Beer Writing – A Good Beer Blog

Your Weekly Beery News Updates For This Mid-November Of 2024

What a boring heading. “Couldn’t you come up with anything clever?” I hear you. Nope. All my wit, such as it is, has drained away with the recent tide of events* and I am still waiting for a top up. Retired Martin, as he often does, gave us some relief this week with a lovely photo essay of countryside walk to a village pub:

In truth, I’d no idea where Great Cransley was, only 45 minutes walk from Kettering station and Wickstead Park, a walk that rewards you with the golden stone of east Northants. A smart looking village of 305 souls whose nearest What Pub entry while the Three Cranes was closed was the (keg) Broughton WMC… and you get 4pm opening here, though as is always the way the door was actually open while I stood patiently waiting for the clock to tick.

Good news, too, for the beer book buyer as Dr Christina Wade has announced the publication of her latest:

I’m delighted to announce after seven years of research and writing FILTHY QUEENS: A HISTORY OF BEER IN IRELAND is here! Published with Nine Bean Rows, it is available for preorder now… we look at the history of beer alongside some of the biggest events in the story of Ireland. You’ll find an 18th-century courtesan who had a wicked streak of beer snobbery and early medieval monks who wrote beer reviews so terrible, any Untappd fan would feel right at home.

Yikes! A bit of harshing on the craft nerdiratti. Get your copy here. And Jeff posted an interesting essay on the effect of history’s tide on the distinction between Bavarian and Czech lager:

In a remarkable article in the New York Times immediately following the fall of Communism, reporter Steven Greenhouse identified 2,000 workers at Pilsner Urquell, a brewery roughly the size that Sierra Nevada is today. Among this giant workforce, “the advent of capitalism” will, he wrote, “probably mean tougher management, less slacking off and perhaps some layoffs, especially among the 400 administrative workers who spend much of their time doing paperwork for Prague’s central planners.” It’s hard to fathom what four hundred administrative workers would spend their days doing, though “slacking off” would seem to have been a central activity if for no other reason than there was no work to do.

I worked in Poland as an ESL teacher not long after the fall of Communism there and the drunk principal in the nearby elementary school was certainly proof enough to convince me of Jeff’s main argument – that there was little initiative or innovation under the Soviet system. Yet… I wonder if that is the whole story. Are there cultural differences beyond that between the German and Czech experience? Does the Austrio-Hungarian empire have any lingering effects?** And if there had been no Soviet era locking time in amber… would there still be any Pilsner Urquell as we know it?

Stan shared the news of the closure of the Chippewa Falls brewing facilities of Jacob Leinenkugel Brewing Co., one of America’s oldest breweries founded in 1867, and the consolidation of operations at another nearby plant owned by parent company Molson Coors with some hard news for those employed there:

The closings will result in the loss of a total of 90 jobs – 34 in Milwaukee atnd 56 in Chippewa Falls – according to notices filed by Molson Coors on Thursday with the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development. The layoffs at both facilities are expected to begin on Jan. 17. The Milwaukee brewery layoffs include 33 hourly employees and one salaried employee. The Chippewa Falls plant layoffs include 54 hourly employees and two salaried employees. Hourly workers at both plants are represented by local Teamsters chapters.

So… which brewery at this point is more authentic to its own roots? Pilsner Urquell or Leinenkugel? And, to ask Marx’s question, which system alienated the workers from its product, capitalism or collectivity?

Speaking of capitalism, in his most recent edition of London Beer City, Will Hawkes shared a conversation with Sam McMeekin of craft brewers Gipsy Hill on their decision to be acquired:

With the London brewing scene getting progressively smaller, it makes sense to be as big as possible, even for a company that, as Sam puts it, is “essentially debt-free.” “In theory, we could have refinanced all of our equipment, taken on a load of debt and struggled on,” he adds. “But I don’t have [enough] faith in the market [that that would be] a success.” Hence the deal with Sunrise Alliance Beverages, a group which grew out of St Peter’s Brewery in Suffolk and which now takes in Wild Beer, Curious Brewing and Portobello, the latter of which was added last month. It’s more complex than a simple takeover, Sam says: he describes it as a “partial MBO” (Management Buyout), in which Sunrise has bought all the shares but Sam still retains his chunk, “rolled into” the new company.

There is a lot of heavy lifting (parenthetically or not) in that sentence “I don’t have [enough] faith in the market [that that would be] a success.” Picking up that story and hot on the heels of recent reports of SIBA moving to adopt “independent” and ditch “craft” in the ongoing saga of the key adjective tussle (KAT), Glynn Davis applies the new approved verbage to report… things are not going well:

My own involvement with Bohem Brewery has shown that independent breweries without a decent pub estate to sell their beer through will face ongoing pressures, and sadly, there will be more failures. It’s why I sold out at a painful 80% loss. Along with many other craft breweries, Bohem has produced some excellent beer, but as an investment, these businesses can leave a sour taste in the mouth.

And building a pub estate may well require that “faith in the market” that might not necessarily be reasonable. Hmm. Not unrelatedly, Liam guided me to a news item on another approach being taken in Ireland where a number of pub owners showed some faith combined with another now familiar zing:

It is thought to be the first time that a group of Irish publicans have come together to launch their own brewing operation… The new brewery launches into a challenging market, dominated by a small number of large established brewers and brands. It also does so at a time when the cost of living remains a difficulty for many potential customers and when more drinkers are moving away from alcohol to zero-alcohol products. “I think it is a very good idea. It is probably very timely because the craft beer phase has kind of come and gone and the bottle beer and so on,” said Damian O’Reilly, lecturer in retail and services management in TU Dublin.

Phase. You were just going through a phase. You know that, right? Speaking of phase, you don’t have to get past the first paragraph to see something that takes little analysis:

An ongoing point of frustration within the contemporary American brewing industry is the vast chasm between what drinkers say they want, and what they actually buy. For example: sessionable alcohol-by-volume beers. Even though stroller dads get their Vuoris in a bunch lamenting the lack of broad availability of full-flavored, mid-ABV craft beers, the sales data suggest that they simply don’t buy those beers in meaningful volumes.

What frustration? It seems pretty obvious that if you want low alc beer you are also going to be buying less beer*** but, hey… similarly, Katie Mather may have identified the reason for all this change, may have sussed out what is really going on:

In my banking app, it tells me what I could afford to spend less on in future, and this is always a list of pubs I’ve bought pints in. It’s never told me to cut down my spending on bills, by far my largest outgoings. Quite frankly this is bullshit… pubs are still shutting down because people can’t afford to leave their homes to enjoy a little bit of leisure and all-important social time, and the official reaction is, “oh well.”

“Oh well” was also my response to the fair bit of anti- neo- prohibio–science– mumbo- jumbolian back and forth this week, both sides not making any new convincing arguments… until I read this in that august medical journal SurreyLive:

…alcohol indiscriminately impairs brain function as it is a “very weak neurotoxin” that disrupts neuron communication. Restak emphasises the importance of abstaining from alcohol past the age of 65, a time when the body naturally loses neurons more rapidly, potentially exacerbating mental decline: “It is essential to abstain from alcohol at a stage in life where preserving neurons is crucial.”

Drag. But as a bit of relief to all that… we have a wonderful and particularly deftly written**** portrait of Timothy Taylor’s Landlord by Rachel Hendry in Pellicle. Structured in parts that focus on different elements of the brewing and experience, it is both a bit impressionistic as well as, well, expository:

Once I am sat, I slowly rotate the glass clockwise, and then anticlockwise. The colours change with the movement—chestnut glints into amber, glints into cinnamon. I take a sip and I am greeted with thick slices of toast generously spread with a whisky marmalade, the sweet squidge of malt loaf, the reassurance of blood oranges in the depths of winter. The tension in my shoulders begins to dissolve. I can see why so many view this pint as a friend. I have taken it in my hand and it has placed an arm around me in return.

Lovely. I particularly like the concise treatments of various sorts of men. And another warming photo essay, too. This should fall in the beer flavoured beer filing cabinet folder neatly so you can bring it out and point at it when someone says beer flavoured beer is a meaningless concept.

And finally, before the links, we note the passing of Beth Demmons’ Prohibitchin’ which regularly was referenced around these parts. She explained why:

I feel like it worked, for a while. But over time, things have changed. DEI initiatives are getting slashed across the country, from academia to private business. Promises of change are quietly fading into distant memory. People—mostly women and non-binary folks, some even featured on these pages—have faced burnout, changed careers, or just moved on to different things. People kept reading Prohibitchin’, but over the past four years, fewer people have engaged, or even really seemed to care. I’ve felt like I was shouting into the void, or perhaps just preaching to the choir.

Sad stuff, especially coming so soon after the suspension of The Share as noted last week.

For more beery news check out Boak and Bailey every Saturday and Stan going strong again each and every Monday. Then listen to Lew’s podcast (maybe he’ll do one again) and get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by David Jesudason on the (now hardly at all) odd Fridays. And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is out there with the sweary Mary! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass which is going back to being a blog. Any more? Check out the Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good and they are revving up for a new year. And the BOAS podcast for the bro-ly. And the long standing Beervana podcast …except they have now stood down. Plus We Are Beer People. The Boys Are From Märzen podcast appears suspended as does BeerEdge, too. But not Ontario’s own A Quick Beer. There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. All About Beer has podcasts and there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube. The Moon Under Water is gone which is not surprising as the ask was $10 a month. Pete Brown’s one cost a fifth of that but only had the one post.

*As per usual, B+B have something welcome and wise to say about where we are at, from last Saturday’s footnotes on Patreon: “The elephant in the room is the US election which is definitely big news. Our general approach to unsettling events (the pandemic, war in Ukraine, and so on) has been to keep on posting through them more or less as usual. As a wise person once observed: “You don’t need to publicly condemn or condone every event, every announcement, every story. You’re not an embassy.” Don’t think we’re not following the news, though, or that we not concerned about what’s going on. It’s just that a beer blog, and our various silly social media accounts, don’t seem like particularly useful tools for addressing any of it. The best thing we can do is provide an opportunity to think about something else for a few minutes every now and then.“
**A question I ask myself at least once a day in relation to something or other.
***‘Cause who doesn’t love to drain a 12 pack of thick soda pop? See also the shocking concept that high alc low price sells. “Breaking!“
****And a particularly good example of how this publication has succeeded while GBH and others have packed it in.

Your Bootastic Hell’s Gates Open Up Today Halloweeny Edition Of The Beery News Notes

Today is the second scariest day in the next week or so. Number two. Today, the undead walk the earth! But by next Wednesday, Americans may have elected the Nazis. I sure hope some of that polling data is wrong. Anyway, there is a time and place for everything and this day and this week’s focus is all about the lesser of those two evils – the celebration of Lords Satan’s reach into your verrrry soul and the tenuous grasp of all existence, of all of reality itself. Let next week take care of next week.

Still, good to see one of the candidates has some normal habits, some of which like drinkin’ and swearin’ were on display over beers at a stop with the Governor of Michigan at a bar on the campaign trail:

‘We need to move ground among men,’ she can be heard saying in a low voice to Whitmer, clearly not thinking that anyone was privy to their conversation. She then looked up abruptly and cut off the private chat. ‘Oh, we have microphones and listening to everything,’ a surprised Harris says. ‘I didn’t realize that.’ ‘Okay… you’ll bleep my F words hopefully,’ Whitmer joked. ‘We just told all the family secrets, s***,’ Harris replies before her busting out into a loud laugh.

Giving equal time, did you hear about the Respublican running for office in Wisconsin? Traveling GOP U.S. Senate candidate Eric Hovde (AKA the “California banker”) wants to ban beer sales and it has been picked up in his opponent’s political ads. Rolling Stone covered the story a few months ago:

…if we just decriminalize [marijuana]? Fine. Nobody’s going to go to jail. No one’s going to get arrested for it. That’s your self-determination, but you’re not going to turn it into an enterprise. Frankly, it should have happened with alcohol,” Hovde says in the audio. “I mean look at — alcohol has a lot of negative byproducts. If somebody wanted to distill it, drink it. Fine, go ahead…

He also apparently bought a tavern to tear it down. Booo…. Now… getting serious, Jessica Mason has reported on concerns that the language related to the pricing of beer is posing challenges:

One of the issues this kind of research presents is that if the nation is constantly sold beer on “lowest prices” translating as “best” then it will not consider beers as different or with some deserving of higher price points than others. Describing how crucial pricing is, Sussex-based Burning Sky founder and head brewer Mark Tranter told db: “All overheads continue to rise but it’s impossible to put our prices up in line with these, without running the risk of pricing ourselves out of the market and or alienating people.”

That sounds a bit like being clear about value is a bit of a problem – unless there was a way to factually explain the value to be found in an more expensive drink. Well explained value is always good. Consider how Tennent’s is holding its own in its home market due to its accepted inherent value:

Changes in UK alcohol duties have led to some lager brands, including Carlsberg and Grolsch, being reformulated to a lower 3.4 per cent ABV, but Findlay said that would not be happening with the core Tennent’s product, which has an ABV of 4 per cent and accounts for more than half of the lager segment in Scotland. “Tennent’s is such a strong brand that to reformulate it or reduce the ABV would be a no,” he stressed. “We have lower ABV variants of Tennent’s available, so there are no plans and no need to change what is an astonishingly successful brand.”

Hmm… somewhat relatedly Matty C. shared on the absense of critical writing in beer, something that that is has been one of my interests for, well, decades now given it is only through critical thought that value is established:

This week I’ve been thinking about the lack of criticism in beer writing. It’s something I’ve thought about a lot over the years, because beer and pub reviewing doesn’t really exist in any meaningful way compared to how it does in wine or food writing. I consider that there are many reasons why this is the case, the main one being a general lack of consideration from mainstream (or, indeed, niche) media outlets for beer and pubs. But also it’s because beer drinkers are a different beast to most wine drinkers. There’s a certain level of—dare I say—zealotism, that means if anyone decides to log on and pan a beer, they can almost certainly expect some flack.

This is great. He has pushed this out into a great open conversation and I have to say that it has caused me a lot of thinking – something I like to avoid most weeks. I’ve actually written this week’s notes twice to cope with my inner termoil. Why? In part, that word – zealotism. Zeal seems to sit one step down the stairs from enthusiasm and you know what we think of the enthused. Why? Because zeal places countervaling pressure on value. It distracts one from reality. So how to respond?

First, I will try to be brief but I see three distinct factors as the prime drivers of this gaping chasm between reality and zeal in beer writing: (i) objectivity denial; (i) unreliable claims to expertise; and (iii) real marketplace consequences. Starting with objectivity denial, have a look at this passage in one of Boak and Bailey’s recent (and always fabulous) Patreon footnotes to their Saturday roundups:

…the two Grodziskies we drank this week were more interesting than enjoyable. Both were also adulterated with things like fruit and tea, making it hard to get a sense of the base flavour… We’ve tended to avoid the phrase ‘beer-flavoured beer’ and similar for the reasons Jeff sets out: the idea of what ‘beer flavoured’ is totally subjective.

It appears they and I are struggling with similar thoughts* as after I started sketching this out on Monday, I realized they themselves had posted their own cogitations on this whole thing – though I cannot agree with their interim assessment that it is just a pint and “we do not need that intel” – especially given the annual investment a beer fan may make. It’s not about the pint but all the pints one buys. In a year. In a life. As a result, I believe it is not correct to say that good beer can be, should be lost in an ocean of subjectivity. One cannot determine value if everything is subjective. No, there are and should be measuring sticks which can be relied upon. There must be the intel.

