Culture

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  Culture - Full Pints

  Alchemy in France

  French Micros Rediscover Regional Flavors May 1, 2001 - Jean Claude Colin

  Great beer in France? Long renowned for its fine cuisine and its wine industry, France is today recalling its past as a great brewing nation.

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  Culture - Sidebars

  Tasting Notes from the Distilleries

  January 1, 2001 - Rick Lyke

  Cascade Mountain Gin: A hint of Christmas trees in the nose, and a mild, spicy flavor that washes over your taste buds. This gin from Bendistillery in Oregon has a very clean flavor profile and the juniper berries get a chance to show off. Classick Bierschnapps: A flowery nose with just a very slight hint... View Article

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  Culture - Sidebars

  What Shape is Your Still?

  January 1, 2001 - Rick Lyke

  It takes heat–at least 173 degrees worth–and a still to produce distilled spirits. There are two basic styles of stills: the continuous still (also called a column still or Coffey still) and the pot still (an offshoot of which is the alambic, or alembic, still used for brandies). The continuous still technology is used by... View Article

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  Culture - Sidebars

  From Grain, Grapes, Fruits or Vegetables?

  January 1, 2001 - Rick Lyke

  Distillers have a number of choices when it comes to making spirits. All spirits start out as fermented beverages. By boiling the fermented liquid and passing the alcohol-ladened vapors through a coil, distillers use condensation to create the liquid spirit. But what you start with determines what you end up with. There are grains, with... View Article

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  Culture - Sidebars

  Beer on Steroids

  January 1, 2001 - Rick Lyke

  What happens when you distill beer? Well, whiskey starts out with the same basic raw ingredients as beer, so what happens when you take actual beer and distill it? The answer is an 80 proof beer schnapps. Dave Classick formed Essential Spirits of Mountain View, CA, with his wife, Andrea Mirenda, after a European vacation... View Article

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  Culture - Full Pints

  Small Stills, Big Spirits

  January 1, 2001 - Rick Lyke

  In late 1970s, if anyone had predicted that, by the turn of the century, American cities big and small would almost universally have at least one thriving hometown brewery–in some cases, multiple breweries―their friends might have wondered about their sobriety. Now, it seems, microbreweries can be found almost everywhere.

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  Culture - Sidebars

  So Different, so Italian

  January 1, 2001 - Lorenzo Dabove

  Among Italian craft brewers, two young men strike one’s imagination at first meeting: Agostino “the Bear,” and Teo, “the man who never sleeps.” Agostino Arioli was born in Milano in 1965. His father was a biologist and researcher. “I have been fond of beer since I was 15 years old. My dream was to become... View Article

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  Culture - Full Pints

  The Magic Moment in Italian Craft Brewing

  January 1, 2001 - Lorenzo Dabove

  Beer faces an uphill battle in Italy, where it has always been considered inferior to wine. The climate, culture and religious beliefs are all friendlier to grapes than to barley. As Catholics, we Italians believe wine to be the sacred beverage, blessed at the Last Supper, whereas beer is the symbol of the paganism of... View Article

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  Culture - Sidebars

  What is “real ale,” and why did it inspire a campaign?

  September 1, 2000 - Roger Protz

  Real ale was the term used by the Campaign for Real Ale in the early 1970s when it set out to rescue England’s great contribution to world beer. Brewers prefer to call it “cask-conditioned beer.” At the end of fermentation, beer is left to condition for a few days in the brewery and is then... View Article