Cask Beer 101

Now that we have successfully tapped our first keg of draft beer at Anvil my thoughts have shifted to the next addition we will make to the Anvil beer program, cask ale. It is my hope that in the next 6 months we can find the money to buy ourselves a cask engine which will allow us to pour cask conditioned ale all the time. Before I launch into an equipment nerd break down of the cool workings of a beer engine however, let’s cover the abc’s of cask ale to find out why this type of beer is so special and rare. Read more

Follow Bobby Heugel on Twitter

Drink Dogma and Anvil Bar & Refuge are now on Twitter. Keep up with bar updates, new posts, and other news with Bobby Heugel, co-owner and bartender at Anvil Bar & Refuge. I hope to use Twitter to stay in touch with our local regulars and other cocktail friends online and across the nation so that those of you waiting for us to open stay as updated as possible. As always, if you have any questions you can contact me here. Over the next couple of weeks, you can expect an official opening date for Anvil to be posted, more pictures of the bar, and a link between the blog and Anvil’s website, currently under construction. Read more

Anvil Bar & Refuge Video Online

There is a new website online called Blockcast.TV, which is visiting Houston bars and posting video tours.  Blockcast is touring a wide spectrum of Houston bars, and recently, they came to see us at Anvil.  I spent some time talking with them during a recent shift, and now the video tour of Anvil is available.  I think the below video concisely gives a great tour of our bar, and I get to make a virtual version of one of my favorite cocktails, the Pisco Sour. So enjoy, and be sure to check back with Blockcast for more bar tours. Read more

The Texas Micro-Distillation Market

Since my return to Houston a couple of years ago, I have anxiously monitored the Texas spirits market. In Chicago, I had the great small-batch spirits from North Shore Distillers, including Distiller’s Gin No.6 and their Aquavit. But, despite the boom of Tito’s Vodka years before, the Texas market remained relatively quiet, adding only Paula’s Texas Spirits until 2007. Read more