No matter how dearly you love beer, or how far you’ll willing to travel for an obscure brew, there are some beers you cannot have. Unless, that is, you’re willing to serve your country.
The children are nestled all snug in their bed,
Santa’s outside, he’s full of dread.
The old elf’s been working hard all night,
Inside awaiting, it’s the same old blight.
Milk and cookies, usually they’re stale.
Won’t someone leave him a righteous pale ale?
Listen kids, contrary to the tales Mom and Dad told you, Father Christmas did not get that round belly and red nose from sucking down glasses of skim. Not to destroy your innocent visions of sugar plums and candy canes, but when it comes to treats on a long winter’s night, if it’s all the same to you, Santa Claus would rather have a beer.
Aristotle observed, in his classic work Metaphysics, that “the whole is more than the sum of its parts.” He may not have been talking about beer when he said that, but then again, he was on to something. Over the past decade or so, there’s a trend that’s been slowly building as craft brewers are increasingly making metaphysically delicious beers, in pairs or in groups, with the results often tastier than the sum of their part-iers’ efforts alone.
Back in the 1990s, I was hanging out with my brothers-in-law in Richmond. Richmond is a great place for a history buff like me, and it’s got a neat aspect for the beer-lover, too: Richmond is a common test market for new beer ideas.
Which is how we came to be passing around a bottle of Miller Clear, a colorless 5% ABV beer that was on trial there that summer. We decided we had to try it.
When most people today think about New Zealand, beer is probably not the number one image conjured up. Instead, the Lord of the Rings film trilogy probably springs first to mind, and they did wonderfully showcase the island nation’s wide and varied landscapes and unique native flora and fauna. In the years following the release of the Tolkien films (2001-3), New Zealand tourism more than doubled, and it shows no signs of slowing down. More people visiting also means more demand for local beer, which in turn can only help New Zealand’s craft beer renaissance.
Americans who are told that Fosters is “Australian for beer” may scratch their heads with confusion when they land on our shores expecting to be greeted with barbequed shrimp and “Australia’s beer.” They would be hard-pressed to find the blue, white and gold label during their visit Downunder and they definitely won’t find the famous oil cans.
Fri Sep 23rd, 2011
Some Great Festival News
This year’s World Beer Festival – Durham has a few surprises for Triangle beer lovers. To begin with, we’re making some changes for the North Carolina breweries. We’ve set up...
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