While the style of this week’s beer arguably originated some 3,000 years ago during the Iron Age in northern Bavaria, Germany, Rogue Farms Dirtoir Black Lager is a variation on a variation, making it a very modern interpretation of a classic German schwarzbier (“black beer”). Rogue’s history started in 1988 with a brewery and 60-seat […]
Tokyo has many great beer bars, but one that keeps drawing me back is DevilCraft. DevilCraft is the brainchild of three American beer lovers, John Chambers, Jason Koehler and Mike Grant. They opened the first location in Kanda in 2011, and followed it up with a roomier one in Hamamatsucho a couple of years later. […]
This week’s beer is Val-Dieu Brune, a Belgian dubbel from the Brasserie de l’Abbaye du Val-Dieu located in the town of Aubel in Liege Province, Belgium. The abbey was founded in 1216, and brewing began not long thereafter. While the abbey church was destroyed and rebuilt four times over the course of several hundred years, […]
One thing that I think draws people to brewing, both as a hobby and a career is the chance to express your creativity. Last year I started off the spring brewing season with a mocha milk stout. I am a hop-lover at heart, but I think that brewing a wide variety of styles is fun. […]
This week’s beer is particularly exciting, as it is the result of a collaboration between two of my favorite breweries—BrewDog and Weihenstephaner. The beer is BrewDog’s India Pale Weizen, a fusion of a hoppy pale ale and a spicy, fruity wheat ale. Judging from its specs, it looks as though the wheat side will only […]
I was concerned. Walking down the dark street with looming office blocks and shuttered shops, it did not seem like a likely place for a beer bar. The maps said it was just ahead, but maps can deceive. It was a holiday Sunday night in Osaka, and I was hunting for one of Minoh Beer’s […]
A couple of shady mobsters form the stylish design of this week’s beer, Speakeasy Ales and Lagers’ Big Daddy IPA. With an ABV of 6.5% and 60 IBUs, this India pale ale promises to be a hefty hop showcase. Founded in 1997 and stationed in San Francisco, Speakeasy Ales and Lagers offers a lineup of prohibition […]
Last year Americans bought more craft beer than they did Budweiser. In the 1970s there were only forty-four breweries in the United States, but now there are over three thousand. The market for “macro” lager is on the decline and the companies that make it are looking at craft beer as a way to turn […]
