, when that's what the craft beers can be any Level of alcohol, because there's session beers, there's session session beers.
Joe Mongan:But session means is there are light alcohol beer. There are three to five percent roughly, and what it means is you can drink these all day because they're lesser alcohol. So when you get to the craft beer style that you start getting to the doubles and the triples and everything else. But you can go from a session beer all the way to a Russian Imperial Stout and sometimes you can get those in the 18 range of 18%.
Joe Mongan:ABV 18%, their barrel aged beers which has got a little picked up from the barrels and all that stuff. So you can get a broad range in craft beers where some of the cheaper beers on the market they have 4% and that's where they stay. They don't alter those kind of qualities.
Mike Roth:Joe, how long have you been brewing beer?
Joe Mongan:been brewing beer a little over 12 years. So it's it started all out as a. There's two different reasons I started it. I started it out because in Illinois, where I was in the Chicago area, about 90 miles west of Chicago, I found the beers were bypassing and I would come from Rockford, illinois. The good craft beers were bypassing Rockford and going up into Wisconsin or to some other cities because our distributors were not bringing it, bringing them in it Currently and I thought what's the reason for that? I could see some of, because what some of my favorite beers and what I really originally started brewing beer was, it was three Floyd's. Indiana was producing a craft beer never, never had it before and all of a sudden somebody went and brought some back and give you a Taste of that and it's why can't I get that here?
Mike Roth:Yeah, I've had that with a beer from Montauk Point, long Island. You can't get Montauk beer out, so I had a New.
Joe Mongan:York. Yeah, that's the way. There's other beers. They do that for a reason. So I thought why can't I just start investigating? How can I make this at home? So I had my two son-in-laws. I said let's brew beer together for something to do. And we brewed a couple batches and so on and I went to. They didn't have any problem drinking my beer, mm-hmm, or our beer at the time. But then I started getting involved in more in the brewing process, which had created a habit for more money to put into the project. And they had families they were just starting out in and everything else. So they said, oh, we're bailing out now. We can't get into your, you're spending too much money.
Emily:So I said okay, that's fine.
Joe Mongan:But they never had a problem coming home over the house and drinking what I was making. When they still don't, they still visit here and everything else and they still love to do what I drink, what I do.
Mike Roth:So do you have any craft beers with strange names?
Joe Mongan:Oh yeah, I got a few strange names, like I. Well, we just had a what we called our home brew rock party a couple weeks ago, and I have a Coconut milk stout that I call monkey trap. So you wonder how does that come about? And well, the milk stout actually has coconut in it, so the beer is white. No, it's actually dark. Basically mortar oil.
Joe Mongan:Mm-hmm and I looked online. I was looking for names of beers and I look, I'd like Google a lot of things and I thought if it's got coconut in it. Then I found a picture of something where a monkey they trap monkeys by Putting a coconut on a chain, tie in it down and then they put rice in the coconut. And then the monkey reaches in there and grabs hold of the rice, but it can't open its hand back up because it never wants to let go of the rice. So that's just much like my beer. You never wanted to let it go either as you're drinking it. So that's how I come up with the name of that.
Mike Roth:What's your favorite style of beer?
Joe Mongan:IPA's are probably my most favorable For people who are familiar with IPA tell us what that means an IPA is an India pale ale and the Folklore goes that they used to add a lot of hops to beers to India. As they cross the desert the beers would become less flavorful and maybe come because they got too warm or something. It was to add more hops to beers. It took the American Style people to probably start increasing the style, but the name kept up the same profile or style you want to say. And there's so many different styles of IPA's out there. That's what I say to some people. They say I don't like IPA's. I said you just not, have not had the right one yet there's a style of an IPA out there for you. That's why you have to read the cans, attention to it and much like that. You have to join a club that teaches you about craft beer and that's why we started what we do good.
Mike Roth:Good, I understand that you are working, or have worked, with a brewery in Tampa to create a new beer.
Joe Mongan:Yes. So what I started out with Tampa how I met her was is that we as a club we start doing brew trip, the brewery trips to different breweries in the area, because, as everyone knows, the villages Does not have a brewery in the villages within this good limits. Really, no, which they should, and I think it's going to change because I hear some rumors that there might be some coming. Either they've started by the villages or somebody I believe is going to start one out of an adventure through my club or some other people who knows who's coming in here. But this is a prime market for it. So I've met Devin Kreps of Seventh Sun Brewery on one of my bus trips and we take 56 people and we're gone 10 hours a day. That seems like a lot, but when you hour and a half drive in which way, and then you've got to go to all these different breweries and it's just a fun day here.