That being said, who would set these standards. Who measures the sticks? Beer experts? Problem: there are no beer experts in that blanket general sense. Sure, there are real experts in specific areas of beer and brewing with the greater expertise existing in narrower areas. Like any study. And a number people certainly know much more than many others. No question. But claims of expertise in that general sense that we see eminating from some of the merely eager is a common problem with beer writing. Can we place our trust with zealots? One shouldn’t. The resulting status scrambling** to be identified as that authoritative person may be vigourous, vicious and even entertaining but all in all it’s hardly an academic process. And it creates a fog around the question of value.

Perhaps the saddest reality is that the rejection of standards and the weakening claims of expertise have left an imbalance of power. Perhaps ironically, beer writers lack sufficient security to stand up against pressures from the trade. In the very comments under MC’s post, Gary raised this very point:

The difficulty is few want to risk offending people in the industry, as future access to the brewery may be limited and awkwardness can arise when you meet them at events.

And in addition to event attendence, in order to get ahead some beer writers are also expected to show up time after time as supportive boosters – as compliant judges or even consultants. We even sometimes see the trade described as a “we”*** – which can leave one left with the impression that one gets the inside view of the trade by being effectively a branch of the trade. None of which is wrong if, well, you don’t want to be warned off the bad beer, don’t want to learn about relative value but are only looking for something to read as light entertainment. Which it often all that you get. Which is fine. Consequence free and affirming pleasure writing for a happy sometimes tipsy crowd. All fine.

But we have to be honest – that is the opposite of a critical discourse. It can deter journalistic inquiry and even triggers stronger response: “…you can’t write that, those are real people with real jobs!” or “you shouldn’t be writing about beer” or that stumblefuck of a non-thought “you are just a old curmugeon!” It even justifies the recently received assessment I’ve heard from one writer about being told in a formal setting that DEI isn’t a business imperative for breweries, just part of culture wars. And of course this is all in addition to that old chestnut of total alcohol harm denialism from the anti-science set.**** As a direct result of those factors, not only has the opportunity to argue in favour of value been lost, I would also argue that it is one key reason there is no reliable concept of “fine beer” – like we have in wine or spirits. A critical discourse is fundamental to anything deemed fine. But this trade? Won’t have it. Would you want it? I do.

Thankfully, there is a actual critical discourse out there even if the jockeying beer writers of a certain scrabbling sort don’t engage with it. Think of The Beer Nut reviewing can after can, glass after glass excellently so you don’t have to… unless you want to. He has no problem being honest about value:

My recent complaint that the Teeling Distillery giftshop was overcharging for the small cans of DOT collaboration beers at €5.50 has been heeded. The latest addition to the series was €6: For Wheats Sake!

Think also of Retired Martin, Ron and others travelling to pub after pub taking photos and making observations with his exceptionally keen eye so you don’t have to. This week Boak and Bailey wrote in generous terms on the wonders of this sort of blogging… over, you know, on their Substack:

One thing blogging is better at than social media is linking. Old skool blogging thrived on the practice of generous linking. Sometimes, it was about search engine optimisation (SEO) – which is no bad thing when it helps good stuff rise to the top of search results. But mostly it gave readers a chain to follow. We used to spend ages following links from one blog post to another when we were first learning about beer. A sort of Choose Your Own Adventure approach to study. Blogs are also more stable and more independent. They’re less likely to suffer from an egotistical investor buying up, damaging, or shutting down a platform. With a blog, you have your own space to do your own thing.

Viva blogs! Viva Viva!!! And there are a few dogged shapers of public opinion working their way into the general media who rise above as well as other sorts of independent voices with critical views are out there. Consider the David Bailey cartoons in Pellicle which have a cheery habit of undermining supposed established principles.***** Similarly, in beer history writing, we also find people digging and digging into the past pulling out the correcting facts and illuminating stories which both add depth and redirection to good beer culture. This week Liam wrote a post about the 1913 theft of pewter tankards from Dublin’s pubs for melting down and sale:

… this was a relatively common practice but it is interesting to see the ‘modus operandi’ here in print. So, it appears that the theft of drinkware from pubs isn’t a new phenomena – not that we really thought it was – although the reasons for said theft appears to have changed through the years to one of collecting. Although there is no mention of where the ladies mentioned in the report hid their soon-to-be-swapped tumblers and stolen tankards, it is possible they were tucked neatly into the folds of a dress but it is probably more likely a bag of some description was used.

See also Gary’s extensive posts on tavern culture in Quebec or Canadian brewing during the Second World War. No one will pay for that sort or writing. But no editor will also smooth or dilute it either.

These things lead to other helpful insertions and inveiglings .Last week we saw Katie Mather have a deftly written argument published in The Guardian. She wrote in support of the decision by the UK’s small brewers’ organization SIBA to ditch “craft” in favour of “independent” to help buyer understand what is in their glass:

Beer fans are starting to realise that their favourite breweries might not be the paragons of independence and system-subversion they once thought they were, and it’s leaving an unpleasant taste. Now that many of these breweries have become part of large corporate entities, the idea of standing against the man, colourful can in hand, is a ridiculous one. It’s sowing seeds of doubt across the whole industry, too – the word “craft” never meant anything specific, and so it can be used to market beers that aren’t “craft” in any understanding of the term.

And she expanded on this in The Gulp, her newsletter: “We all got bored of defining craft a decade ago. But just because something is boring, doesn’t mean it isn’t important.” I don’t really agree with any of that – but really I do like to have the well-argued ideas bouncing around in my brain. And speaking of a knowledgable grasp of specifics versus what is in my brain, Stan’s Hop Queries hit the inbox just after last week’s press deadline and it is full of detailed goodness around the king of all adjuncts, including this about how Kiren invested “dip hopping”:

Basically, they made a slurry by steeping hops for about an hour at temperatures (150-170° F) lower than found in conventional whirlpooling, then added the slurry into wort before pitching yeast. Kirin learned that the resulting beers contained as much linalool as dry hopped beers but less myrcene (which itself may mask fruity aromas associated with linalool and other oxygenated compounds). This also reduced production of 2M3MB (an onion-like off flavor)… For brewers, the appeal is pretty simply: less isomerization than with whirlpooling and greater retention of some essential oil for biotransformation. In addition, drinkers have said they perceive a difference, a positive difference, in dip-hopped beer aroma and flavor.

Me? No, not really. But sorta. You know… but how else are you going to learn? Exactly. And expertise is not just about having a deep understanding one one topic but also a view on the intersections of a number of areas. For example, The Sunday Times had an interesting story on the disappearance of Britain’s pubs called “The Black Bull” based on some excellent investigative reporting of the role of Big App:

Another Black Bull is the historic community-owned pub in Gartmore in the Stirlingshire Trossachs. Its name makes sense: this is an old drovers’ inn. There has been a pub on the site since at least 1740. It too has lost its Facebook, and the thousands of connections the social media giant brings. Wilson believes Facebook removed the page because of a row involving a New Zealand company called Black Bull Group Limited. And this, The Sunday Times can reveal, is certainly the reason why at least one Black Bull pub in England was told its Facebook page was being shut down. This New Zealand company two years ago won a trademark case against another business which launched a website called Blackbull Markets similar to its own. The firm’s complaint, heard by the World Intellectual Property Organisation, did not feature British pubs.

Look at that density of ideas. Global law versus the wee pub, private international social media control versus local community heritage – all coming into conflict. Fabulous. And speaking of fabulous, here’s one last story this week. It’s from Chris Drosner in Milwaukee Magazine, his love letter to dive bars:

I love settling onto the stool, hanging my jacket on the hook under the bar. The sound of pool balls dropping after the quarters go in. The shake of the day. The neon glow. Overhearing bad takes about the packers. Seeing ice in a beer down the bar – not my thing, but you do you. Someone hitting a pull tab big enough to pocket the cash. Being the tiebreaker in strangers’ friendly argument.

I particularly liked his list of the key signs you’re in a dive bar including: (i) “someone lives upstairs”; (ii) “unclear if it’s open, or how to get in” and (iii) “sink outside the bathroom.” Beautiful.

All of which is to say there is actual critical writing out there but it is not often found in that certain circle of trade friendly and, dare I say, commodity writing that has gotten a lot of attention. Thankfully, it role may be fading as part of the bubble burst of zealot culture. At least in beer even if not in rest of the world, like the geo-political world. Maybe. Well, let’s see how that pans out next Tuesday evening.

That’s it. That’s a lot. And there’s a lot of footnotery still to come down there below. Neatened and nicened any number of times over the more than 45 edits of this week’s post. For more beery news check out Boak and Bailey every Saturday and Stan going strong again each and every Monday. Then listen to Lew’s podcast (if he ever does one) and get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by David Jesudason on the (now very) odd Fridays. And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is out there with the sweary Mary! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass which is going back to being a blog. Any more? Check out the Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good and they are revving up for a new year. And the BOAS podcast for the bro-ly. And the long standing Beervana podcast …except they have now stood down. Plus We Are Beer People. The Boys Are From Märzen podcast appears suspended as does BeerEdge, too. But not Ontario’s own A Quick Beer. There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. All About Beer has podcasts and there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube. The Moon Under Water is gone which is not surprising as the ask was $10 a month. Pete Brown’s one cost a fifth of that but only had the one post.

*And that to me is a contradictory set of statements even if understandably so. In the first, there is a desire for the standard base beer to then, one assumes, compare with the ideal standard of an unadulterated Grodziskie, a presumably identifiable fact. In the second, the existence of standards is rejected. There can’t be a dependable body of knowledge that spawns experts at the same time as you have a totally subjective subject matter. Thankfully, I am reading a bit of Smil these days which may explain where we are. He describes how the quality of information received though individual perception is not in the control of those doing the perceiving but also that it does follow reliable patterns. Understanding those patterns can draw us back to a greater sense of objectivity by removing our natural tendencies to clarify the equation. As a result, as I understand it, reasonably objective assessment of beer is possible even if it is surpressed. But just a minute. Isn’t that itself a smarty pants faux expertise claim? Am I the zealot? Well, I have always enjoyed the sort of long long essays that argue that personal persception is deeply flawed ever since I took courses from Canada’s conservative Anglican philosopher George Grant (a chummy sports sideline watcher, Ten Penny drinking, ebullient ciggie smoking presence of my college days.) Around the same time I was reading liberal Catholic Ivan Ilych as well as atheist mathematician Bertrand Russell before I moved through my work then family into eastern North American Indigenous writings as well as other perspectives. They all teach that personal subjectivity and even institutuional authority are deeply unreliable. They also proposed various competing objective constructs that we can rely upon as footholds in any subject matter. Testing and contesting the application of those constructs is what critical analysis is all about.
**How did we get here? How did the blandification of beery expertise arise? In the beginning, you had the established authoritative few who wandered in a primordial shallow end unaware. Then, new voices arouse who started asking questions, on blogs in zines, much to the irritation of those who will never be bettered. And, about a decade ago, the dead end was entered as good bloggy writing was pushed a bit aside in favour of the hunt for paid writing. (We were all going to be published authors!!) And then, rather than fostering a peer reviewed discussion of relative merits of contrasting views, we have the unending awards circuit populated by oddly familiar judges handing out statuettes for BOBs like Halloween candy to bolster CVs and bios. (We’re all going to be award winning published authors!!) Circles of backpatting by the accepted then boost each other to take up all the available chairs and even oxygen in the room. (We merry few are all going to be well paid award winning published authors!!) But now… now with the retracting good beer marketplace those less endowed chairs have become more musical as the opportunities and the payouts shrink. Breaking: closed access newsletter subsciptions did not save the day. This is good and healthy. Be loud and proud.
***Like this comment on BlueSky in response to MC’s post: “Perhaps there is something like: all attention for beer in writing should be mostly positive, or we will lose even more fans. With the beer market on a general recline, we want to make more people enthusiastic, rather than pinpointing flaws.” Who is this “we”? And, really, who wants to be involved with any interest that is just a glob of semi-smug uninformed fans? Apparently not the new satistied than you very much lager lovers. Yet… “We Are Beer“? Really ?!? FFS.
****In addition to all the flawed, gratuitous and possibly even actionably negligent opinions on alcohol and health we are subject to from the unknowing on a regular basis, I always come back to the emailed dingbattery shared via email by one prominent beer writer about 15 years ago on the topic of drunk driving: “As much as I am against careless driving caused by drinking, smoking, the application of eye make-up, over-tiredness, cell phone conversations or the accidental spilling of tomato sauce off the veal parmigiana sandwich being scarfered whilst at the wheel, I have no wish to be associated with anything ending in “…ADD,” Alan. Bad enough that the loonies at MADD have co-opted the anti-drunk driving position to the degree that they are a force behind such things as the lowering of the legal limit — you can now have your car taken from you at .05…. which I think is quite extreme — and interlocks for all, worse still to be associated with them in any way, shape or form.”
*****Thanksfully without hallucinogenic recourse to cats.

Beer. News. Notes. Phrases. Words. Selections. Pretentious. Minimalist. Heading. Formats.

What a week! I had no idea that I’d make it to this Wednesday evening when upon I do scribble out these notes. And it’s not even sun up before I’m out the door, although the moon apparently has a decent view up there looking east. And the reading takes a bit more digging. But as B+B wrote:

…we embraced that: let’s focus on some smaller, more unusual pieces from old skool blogs and old-fashioned Web 1.0 hobby sites. That’s good stuff, too.*****

Agreed. Enough complaining. Let’s get at it. I do like this entry in Every Pub in Dublin if only for its lack of information:

I just walked in and looked for it. And found it relatively easily, as its basically just straight back from the front door, albeit well into the hotel. It’s quite a fancy hotel bar, but nothing incredibly special. I doubt many people ever go here just to drink, what with the Baggot Street and Haddington Road pubs nearby, but you *could*.

Even more of a deterrant to drinking in Dublin is this explanation by Lisa Grimm of the environs of her pub of the week, The Circular:

…the first stone bridge was built here over the Grand Canal in 1795, replacing an earlier wooden structure, and its resemblance to Venice’s Ponte Di Rialto gave the bridge, as well as the surrounding area, its better-known name. There are stories of a Black Shuck-type dog stalking the underside of the bridge, with some tales more specifically citing the devil himself appearing as a black dog in the area. Indeed, devilish attachments (literally) continued with a stone ‘devil’ head formerly being affixed to the bridge – though whether the stories or the sculpture came first is open to investigation.

Satan himself! Yikes. [You know, I just thought it was a song by The Darkness.] On a more positive or at least not as terrifying note, there was a good bit of writing from Jessica Mason this week on a fairly singular business decision seeing one craft brewer and wine cidery to join up on distribution:

On-trade customers can now buy Red Fin cider products directly from Siren, packed in the brewery’s 30l stainless steel kegs. Two Red Fin ciders are available alongside Siren’s beers to help publicans consolidate their beer and cider deliveries. Further benefits include the option for pubs to take advantage of collaborative brand activations and events as well as custom installations. According to the business owners the new partnership isn’t financial and neither company has a stake in the other. However, the independent businesses describe it as “strategic”.

Sensible. E.P. Taylor would be pleased by the effort to cut what he would have called waste – the failure to find harmoneous deals on the non-profit making expenses. Seeing what is around you with fresh eyes was also the subject of a great interview early one morning this past weekend on CBC Ontario’s Fresh Air on a South African brewery working to support local traditional brewing:

Reitumetse Kholumo is the founder of Kwela Brews in South Africa. She recently won a pitch competition at Queen’s University for her venture.She told us how she is using the prize money to empower women and protect the Indigenous tradition of sorghum beer.

