The Friar drummed up another post for Hopfen und Malz, so here it is:
Less than a week ago, several members of my beer club bottled our first two batches of homebrew. I am well aware that when we taste it next month, the results may be less than spectacular. In fact, given the cost of ingredients (around $110) and the many, many hours of labor that went into it, I am quite sure that it would have been both more economical and better tasting to just go and buy four cases quality craft beer. But as I …read more

It’s been a rough ride for Colorado thus far in the World Series, so I thought I’d give them another chance by comparing the strength of beers from Colorado with those of Massachusetts (much of which, let’s face it, is a suburb of Boston anyway). Now, both states have a lot of good brewpubs, but for those of us sitting elsewhere, that’s not very useful right now, is it? So, here goes.
Looking at the Colorado brewer’s guild list of breweries, I see a few that I recognize and two that I’ve quite enjoyed. One is Left Hand, which I’ve already …read more

As you may have guessed, I like beer. In fact, I like beer so much that our wedding reception was at the Stoudt’s brewery, and the guests threw hops as we left the church.
Now, UK beer aficionados have what sounds like an even better option. Shepherd Neame, one of the oldest breweries in the UK, now hosts weddings. I’m actually quite surprised that the oldest brewery in the UK only predates Yuengling by a mere 130 years, but the place looks quite nice from the pictures. My wife, the Anglophile in the family, tells me it’s in a nice …read more

I’ve tried a lot of different beers from a lot of different places, and sometimes it’s easy to get lazy. You order the tried and true, rather than trying something different, and at some point you begin to get a little bored. Thank goodness, then, for those breweries which brew a product which shakes up the old taste buds a bit and gives you a reason to remember why you like beer in the first place.I reported on one of these a little while ago, when I bought a case of Dogfish Head’s 60 Minute IPA on a whim. This …read more