I have to call myself out on something – I don’t have any facial hair.  No beard, no goatee, not even a soul patch.  I’m clean shaven and sideparted.  I’ve come to the conclusion that this makes me somewhat of a rarity in the beer geek kingdom, sort of like one of those weird skinless […]

Recent events have been a bit of a downer for us craft beer geeks.  There’s been legal wrangling, banned beers, big boy buyouts and allegations of macrobeer media bullying. That’s enough conflict and negativity for a year, much less a couple of weeks. In an effort to cleanse our mental palates, I thought I’d do […]

This is going to be a long post for me, so fair warning.  It will be a little bit of a rant, and I am going to throw in some family history to boot, but this is important for me to say and I feel like the events that have unfolded this week in the […]

If you recall, we were the ones who said definitively that the Discovery show Brewmasters was dead.  There were a lot of folks who said we were wrong, but we had it on good authority that the show was done. Now we have it on even better authority. 

I don’t usually drink beer with my meal.  I tend to have water with my dinner.  Clear, refreshing, and no off flavors to mix in with whatever I am eating.  But I was reminded last night that beer is food, not just a liquid refreshment, and as such should be integrated into mealtime just like […]

It looks like Michigan wants nothing to do with bitchy beers.  Last year we saw the ban of Dogfish Head’s Bitches Brew because of the “b” word in the title, and now Flying Dog is suing the state to allow their Raging Bitch Belgian Ale to be sold there. Raging Bitch was first banned in […]

Some of you already know about this because its been out there for a few months.  Whole Foods is opening bars inside their grocery stores that serve wine and craft beer.  It is a pilot project now with bars in about 12 Whole Foods stores, and plans are to put them in Throughout the country. […]

There’s an old business adage: if you can’t beat ’em, buy ’em, and that’s what Anheuser-Busch is doing, buying out Goose Island Brewery for somewhere between $22.5 million (according to MarketWatch) and $38.8 million (according to the Chicago Tribune). When I first saw this I thought it was an elaborate April Fool’s Day joke, but […]

You can keep your beer firing robots and your shoot-a-brew – there’s a reason the dog is considered man’s best friend! Happy Friday everybody – now go get a beer!! . .

There are two ways in which first impressions can be wrong.  You might think something is good and it turns out to be…Hmmm, not so good.  Then sometimes you can think something is not so good, and it turns out to be great.  Take for a moment the case of Fran Drescher.  She played “The […]

We keep talking about how our beloved craft beer is growing up, and here’s another good example of the industry’s rapid evolution. Bell’s Brewery (one of my favorite brewers) has sent a cease and desist letter to Northern Brewer (my favorite home brew supplier). Bell’s is trying to protect their trademark for Two Hearted Ale […]

Some Observations: California is a Mecca for Craft Beer. Idaho is not. But apparently neither is New Jersey, But Jim gets a lot more choice than me. New Mexico and Arizona, WTF? Denver Rocks! Abita Rules the Gulf Coast. Thank God for Alaska and Hawaii. New Glarus doesn’t ship far, but they make a lot. […]

Growth, growth, growth, growth, growthity growth!  So much growth already.  Craft beer is looking like the Dot Coms of the late 90’s early 2000’s.  Oooh…That can’t be good.  Or is it?  Truth is we just don’t know.  The craft beer industry continued its blistering pace of growth in 2010, during a down economy blah, blah, […]

I’ve become fascinated by watching the combination of shitstorm and debacle (know by linguists as a “shibacle”) that Dark Lord Day is becoming before our eyes. As we noted here, Dark Lord Day tickets went on sale Saturday, and according to BeerNews.org, they sold out in 23 minutes.  It’s great to see such enthusiasm for […]

Man, I don’t know about you, but this week has taken FOREVER to come to a close!  I think it has to do with the time change and my body adjusting to the new light schedule, but I have been staying up late and getting up at an ungodly hour (my normal time) every day […]