More here on Kwela Brews in this Forbes Africa article from last year. There were two other articles that caught my eye this week which touched on beer and colonialism. First, in New Zealand recently there has been controversy about the naming of a beer after a Māori navigator:

Te Aro Brewing named its Kupe New Zealand IPA after the Polynesian navigator as part of its Age of Discovery series – a limited range of beers showcasing historical explorers including Christopher Columbus and Ferdinand Magellan… Both complaints argued the association of Kupe exploited, degraded, denigrated, and demeaned his mana and, therefore, that of his descendants and the people and places associated with him….”I’m really upset about it because our tupuna is being used as a platform for promoting alcohol, and his name being used on the [packaging] says we agree to this, and we don’t,” she said. “Culture should not be used in that form; whether it be Māori, whether it be other indigenous peoples, or whether it be our community – our babies are having to walk past that every single day… that advertising, that promotion… Peka said she wanted to acknowledge the people that had used their voice to make a difference for the whānau, community and cultures within Aotearoa.”

I will leave it to you to look up the meaning of manu, tupuna and whānau like I did. The other story is the article this week in Pellicle by David Nilsen on the colonial and Indigenous legacies of brewing in Quito, Ecuador – that capital of a nation facing many serious issues. Elsewhere** we have seen how the perspectives from beer writers on a visit have posed, shall we say, challenges but this artlcle manages this well, if a bit obliquely:

…that rural connection has, sadly, not always helped chicha’s image in Quito as the city tries uncomfortably to balance its Indigenous heritage with its cosmopolitan aspirations. “A lot of people here grew up knowing about chicha, with their aunt or grandmother making it,” he says. “For many years, it had a stigma as a drink that was only for the lower classes living in the country. In Quito, as craft brewers became more knowledgeable about fermentation, they became more interested in reclaiming and revitalising this from their heritage.”

David sets it out for your consideration. We see the colonial hand moving in many ways in the article. The taprooms with the IPA. The central presence of the monestary and the museum. The application of science upon an Indigenous practice without space for a voice speaking for the pre-contact and continuing original culture as we heard the Māori perspective above. There is much packed into this piece.

Building on the least serious or perhaps most recent form of those intrustions from abroad, in Britian apparently SIBA is sick of “craft beer”… if only as a term:

Small breweries in the UK are ditching the term “craft beer” in favour of “indie beer”, warning that global corporations have bamboozled many drinkers into believing that formerly independent brands are still artisanal hidden gems. In a survey by YouGov that marks a new phase of the bitter war over what constitutes “craft beer”, consumers were asked to say whether 10 beer brands were made by “independent craft breweries”… More than three-quarters of those surveyed said they felt consumers were being “misled”…

CAMRA is in on the campaign as well. So is “craft” now a dirty word in Britain? Is it dead… again? Hmm… and there was also an interesting choice of words in an interesting paid advertorial this week in Politico, “sponsor generated content” it says. By Julia Leferman of the Brewers of Europe. Why is this bit of lobbyist comms interesting? Because of this passage:

Brewers are empowering consumers with the tools to take responsible decisions. This is about choice: if people don’t wish to, or simply shouldn’t, consume alcohol, they can still participate in the social experience of sharing a beer with friends and family. At the same time, brewers have pioneered initiatives in education and community engagement to encourage a better drinking culture and help reduce alcohol-related harm.

Could you imagine a North American trade organization place “alcohol” and “harm” that closely? Speaking of choice of words, Stan stood up for flavoured beer this week, building on the use of “beer flavoured beer” and admitting at least one of his sins:

I was wrong to use the term. It can be used to exclude, wielded as a weapon by drinkers who imply they know something others do not. “I can appreciate beer-flavored beer, the complex flavors that result from the interaction of malt and yeast in a simple helles. You are not worthy.” More obviously, it also excludes many, many, many flavors. In fact, some drinkers do not like the flavors in what they’ve come to know as beer-flavored beer. A survey of consumers in non-alcoholic beers in Northern California found they did not care for the “beer like” aroma, taste or mouthfeel they associate with non-alcoholic beers that were intended to mimic alcohol-containing lagers.

Let us be honest. Flavours that come from adjuncts are just not that interesting. The infinity that four ingredients can provide is enough for me. That’s brewing skill enough to draw me in. To be fair,² Stan did mention that he “would not drink a peanut butter chocolate merlot, but I would like to try the peanut butter chocolate porter from Schell’s.” I wonder what it would taste like? Oh, I know. Peanut butter and chocolate! Brilliant. I am not going to judge – but masking the taste of beer by adding other things to it is in the fine tradition of alco-pops. Fine. I judged. But has any industry succeeded long term by focusing on newbie marketing? One – candy. And I get that it’s a business decision to chase that market but it does seem interesting to me how that trend has tracked in parallel in recent years with the stalling and contraction of interest in good beer. A curse. A pox. Jeff has more, much of what I don’t buy given the tone of sheer presentist congratulationism.**** Still, it’s not that far off my favourite version of the phrase is 1998’s “beer-flavoured water” to describe PBR.

Consider this as something of a contrapunct to all that, entirely thoughtful words from Rachel Hendry (h/t to KM) within her thoughts this week on “Wine and Cider”:

When trees are knocked down, when orchards are treated poorly in the name of higher yields, when cider is infantilised and drinks are manipulated and artificially mimicked in order to make more money for big brands, very few of us win. Where lack of care destroys, care itself transforms. Those who take the more romantic approach, who approach the trees and their fruit and the ecosystems around it with care, who make their drinks to showcase the amazing things that apples have to say once fermented, who pick and press and pour and produce with such ferocity of respect and reverence, well our lands and our lives are better for it. We owe them so much.

I like that. A lot. Romance as integrity. As opposed to infantilism. See above. Maybe. Perhaps quite conversely but still about the language, when they are not bored (at least according to a poll run by the imported and apparently not boring brand Kingfisher) British lager drinkers appear to be really angry with brewers:

One person described a 3.4 percent strength beer as a ‘f**king shandy’, while another lamented Grolsch as a ‘once decent’ tipple, and said he’d been a fan of the old five percent mix. He wondered who the 3.4 percent beer was aimed at, while a third declared: “Grolsch, now alternatively known as p**s.” Someone else said the downgrade made Grolsch into a ‘run of the mill session lager’ that was ‘certainly no longer premium’.

Another sort of infantilisation, I suppose. Potty mouth. Still… journalism FTW. Note: Britons are also livid over noisy upgraded beer gardens and ugly view blocking teepees in upgraded beer gardens.

Finally, Stan** went someway to answer my question when he indicated that the NAGBW attracted 269 submissions from 96 entrants this year. I wonder if that is an increase or decrease? As the scope of the focus narrowed to those who “cover” the beer industry, one can’t help make comparisons*** with the often seemingly more vibrant and ecclectic awards from the British Guild of Beer Writers. Where is the Hawkes? Where is the Jesudason? Yet… I was really pleased to see the first place wine for the fabulous Courtney Iseman for her “Secondary Fermentation — New York City’s Strong Rope Brewery and the East Coast Cask Revival” in Pellicle last December. A writer of fine strong words like “craft beer cringe” and “toxic fandom“, I remember when I saw the title of her winning piece I thought “please reference Gotham Imbiber… please oh please” and yup there is was. Proper job. Proper recognition.

That’s enough. How many links do you need? Until the boo-tastic edition next Thursday, for more beery news check out Boak and Bailey every Saturday and Stan going strong again each and every Monday. Then listen to Lew’s podcast (if he ever does one) and get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by David Jesudason on the (now very) odd Fridays. And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is out there with the sweary Mary! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass which is going back to being a blog. Any more? Check out the Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good and they are revving up for a new year. And the BOAS podcast for the bro-ly. And the long standing Beervana podcast …except they have now stood down. Plus We Are Beer People. The Boys Are From Märzen podcast appears suspended as does BeerEdge, too. But not Ontario’s own A Quick Beer. There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. All About Beer has podcasts and there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube. The Moon Under Water is gone which is not surprising as the ask was $10 a month. Pete Brown’s one cost a fifth of that but only had the one post.

*For example, the stunning white-washing of German atrocities in Brazil or the naive deflection of the genocide by American Revolutionaries against the Haudenosaunee in New York.
**For the double!
***Hmm… maybe “best in the world, if it is focused on the trade side, written in English, relevant to an American perspective and, yes, written by one who submitted“… perhaps?
****That’s a new one… I like it… BUT THESE FOOTNOTES AREN’T EVEN IN ORDER!!!!
*****“Evanescent“!?!? Really???? At least it isn’t “quotidian”… if there were every a inflationary ten dollar word that is never needed and rarely used correctly it’s friggin’ “quotidian”… sheesh… yet also**. See also this sort of devaluation of a concept… no one at all is shocked by a beer trade fact… no one cares…
²Am I ever not?

These Be The Reflective Yet Exhuberant And Cardigan Considering First Beery News Notes For Q424

I was thinking about these weekly things I write and whether there are themes are not. Mainly because I thought last week’s was pretty theme-y. Thematic perhaps. All about ones relationship with the ancillaries surrounding beer. Sorta. I tell myself that by writing these summaries I am tracing, following patterns. But I rarely go back and look. Behind the scenes, there are no graphs being added to every seven days. Then Jeff posted about an AI widget that Google has posted and I plunked a document I worked on years ago, trying to combine my research on English strong ales of the 1600s, the ones named after cities like Hull or Margate. Whammo. Summary and key points in about 3 seconds. Weird. Yet not uncompelling.

Back to the present, we have lost one of the great experimental US brewers with the passing of Ron Jeffries of Michigan and Hawaii:

A true embodiment of ohana, Ron was not only a loving family man but also a creative genius and lifelong learner. He dedicated his life to sharing his knowledge, serving as a mentor in the brewing industry. As a legacy brewer and the founder of Jolly Pumpkin Artisan Ales, his contributions to the craft are immeasurable. In his final year, Ron fulfilled the lifelong dream of moving to Hawaii where he eagerly worked on his family brewery. He was excited about what the future was bringing and what he would be bringing to the world with Hilo Brewing Company/ Holoholo Brewing. He cherished moments spent on his lanai, soaking in the Hilo rain with a pint in hand.

In 2007, I found myself at Jolly Pumpkin in Dexter and Ron Jefferies gave me a hour of his time at the end of a long day. That’s his barrel room from that visit up there. Frankly I don’t meet a lot of people I write about so I was it was a real treat. My favourite part of the talk was his curiosity in what exactly beer blogging was and might be. He also doubled over with a big laugh at my story about the December 2006 Hair of the Dog shipment with the incompetent capping and how the yeast saved the beer. I visited again a few years later and he was just as swell. Very sorry to hear that he passed.

On a cheerier topic and adding to the discussion about the need for the pint from last week, Liam wrote a very interesting bit about what he calls the “meejum”:

…how much beer was actually in a meejum? The simple answer seems to be a little less than a pint as per the comments from our annoyed Londoner above, but I have come across a couple of others mentions of the volume too. In a court case in Dundalk in 1904 the judge has the same question and was told it was ‘a glass and a half’ (426ml) and another mention in 1901 that says it was ‘two-thirds of a pint’ (379ml). A more recent comment from a letter to the Irish Independent in 2003 looking for the medium to be reinstated, it is said that it was ‘approximately 500ml’. With a pint being 568ml we can see some wildly fluctuating volumes here, but I think we are missing the original point of the medium, which was to give the consumer a drink based on price and not volume, so therefore it is very possible that a medium was a different size in different counties – and even different pubs. It was a portion of beer that equalled a value that was acceptable to the working man.

And we note the announcement of the coming retirement of Humphrey Smith, the controversial Chairman of Samuel Smith’s Brewery and perhaps good beer’s Epimetheus, taking particular guidance from Old Mudgie:

Despite all these problems, it has to be said that Sam’s pubs, when they are open, have a very distinctive appeal that is not matched by any of their competitors. They offer comfortable seating, traditional décor with plenty of dark wood, an absence of TV sport and piped music, and only admit children if dining, making their wet-led pubs adults-only. They are oases of calm. They may not offer the widest choice of beer, or the absolute best beer, but in many locations they are the most congenial pubs around.

A new source to me, Literary Hub published a passage or perhaps a chapter on the history of Pilsner drawn from Hopped Up: How Travel, Trade, and Taste Made Beer a Global Commodity by Jeffrey M. Pilcher published by Oxford Univ Press:

Few visitors in the early nineteenth century might have guessed that the market town of Pilsen, on the road from Prague to Bavaria, would become world renowned for its clear, sparkling beers. Having grown rich from the business of anthracite mining, residents imported Bavarian lagers. In 1840, the town fathers decided to invest some of their mining profits in the construction of a municipal brewery. The first tasting, held on St. Martin’s Day, November 11, 1842, brought their home-grown beverage local acclaim. But apart from the basic recipe of Saaz hops, Moravian malt, soft water, and lager yeast, little is known about how Pilsner acquired its legendary status. It was prized, at first, as an exotic “Bavarian” beer, and the malting process relied on British advances in indirect heating, like Sedlmayr’s Munich malt, but without the final burst of caramelization. The brewery’s capacity of just thirty-six hectoliters, about twenty barrels, meant that the beer was sold primarily in local markets.

My problem with these things is, of course, whether is it, you know, true – keeping in mind, of course, the degree of abstraction at play. It speaks nothing of Prof. Pilcher for me to point out that Pilsner’s history has been stated, restated and revised and refused and refined and (… you get my point…) so often in the last wee while that it gets one in a big of a fog. But there is a certain compelling style to the passage provided in LitHub that I would invite comment from those closer to the topic.

Speaking of style, I missed this post by B+B last week just at the deadline on spinning LP records in pubs and why it works for them:

The magic that people perceive in cask ale is similar to the magic they perceive in pub buildings which is similar to the magic they perceive in the sound of vinyl. A sense of connecting with something authentic. They’re also essentially nostalgic. Most pubs are embassies of the past. Victorian buildings with plastic Watneys clocks, Bass on the bar, and packets of pork scratchings whose packets haven’t been redesigned since 1981. It’s not unusual to find a pub with a stack of records in the corner or behind the bar. Albums that, if they were sold on Discogs, would not warrant a ‘Mint’ or ‘VG+’ rating. Split sleeves, yellowing inner sleeves, with a whiff of stale beer and cigarette smoke about them.

Writing on FB, Alistair brought my attention to a surprisingly startling and poignant video about the loss of working class neighbourhood and working class neighbourhood pubs as part of the modernization of in Salford, England in the 1960s. Here’s the video from the BBC from the time. It appears the modernization did not fully take. Then I thought… Salford… I know that place. Pellicle posted a podcast about Marble Brewing of Salford back in 2023. And Martin (with an “i”) has been there, too. The juxtaposition of each stage of Hanky Park over the sixty years is remarkable.

And, over on BlueSky, I came across an interesting thread on why hip-hop culture connects with Hennessey cognac and why Lebron is tying his brand to the drink:

During the war, African Americans stationed in France began consuming Hennessy. Afterwards, Hennessy, being French & having a different relationship with Black people than American companies, trail blazed by simply marketing to & employing Black people, carving out an extremely loyal consumer base. WWII saw Black soldiers abroad enduring antagonism from USA, like leaflets being dropped over France claiming they had tails in order to discourage sexual intermingling. Many were dismayed to find that their service in the effort of helping stop genocide abroad had not granted them humanity at home. During that time Hennessy was continuing to cater to African Americans & before we were sensationalizing terms like DEI, they had hired Black Olympian Herb Douglass as their VP of Urban Market Development, a role he served in for over 30 years. This history is why you hear about Hennessy in hip hop.

