I do like the sound of bottle of beer being uncorked, the pop followed by the lively sound of carbonation, or perhaps . . . “Oh, bleep, we’ve got a gusher.” Not to harp on the beer versus wine thing but that’s one thing beer has over wine (Champagne excepted). I thought about this a [...]

Next weekend in Washington, D.C., the Brewers Association plans to show that beer belongs at the table with the grownups. OK, maybe that’s not the best analogy – suggesting beer might otherwise be served at the kids’ table won’t go over well in most circles – but you get the point of SAVOR: An American [...]

This is a story overtly about wine, so you might not care, and about trends, so you might not care. Rather than revisiting the discussion about if we want our beer hip or sick I will simply argue that trends matter because they may determine what’s available for us to drink. After all, hipsters managed [...]

Now some Monday afternoon musing (because I just came across this). This is how the Times Online leads the story: “Restaurants charging inflated prices for wine could be doing their customers a favour. A study has found that people who pay more for a product do enjoy it more.” This was in fact serious research [...]

Go away a few days and links worth pointing to and/or commenting on sure pile up. Some have sparked ideas for longer posts in the next few days. Even so the list got long too fast so I’ve tried to minimize my musing: – As you’d expect, lots of recaps on 2007 and predictions for [...]

Michael Jackson and Blue Moon. Those were the most popular search terms that brought readers here in 2007. Looking at lists of the best read posts at several blogs I read got me poking around the stats at Appellation Beer, to see what you were reading and to try to guess why. I was surprised [...]

Is this beer and food thing gaining a little momentum or is it my imagination? – Otter Creek Brewing will continue to host its weekly local cheese and beer pairings each Friday through October as part of the brewery’s “Local foods meet Local Brews” events. The free beer and cheese pairings, which include eight different [...]

Yesterday’s beer word of the day was lactobacillus (as in those gross beer lines in Milwaukee). Today’s is Cicerone. And the two are related. I was going to wait a few weeks before writing about the Cicerone Certification Program Ray Daniels is launching. But in the wake of the Milwaukee story, and comments that followed [...]

Salt sommelier? Water sommelier? These job descriptions make beer sommelier seem like less of a stretch, don’t you think? The Los Angeles Times has a story about how the food business is booming, “and with it, there’s a boom in jobs you’ve never heard of.” Consider the specialty Christina Perozzi has carved out for herself. [...]

The things you learn reading the Wine Enthusiast Online: Sommelier Marnie Old and Dogfish Head Brewery founder Sam Calagione are writing a book called He Said Beer, She Said Wine. It’s due in the spring of 2008. Calagione (pictured here in plaid; that’s Vinnie Cilurzo of Russian River Brewing with him, not Old – and [...]