Joe Mongan:So if you go to Tampa and visit, how many breweries we do four or five, four or five in a day, and sometimes we can go to a place where you can get three within walking, doesn't. So that's up to you which ones you want to go to. So we were just sitting out back talking about a style of beer that I was starting to come up with, and it's never been produced before.
Mike Roth:It's been produced.
Joe Mongan:No, because I came up with a style myself, because I used to. There was a what they call a brute IPA, which is a style much like brute champagne.
Joe Mongan:Very dry they're very dry, highly carbonated and they just lack body. So I thought I speaking of my milk stout, milk stouts that have lactose sugar and that does not ferment out, so it leaves the beer sweeter. So when you see milk stouts, they're different than a stout because of the sugar that's left in the beer, because it does not ferment. So I thought, if I'm gonna, I like the brute and I like the milk stout. I added lactose to a brute and now it's called a hyperbalique IPA. That's the name that Devon come up with it, because she's that's her job is to think of different names of things, the styles, and it was like what style do we call it? What do we do that?
Mike Roth:So is it available for sale in publics here in the villages Not currently.
Joe Mongan:We brewed 450 gallons of it about probably really about a year ago and it all sold. It was on tap at Edna's, it was on tap at Sunnypike and it's pretty cool to see your own beer on a tap list where you live, and that's probably one of my goals as a brewer is can I get my beer ever mass produced? So she opened her Dunedin branch was the branch that she first started with and that's where I met her and started talking about that style of beer. She asked me after I brewed it she goes, please bring that down because I'm interested in trying that. I've never heard of that combination. I took it down to her and as we, she sampled it and as we're sitting around the brewery and customers were there, I started taking a few samples around. They said no, we don't like IPAs and I said this is a little bit different style of an IPA. It's got more body, it's got more hops, but the hops are pop a little bit more by popmys. I think you have more aroma and you have more flavor out of them because of the lactose being used. Very true, that was the case After the beer actually came out.
Joe Mongan:We were at the brewery to go pick up some more of my beer and I was sitting around at the tables and I was looking around at everybody drinking the beer and I told my wife, I said half the people in here are drinking my beer and she said I don't believe you. And I said go up and ask them because I could tell by the way the body, the lacing on the glass and what the lacing means is there's really as you drink it. It's much like wine where you see the rings of every time you stop sip rings right. The beer will do the same thing. It'll leave the foam ring as each time you take a sip. And I could see by the foam ring and I could see by the color. I said they're all. Half these people are drinking my beer. And she went up and asked and sure thing they did.
Mike Roth:They work so, yeah, and let's take a quick break here and listen to a Alzheimer's tip from Dr Craig Curtis. Yeah, dr Curtis, can you talk about alcohol use and Alzheimer's?
Dr. Craig Curtis:Yes, mike, they have had studies out for years that show those with that have one to two drinks a day actually have a lower risk of heart attack or stroke. And in a study published, that's interesting.
Mike Roth:That means that people who totally abstain from alcohol have a higher risk that's it.
Dr. Craig Curtis:That's a difficult question, mike. It's yes, those that abstain from alcohol not with Alzheimer's disease, but actually had a slightly higher risk of heart attack and stroke, however. So this was a study published in June of 2023 in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology and they showed for the first time that those that had one to two drinks per day it was associated with lower risk of heart attack or stroke, and they found out it was because of long-term reductions in stress signaling in the brain. So essentially they had less stress, which we've always known as a risk factor for a heart attack or stroke. But the American College of Cardiology currently is not advocating for the use of alcohol to reduce your risk of heart attack or strokes because of other concerning effects of alcohol on health.
Warren:With over 20 years of experience studying brain health, dr Curtis's goal is to educate the village's community on how to live a longer, healthier life. To learn more, visit his website, craigcurtismdcom, or call 352-500-5252 to attend a free seminar.
Mike Roth:It was a beer salesman in Cincinnati, I think his name was Herdman. He decided he left the beer company that he was working for and opened up his own brewery. He bought up the beer formulas for all of the old beers from Cincinnati and was brewing fresh from the old formulas, opened up a couple of restaurants and a brewery of his own. Then he ran out of capacity and he's having other people brew the old beers with the old labels on them for him.
