Professor Good Ales

This year, on that mid-February weekend that’s been, well, illuminated for the past four years, I just could…not…do it.

I attend ONE beer festival, in the course of each year. One. Carefully selected, pushing all my buttons, done better than any other beer event – of any size and any type – that I ever attended, back when I was doing such things. And something which fills a cranky old hillbilly like me with almost agitated excitement and anticipation. And I had to say, “Pass“.

Want to read more? Please click…

HERE

A little background: Lemondrop is a new variety of hops, from the estimable Hopsteiner of Yakima, a lab that hybrids and propagates little miracles like this with the same casual brilliance that Mozart displayed in writing music. Of his musical gift, Wolfgang once said, “I write music as a sow piddles.”

Hopsteiner lights up ales “as a sow piddles”.

Lemondrop started its flamboyant little life as Hopsteiner Experimental Hop #01210. I first encountered it in a leading role in Deschutes’ unforgettable Chasin’ Freshies, back in late October of 2015, and as a supporting actor even earlier, in Stone’s groundbreaking “Delicious” IPA, in January of ’15. It’s a hybrid of the workhorse Cascade and USDA 19058 male…and what that latter hop may lack in poetry, it more than makes up in intense aromas and a very deliberate evocation of every atom of the hops world’s ability to express fresh, vivid lemons. This is very much a designed hop. It’s not at all accidental that this explosive bud makes your beer taste like LemonHeads candy and/or candied lemon rind. Lemon is one of those universally harmonious flavors that flatters and enhances almost anything combined with it. And that bright, fresh lemon character lit up both Chasin’ Freshies and Delicious in an unmistakably new way. Even craft beer newbies tasted those beers and detected something new and different.

Want to read more? Please click…

HERE

Michael Oxton’s father-in-law usually drinks Miller High Life, and doesn’t care much for craft beer. For most families this would be no big deal. Mr. Oxton, however, is a founder of Night Shift Brewing, a Boston-area company noted for its fragrant I.P.A.s and other big-flavored beers.

So last fall, when Mr. Oxton offered his father-in-law, Anthony DiPalma, a retired New York Police Department lieutenant, a taste of Night Shift’s newest product, Village Lager, expectations were scant.

Want to read more? Please click…

HERE

Last weekend, for the third year in a row, I was pleased to be a guest of honor at the ColoniALE Fest, a little beer festival fundraiser at the Colonial Club in Sun Prairie.

I can’t blame you for being skeptical of a beer fest at a senior center, but there’s a simple reason I’ve returned twice to speak and hobnob at ColoniALE: It’s a lot of fun. It’s well run, it’s a good, manageable size and it’s well stocked with brews to please novice to intermediate beer enthusiasts. The presence of the Sun Prairie Wort Hogs homebrewing club doesn’t hurt either.

Want to read more? Please click…  HERE

In Greek mythology, the Olympians were said to drink ambrosia, which bestowed upon them immortality. Occasionally, athletic heroes like Heracles were also gifted a sip. But the myths don’t say much about the golden-amber liquid getting them all drunk.

Today’s Olympians have been swept up in a new trend largely emerging from Bavaria: nonalcoholic athletic recovery beers. Over the past few years, a number of breweries, such as Erdinger and Krombacher, have expanded their offerings of sober sports beers. This year, beers from both brands are a common sight in the Olympic Village.

Want to read more? Please click…

HERE