So it is not too far off the “I Am A Man” protests and declarations in the Civil Rights movement. Very interesting. Staying with history but reaching back further, last Sunday Martyn (with the “y”) disassembled the notion that the “Hymn to Ninkasi” is any sort of Sumerian beer brewing guide and did so with both verve and detail… like this:

Paulette has invented the word “šikarologist” to describe students of Mesopotamian beer, from the Akkadian word šikaru, meaning beer, the cuneiform for which looked like one of those pointy brewing jars laid on its side: 𒁉. I will definitely be stealing that. Strangely, a cognate of šikar in another Semitic language, Hebrew, the word shekhár, meaning “intoxicating drink”, is the root of the English word “cider”, via Greek, Latin and French. Shekhár is also the root of the Yiddish word for “drunk”: I remember my Jewish ex-father-in-law, who came from Vienna, staggering around at his 70th birthday party, surrounded by his extensive family in his large garden in rural Surrey, saying: “Ich bin so shicker!”

An interesting chit chat ensued in TwexLand led by Lars which touched on (i) the title is made up, (ii) it’s a hymn and maybe a drinking song but not a brewing guide (iii) why was the grain covered in dirt? (iv) woundn’t the malt get suffocated? and (v) why are the translations so different?

And Martin (still with the “i”) has been out and about in Filey on the North Sea coast seeking out GBG25 entries:

…the thing that hits you about Guide newbie the Station is the friendliness of the welcome, the Guvnor checking we know that food service has stopped before we waste 10 steps to the bar… I ask for mild and a Pride, and get mild and Blonde in Pride glasses. Four simple and unfussy rooms, a good mix of bench seating and squidgy chairs, we take a table with a reservation for “Bingo” in 3 hours time. “Bingo” was a popular boys name in the ’50s, along with Bunty and Bungo.

Top tip time. You want to make the weekly roundup? Include an accurate use of the word “squidgy” – can’t resist! Speaking of good words, Gary wrote an excellent post on the appearance of “suffigkeit” in mid-1900s US beer advertising:

You want Bavarian beer? Here it is, new and improved – tastier, clearer and more sparkle than your original – that’s suffigkeit, or it is now.

Speaking of clearer and more sparkle, Matt made something of a declaration, the return to voluntary non-paying scribbling:

Yes, I still write. For lots of publications in fact. Not as many as I would like, but a writer is never satisfied. What I crave is that unpolished, flow-state writing, the kind that feels like stretching a limb, or the freedom of trying something new that might be absolutely terrible but you’ve done it anyway and calmed that twitchy section of your brain. Writing like this, which I’ve written in 10 minutes, proofed once, and hit the publish button. I just have a need for a space, a scratchpad, to try a few things out once in a while. I want to write basically, so that’s all I’m going to do. No newsletter, no subscription, just a place to take things out of my head and put them on a page.

Very good. Excellent even. Unfettered scribbling is the best. Compare that to the advice own newletter writing beer marketeer offered this week:

Content that takes you wide has to be relevant to millions of people. It can’t be about the impact of thiolized yeasts on lagers. Wide aiming posts tend to be less about you and your brand, and more about the industry, interest, or setting you’re a part of. They can still find parallels to your brand, voice, ethos, or sense of humor. The point of these posts are to appeal to what most people come to social media for these days whether that’s to shut off their brain, have a laugh, or learn something new. Nobody opens Instagram hoping to be sold a new 4-pack of Hazy IPA, so that shouldn’t be the goal when trying to go wide.

Please don’t go wide. Wide is a euphemism for dull, undifferentiating and disposable. It pandering to other goals outside of what’s written. Jeff (for the double) went very narrow and shared something quite personal which lead me to cheer “Yay, Poop Tests!“:

The rest of the trip went fine, but my body was experiencing a kind of systemic failure. I got back to the U.S. and the rash became permanent. I gave up beer and then coffee and eventually even food. In the past, fasting calmed the itchy nerve endings. Nothing helped until a friend recommended a gut naturopath. She gave me a stool sample and we discovered I had an overproduction of some kind of intestinal yeast. She gave me an antifungal and within days the rash left. Today I am back to my old self, happily eating and drinking whatever is placed before me.

Finally and keeping with the personal, Rachel Hendry‘s piece in Pellicle this week is a rich contemplation of loss through the lens of taste:

I want to know what her wine tastes like.

I can’t think about what is going to happen to her. Instead, I find myself obsessed with whether her perception of taste has changed. I think of whether memory can still come to her each evening when she pours herself a glass of wine. I want to ask someone this but it seems so silly in the grand scheme of things—can she still taste if she can’t remember? Can she feel flavour anymore? Is this why she drinks more now?

What if one day I no longer know what my wine tastes like?

I become selfish in these moments. Thoughts of her quickly turn into thoughts of myself. What if one day this happens to me, too?

Some tests, we all learn as we age, do not lead to a good outcome. Rachel has captured that moment with brave clarity.

That ended up unexpectely bookended. Not really themed. Maybe. Still, until next week, as we consider this shared mortal coil, for more beery news check out Boak and Bailey every Saturday and there is a promise that Stan may be back from his autumnal break starting this very Monday. Then listen to Lew’s podcast and get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by David Jesudason on the odd Fridays. And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is thereback with the sweary Mary! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass which is going back to being a blog. Any more? Check out the Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good. And the BOAS podcast for the bro-ly. And the long standing Beervana podcast …except they have now stood down. Plus We Are Beer People. The Boys Are From Märzen podcast appears suspended as does BeerEdge, too. But not Ontario’s own A Quick Beer. There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. All About Beer has podcasts and there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube. The Moon Under Water is gone which is not surprising as the ask was $10 a month. Pete Brown’s one cost a fifth of that but only had the one post.

*Me, I’m all about the social medias. Facebook still in first (given especially as it is focused on my 300 closest friends and family) then we have BlueSky (189) rising up to maybe… probably… likely pass Mastodon (931) in value… then the seemingly doomed trashy Twex (4,454) hovering somewhere well above my largely ignored Instagram (151), crap Threads (52) with Substack Notes (1) really dragging up the rear.

Your Beery News Notes For Turning The Calendar Page From Zeptember to Rocktober

Happy autumn! Did you find any September Ale yet? Nope, me neither. But as I probably say this time every year – it was a thing! Whatever it was. Defo. A certain thing for a certain time:

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core…

Ah, poetry. Autumn wasn’t all about Halloween candies and scaring the kiddies. It was the harvest – as Big Johnny K told us right there. To the core, baby! Just look at my meaty paw loaded with tamayddies. And just look at this bit of harvest Pr0n from Barry. And speaking of the arts poetic, I was listening to NPR’s Mountain Stage on Sunday as I usually do and heard a bit of a band by the name of The Brothers Comatose and these their lyrics:

You look at me like I’m crazy
But that stuff is bitter and gross (So gross)
I just wanna enjoy myself
I don’t wanna be comatose
Well, after a day of working hard
I’ll belly up at the bar
You can keep your hoppy IPA’s
I’ll be sipping on my PBR

The title of the song is “The IPA Song” which has some pretty clear messaging. The concerns are plainly stated: “When I drink a half dozen, I’ll be winking at my cousin…” And the ecomomics is addressed: “…you can keep your bitter brew / That costs you twice as much…” On that last point, Ron found a similar theory on why certain beers are trendy in an article from over fifty years ago:

Mr. Claude Smith, President of the Incorporated Brewers’ Guild, puts it down to cash. “It all down to people having more money,” he says. “At the bottom of the pile you get mild drinkers. When they get paid more, they drink bitter. When they get paid even more, they drink lager, It’s sort of fashionable and up-market. They want to prove they can afford it.”

All reasonable points. So, when people want to be seen they get that IPA. While still on vacation Stan, however, argued to the contrary and even made the news as reported in Bloomberg praising that “bitter brew” with a focus on what really makes the most popular US hop so… popular:

“The popularity of Citra is directly linked to the popularity of IPA, and the proliferation of IPAs that were brewed with more hops than in the past, notably dry-hopped beers,” says Hieronymus, referencing the process by which even more hops are added late in brewing to boost aroma and flavor without increasing bitterness. “Citra thrived because it works well on its own, but also both compliments and complements the character of other varieties… IPAs are becoming less bitter,” says Hieronymus. “There are three types of hops: aroma hops, high-alpha hops that add bitterness, and now dual-purpose hops that can do both. Citra is the latter. The shift from the qualities of Cascade to those of Citra has led to interest in more expressive hops with higher impact.”

Still… there are so many stories out there about how to avoid beer when having beer. Is an “give me even less than a PBR!” movement? We’ve waded through the zero alcohol stories for a while now but the zero pints stuff is a new twist on how to get less for your beer buying bucks. In The Guardian Eleni Mantzari, a senior research associate from the Behaviour and Health Research Unit at the University of Cambridge, explained the logic behind the study that experimented with smaller portions to capture the reaction:

She explains that there is not a lot of evidence about the impact of serving sizes when it comes to alcohol, but there is lots of research into food portions. “Larger portion sizes are linked to obesity. When portion sizes are smaller, consumption is lower,” she says. Regarding beer, “we just wanted to get the evidence. It’s up to the people in charge what they do with it.” Mantzari spoke to managers and owners from the participating pubs at the end of the study to find out how customers had reacted. “People didn’t tend to order two halves on the spot,” she says. “Some venues got complaints – mostly those outside London and mostly from older men. The complaints subsided over time, whether because people got used to the two-thirds, or because they knew the pints were coming back.”

Yup, there’s a certain sensitivity there. [Was the loss of the Canadian stubby in the 1980s our cultural equivalent? They never really came back. Gary’s been checking for them in Owen Sound. None there. (But there used to be bootleggers.)] And, you know as I get back to the point, it’s not just the ability to have that pint, it’s about where to have one as the number of pubs keeps shrinking, as Jessica Mason summarized:

The analysis showed that number of pubs in England and Wales fell to 39,096 at the end of June with industry experts warning that tax rises in 2025 could result in further closures across the industry. The data additionally highlighted how the total figure also included pubs that currently stood vacant and were being offered to let, which meant that the number of operational pubs was in fact even lower… In the first half of 2023, 383 pubs also closed, the equivalent to 64 pubs closing every month, showing that the situation is dire.

And it is not about how much or where you have one – it’s also about when and how the pint is even pictured. There is a fixation with British beer writers about certain photos being used for certain purposes. David J. picked up the theme for CAMRA’s What’s Brewing but added an insider’s view:

Working as a sub editor at the Guardian around the time web stories started to become very popular – and the newspaper was losing £1m a week as print sales started to fade – was a quick education. The volume of work we had to publish was so punishing that very little attention was given to details that were vital to make a story appeal to a reader. Captions, headlines, and, crucially, photos were slapped on quickly because senior editors would shout and curse for us taking too long… Now 15 years later, I’d like to hope that things have changed, but when I read national health stories about alcohol abuse, I doubt it. This is because nearly every time a sub publishes a story that looks at the harm alcohol causes, or the impact abuse can have on our society… a photo of a pint is used.

He calls it “lazy caricaturing” which is fair enough but is beer really more beautiful to the eye than wine or spirits? Could the average British beer drinking person in an slightly, err, obsessive relationship? I am pretty sure that it is no more healthy or less heathy than other booze. They are just different outfits for the same paper dolls. But, yes, they could get about four more stock images to add to the three that get heavy rotation.*

Not unrelatedly in terms of how and why the beer is presented, The Conversation published an interview with Dr. Jordanna Matlon of American University on what is described as the exploitation of lower income men in Africa by Guinness through leveraged advertising:

Guinness needed to speak to the experiences of real consumers: men who had long abandoned the prospect of a job that would have required a tie and a briefcase… I borrow this idea of the “bottom billion” from the business world, where emerging markets are a final frontier for corporate profits. It is supposed to celebrate the wealth potential of the poorest people on Earth: as the argument goes, the minuscule “wealth” of a billion people is really a fortune. Of course if we pick this apart just a bit it is clear that the wealth belongs not to the poor but to the corporations that sell them things. There is no real “Africa Rising” in this vision, no plan for enlarging an African middle class. Reflecting a longer colonial legacy, wealth here is something to be extracted.

It’s the whole bonding thing. Does beer and other bonding agents get taken advantage of? For example, I like this analysis, as discussed in TDB, of the cost of being an English football fan which not only compared the price of a pint at a game but added another six factors to come up with a more wholistic sense of how the fan is squeezed:

Ipswich Town came out top, with an average beer costing just £3.50. In second were Wolves and Brentford, where the average cost of a beer was £4 – although the overall second cheapest team including tickets and other goods was Southampton, where the price of a pint was £4.55. At the same time, bitter North London rivals Arsenal and Tottenham were the two most expensive teams to follow. A pint at Arsenal cost £6.30 and pies cost almost a fiver (£4.80). Spurs pint was considerably cheaper, at £5.10, but it performed poorly in other goods and ticket prices, with shirts costing £85.

I always like me a good methodology. Brings out considerations of integrity. In Pellicle, Anna Sulan Masing wrote about another sort of integrity, transparency in spirit making:

Are sustainable changes happening because of consumer demand, or because businesses think it is the right thing to do? I believe it should be a combination of political structure, business desire and consumers wanting to drink better. Wong thinks there is real change happening. “Since lockdown people have had a bit more time to think, consider what they buy, invest (time and money) as well as what they put into their bodies.” She says it is akin to eating organic, sustainable foods. “People are more curious.” She sees a correlation with the growth in agave spirits—people are coming to the category with an interest and understanding about the growing process, and the farming and the farming community is very much a part of the narrative of understanding the quality of the liquid.

Are these things, as she wrote, “rich, white person’s badge of honour”? Why do we associate so strongly about these things? Speaking of which, Boak’s and Bailey’s emailed monthly newsletter is a goodie this time, with the interesting results of questions they had posed about the effect of change of management in pubs as well as this line which sort of summarizes the arc of their last twenty years of beer writing:

It’s easy to romanticise pubs. This makes clear how crap they can be while still, somehow, being enchanting…

Is that it? You’ve been enchanted?

In the health section this week, we revisit whether there is any aspect of alcohol drinking that legitimately is a boost to your health? Did I ever mention my 2012 kidney stone? What fun. Well, there may have been a reason it was not as bad as it might have been:

In a study that included 29,684 participants in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 2007-2018, mean alcohol intake was significantly higher among non-stone formers compared with stone formers (42.7 vs 37.0 g/day). Beer-only and wine-only drinkers had significant 24% and 25% reduced odds of kidney stones compared with never drinkers or current drinkers who did not report alcohol intake by dietary recall, after adjusting for multiple variables, Jie Tang, MD, MPH, of Alpert Medical School of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, and colleagues reported in Nutrients. The investigators found no association with liquor-only intake.

Finally, if kidney stones weren’t uncomfortable enough for you to add to your worries of the week, Jeff posted an excellent and extended consideration of the implications of arguments made by a lobbyist group advocating for increased beer taxation in Oregon – with some interesting candor:

Beer tax proponents should be honest about their goals, which mirror anti-tobacco efforts to marginalize smoking by making it so expensive. That’s a fine goal! I would be completely happy to see cigarettes completely vanish from the earth, and I’ve supported taxes that make it so expensive that people have to be really committed to continue. Not everyone agrees with the position, but that’s the way of politics. Oregon Recovers wants to cripple the beer industry much as I wanted to cripple Philip Morris. I’d be happy to put it out of business and I’m willing to own that.