Joe Mongan:That's one thing about beers. There's beer styles that have been out, but there's also been out for years. But there's also a lot of beers and the styles are starting to come back now because people are saying what can I brew next? That's different. Everybody's brewing an IPA, everybody's brewing a stout. Everybody's doing this. What can I do to be different?
Mike Roth:I've never heard of a monkey beer before. I can't find that in the store.
Joe Mongan:No, you're not. Yeah, you never know. I do have another one that I'm thinking about trying to release in the villages and I'm not sure I should say that on this program. But are you open to villages folklore? Sure, I've asked Devon. The same lady is thinking that I'm going to brew a pineapple and wheat beer and mass produce it and release it in the villages.
Mike Roth:What are you calling it?
Joe Mongan:Pineapples and luffas. You've heard the folklore of the villages, but the luffa is in the pineapple. Right, I've heard about the luffa, not too much about the pineapple Pineapples were like the long ago thing that you have a Google and there's a pineapple or whatever you do with it. It's just like everything else Pineapple.
Mike Roth:Yeah, that was from 1930s.
Joe Mongan:So there's that story. So it was like a combination thing. So that could be possibly the next beer that hits the market. We don't know yet. That could be a big hit in the villages?
Mike Roth:Yes, exactly, and 150,000 people here. You don't need too big of a hit to sell out. So, Joe, are you still working or are you retired?
Joe Mongan:I'm working. I think I have a couple of years left. I work for a dredging company in Leesburg which is only about 10-minute drive. I'm very happy with what I do and then it keeps me busy. But then when everybody says, how do you do that and run a club and do some of these other things and brew beer, it's just, I have a wife that allows me to do some of these things. Sometimes she thinks I'm crazy for doing Certain things, are getting involved in things, but I like to be involved in things. I just it passes my time.
Mike Roth:Would you do take the whole garage air-conditioned and turn it into a mini brewery?
Joe Mongan:You know, I wish I would air-conditioned it, but I have not done that yet, actually, because when you brew it, you're creating, you're boiling for an hour, you're doing that, so it'd be like a waste of time to set some fans you gotta have fans.
Joe Mongan:Yes, and then the Florida weather is always. It makes brewing beer interesting. The groundwater Temperature affects things for cooling the beer down. In Illinois I could brew in the winter time and my groundwater temperature be in the 50s. It cooled my beer down a little bit of no time. But here's a little different ball game.
Mike Roth:So here do you use, like reverse osmosis, filtration water or you just use tap water.
Joe Mongan:I use tap water but I run it through the Nova system that a lot of the villagers have in their houses, and then I sent the water sample out after Came out to word labs and then I know what to add back into it, because if you take and use our old water, you're stripping all the good stuff out of the water. Then you got to build it all back up. So if you know something, you're starting with it's. You know, in the ballpark of what your brewing water is, I bring water and messing with the water would kick me different additives for your water, like salts and Gypsum, and all that stuff becomes a big game and it's a. It's just like anything else.
Joe Mongan:How good you want to get is how much you want to keep tweaking. Do you want to just brew and get it done and drink it real fast? That's a different ball game too. But if you want to make quality beer, go through all the rig, what the proper procedures, and buy the equipment and all that. Yeah, up to you what you want to do. Brewing beers like like cooking. You can buy the cheapest oven or you can buy the best. Oh, and it's up to you right.
Mike Roth:So in your club, how many of the members actually brew their own beer?
Joe Mongan:that actually brew their own beer. We're doing what we've had a big major revamp of our website and what we have found out there's 115 people that are interested, have or have our active brewers. So we're gonna break that down and try to increase the number. I would say we probably have 30 active brewers in the villages and probably another 50 or so that have brewed before the total. So by the time you get done, we're gonna start really pushing that branch of the club as far as getting in the brewing process, trying to get involved at some festivals in the area, try to get involved in festivals in within the villages, sure.
Mike Roth:I could see something at that like the barbecue festival.
Joe Mongan:Yeah, and it could be. A thing that we would like to try to do is do our own festival, tie it with some of the other bigger clubs and turn it into a yearly event and raise money for a charity.
Mike Roth:Yeah, that's great. I used to run the three years. I ran the all German car show and we wanted to do it outside of the villages so we held it at the Harbor Hills.
