Craft beer fans never need an excuse to pour a pint of the good stuff, but we never turn one down either.  Started in 2009 by Justin Smith of Richmond, Virginia and Mike Connolly of Liverpool, England, National Beer Day is a celebration of the repeal of prohibition in America, 80 years ago today.

It’s also Session Beer day and the tie to National Beer Day is no coincidence.  The Cullen-Harrison Act, which repealed prohibition, only allowed American to buy beer containing up to 4% abv.  Thus, we can both cheer the ability to enjoy great craft beer while also celebrating the difficult task of brewing flavorful creations on the lower end of the alcohol spectrum.

What is a Session Beer?  According to the Session Beer Project, a session beer as a beer that is:

• 4.5% alcohol by volume or less
• flavorful enough to be interesting
• balanced enough for multiple pints
• conducive to conversation; and 
• reasonably priced

Session beers seem to be the latest trend, finally giving us some great options that don’t involve large abv hits. 

I’m celebrating in a couple of ways.  First, I’m brewing a brown ale. The first beer I brewed was a brown ale some 15 years or so ago.  I still remember opening up a couple of cans of pre-hopped malt extract, boiling it for a bit before adding it to the fermenter with some dry yeast.  The results were . . . . less than inspiring.

Today’s version represents the evolution I’ve made during my homebrewing adventures while harking back to that original brew.  It’s an all-grain American nut brown ale made with five malts (Montana grown and malted two-row pale malt as a base), two varieties of whole leaf hops and liquid yeast.

I’ll also be cracking open a session ale – Deschutes’ new Deschutes River Ale, a very tasty 4% abv golden ale – and probably a homebrew (Nearly Imperial Amarillo IPA) and possibly a Montana craft beer. It’s a day to celebrate, you know.

Spent grains from the American Nut Brown Ale