But if that is the case, if you have a certain understanding that alcohol is detrimental to health and to society… should we be listening or opposing? Do you associate so deeply with the booze you drink that it is a political platform?

As you think about that… until next week for more beery news, check out Boak and Bailey every Saturday and let’s see if Stan cheats on his declared autumnal break on Mondays. Then listen to Lew’s podcast and get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by David Jesudason on the odd Fridays. And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is thereback with the sweary Mary! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass which is going back to being a blog. Any more? Check out the Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good. And the BOAS podcast for the bro-ly. And the long standing Beervana podcast …except they have now stood down. Plus We Are Beer People. The Boys Are From Märzen podcast appears suspended as does BeerEdge, too. But not Ontario’s own A Quick Beer. There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. All About Beer has podcasts and there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube. The Moon Under Water is gone which is not surprising as the ask was $10 a month. Pete Brown’s costs a fifth of that but is writing for 47 readers over there.

*Just click on that zero pints link up there for one of them.
*Just consider this on the two-third portion in their footnotes this week: “But what problem are they solving that half-pint glasses don’t? Well, half-a-pint does feel a bit too small sometimes – especially if the glassware is really nasty, like something you might find in a hotel bathroom. We used to love drinking Brooklyn Lager out of branded glass that was about two-thirds-of-a-pint. It felt nice in the hand, swiggable but not over facing. Again, more choice, by all means. Let’s have options.” I now want a t-shirt that says “swiggable but not over facing”! I don’t really know what it means – but I like it.
***Me, I’m all about the social medias. Facebook still in first (given especially as it is focused on my 300 closest friends and family) then we have BlueSky (185) rising up to maybe… probably… likely pass Mastodon (931) in value… then the seemingly doomed trashy Twex (4,455) hovering somewhere well above my largely ignored Instagram (153), crap Threads (52) with Substack Notes (1) really dragging up the rear.

Your Definitely Final And Last Chance End Of Summer 2024 Beery News Notes

The next time we meet it will be autumn. Who submitted the requistion for that? Thanks. A lot. At least we get one more Saturday in. We’ve had a good run of weather to see us out, picking a couple of pounds of tomatoes a day. I’ll need a new hobby once the garden slows down. Maybe I could join a men’s pie making groups or something. The American Association of Wine Economists is one of my favourite BlueSky feeds to follow. They seem interesting. That up there? Germany 1920s. Men with a hobby. Comparatively speaking, a better sort of marching in those times.

Speaking of weird, Stan’s monthly newsletter Hop Queries is out for another month and, under the surprising heading “Bitterness and Attitude”, he wrote:

When we moved from the low-altitude flatlands of Illinois 700 feet) to New Mexico (5,320 feet), a professional brewer told me to just throw in a few more pellets when I brewed an IPA. I hope the information in the archives is more useful.

Oh! Altitude. He wrote altitude. That makes waaaaay more sense. Note: rumours of Stan O’Eire. Another bit of a puzzle was encountered in this story of the passing of a venerable Mancunian:

…for ten years straddling both decades there was one constant on the streets of Moss Side and Old Trafford – George Powell, the self-syled Ginger Beer Man. He became a legend too selling his home made brew from his bike. George has died, aged 97, and later this month 500 people from all over the country and abroad are expected to pay their respects and attend his funeral. And his son Glen is going to ensure he will get the send-off the big family man deserves after his perfectly timed win at bookies Betfred. Self-employed handyman Glen won £20,000 from a £4 wager… much of his winnings will be spent on George’s funeral at the Church of God of Prophesy in Moss Side, burial at Southern Cemetery followed by the wake at Bowden Rugby Club.

Would that have been an alcoholic ginger beer? I used to brew one based on the CloneBrew recipe. This January 1978 edition local CAMRA newsletter “Whats Doing?” from Manchester suggests (at page 9) that the Salford brewers Walker & Holmfreys brewed a ginger beer along side ale brewing.

Staying there about, you know some things are worth repeating. This same passage in Katie’s edition of The Gulp at the end of last week was quoted in the Boak and Bailey Saturday update but I have to note this fabulous bit of stream of consciousness too:

…I have to check myself before I wreck myself. Tonight is going to be a late one. But it’s just so delicious, so perfect in this moment. Savour it, I tell myself, knowing that I can’t. I’m not a savourer. I eat in big bites, drink in big gulps. I want the best things all in one go, now.

There go I, too. Back here at home, Ontario’s new booze sales in corner stores have attracted all sorts of attention… including the independent accountants:

When the Ford government expanded sales of beer, wine, cider, and ready-to-drink cocktails into Ontario convenience stores and gas stations on Sept. 5, it did so ahead of schedule. A master framework agreement (MFA) signed under the Liberal government in 2015 gave the privately run Beer Store exclusive rights to sell 12—and 24-packs of beer. It was set to expire in 2026, but the government’s expedited plan involves an “early implementation agreement” with the beer retailer that will see the province pay the company up to $225 million. The FAO report will estimate the financial costs and benefits of accelerated expansion “and compare these fiscal impacts to a scenario where the Province expanded alcohol access at the expiration of the MFA on Dec. 31, 2025.”

Listening to CBC Radio 1’s Ontario Morning the other day, they played an audio reworking of this story including interviews with convenience store clerks and customers about the new rules and heard some interest points of view. Shop owners have not been informed about expired product returns so many only place small orders. And a portion of product has to come from small producers – 20 per cent for beer, ciders, and ready-to-drink cocktails, and 10 per cent for wines. Which is not a bad guaranteed return. But there are supply chain issues getting all the stores stocked up. Me, I have not taken advantage of the new world order yet.

Conversely, over on FB, Max has been out and about posted a brief report on his trip to Vorkloster, a brewery in Predklasteri, Czechia… using many words I do not know:

Vorkloster’s pivnice is cute and friendly, it does feel like part of a monastery, and many of the punters are locals dropping by for a pifko. The kulajda was just luvly. The Výčepní tasted jaded, like the feeling of an afternoon after a couple of very rough days at work. Jantarový Ležák is like an otherwise very good sauce that’s just not thick enough. Tmavý ležák has the right balance of coffee and milk chocolate.

Breaking news out of Albany, NY:

Free pizza is almost dead at the City Beer Hall! Long live pizza at CBH! A promotion in place since the City Beer Hall opened in spring 2011 at Howard and Lodge streets downtown provided a small individual cheese pizza for free with every pint of beer sold. The practice is being sharply curtailed, now available only after 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday.

I will have to check in with Craig to find out of I was ever there. Over at Pellicle, Katie (for the double) wrote about a beer that I used to cross provincial borders* to buy, Theakstons’ Old Peculier:

If it wasn’t for the Steel’s Masher, Old Peculier would not be the beer it is today. The way that the malt is hydrated and mashed by the machine is incredibly efficient, releasing enzymes and raking through the grist before it can form dry-centred clumps. This machine makes short work of stiff mashes. It was invented in Scotland by James Steel, a brewer who, like many of his peers in industry, was making a lot of Scotch Strong and Wee Heavy beers—high malt content, low water content mashes. Getting the paddles around a mash like that is like stirring six tons of day-old porridge, in intense steam heat, in cramped conditions.

Speaking of the good stuff, Matty C wrote about cask ale for What’s Brewing (apparently a play on words of the 1978 Mancester journal of note mentitoned above, What’s Doing) and makes a very good point about the enjoyment of things in the abstract:

I tend to find that foreign visitors who appreciate their beer genuinely revere the cultural significance of cask dispense. But they also find only disappointment when, after months of anticipation, they arrive at last only to be served a tired pint of London Pride that is, well, warm and flat. We’re responsible for that reputation because in so many places where cask beer is served it’s not treated with the care it deserves. I don’t believe in the notion that cask should be some sort of protected appellation though. For me, the problem exists because advocates too often tend to raise cask beer on a pedestal, when really it should be treated like the most normal thing in the world. Yes, it’s a wonderful way to drink beer, but it’s not that special, really, it’s just beer, after all. Care and reverence are not the same thing.

On the topic of keeping the beer cool, one award winning pub has a related issue on its hands with the authorities due to a noisy fan:

Mr Bull took over the listed corner boozer in Gosport, Hants, in 2022. The previous landlady had the cooling unit located in a door cavity close to the beer cellar but after receiving safety advice, he moved it into the courtyard. Following a complaint, he was visited by a planning department enforcement officer last summer and later informed he would need planning permission for the unit. As part of the application, Mr Bull spent £1,500 on a sound survey as part of this in order to prove that the unit was not noisy. However, the survey found that the unit was loud enough that “it would cause sleep disturbance” to someone sleeping on the ground floor of the house next door, and ‘may’ do so for someone sleeping in the upstairs room.

Speaking of a proper pub, I have seen such things in histories of Victorian saloon hellholes… but never in real life:

…see that trough in the pub? That was so blokes didn’t have to leave the bar to relieve themselves. People in London are posh now though; they go to the gents for a piss.

Want a job in beer? Perhaps an open position with the Anderson County Beer Board is for you!

The three members would serve a three-year term expiring in September 2027. The Beer Board was established for the purpose of licensing, regulating and controlling the transportation, storage, sale, distribution, possession, receipt and/or manufacture of beer, according to a county government information. Interested residents can send a resume or pick up a request-to-serve form at the County Commission Office, 100 N. Main Street, Room 118, Clinton, TN, posted outside the office door.

Will Hawkes is doing an excellent job in London Beer City with his extended series on the history of the biggest pub in London from the 1930s to the 1990s, reminding us that the past is a foreign country and that includes the fairly recent past including the era of the rave:

…Fascination at the Downham Tavern took place on Sunday afternoons, taking in not only DJs but also live bands like Natural Life. These all-dayers quickly became a huge thing, according to Wilson, who always played the last three hours, and who played at Bonnie’s on Saturday nights. “We had the best laser show, we had the first gyroscope in [a dance] venue,” says Wilson. “When we first started [in 1988] we had 300, 400 people but it just took off. It got to stage where we had ticket touts … the build-up was massive, ‘I can’t wait, I can’t wait!’” Unusually for a pub, all this excitement was not fuelled by beer. Ecstasy arrived in the UK in a big way in the late 1980s, and it’s fairly safe to assume it was a key part of the Fascination experience. “Oh yeah,” says Wilson with a chuckle. “That was flying about.” The Downham Tavern all-dayers ended in 1990. By that stage, media hysteria about rave culture had reached fever pitch, and policing had become much stricter…

There was a good piece in the Manitowoc Herald Times on a 71 year old ship that has helped make that fine community the “Specialty Malt Capital of the World”, the self-unloading freighter SAGINAW:

The name was changed to SAGINAW on Nov. 20, 1999, in honor of Michigan’s Saginaw River. By 2008, the vessel was repowered from steam propulsion to diesel. Today, the 14,000-ton SAGINAW routinely transits between the ports of western Lake Superior and the Port of Manitowoc at least twice a year. Briess confirmed we can expect to see one more shipments of grain this year aboard SAGINAW. With up to 25 million pounds of raw barley in each delivery, that equates to about 40 million 12-ounce bottles of beer.

Finally, word of two more passings. Many remembrances followed up the announcement of the passing of drinks writer and cider maker, Susanna Forbes:

Forbes, whose long fight with cancer had been known by those close to her, had not faltered over the past few years in her dedication to the industry she loved. Speaking to db last year, she outlined how much she “appreciated people and cherished the perspective that treatment and its challenges had uncovered”. Her generosity of spirit showcased by her constant reminder that “in times of hardship you recognise the people who go out of their way to really make a difference”. Friends and colleagues have come from far and wide to pay their tributes to Forbes for her personality and kindness being at the forefront of their descriptions.

And there was another passing this week of particular note for me, of a craft beer pioneer in my old hometown of Halifax NS, Kevin Keefe of the Granite Brewery:

When Keefe opened the Granite Brewery, it was the second microbrewery in Canada — and first east of the Rockies. That’s a far cry from today as there are dozens in Nova Scotia alone. Keefe first became interested in craft brewing after reading an article about it. In 1984, he went to the U.K. and learned how to do it at a brewery. Not only was Keefe a brewer, he was a savvy businessman. “If I retailed it to the liquor commission, I’d get 50 cents a bottle, but if I sold it in a glass to you, I’d get almost two bucks a bottle, so it didn’t take very much for me to figure out, well, what I want to do is sell it to you,” Keefe told the reporter in a 2017 interview for Halifax Magazine. And thus the Granite Brewery operated out of Ginger’s Tavern.

The Granite of Halifax was a big part of my good beer education. I was a bar rat there in my early twenties as soon as he opened the place. I can smell the Ringwood yeast in my mind’s schnozz this very minute.

There. Until next week, check out Boak and Bailey every Saturday and let’s all see if Stan cheats on his declared early autumnal break from his updates on Mondays. Then listen to Lew’s podcast and get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by David Jesudason on the odd Fridays. And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is thereback with the sweary Mary! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass which is going back to being a blog. Any more? Check out the Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good. And the BOAS podcast for the bro-ly. And the long standing Beervana podcast …except they have now stood down. Plus We Are Beer People. The Boys Are From Märzen podcast appears suspended as does BeerEdge, too. But not Ontario’s own A Quick Beer. There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. All About Beer has podcasts and there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube. The Moon Under Water is gone which is not surprising as the ask was $10 a month. Pete Brown’s costs a fifth of that but is writing for 47 readers over there.

*When we lived in PEI in eastern Canada, I would stop in Sackville NB when returning from Halifax NS just to grab a few Peculiers.
**Me, I’m all about the social medias. Facebook still in first (given especially as it is focused on my 300 closest friends and family) then we have BlueSky (183) rising up to maybe… probably… likely pass Mastodon (932) in value… then the seemingly doomed trashy Twex (4,457) hovering somewhere well above my largely ignored Instagram (152), crap Threads (52) with Substack Notes (1) really dragging up the rear.

The Mid-August 2024 “No, You’re The One Dreaming Of Sweater Weather” Beery News Notes

Great. Stan took this week off. And probably next week too. He may hover in my mind like the absentee desk editor like I mentioned a few weeks ago. But he also has a nickname, too: cheat sheet. Stan “The Cheat Sheet” Hieronymus. Yup. See, come Monday when I can’t think of anything to go look for in the world of beer to think about, I can go see what Stan has been thinking about first. He’s a bit like that nice smart left handed kid in grade 11 math class with really good posture that I sat one row back of and one seat over to the right. Gave me a good view. Made tests just a bit easier.

By the way, there is little beer related in that photo up there. Took the image Monday evening looking due south, down over central New York State. A pinhole sunset catching the anvil cloud from below. Right about in the middle of that horizon is Oswego, NY. On still days in winter, you can see the plume rising from Nine Mile Point Nuclear. Also, home of Rudy’s. Where you can skip stones and drink Genny Cream Ale.

Did someone mention beer? Starting hereabout, as we face almost 4,000 new beer retailers in these parts in a few weeks, Ontario’s public broadcaster TVO published a great piece by Matt Gurney about the shock of the new he has experienced in the last few years of deregulation of the provincial booze market, with a particular focus on that one odd rule that allows 7-Eleven to qualify as a restaurant:

Seeing someone drinking in a 7-Eleven or walking out of my local variety store with a bottle of wine will probably feel exactly the way seeing people openly smoking cannabis felt like for the first few years after legalization. I have a specific memory of standing at an intersection, waiting for a light so I could cross, and noticing two young men standing on the corner passing a joint back and forth. I thought to myself, huh, that’s unusually brazen. And then, seconds later, my brain caught up with reality: it would have been brazen a few years earlier, but that day, it was simply two law-abiding citizens engaging in a legal activity in public.