Mike Roth:Country Club which was okay, but we were on an asphalt parking lot and you know we were limited to a hundred vehicles because of the size of the parking lot. In fact, they wanted to keep his golf course open. He wouldn't let me park cars on the golf course. I don't know why. That's how you do a concourse. Yeah, exactly, but now the Baker house is open to car shows. That would be a an interesting proposition.
Joe Mongan:I think what I would visualize if we do this.
Joe Mongan:I've heard a little bit about how Eastport is being designed and there will not be any street Traffic as far as cars and golf carts and all that is supposed to be a walkthrough Kind of area, so you will not be able to park on the streets. It's gonna be parking behind the buildings. It's gonna be much like a lifestyle walkthrough center, like some of the malls you get to. Now I'm not a hundred percent sure about that, but that's what I was told. Yeah, which makes a good concept.
Mike Roth:If they can, they expand the concept of the Sawgrass food building. That probably would be a good idea, but Sawgrass doesn't have enough parking.
Joe Mongan:That's. They should have probably figured that out a little bit more, I see, when they everybody was parking off by the street on the grass, or they fixed that problem real quick.
Mike Roth:But they know how to fix things it would have been far better to build a two-story garage where you can stash 300 cars yeah. And that would have solved the whole problem up front.
Joe Mongan:I do saw grass a lot, though. I think the sound quality is good there because of the canopies and of course it's a newer setup. But I do the sound quality there? I think it sounds really great.
Mike Roth:It's going to have a very interesting town square.
Joe Mongan:Don Wiley does a good job. That's how I found a word of move by my lot. I looked on the village's map and it's what's across the street from here. I just watched his drone fly over and I said oh, I see I got a pond across the street, I'll take that lot. Yeah, he does them a really good justice to do one of that, and then he also throws people under the bus that are driving through some of the areas they're not supposed to be, which I like. That too.
Mike Roth:Yeah, don is a county commissioner now and he was actually my first guest on the show.
Joe Mongan:Oh, that's cool yeah.
Mike Roth:We did three episodes with him and we didn't Another one when he was doing the election for a commissioner, and he's got to do another election this year, so I guess I'm going to bring him back for another episode.
Warren:Before we go.
Mike Roth:Joe, is there anything else you want to tell our listeners how they get a whole of you, or how would they find out more about your club?
Joe Mongan:They could go to the villagescraftbeercom or wwwthevillagescraftcom. There's a join us link there.
Joe Mongan:So if you click the join us link you will get put on our waitlist currently we're going to start sending out a poll to see if our membership wants to increase or leave alone. I don't make that call. That's not for me to decide, and they can. We'll get emails of that and you can watch on our website what we do. We have a Facebook page called the villagescraftbeer and brewing enthusiasts. That's how you can get all of us and then we'll send you an email that you actually contacted us and you can get on, put on our waitlist or ask information. We're currently setting up a sponsors page, so we're going to have.
Joe Mongan:We have a lot of people in the craft beer industry that want to start being in front of 400 people. So we picked up the sunny pint here in the villages as a sponsor. Pat's Taps over in Lake Panasafki. We got tri-eagle distributors that are the distributor in the villages that are coming on board now. They really treat us really well and a few others will bring on board. So it's really it's neat to get other people involved. It allows us to do more things.
Mike Roth:So is your club listed in the recreation center news.
Joe Mongan:Yes, it is, and find us that way. We meet the first fourth Thursday of every month, but you have to be checked in and registered on the website in order to attend. Please cannot take guests in currently because we packed a room at 180 people. That's our max to keep it comfortable. You don't want to be sent. Our meetings are about being social and it's not sitting in rows and teaching and getting up and leaving. We sit around around tables, people bring snacks, they bring everything else. Because of what it is, everybody comes around the enjoyment of beer, and that's what makes everybody happy.
Mike Roth:Great Joe, thanks for being on the show.
Joe Mongan:You're welcome. Thanks for having me.
Emily:Remember our next episode will be released next Friday at 9am. Should you want to become a major supporter of the show or have questions, please contact us at mikeatrothvoice. com. This is a shout out for supporters Tweet Coleman, Ed Williams and major supporter Dr Craig Curtis at K2 in the villages. We will be hearing more from Dr Curtis with short Alzheimer's tips each week. If you know someone who should be on the show, contact us at mikeatrothvoice,com. We thank everyone for listening to the show. The content of the show is copyrighted by Rothvoice 2024, all Rights Reserved.