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The Randall: Better beer through chemistry

There’s a monster loose on the streets of Southwestern Ontario. A wild beast that has invaded our very city. Its name is Randall the Enamel Animal, and it’s about to blow local beer–lovers’ collective minds.

“Randall is a flavour–infuser. In very simple terms you choose what flavours or materials you want to infuse the beer with, flood the chamber and then run the beer through,” explains Milos Kral, head bartender and beer guru of Gambrinus Bistro & Café.

Originally created in 2002 by Dogfish Head Craft Brewery — a world–renowned brewery located in Delaware, U.S. — the Randall has experienced several major modifications over the years. Early versions had a tendency to foam excessively, but the brewery feels it’s eliminated the issue thanks to a plethora of design changes  the new  “Randall 3.0”

The process itself is a devilishly simple one. A draught line is fed into one side of the apparatus, filling a chamber where a variety of ingredients are stored. The chamber drains into a second reservoir chamber which mitigates any foam produced by the filtering.

Though the time varies depending on how tightly the ingredients chamber is packed, generally about five to 20 minutes are needed from adding the beer to pouring out the finished product.

But the real excitement for Randall stems from the ability of bartenders and beer enthusiasts to have a hand in styling their own beer.

“It’s like when you’re cooking,” Krall says. “Some cooks have better imaginations and creative abilities. If you know your ingredients and you know your basic beer […] it gives us a chance to imprint our own personal ideas on some of these beers.”

The units themselves have proven to be wildly successful. In the last eight years, Dogfish Head estimates they’ve produced over 260 for clients all around the world.

In fact, the units have proven so popular, demand has far exceeded Dogfish Head’s output abilities. As a result, bars able to offer Randalized beer are a hot commodity in the serious beer geek’s world. To the best of Kral’s knowledge, Gambrinus is now only the second place in the province to offer the experience.

“The first beer we did was [Grand River Brewery’s] Galt Knife Old Style Lager,” Kral explains. “We used Amarillo hops and honeycomb and the conbination was just phenomenal — it’s a nice malty, hoppy pilsner on its own and when you add some fresh, hoppy flavour and honeycomb? It was brand new beer.”

Adil Ahmad, one of the bartenders at Gambrinus, explained the choice of beer.

“The first beers we experimented with we needed to be blank–slate beers. We needed them to be almost our control group so we could detect a discernable difference,” he says.

Of course, that mentality only lasted so long. With the first test batches proving to be popular, the Gambrinus staff started looking to other flavour combinations.

“The Randall, at least in the beer world, represents the opportunity to actually modify the beer in a way that the brewer might not have thought of,” Ahmad says. “Since it’s by the pint it’s really opened up opportunities. It actually has built kind of a community around it. If people love a beer in particular they get to see that mod done to their beer.”

Community is also something that enters into the ingredient selection for Randall. Gambrinus’s location inside Covent Garden Market means access to a wide variety of fresh ingredients and the opportunity to support local businesses.

“It’s especially important to us to use local places,” Ahmad explains. “It garners their attention and allows us to make small contracts of mutual respect. It’s a big thing for Milos.”

This author was lucky enough to try the flavour combination described below — a dark ale combined with hops, chocolate, cocoa and, most interestingly, chipotle peppers. The Randallizing process emphasized the already present hop, coffee and chocolate flavours and fundamentally changed the beer’s flavour, with the chipotle peppers providing a warming sensation in the upper chest.

Gambrinus Bistro & Café is located at 130 King Street and offers Randallized concoctions every Saturday.

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