On undoubtedly similar sorts of offerings, Doug Velky of Revolution Brewing in his newsletter Beer Crunchers, unpacks how craft has turned full circle with craft’s adoption of “cold” in the race to make light generic lagers:

…we also recognized that Cold Time, whose model focuses more on volume than margins, would require broader adoption than just our loyal Revolution customers to ever be considered a success. To achieve this greater scale, early investments would be crucial to get Cold Time into new places to find audiences who don’t currently think of themselves as craft beer fans, but are very open to a great, locally made lager.

Volume. Hmm. Disclosure. I’ve been buying Ice Cold Beer from Toronto’s Left Field Brewing for at least three years so there is no news here. But that branding had at least a level of self-parody in the mix along with the tasty within. Is that self-effacing sort of joke now all so… what… 2021? They may not be dipping as low as the macro-lags but aren’t they fighting for the Centro-Euro buyer‘s attention? Given how well “beer from anywhere you like” can sell, can we blame them?

Interesting bit of history over from Katy Prickett at Auntie Beeb this week on industrialization of England during the Roman Era, including brewing at scale:

“At Berryfields, we found evidence of malting and brewing and the tanks used to steep the grain before processing,” he said. “We tend to think of the Roman world as being very much a wine-loving place. “But actually a lot of the population in Roman Britain were drinking beer and we see that in the pottery they were using, large beakers in the same sort of sizes as modern pint glasses.”

Being someone who never gives a second thought for the Roman Empire, this was all news to me. I am told that Barryfield was located “at an intersection along a major routeway” and was “the location of multiple roadside industries, such as brewing, woodworking, and metalworking, aimed at supplying the travellers passing through.” Here, too, is an archaeological report on a neighbouring site complete with maltings and even malted spelt deposits along with some barley and even some apples and beets.*

In an exploration of more recent history and in light of far more recent racist events in the UK, David Jesudason published the story of a hopeful scene in late 1940s Wales as recoujnted by historian Kieran Connell, the story of an event that showed how working class people rejecting racist hostility are always as he says the vanguard of multiculturalism:

In 1948, the CIAC organised a black-tie event to celebrate Douglas’s success after he made 39 first-team appearances for the team, with the CIAC inviting white members of Cardiff Rugby Club. Announcements were placed in Tiger Bay shop windows and St Clair attended the night which was held ‘not at a dingy clubhouse’ but in the convention room of a city-centre hotel rented for the occasion. “He [St Clair] entered the hotel,” writes Kieran, “without any of the stares or comments that might ordinarily greet someone from an ethnic minority in central Cardiff. In the hotel lobby, he spotted five white girls and two black girls chatting with a group of four white boys. Further on, four or five boys of mixed ethnicity were trying to set up a large keg of beer.”

Table tennis? Bun fight? A bit of both? That’s the theme in an article by Ted Simmons in The Spirits Business about the dispute between the American Craft Spirits Association (ACSA) on the one hand and, on the other, the Wine and Spirits Wholesalers of America (WSWA) over what is causing the great retraction. We join the debate half way in progress:

WSWA released a second statement [:]… “Blaming wholesalers for the industry’s challenges is shortsighted. The focus should instead be on how the entire supply chain, including wholesalers, can adapt to changing market conditions and support each other in navigating economic pressures,” it read… ACSA cites a study that found that 87% of craft spirits drinkers want to legally purchase via DTC, and 82% of craft spirits drinkers support laws changing in order to expand DTC… The WSWA calls for an end to any finger pointing…

Speaking of handbaggery, Ed had a posted about the redistribution of CAMRA branches which so far has not yet popped up into the general finger pointery zone but might be heading that way:

CAMRA currently has a plan to change its branch structure so no branch straddles CAMRA region or county boundaries. From what I can gather it’s a top down proposal from the National Executive… I’m a bottom up man so am dubious about the proposal. Though a devout member of our Mother Church I’m not very active in the branch, but it is the branch I’ve been in since I was a teenager so I would be sad to see it end. Our branch chairman has written a long reply detailing how the branch came to be and why its current structure works.

BREAKING: Ron + Uruguay: one, two, three, four plus one alarming admission: “I want a rest from being Mr. Beer“!!! Heavens. Jings even.

And Jessica Mason shared details on the losses left in the wake of the failure of one brewery, the unfortunately** named Anarchy Brew Co of Newcastle:

Following the pandemic, the business also reportedly fell into financial difficulties after being unable to pay back loans and financial obligations on top of rising supplier costs. Reports have outlined that the trouble began when directors of the company took out Covid support loans and used tax deferrals to manage finances. FRP Advisory has since put together estimates with a breakdown, showing the shortfall owed to creditors stands at approximately £492,413 and an additional £158,016 still being owed to HMRC. Many in the sector with debts currently unpaid by Anarchy are set to lose out with 22 businesses in the industry, including malt and hop suppliers, still being owed thousands of pounds.

In the referenced reports, it is stated that unsecured creditors such as trade creditors, the landlord and loans and finance agreements are owed £261,468. Assets came in at about one-third of that fugure. What to take away from all that? Certainly the interconnectedness what with so many others dependent on the success of the brewery. Plus… would it have been a kindness had the pulg been pulled earlier?

Perhaps speaking of which but definitely for the double, makring the Molson Coors cutting of losses Doug Velky posted a neat and tidy summation of the recent string of ditchings of unwanted craft brands which has seen one firm… consortium (… collector… aggregator…) named Tilray picking up the pieces to perhaps slide up to fourth place in the contracting US craft brewer market:

For Molson Coors’ there’s no growth potential looking forward for these brands as each posted negative trends in 2023. The brands aren’t dead as nearly 200,000 BBLs across four regional breweries is nothing to sneeze at, but in order to reverse these trends it would take focus, vision, energy, and dollars. As a public company focused on growing shareholder value, cutting these brands and focusing on positive trending formulas is where they’ll head instead. We saw the same of Anheuser Busch who dumped more than half of their crafty brands to Tilray in 2023 and Constellation Brands who quickest to take their “L” in craft and move on when they cleaned house and sold off Ballast Point, Funky Buddah, and Four Corners.

Jeff asks some good questions and triggers good thoughts – but there seems to be an assumption that “local” and “regional” are similar constructs. I don’t think they are. By the way… does one now cheer in 2024 as much as one booed in 2016? Such a long time ago, isn’t it? Wasn’t it? My thought it that it all such a case of corporate deck chair shifting that it really no longer matters. Macro abandoning craft at the same time craft is seeking to mimic macro. Whoda thunk it? What an odd scene this is for so late in the play.

Headline for these times: “World Of Beer Has Filed For Bankruptcy, Here Are The Details.”

Interestingly and conversely, the government of Western Australia has created a ten-year economic development plan to boost the state’s craft beer industry:

The plan was put together by the state’s Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development, the Independent Brewers Association (IBA), West Australia Brewers Association (WABA) and South West Brewers Association (SWBA). As part of the strategy, the four parties’ two main goals are increasing the volume and value of locally produced beer threefold by 2034 from a 2023 baseline and creating “greater vertical integration of the craft beer value chain” in the region. Over 120 craft breweries exist in Western Australia, representing 20% of total craft beer production in the country.

A ray of hope? A futile effort given the bigger picture? Who knows. Finally – and as a welcome night cap if you get my analogy – ever the optimist or at least open to the possibility, The Beer Nut gave credit where credit was due in his piece this week on a brewery that has turned its luck around:

There’s hope for us all, I like to think. Today’s beers aren’t the first to come from a brewery premises whose earliest wares I didn’t care for and thought poorly made, but under new management seem to have been turned around. Investment in better equipment? Less corner-cutting? Or just a more highly skilled brewer? I don’t know. I do know that the beers from the Hillstown brewery in Co. Antrim were usually a raft of off-flavours, of the homebrew rookie sort. It seems that there’s a new broom about the place now, going by the friendly and approachable name of Modest Beer.

PS: I like shameless. I can work with shameless.

Here are the credits, the stats the recommends and the footnotes and the many ways to find good reading about beer and similar stuff via any number of social media and other forms of comms connections.*** Want to keep up with the news before next Thursday? Check out Boak and Bailey every Saturday and Stan back each Monday… with a top drawer effort this week. Elsewhere go look at then listen to Lew’s podcast. And get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by this year’s model citizen David Jesudason on the odd Fridays. And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s now revitalised and wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is back with all the sweary Mary he can think of! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass which is going back to being a blog in this weeks best medium as message news. Any more? Yes! Check to see the highly recommended Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good. And the BOAS podcast for the bro-ly. And the long standing Beervana podcast …except they have now stood down. Plus We Are Beer People. The Boys Are From Märzen podcast appears suspended as does BeerEdge, too. But not Ontario’s own A Quick Beer. There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. All About Beer has introduced a few podcasts… but some may be losing steam… until… Lew’s interview! And there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube. The Moon Under Water… is gone which is not surprising as the ask was $10 a month. Pete Brown’s costs a fifth of that but is writing for 47 readers over there. There was also the Beer O’clock Show but that was gone after a ten year run but returned renewed and here is the link! Errr… nope, it is gone again.

*How do you say “ooh, look, my pee’s gone all pink” in Latin?
**Although perhaps not as unfortunate as Jolly this week.
***This week’s update on my own emotional rankings? Facebook still in first (given especially as it is focused on my 300 closest friends and family) then we have BlueSky (+1=133) rising up to maybe… probably… likely pass Mastodon (-1=929) in value… then the seemingly doomed trashy Twex (plummeting a bunch to 4,466) hovering somewhere well above my largely ignored Instagram (160), crap Threads (52) with Substack Notes (1) really dragging up the rear.

The “We Are Only Now Actually Halfway Through Summer 2024 This Week” Beery News Notes

Midsummer. This week. It’s now been 48 days since the summer solstice and the autumnal equinox is still a whole 45 days away. Mid. Summer. I blame public education for the false impression. The months of harvest are really just getting in gear. Moved: school should only be held in the months which are not summer gardening months. Approved. And Pete‘s #1 beer is exactly right. Beer after garden or yard work. Except… beer during garden or yard work. Or after coming back from the hardware store, I suppose.

What’s up? First off, I know my people can be a dour lot but I have never heard of it being a selling point in the hospitality trade until now in Inverness:

Dog Falls Brewing Co has applied for change of use to convert the long-closed Semi-Chem chemists’ to a beer “taproom” selling its product and other selected beers – but without music or entertainment. The brewery through planning agents Davidson Baxter Partnership Ltd, say in a supporting document to Highland Council: “The concept revolves around experiencing fresh beer from Dog Falls and selected other breweries in a setting where locals and visitors can talk, laugh, and interact with each other rather than being distracted by loud music or entertainment.” Dog Fall proprietor Bob Masson explained the concept further saying: “We want to encourage a convivial atmosphere among the customers without the entertainment add-on…

Got that? No need to repeat the point again. No entertainment. None. Nada. Don’t be looking to be entertained at this place. No way. Don’t. Not apparently related at all, I have never really needed twenty-four drinking each day in my life. Once forty years ago I got hammered starting at 4:30 am but that is only because I was a campus police officer at my small college and I arrested a guy breaking into cars at 3:30 am. After the fist fight in the wee hours and after handing the over to the actual cops, me nerves were a bit shot. So when I was offered unending tequila sunrises by my pal Bruce who was also technically my managing supervisor at that moment, I took up the opportunity. Anyway, all that is to say, by way of intro, that the entire City of Montreal is now acting like my pal Bruce and is offering drinks around the clock for interesting reasons – and the BBC took notice:

Montreal will become the first city in Canada to allow 24-hour drinking. In Toronto venues have to close by 2am, and it is 3am in Vancouver. In the US, Las Vegas and New Orleans have long allowed bars and clubs to stay open all night. While in New York the cut off time is 4am, and in Los Angeles it is 2am. On the other side of the Atlantic, pubs in London still typically close at 11pm… Ms Alneus agrees. She says the fact that so many bars and clubs all currently close at 3am presents problems for the police. She believes by allowing 24-hour drinking, those venues that don’t wish to stay open all night will be able to close at different times across the night.

I will be over there in a few weeks but I am pretty sure I won’t be checking out that scene. Yet a few hours after the party ends, in the UK for some on the move it starts up:

“Whether it’s 3am, 6am or 5pm, we all know that having a pre-holiday beer is a true British tradition. “Most of the time it’s a Fosters or a Carling and we all know they don’t exactly hit the spot. So, we decided to work with a local brewery and create the ultimate breakfast beer – the first of your holidays that matches perfectly with breaky.” Further findings from the research also revealed that a large majority of Brits (72%) believed a beer pre-10am is a “must” on our holidays.

Really? Honestly, I though it was just Ron. He’s been on the road in South America, as mentioned a couple of weeks ago, but he has finally gotten around to sharing the deets as well as the breakfast buffet experiences not to mention the glimpses into family life on holidays:

It’s quite chilly inside. Feeling a little cold, I put my coat back on. And notice no-one else has taken theirs off. They aren’t great on indoor heating here in Santiago. There’s a TV showing non-stop heavy metal videos… “Would you like to climb Mount Fuji, Dad?” Alexei asks. “No.” “Why not?” “For obvious fucking reasons. Like age and not wanting to die on a fucking mountain.” “If you weren’t old and scared, wouldn’t you want to climb it?” “No. I probably wouldn’t be able to breathe at the top of it.” “Well, apart from that?” “Just leave it.” After our first drink, it’s time for food.

In opposition to both Montreal and Ron, TDB reports that India is continuing its tightening of the prohibitions against liquor advertising after it became clear that there were efforts to circumvent the ban which already “outlaws direct advertising” by adding laws against “surrogate commercials and the sponsoring of events…” Examples:

Carlsberg would no longer be permitted to promotes its Tuborg drinking water in India by showing film stars at a rooftop party using the slogan “Tilt Your World”, which echoes its beer commercials. Nor would Diageo’s YouTube ad for its non-alcoholic Black & White ginger ale [which] features the iconic black-and-white terriers used to promote the scotch whisky brand of the same name.

Speaking of things that make you go “…hmmm…“, Jeff did some interesting data collection this week which has raise questions about some other data collection:

I found many of the breweries were no longer around. It wasn’t a marginal number. Despite the ambiguities in identifying what a brewery is, the number I ended up with was about 30% less than the Brewers Association’s official tally. For a number of reasons, this may be higher in Oregon than elsewhere: we have a more mature market, which means a lot more breweries have taprooms, which confounds things, and we also have more breweries closing because competition is so fierce. Nevertheless, it seems almost certain that the number of breweries in the US is thousands fewer than the regularly-cited figure of 10,000.

Which leads one to ask, of course, if that number is that wobbly – what else is? I mean, it’s not like any of this stuff is peer reviewed and footnoted.

Displaying far more solidity, The Guardian had a pretty good interview with ‘Spoon owner, Tim Martin, who shared some interesting information about his approach to business including this early decision:

He wanted to be a barrister and studied law at Nottingham University, but was paralysed by a fear of public speaking. “I went to my first law of contract lecture and the professor started asking questions, so I didn’t go back. It made me very nervous. It sounds pathetic but you can get these little phobias.” The solution, it turned out, was getting into the pub trade, which he did in 1979 with the opening of Martin’s Free House. The JD Wetherspoon name came later, a mashup of JD Hogg, a character in The Dukes of Hazzard, and Wetherspoon, the name of a teacher who did not think much of him.

