Tales of ales from the heart of Ohio to the ends of the Earth
The Lambic brewers have been conditioning their complex sours on fruits for a very long time, using cherries (kriek) and raspberries (framboise) to accentuate the fruity esters created during the complex mixed fermentation process. In this episode, recorded remotely last summer during quarantine, Dan Reeve joins us for a closer look at these complex, elegant... 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 →
In yet another episode without a proper guest Mark, Hans, and Pat take a deep dive into the world of Trappist Tripels and Belgian Golden Strongs. They start with the progenitors of the two closely related styles, Westmalle Tripel and Duvel. Having paid homage to these trailblazing examples, they look at the way Italians treat... 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 →
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 →
Last month I completed a week long, beer-centric trip around Belgium. What an amazing trip and not just because of the beer. For a country with the second highest population density in Europe, it has a surprising amount of green space. We encountered vistas as diverse as the wooded hills of the Ardennes, the verdant... Continue Reading →
After spending a few enjoyable days in Amsterdam, today I leave the land of tulips and windmills, Rembrandt and van Gogh, Heineken and Grolsch. My destination, Belgium, has long been at the top of my list of dream travel destinations. The anticipation is palpable, and for good reason. In Belgium brewing is elevated to an... Continue Reading →
Most craft breweries are small businesses in the truest sense of the word, and the people who launch them are often forced to be creative when it comes to siting their breweries. In Ohio alone, I’ve visited breweries housed in old car washes (Lineage) and auto parts stores (JAFB), in pole barns (Little Fish) and... Continue Reading →
One of the perks of being an academic is the occasional opportunity to travel to faraway places. If you’ve been reading this blog for long enough you’ll know that I try to take advantage of these opportunities when I can. I’ve got a responsibility to my readers after all. Earlier posts described my efforts to... Continue Reading →
Last night Land Grant Brewing held their first session of what they call Land Grant University, a series of educational sessions on the key ingredients in beer. The inaugural session was devoted to yeast, future sessions will focus on hops, malts and water. Attendance was capped at 50 participants and there was a full house... Continue Reading →
Relatively speaking the United States is a newcomer to the worldwide brewing scene. Prohibition was a major blow to the brewing industry in this country, and in the decades that followed mergers and acquisitions consolidated the brewing capacity of our nation. By the 1970s all that was left was a handful of industrialized megabreweries intent... Continue Reading →
Delaware, Ohio (pop ~35,000) is a charming little city located about 30 miles northwest of Columbus. History buffs know Delaware as the birthplace of Rutherford B. Hayes, 19th President of the United States, and people who follow harness racing (I’m told such people do exist) know Delaware as the home of the Little Brown Jug.... Continue Reading →
Christmas is almost upon us and I've saved a special seasonal beer for my last beer review before the big day—Christmas Ale by St. Bernardus Brewery in Watou, Belgium. As beer geeks will know St. Bernardus brewed the beers of the Trappist monastery of St. Sixtus in Westvleteren from 1946 to 1992, using the recipes... Continue Reading →
I recently attended a conference at a small college in the middle of New Hampshire (Colby Sawyer College in New London). Looking to squeeze a little beer tourism into the trip I was faced with a difficult choice. On the one hand, I could head west into the wilds of Vermont and seek out the... Continue Reading →
Having spent a month of grueling research on Belgian and Belgian-style Quadrupel Ales this final post in the quadrophilia series is my attempt to summarize what I have learned. Over the past four weeks I’ve tried 15 different quads in three rounds of blind taste testing with my friends. I’ve gone back to many of... Continue Reading →
Even though the final round of quadrophilia wrapped up last week, once I got going I couldn’t control my urge to add more raisin soaked 11% abv beers to the list. There are after all only a finite number of quads out there, so by adding a few more one can start to approach a... Continue Reading →
This is the moment you’ve all been waiting for. We reveal the final results of Quadrophilia and award the title, “King of the Quads”. The video below gives you all of the information you need delivered in video form by three happy judges who have been drinking some of the best 10-11% abv beers in... Continue Reading →
After two preliminary rounds our quest to identify the best Quadrupel Ale in the world has reached the final stage. The final round will be presented in two parts: this post where we meet the finalists, and the follow up where the results are revealed. For the visual/audio learners out there I’ve captured a video... Continue Reading →
In Round 1 we compared four American brewed quads, with Three Philosophers coming out on top. In this round, we move across the pond to Belgium and the Netherlands where this style of beer originated. There are two Trappist beers (Rochefort 10 and La Trappe Quadrupel), one abbey ale brewed with the old... Continue Reading →
We start the contest off with quads brewed on this side of the pond. The truth is that it was not that easy to find beers to fill up this side of the bracket. Not too many American breweries make a quad. Firstly, to brew Belgian-style beers a brewery needs to develop the right strains... Continue Reading →
Pat's Pints 