I love analogies to music when it comes to describing some of life’s other pleasures. This happens to come from Whiff! The Revolution of Scent Communication in the Information Age and doesn’t mention beer, but you’ll get the point: As any wine connoisseur can attest, aromas are often described in melodic terms as three distinct [...]

Bring on the vestal virgins. The White IPAs are upon us. This is not a bad idea, marrying Belgian White beers with New World hops, at least until somebody starts writing new style guidelines. Last year’s collaboration beers from Deschutes Brewery and Boulevard Brewing proved that. Boulevard’s version even won a medal at the Great [...]

Having once accidentally driven a car into a large pedestrian-only square in Brugge I can assure you this is a city best enjoyed on foot. You can just stop and stare at the architecture. That the streets are narrow and winding becomes charming instead of exasperating. And there are the chocolate shops. We are partial [...]

At the risk of repeating myself . . . A) If you want to start a heated online conversation then making beer rating the theme seems to be the way to go. Witness the dust up at Beer Advocate that was followed by commentary in 718 722 beer blogs. Or the 57 comments (so far) [...]

The archives indicate that on Nov. 17, 2005 I posted this: Does it matter where beer is brewed? Yes. At least that’s one of the premises behind Appellation Beer. Some of the others: – It matters what the ingredients are and where they come from. – Wines and cheeses aren’t the only products that can [...]

Let’s cut directly to the press release. The Weeping Radish, North Carolina’s oldest micro brewery, will debut its first beer produced from all locally grown hops and malt. A year ago, the brewery began producing the first beer dry hopped with the first commercially available hops grown at Ecoview Farm in Weaverville, NC. Named IPA [...]

Alaskan Brewing co-founder Geoff Larson tells a good story. One you want to listen sitting next to a roaring fire on a Juneau beach. Like the one about what he learned not long after Alaskan brewed its Smoked Porter for the first time in 1988; a beer that recently won its twentieth medal at the [...]

The goal is to identify the outlier and explain why it doesn’t belong on the list. There may be more than one answer, although I happen to have a specific one in mind. (In this case, reviewing the list because I did a lousy job of vetting the previous round I spotted a second likely [...]

The goal is to identify the outlier and explain why it doesn’t belong on the list. There may be more than one answer, although I happen to have a specific one in mind. a) Mission Street Pale Ale b) Perennial Artisan Ales Hommel d) Revolution Ales Anti-Hero IPA d) Three Floyds Alpha King e) LaCumbre [...]

Last beer yesterday: Fuller’s Chiswick Ale in the pub on the brewery grounds. Four different hops. Five different hop additions. Just what a 3.5% abv English bitter should be. First beer today: Augustiner Pilsner after driving through scores of German hop fields sparkling in the late afternoon sun. No stopping for photos on the autobahn, [...]