And Jessica Mason has taken a cheeky approach to a piece which at the outset appeared to be about the place of fruity hazy IPAs in your fridge this summer as illustrated by one brand’s offering of something that is “effortlessly drinkable with a fresh watermelon taste and a pink haze” – and then is smartly turned on its head with the help of a couple of colleagues:

Tierney-Jones explained: “There’s a market for them and beer should have an element of fun but personally I tend to regard them as baby food for adults, the infantilisation of a great and noble beverage, it’d be a bit like a great wine producing chateau around Bordeaux adding mangoes or preserved lemons to their vintages.” Author and beer writer Pete Brown added: “I talk to so many brewers who say they brew hazy, fruity beers because that’s what the market wants. Then I look at the total share that hazy, fruity beers have in the market and think….’really? Looks to me like they want Guinness and ‘Spanish’ lager’.”

Brutal. Speaking of honest truths, Martyn has a book he wants you to buy and, as always, I was most obedient to the call. It sounds a bit like a reverse engineering of that earlier Jacksonian idea of classics:

There are certain classical examples within each group, and some of these have given rise to generally-accepted styles, whether regional or international. If a brewer specifically has the intention of reproducing a classical beer, then he is working within a style.

I say a reversal as Martyn is taking each of these eighty beers and expanding on their inherent implications – and not without peril as he explains:

One big problem with writing a book about beer with one foot firmly in the present is that the present is constantly changing. After I submitted the manuscript, it was announced that the Anchor brewery in San Francisco was shutting down. I hesitated for some time over whether to take the chapter on steam beer out, decided it was too interesting a style to ignore, and was saved by the announcement that the brewery had – at the time of writing – found a buyer. Similarly the chapter on Gale’s Prize Old Ale had to be rewritten twice, first after the closure of the Dark Star brewery, where POA was revived, and then after the closure of the Meantime brewery, where the brewing of POA was transferred.

Speaking of wordcraft – and for the double – Jeff wrote about a subject that never has left me with much satisfaction – authenticity. What is that you say? He summarizes: “Authenticity is a self-referential quality. We associate ourselves with products that have the social currency of authenticity because it reflects well on us. We become authentic when we consume the right products.” It has always seem circular like that to me. A vessel of an adjective into which pretty much anything can be placed. And Stan provide some more context particular to one beer related point:

In 2003, Holt and Cameron created a commercial that features a character they called The Tinkerer, who finds an old bicycle at a garage sale, carefully restores it, and then happily rides it into the Colorado countryside. They outline their strategy for New Belgium in a chapter called “Fat Tire: Crossing the Cultural Chasm” within their book, “Cultural Strategy: Using Innovative Ideologies to Build Breakthrough Brands”… The word authentic comes up in most chapters, but usually as a given and without a definition of what it means to be authentic. What is clear is how important whatever they label authenticity is to those focused on marketing.

This has not been my sneaking suspicion so much as my clear understanding for years. I think we three are all on the same page so we can be honest. The call to generic authenticity is a useful call to nothingness, a warming abstraction which is is nothing more than a vacant space for marketeers. The sibling of “effortlessly drinkable” when you think about it. This is where we are. Craft beer has long abandoned the firmer footholds of traditional techniques and smaller scale* – but will current welcome interest in Czech lager and perhaps a building upwards blip in English cask now act as a counterweight to the mess big craft has made of itself? If so, isn’t there a better word then authenticity? Perhaps credible. A credible rendition of something is a simple direct take – in the X=Y sense – without adding any intermediate generic analytical steps. I’d much rather have a credible take on a Světlý Ležák than an authentic one. Must now consider the other applications for the word in the beer world.

Finally, Matthew has written a personal essay about the pubs of his hometown of Lincoln and how his parents’ divorce when we was a teen affected his relationship them. To do that, he visits his Mum to spend a day about town:

The day starts off well. Mum has a hairdresser’s appointment on the other side of town and has offered me a lift. This means I have to leave early, burdening me with an extra hour to kill before the pubs open. No matter, I thought, this would give me a rare opportunity to play tourist in my birthplace. Mum, however, is running late, so puts her foot down. She banks hard down a side street, hitting 40 in a 20 zone. I grip my seat, before reassuring myself that she has spent her entire life driving on these roads, and probably knows them better than anyone. She drops me off close to my first stop and reminds me I need to be home before 7pm. It’s her choir practice this evening and she wants to make sure I’m back in time for tea.

We’ll have to tune in next week to find out if he made it back in time for tea. See, he ends the story in the last pub. I just hope his Mum wasn’t late for choir practice.

Enough! Here are the credits, the stats the recommends and the footnotes and the many ways to find good reading about beer and similar stuff via any number of social media and other forms of comms connections.** Want to keep up with the news before next Thursday? Check out Boak and Bailey every Saturday and Stan back each Monday… with a top drawer effort this week. Elsewhere go look at then listen to Lew’s podcast. And get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by this year’s model citizen David Jesudason on the odd Fridays. And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s now revitalised and wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is back with all the sweary Mary he can think of! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass which is going back to being a blog in this weeks best medium as message news. Any more? Yes! Check to see the highly recommended Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good. And the BOAS podcast for the bro-ly. And the long standing Beervana podcast …except they have now stood down. Plus We Are Beer People. The Boys Are From Märzen podcast appears suspended as does BeerEdge, too. But not Ontario’s own A Quick Beer. There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. All About Beer has introduced a few podcasts… but some may be losing steam… until… Lew’s interview! And there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube. The Moon Under Water… is gone which is not surprising as the ask was $10 a month. Pete Brown’s costs a fifth of that but is writing for 47 readers over there. There was also the Beer O’clock Show but that was gone after a ten year run but returned renewed and here is the link! Errr… nope, it is gone again.

*A movement perhaps so spent that there’s only one move left – a Hall of Fame for the same approved names to give themselves a good old pat on the back! Will the nominating committee weigh each candidates downsides along with the PR pluses? Will “Sex for Sam” be to this HOF be what the steriod era is to another? If not, what is the committee doing? Something authentic perhaps.
**This week’s update on my own emotional rankings? Facebook still in first (given especially as it is focused on my 300 closest friends and family) then we have BlueSky (132) rising up to maybe… probably… likely pass Mastodon (930) in value… then the seemingly doomed trashy Twex (4,483) hovering somewhere well above my largely ignored Instagram (160), crap Threads (52) with Substack Notes (1) really dragging up the rear.

A Most Thoroughly August Edition Of Your Beery News Notes

What can you say about August that we each haven’t thought in our hearts of hearts? We are now well into the downside of the year, four months and three weeks and a bit until Christmas. It’s always struck me as odd that the first half of the year has seven months while the second only has five. August. Hmm. Plus it all gets a bit endtimesy around now. The garden gets weedy and a bit tired in the corners. We even got forest fire smoke from Pennsylvania this week, for God’s sake! Looks!! Good thing there’s all those fit folk at the Olympics in Paris, over there throwing themselves against the track, against the ball, against ocean waves and against each others fists to give us all at home cheering on the sofa an endorphin boost. Speaking of the Olympics, how’s the beer?

Anyone who was planning on heading over to Paris for the 2024 Olympics and expected to be having a boozy jaunt in a stadium is going to be sorely disappointed. Almost everyone who has got tickets to see bits of the 2024 Olympics will not be allowed to buy alcohol at the venues where the sporting competitions are taking place… if you must drink beer inside the venues then you’ll have to stick with the non-alcoholic stuff. For half a litre of non-alcoholic beer you’ll need to be spending €8 (£6.74), while if you want a 400ml drink of zero alcohol beer with some lemon juice in it that’ll cost €6 (£5.05).

Whhhaaaaat?!?!? Really? I’d be tempted to get me a robot but I suppose that makes sense in the keeping the eye on the ball sense for spectators but, more importantly, what is the point of cutting NA beer with juice? Don’t worry, however, as the rich in catered VIP zones will be able to drink… because… France… or the Olympics… or…

Same as it ever was? Things go around and around. Consider this piece from Jessica Mason in TDB on salting your beer:

According to the reports via Parade, the trendsetters claimed that “adding a bit of salt to your inexpensive brew will enhance the flavour” and described how “some people add salt to certain beers, like sours or IPAs, to enhance the fruity notes and reduce the bitterness” and suggested that “for those ‘cheaper’ beers, it’s supposed to make the brew taste a bit more highbrow”. The report emphasised how “Texans take beer salt so seriously” and said that drinkers were “likely to find lots of flavoured beer salt options when you want to crack open a cold one”.

Taverns when I was a lad in Halifax, Nova Scotia in the 1980s had shakers of salt on the tables. It was an old guy thing even back then, used by the hard cases in the back corners, but soon a little rattle of the shaker was a habit at the Seahorse or the Lower Deck when the unpasturized generic draft was a little off. Definitely done at the Midtown.

More information has been released on experimentation with the hotest new brewing grain in town, fonio. Interesting news even if this was a rather silly statement from Carlsberg director of brewing science and technology Zoran Gojkovic apparently (but I hope incorrectly) recalling a past discussion with Garrett Oliver:

“The internet says it is millet, but there are lots of millet grains and this one comes from Africa. But, back then, I misunderstood was what it really was all about. If someone tells you something is beef, but really it is like a variety, like wagyu steak, then it can be more easily understood. What I didn’t know was that fonio, compared to other kinds of millet, is like the wagyu steak of grains. Millet, as a cereal could be quite boring, but this in its pure formula is not boring. It is elegant.”

I’m more comfortable with it being the warp drive of millets – but only because that is obviously even more silly. Or is it the warp drives of wagyu? Or the wagyu of warp? That’s the fonio beer name I want to see: Wagyu of Warp!

And, speaking of silly, we have yet another study that resulted from the study of studies that studied booze and, again, it has been determined that there has been a lack of studiouness about that J-Curve fibbery:

…a new analysis challenges the thinking and blames the rosy message on flawed research that compares drinkers with people who are sick and sober. Scientists in Canada delved into 107 published studies on people’s drinking habits and how long they lived. In most cases, they found that drinkers were compared with people who abstained or consumed very little alcohol, without taking into account that some had cut down or quit through ill health. The finding means that amid the abstainers and occasional drinkers are a significant number of sick people, bringing the group’s average health down, and making light to moderate drinkers look better off in comparison.

I mentioned how dodgy the concept was at least as far back in 2018 but this newer focus on the problem of including “people who had stopped or cut down their drinking for health reasons in the comparison group” is critical. Note: not drinking because you are sick is different that being sick due to not drinking.

Note too: “golloping beer with zest” was a thing. Gary explains.

In Pellicle, David Jesuason wrote about one of the the tougher aspects, the mental health implications, that can go along with setting out to run a small brewery. This is how he set the scene at McColl’s Brewery of Evenwood, County Durham before help arrived:

“I came here thinking all I have to do is 150 casks a week and it didn’t happen,” Danny says. “Because I did it [before] I thought I was capable of doing it and not even knowing it was the wrong [thing to do] as well.” Danny’s mental health suffered because there was no long-term strategy, just day-to-day drudgery. Graft instead of focus. “I couldn’t make good decisions,” he tells me. He was running the entire operation by himself: brewing, selling and even delivering the beer to customers. It was far too much to take on, his mental health suffered and Gemma, his wife, became worried about him having suffered from depression herself.

That piece reminded me of the life of a farmer, alone with their business subject to the whims of nature and the trade. Should brewing trade associations provide mental health support programs similar to those being set up for agriculture?

Also on the ag beat, Stan has given us something to chew on with his July 2024 edition of Hop Queries, Vol. 8, No. 3 for those who are trying to collect a full set. He mentions that harvest time has begun, triggering images of golden light on hedgerow graced horse plowed scenes, perhaps mixing with Beethoven’s 6th wafting quietly in from somewhere… then – WHAMMO – the invasion of the lab-coated eggheads begins:

Scientists at Sapporo in Japan used headband sensors to measure the brainwaves of participants… The subjects reported feeling relaxed by the aromas of linalool and geraniol because they provided floral and green impressions… An increasing tendency in the rhythm regularities of the frequency fluctuations of the right frontal alpha-waves while drinking a European pilsner-type beer with aromas characterized by hops.

HEADBAND SENSORS!!! And, for the double, Stan pointed to this number crunching post from Phil Cook on Monday but (even though I may risk breaking an unwritten weekly updating rule) I want to unpack this point in more detail – one key difference between Australian and other beer judging events:

Because there’s a list of every beer entered, not just those that win medals, we can calculate some ‘batting averages’ to better compare how each brewery fared. So, I’ve worked out each entrant’s medal percentage (MPC: how many of their beers won a medal, of any kind) and their points per entry (PPE: adding 3 for gold, 2 for silver, 1 for bronze, then dividing by number of entries submitted). Bigger numbers are better in both cases; overall about 74% of beers entered earned a medal,² and if your PPE was 1.00 or higher your brewery was in the top half of the competition.

This would be a huge step towards making the results of these events more meaningful that those of the moveable buffet of the international circle of they who judge. Being able to figure out brewery top rankings as well as those surprising disappointments would be a great benefit to consumers. But who in beer puts the buyer first?

Perhaps connected, Jeff shared his thoughts on the financial perils of being a freelancer writing about the brewing trade without separate income:

Writing is a terrible way to make a living. It’s why people end up going into marketing. You could spend your days scrambling after $600 articles, or you could get a job for $60k with benefits. This is why we bleed great writers, who take their services to companies who will pay what their work is worth. It’s not just that the money’s bad—it’s also hard to get. If you could somehow stack up your articles and get a couple in every week, you could make a decent living, maybe fifty, sixty grand a year before taxes… Trying to pitch stories, and then research, report, and write a hundred of them in a year? I’m not saying it’s impossible, but again, you’d be barely making more than working at McDonald’s if you somehow enjoyed that level of “success,” which perhaps 2-3% of working freelancers enjoy.

The best line was near the end: “If you have any other choice, don’t write.” What he means (of course… or rather I hope!) is don’t write for money but this isn’t news.* Still… write. Writing a free, joyful and easy experience of expression. Scribble, jot, draft, forget and rediscover – and, yes, even submit. Just don’t think you’re going to be buying the kiddies shoes with the income.

Joyful, too, is Dave “Still No Relation” Bailey’s cartooning, also in Pellicle, which this month explored the notion of perfection. And if you want an example of writing for joy, ATJ has been working on one particular theme quite a bit over at his Substack, that being ATJ sitting in a pub and looking at the details of the scene around him. Second or third time I read one of his I thought “hmm…now, that sounds familiar” BUT as this week’s edition testifies its his process being worked out before our eyes:

My eye was caught by a faded photo of the pub, sometime before World War I. Outside it, there stood a line of long dead regulars, mainly men, standing still, a couple smiling, the rest sombre and holding themselves stiffly as if on parade, which several years later many of them would be, ready to march off to war. A long ago day, the sun shining maybe, though given the quality of the photo it was hard to say. Bowler hats, cloth caps, none of them bareheaded for that was not how they presented themselves to the world then. I’d like to think that once the photographer finished, off the men went into the pub, glasses of ale and cider purchased and amid the hubbub there would have been little time for reflection.

Sharp stuff. And it sure beats the sort of cash-focused writing that has recently given us such gems as “deepest echelons of the industry” and “with demand being high, the category has continued to thrive, despite the sector struggling” and the astoundingly poorly thought out alleged expression of expertise “Liquids within the same ‘competitive set’ are not distinctive from one another as liquids.” Bring on the robots of A.I.! Viva Robots!!

