Tag Archives: oregon beer news

Boak, Bailey, and Stan have been considering the nature of indigenous beers--what and whether they are, and how that is distinct from "local" beer.  I know Stan has been mulling a high-concept book related to this subject, so I hope the discussion will continue on for years.  In one way, it couldn't matter less--beer is beer and almos ...

Sometimes I skip posting information that I know exists elsewhere on the internet, as if the mere existence of information somewhere means people everywhere are consuming it.  You can find descriptions of Czech lagers from people far more versed on the subject than I--Evan Rail and Max Bahnson (the Pivní Filosof) are your English-la ...

This photo, captured on my camera, was actually taken by Max Bahnson--a better photographer than I.The golden lagers of the Czech Republic are at once the easiest and most elusive beers in the world.  They are easy because, unlike goses and gueuzes, they are imprinted on our brains as the most basic form of "beer."  Frothy, sparkling ...

I have had an incredibly full schedule on my blitz through Czech. (Hmmm, that may not be the best wording.)  There's too much to discuss briefly, so here are a few pics instead.  We spent a day in Prague before arriving in Plzen, site of a significant brewery.  At Pilsner Urquell, we got to see two of the seven staff coopers ...

No more than a couple weeks ago, I got an offer for perhaps the greatest junket imaginable.  Mark Dredge at Pencil and Spoon does work for Pilsner Urquell.  They thought it would be nice to have some writers come and check out the Saaz crop in nearby Zatec, and asked him to put together a list of folks.  When the invite came down ...

I have a sense that an emerging theme of blurring lines is going to play a major part of my blogging over the next few years.  It's the slow mutation of what we would have formerly called "craft" beer into something that looks a lot like mass market lager--if not in type, then certainly in branding approach.  The latest example is Aus ...

Shari Landers was a woman I would have loved to meet.  Here's a tiny bit of her story: She became the first woman pipefitter in Louisiana, as well as a welder, carpenter, pot farmer, crypt caretaker, small business owner, Kool Aid mom, longshore-woman, Bering Sea fisherwoman, a life long purveyor and connoisseur of the finest drugs, and a ...

Brew Britannia: The Strange Rebirth of British Beer Jessica Boak & Ray Bailey Aurum Press, 298 pages $20  Considering the long history of British brewing, most historians have focused on London or Burton and their respective great eras of brewing.  Few have turned their attention to the most recent forty ye ...

A couple weeks ago, Pete Brown posted a wonderfully nuanced piece about Budweiser--both of them--in London Loves Business.  He argued that the two Buds were about as well-made as any on the planet and that, while you may not enjoy the American Bud, you could not doubt its quality.  He's correct. As sensory experiences go, American Bud ...

It looks like it's been a week since I posted, and peering into my crystal ball reveals that the coming week is going to be just as bad.  It's not the usual doldrums of August, but rather a thicket of unexpected activity that has kept me off the site.  A week from now and things should start getting back to normal.  (I may--may-- ...