Bank Street brewed Elector hits the taps at both NABC locations.

Last Friday (August 21), the first batch of Elector to be brewed at NABC’s new Bank Street Brewhouse went on tap at BSB. Kegs were taken to the Public House and Pizzeria, and two kegs were consumed down by the riverside at the Kentuckiana Celtic Fest on Saturday.

Elector’s roots extend to the beginnings of NABC’s original garage brewery off Grant Line Road. It was the third recipe brewed by NABC’s founding brewer, Michael Borchers, and his assistant, Joey Burns, and was first brewed on Election Day, 2002, coincidentally the date of the mid-term congressional election that followed the disputed presidential race in 2000, in which Al Gore won the popular vote nationwide, but lost the White House owing to Florida’s uncounted hanging chads and the state’s votes in the Electoral College.

Needless to say, as subversive leftists, this political outcome was still somewhat fresh in our minds in 2002 as Michael concocted an initially modest plan to follow Community Dark and Beak’s Best with a traditional English-style seasonal winter warmer. Brew day was uneventful, but as the fermentation proceeded and time rolled past, it became obvious that the new batch of winter warmer was going to have a deeper burgundy color than planned, and also was considerably hoppier than the intended style should ever be.

Nothing wrong with that. The resulting hybrid was delicious, full-bodied and aggressively hopped, and we concluded that while the intent had been winter warmer, the result was something else – Imperial Red, in our reckoning – and we went with the results.

Before the finished flavor of our newly hybridized ale had become apparent, we’d already started the process of hybridizing its name, something that arose out of drunken mischief (imagine that!) Joey suggested Elector. The “-tor” suffix would suggest Doppelbock in the minds of knowledgeable drinkers, and of course we had no intention of producing a beer remotely close to Doppelbock, and since “electors” had been in the news, anyway, owing to the 2000 election, and since these electors had overruled the will of the people and in effect made democracy pointless … well, you can see how it all came together.

It’s almost seven years later, and I feel just as strongly that now as then that an Elector in hand is well worth two Bushes in retirement, any election day, and in fact, any time.

Graphics by the inimitable Tony Beard.