No, I didn’t mean that. There are no robots of joy. It’s actually all around us already now if you look for joy. We see it in a long wandering piece about wandering at length. And we also see it at home as when Rachel Hendry in her emailed newsletter J’Adore Le Plonk shared some thoughts on the role and value of the leftover bottle of wine there in the kitchen that was opened a few days ago… and may have lost whatever finesse it had:

Service work should neither be seen nor paid, tends to be the general consensus and when my wine joins me in a position of domestic work I attach the same framework to it. Why add this beautiful, evocative glass of wine to my dish when I can reach for something leftover, or looked down on, fuck it, why not just add water instead? The recipe provides a role for a wine that is past its best, that may otherwise be retired down the drain and into the bin. It doesn’t, however, mean the wine isn’t important. Wine has many roles in our lives and contributor in the kitchen can be one of them. As I work through my hesitation and add a splash of my wine to the courgettes slowly melting into butter I notice I have not lost anything in the process. The wine is still mine to enjoy, I have placed value on an ingredient as I would like to be valued myself and the meal tastes better for it.

And I should have mentioned that Katie wrote a few weeks ago about trying Italian wines with any sorts of unexpected flavours to see what works for you. My tip? Chianti with roast turkey. It can have a swell cranberry vibe going on. Try a turkey and blue cheese sandwich with slices of pear and a cold glass of Chianti. Could sound weird but it works. Not this weird, mind you, but there that gets a lot going on.

That is it. Enough! Here are the credits, the stats the recommends and the footnotes and the many ways to find good reading about beer and similar stuff via any number of social media and other forms of comms connections.**** Want to keep up with the news before next Thursday? Check out Boak and Bailey every Saturday and Stan back each Monday… with a top drawer effort this week. Elsewhere go look at then listen to Lew’s podcast. And get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by this year’s model citizen David Jesudason on the odd Fridays. And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s now revitalised and wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is back with all the sweary Mary he can think of! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass which is going back to being a blog in this weeks best medium as message news. Any more? Yes! Check to see the highly recommended Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good. And the BOAS podcast for the bro-ly. And the long standing Beervana podcast …except they have now stood down. Plus We Are Beer People. The Boys Are From Märzen podcast appears suspended as does BeerEdge, too. But not Ontario’s own A Quick Beer. There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. All About Beer has introduced a few podcasts… but some may be losing steam… until… Lew’s interview! And there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube. The Moon Under Water… is gone which is not surprising as the ask was $10 a month. Pete Brown’s costs a fifth of that but is writing for 47 readers over there. There was also the Beer O’clock Show but that was gone after a ten year run but returned renewed and here is the link! Errr… nope, it is gone again.

*My full sympathies (though I might have used the phrase “good writers” to convey a sense of realism.) I wrote this in an email to Max, now eleven years ago: “It is tough. There is no money in beer writing so if that is all you have to go on… I have met with pro writers over beer and always find them bagged out and drained from the nights of PR work in pubs to keep the wolf from the door. I complained once somewhere about how craft brewers should be supporting good beer writers directly without expectation of return and this was met with howls – even from writers. Earn your way as a freelancer, said the freelancers. Suck it up and take the junkets, said those on the junkets.” Is that the macho forehead + wall thinking part of the freelancing problem?
**This week’s update on my own emotional rankings? Facebook still in first (given especially as it is focused on my 300 closest friends and family) then we have BlueSky (132) rising up to maybe… probably… likely pass Mastodon (930) in value… then the seemingly doomed trashy Twex (4,483) hovering somewhere well above my largely ignored Instagram (160), crap Threads (52) with Substack Notes (1) really dragging up the rear.

Fine… The Dog Days Of Summer Beery News Notes Have Begun

Is it me? It’s not you… is it? No, it’s beer. When beer sales peak, the news gets a bit sleepy or at least played out as expected. LCBO strike got settled. Beer in Canada is still expensive. Biden stepped aside. The French fascists were humilated… again. Sure, the back channel comments about the winding up of GBH continue to flow in – but nothing I would share to you lot. Some write for pay. Me, I write for gossip. I think Martin captured the zeitgeist of the week perfectly with this image above from his trip to take in the delights of the Church of St Mary Magdalene in Yarm.

Which leads to the question of the week, as posed by Stan on Monday when he responded to my comment last week that I think of him as my ever absent desk editor:

I am embarrassed, flattered, and a little surprised (perhaps skeptical) by the idea he does the sifting for me. The takeaway, to his credit, is a reminder of something all writers should remember: who the heck they think they are writing for.

Who or what do you write for? The reader? The commissioning editor? The next commissioning editor? The bills? The long dead relative who told you that you’d never amount to anything? I joke about things but I really have only been writing for myself for years. The beer trade is a benign sideshow that lets me explore ideas in an innocuous way. Ideas about life, business, quality, ethics… the whole shebang. It’s all right there. By the way, did you know a shebang was a rough hut of the Civil War era or a frontier settler? Me neither. One has to be careful about certain words.

Speaking of words, Jordan was out there recently wandering lonely as a cloud, not hunting out daffodils so much as dandelions to do some unpacking, dissecting and extractions to ‘splain a thing or two:

Dandelion has GLVs (hexenol), but that is to be expected since it has green leaves. It’s complex in that the different parts of the plant have their own properties. Harold McGee refers to the component smells as “light, fresh, and watery,” but we’re thinking about the entirety of the palate and not just the aroma. In terms of aroma, we have some of the same makeup as clover. Phenylethanol and benzaldehyde. There’s also Nerolidol, which is slightly woody and barky, which makes sense when you think of the rigidity of the stem. When the stem breaks, the dandelion’s defense method is to secrete latex, which is found mostly in the root system of the plant. The latex is not only bitter, but alkaloid, and polyphenolic. If you pick a dandelion to hold under someone’s chin, you’re going to get aroma from both the flower and the stem.

Yes, yes… outside of the Greater Toronto Area kids used buttercups to hold to a chins. But the point is made. There is science right there. Smelly tasty science. Yes, there. And there as well…. ‘s’tru’. Even if “…phenylethanol and benzaldehyde… There’s also Nerolidol… “ sounds like a particularly challenging point in a Gilbert and Sullivan libretto.

Before the doors close, GBH published an interesting story by Yolanda Evans on the practice of giving “libation” globally and also particularly in Black American culture:

“I think hip-hop just popularized [libations] in a way where we were given the language to talk about the celebrations of life that maybe we didn’t have before,” says Gates. “It’s not specific to a particular generation—hip-hop only happened 50 years ago, while we’ve been in this country for centuries,” she adds. In some ways, the genre transformed the ritual from a private and personal thing to an act so popular it eventually became removed from its roots—eventually, people everywhere, and especially in the African-American community, would pour one out for their homies without knowing they’re performing an old boozy ritual with roots that go back several thousands of years.

The piece expands much on the 2015 article in VinePair and, for me, it’s an interesting exploration a familiar thing because we Highland Scots do it, too. But it’s part of what my Reverend father would call the greater “heedrum hodrum” aka the pre-Christian rituals that hang on. But in that context it’s not so much about remembrance as thinning the ether between here and there, now and then. Want to have a moment with Grannie to share a thought? Pour a little of the good stuff on the ground.

Tasting note of the week: “…distressingly grey…”

Speaking of VinePair, David Jesudason wrote an interesting piece for that fine journal in which his powers are on full display. I love how he places himself in stories, rejecting that more formulaic approach that we suffer along with too often. Consider this passage:

He’s all for mixing Guinness when done well but prefers to use bottled Guinness over widget beer cans or draft kegs in pubs for logistic reasons, such as lower carbonation. “Bottled Guinness has a different bite, of course,” he adds. When I press-gang Gaurav Khanna, the publican at the desi pub Gladstone in south London, into mixing numerous Guinness with soft drinks, he at first struggles with wastage caused by the stout’s carbonation. After a few pints mixed with Irn-Bru and some Gonsters, though, he nailed it. (At the end of the session we had to negotiate hard over my tab because we lost count of the amount of Guinness that was “tasted,” drunk or discarded.)

But no mention of stout and port, 2012’s sensation. Why?

News out of the UK related to the affirmation of the new government’s intention to impliment its predecessor’s public venue protection standards in Martyn’s law. Sarah Neish in The Drinks Business shared the likely implications for pubs and other parts of the UK hospitality industry:

… premises are unlikely to be expected to undertake physical alterations or fork out for additional equipment… measures are expected to include: Evacuation – how to get people out of the building; Invacuation – how to bring people into the premises to keep them safe or how to move them to safe parts of the building; Lockdown – how to secure the premises against attackers, e.g. locking doors, closing shutters and using barriers to prevent access; and Communication – how to alert staff and customers, and move people away from danger. “Additionally staff will need to understand these measures sufficiently to carry them out if needed,” Grimsey tells db, which suggests there will need to be an element of staff training for front-of-house employees of Standard Tier venues.

Sensible stuff. These are different times. Speak of these times, Katie wrote an explanation of “underconsumption core” this week in her newsletter The Gulp, a concept which may explain my dedicate use of a dull manual rotary lawnmower:

Underconsumption core exists because even the most exuberant of haulfluencers are starting to feel the constrictions of what is basically a national money shortage. When Broccoli is £1.20 a head in Lidl (one pound twenty pence!! for broccoli!!), there are many other things that have to get cut from our monthly budgets. Nights out become more infrequent. Takeaways become frozen pizzas. Beer turns into slabs of whatever tinnies are on offer at Tesco. We do what we can to keep ourselves afloat when the weekly shop increases by more than 20% over a year.

Reality. It may be a variation on another thing – the return to basic beer. Don’t tell Forbes, by the way, which published a piece by one of the 198,349 beer columnists (no, not AI generated at all, no way) they seem to have on the payroll that offered this astounding statement:

Researchers highlighted the increasing popularity of craft beer and the emergence of more independent breweries, reflecting evolving consumer preferences, especially among younger consumers of legal drinking age in local markets. These breweries are often at the forefront of innovation, offering more flavors and styles that appeal particularly to millennials and Generation Z.

Right. Back on planet Earth, when someone not really at the core of a scene like the former style director of Esquire, Charlie Teasdale, takes the time to give craft beer a mocking kick it is starting to feel like the proper response is, what… pity?*

… like supporting a football team through a massive, slightly grubby commercial takeover, I stayed the course. I never wavered in my dedication to stupidly named pale ales and unorthodox beers. Even a jug of pseudo-craft – a beer brewed by a corporate outfit but marketed as a local endeavour – was better than, say, a Moretti or a Heineken. They were for drinkers, and I was a gourmand.

VinePair may well have gone next level… again, joining this latest pile-on according to Maggie Hennessy. And whereas Mr. Teasdale has moved back to popular lagers, Ms. H is touting something called “lifestyle” beer but mainly to beat the word “hipster” wtith a very big stick… over and over.** Strike me as all a bit of excessively early liminal labeling syndrome. Perhaps best to leave this phenomenon alone until it all settles down a bit and clarifies. By contrast, Courtney Iseman slides a more deftly phased zing in the larger context of her very comprehnensive survey of the use of rice by better brewers:

That industry maturation, and the decreased pressures of toxic fandom—no one’s boycotting your brewery anymore if you sell shares to a corporate overlord, nor if you put rice in your beer—has allowed craft brewers more freedom to find a place for the grain.

Toxic fandom! We are now a long way from the “beer community” fibbery. [Note: as stated in the story, it was the craft brewers were the ones who shit on rice but now it’s us beer buyers who were being toxic for taking up the brewers’s PR (touted by beer writers) as the great cause.] Ron don’t care. Ron is spending much of the month with family in South America. He is sending in posts from the field that look like he’s tied up the radio operator and highjacked a distant railway station deep inland, relying on only direct current and Morse Code to send out terse missives like this one entitled “Loving Santiago“:

The kids, too. We get to ride the metro everywhere. They drink beer, I drink pisco sour. We get to shiver together in the unheated pubs. It’s like being back in the 1970s. But in a good way. Montevideo tomorrow.

That’s the whole post? So unRon, Ron is being. Where the hell are the breakfast buffet photos, Ron?!?!?!

Speaking of a buffet, Rachel Hendry has studied the world of (call them what you will) thin bits of potato fried in oil and shared the extensive results in Pellicle this week. I particularly like the polite “don’t be an arsehole” notice to readers:

I have then chosen ten styles and flavours to explore within each section, with more precise pairings given as examples for each. I have defined crisps as a potato or potato adjacent snack that tends to be found behind the bar or in the crisp aisles of a shop, and I have defined beer styles as you might see indicated on the list displayed in a pub or taproom. There is only so much one woman can cover and I have forgiven myself for the detail and genres missed. I trust you to have the grace to forgive me, too.

And… when did PBR become hipster cool? I was interested for what I consider pre-hipster reasons in 2006. This 2014 HuffPost article traces the story… with graphs!

…something changed, and PBR was suddenly the hipster’s choice at bars and barbecues everywhere. Sales jumped by 20.3 percent in 2009 and continued to rise steadily over the next few years, according to Beer Marketer’s Insights. By 2013, Americans drank more than 90 million gallons of PBR, according to data from Euromonitor, which is nearly 200 percent more than they did in 2004.

“Rise Steadily” is one of those hints that the tipping point people can just remain seated.

Fine. That is it. And with that this and those other thats too … now we roll the credits… well, the credits, the stats the recommends and the footnotes and the many ways to find good reading about beer and similar stuff via any number of social media and other forms of comms connections.** Want to keep up with the news before next Thursday? Check out Boak and Bailey every Saturday and Stan on the job each and every Monday. Elsewhere go look at then listen to Lew’s podcast. And get your emailed issue of Episodes of my Pub Life by this year’s model citizen David Jesudason on the odd Fridays. And Phil Mellows is at the BritishBeerBreaks. Once a month, Will Hawkes issues his London Beer City newsletter and do sign up for Katie’s now revitalised and wonderful newsletter, The Gulp, too. Ben’s Beer and Badword is back with all the sweary Mary he can think of! And check out the Atlantic Canada Beer Blog‘s weekly roundup. There is new reading at The Glass which is going back to being a blog in this weeks best medium as message news. Any more? Yes! Check to see the highly recommended Beer Ladies Podcast. That’s quite good. And the BOAS podcast for the bro-ly soon celebrating a 10th anniversary… or really a 9 1/2th given the timeline . And the long standing Beervana podcast …except they have now stood down. Plus We Are Beer People. The Boys Are From Märzen podcast appears suspended as does BeerEdge, too. But not Ontario’s own A Quick Beer. There is more from DaftAboutCraft‘s podcast, too. All About Beer has introduced a few podcasts… but some may be losing steam… until… Lew’s interview! And there’s also The Perfect Pour. Plus follow the venerable Full Pint podcast. And the Craft Beer Channel on Youtube. The Moon Under Water… is gone which is not surprising as the ask was $10 a month. Pete Brown’s costs a fifth of that but is writing for 47 readers over there. There was also the Beer O’clock Show but that was gone after a ten year run but returned renewed and here is the link! Errr… nope, it is gone again.

*h/t The Tand.
**Stan gave sound advice (see what I did there?): “I think the relationship, if there is one, between hip and hipster has me confused. Were the bike messengers who drank PBR hip, hipsters, or something else? What PBR itself ever hip?“
***This week’s update on my own emotional rankings? Facebook still in first (given especially as it is focused on my 300 closest friends and family) then we have BlueSky (132) rising up to maybe… probably… pass Mastodon (932) in value… then the seemingly doomed trashy Twex (4,485) hovering somewhere well above my largely ignored Instagram (160), crap Threads (52) with Substack Notes (1) really dragging up the rear.