Tales of ales from the heart of Ohio to the ends of the Earth
In my travels around Japan I was impressed with the overall quality of the beer I found. However, the density of small breweries is nowhere near what you would find in the US and many other western countries. It’s hard to get an exact figure but the number of beer breweries in Japan is on... Continue Reading →
Japan’s ancient capital, Kyoto, is rightfully on the itinerary of most foreigners who visit Japan. The city is steeped in history, religion, and traditional Japanese culture. It was the spiritual and sometimes political center of Japan from the 8th century, when Emperor Kammu moved the capital from Nara to Kyoto, until the 19th century when... Continue Reading →
With a population of 2.8 million, Osaka is Japan’s third largest city, behind Tokyo and Yokohama. A visit to Osaka affords you the opportunity to drink craft beer in a former public bath/onsen (Kamigata Beer), in a skyscraper 31 floors above ground level (Craft Beer House Molto!!), on a tugboat (Beer Stand Marca), and myriad... Continue Reading →
I’m currently in the middle of a 3 month stay in Japan. It’s an incredible opportunity, so I’ve doing my best to explore all that Japan has to offer. Naturally that includes checking out local breweries and other beery spots of interest when the opportunity presents itself. In my last post I made some general... Continue Reading →
If I asked you to describe Japanese beer what would your response be? Many people would mention something about crisp, dry lagers, as exemplified by beers like Asahi Super Dry. You wouldn’t be wrong, Asahi Super Dry is the most popular beer in Japan. It relies on the additions of rice and corn and a... Continue Reading →
In the last post we explored Strasbourg and the local beer style, Alsatian pilsner. Think of that as an appetizer, an opening act if you will, because our next destination is Bavaria, the land of lagers. Our first stop is Bamberg, a city in Upper Franconia best known for its smoky Rauchbier, but as I... Continue Reading →
In a recent issue of Zymurgy Magazine (May/June 2025) there was a 9-page article about the past and present of pilsners made in Alsace. The timing was fortuitous as I was about to leave for a conference in Strasbourg, the capital of Alsace. What follows are my notes on beer culture in Alsace and the... Continue Reading →
I’ve traveled the world looking for good beer and interesting places. I’ve written about locales from Bend to Boston, from Burlington to Santa Barbara, and many points in between. I’ve journeyed to faraway places exploring the origins of beer styles such as gose (Liepzig), sahti (Helsinki), Berliner Weisse (Berlin), and pilsner (Pilsen). My travels have... Continue Reading →
In the 21st century a wealth of brewing tips, techniques, and recipes are accessible to anyone with access to the internet. Bohemian pilsner malts, New Zealand hops, Belgian yeast strains are available to brewers from Texas to Tokyo. Water chemistry can be bent to the brewers will. Geographic differences in beer styles that were once... Continue Reading →
Corvallis, Oregon is one of America’s quintessential college towns. It’s bounded by the Willamette River to the east and the highest peak in the Coastal Mountain range to the west. The Pacific Coast, the Cascade Mountains and Portland are all within two hours driving distance. It has the kind of natural beauty and geographic diversity... Continue Reading →
A few weeks ago work took me to Colorado and Wyoming for the better part of my spring break. What follows are some notes from a Sunday exploration of the Mile High City, plus a few quick peaks at breweries further north on the Front Range. This is the third time I’ve written about Denver,... Continue Reading →
About two weeks ago I wrote a post highlighting my favorite British breweries with the promise to follow up with similar posts from my forays into mainland Europe. In today's post we move across the English Channel to the Low Countries. Last April I spent 10 days with my wife and daughter visiting Belgium, The Netherlands... Continue Reading →
At this time of year it’s customary to publish best of lists. In past years I have published a list of my favorite Central Ohio beers, but this year I’m going in a different direction. As many of you know I recently returned from an 11-month sabbatical in Northeast England. Many people have asked me... Continue Reading →
In a recent post I recapped my visit to Vermont’s most celebrated breweries—Hill Farmstead and The Alchemist. It was a popular post, due in no small part to the current craze for hazy IPAs, but there’s more to the Vermont beer scene than aromatic hop oils and colloidal suspensions of polyphenols and yeast. In this... Continue Reading →
I’ve spent a considerable chunk of my spare time over the past year exploring the roots of historical beer styles ranging from pilsners to Flander’s Reds to Scottish Ales, On returning to the US what better way to reintroduce my palate to home grown brewing than a trip to Vermont, a state that can take... Continue Reading →
When you strip it back to the basics brewing beer is a pretty simple process. You need some malted grains, preferably barley, some water, and a way to heat the water. The quality and efficiency goes up significantly if you can measure and control the temperature, but there are workarounds like decoction mashing if you... Continue Reading →
It’s a Friday afternoon in early April, two days into my Belgian beer holiday. As I write this I’m sitting in the modern tasting room of Brouwerij Drie Fonteinen, savoring a 2012 vintage bottle of oud geuze and a cheese board. Sunlight streams through the windows, it seems like the first completely sunny day in... Continue Reading →
I just returned from a short family vacation to Scotland. My traveling companions for the journey included my wife Laurinda, our daughter Iris and two of her friends from Columbus, and my buddy Ralph Wolfe, who also doubles as father of one of the aforementioned friends. On a trip where half of the party are... Continue Reading →
Welcome to the third installment of my Belgian beer adventure. Those who have been following along at home may remember that part two ended on a Monday afternoon at Brasserie Dupont in the tiny village of Tourpes. After leaving Dupont we crossed back into Flanders and made our way to the beautiful city of Ghent,... Continue Reading →
Belgium is formally divided into three regions, Dutch speaking Flanders in the north, French speaking Wallonia in the south, and bilingual Brussels lying roughly in the middle. Setting the capital territory aside, the other two regions are separated by more than just language. Each has its own parliament, political parties, religious preferences, and of course... Continue Reading →
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