How well is alcohol doing? Well, not great, but you knew that. Two new reports take a granular look at the nature of that “not great” and reveal some interesting findings.
Read More
Last week, a new nonprofit announced the inductees into the American Craft Beer Hall of Fame. They will be familiar to anyone who reads this site, and left me feeling ambivalent. In overlooking less-heralded names, the Hall missed the opportunity to reshape the narrative of American brewing.
Read More
Let’s say the cost of aluminum cans rises to the equivalent of five cents a pint. Does the brewer simply raise prices five cents a pint and pass this cost along? Brewer and onetime economist Van Havig has the answer.
Read More
In the event, the snow did come, and a bit early. By the time I was strolling back across still-deserted Burnside an hour later, the wind was whipping pinprick flakes in my face, and white whorls were forming on the asphalt. The snow had arrived, more or less on schedule, and the city held its breath.
Read More
A lot of news to kick off this February, including two very exciting reincarnations, some eye-popping figures on beer’s economic impact, and the announcement of new tariffs on aluminum and steel.
Read More
Herein lies one of the more interesting ironies of our times: there is a distinctive New England school of IPA. It is characterized by strength, sweetness, lack of bitterness, and high residual sugar. But maybe the haze is negotiable.
Read More
On Saturday, President Trump authorized 25% tariffs on our neighbors and close allies Mexico and Canada. This was just one move in a hurricane of activity that has destabilized the US economy and federal government.
Read More
Culmination Brewing, one of those little-breweries-that-could, finally couldn’t. A reminiscence, along with a consideration of Culmination’s place in Portland’s history.
Read More
The best thing about beer always relates to people, so of course that’s where our gaze settles in this revival of the blog-discussion group called “The Session.”
Read More
Last week the American Homebrewers Association announced it was becoming an independent nonprofit. In this post I explain how the AHA became part of the Brewers Association and why this change should lead to quick revitalization of an important hobby.
Read More
Guinness is treated as if it is one beer, not a brewery. Like Pacifico or Heineken, naming the company names the beer. Yet the beer we think of when we name the brewery doesn't date to 1759, but two hundred years later. Here's its story:
Read More
Tillamook’s de Garde Brewing is throwing a huge party with some amazing breweries (local, national, and international) for their 12th anniversary. Info on that, plus how you can score two free VIP tickets.
Read More!["Poland Brews the Best Baltic Porters, [but] We Don't Need to Call Them Polish Porters"](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5876279bbebafb82a7c81c00/1737040278243-FWWJ98RFW4TF6XE19P8M/IMG_4016.jpeg)
This Saturday is the annual Baltic Porter Day, a celebration that has spread from its roots in Poland all the way to Oregon, and Threshold Brewing will be hosting a fest for the style. Since it’s become a major beer in Poland, it seemed time to do a big ‘ol post about Baltic porters.
Read More
Most of those old “great” fires had burn areas measured in blocks. The Great Chicago Fire of 1871, the nation’s worst, burned a staggering 3.3 miles of the city. Los Angeles has already massively outpaced that figure, however, with around sixty square miles burned.
Read More
I’ve been an infrequent user of Midjourney, an AI image generator. Yesterday writer Eoghan Walsh kicked off a discussion about whether this is a good thing, and nearly everyone agreed it’s not. The discussion definitely shifted my own thinking.
Read More
An update 25% into Pub January, with an eye-opening range of activities breweries are offering.
Read More
Today we travel to a time where cars sail overhead and money has lost all meaning as we luxuriate in worlds of leisure. And beer? The year is 2050, and if you want to know what beer looks like, click on through.
Read More
Responding to a recent overproduction of hops, U.S. growers scaled back the acres they cultivated in 2024 in dramatic fashion. Here’s a summary of how that affected the states and individual varieties—with graphs and tables.
Read More
2024 was a year of mixed signals and confusing trends. In this year-end post, I review the major themes, positive, negative, and just weird. And then I finish with a flourish of almost certainly bad predictions!
Read More
In recent years, many people have decided, post-holidays, to spend the first month of the year on an alcohol hiatus. That’s not great for breweries—and honestly, holing up isn’t great for people, either. So this year, whether you’re drinking or not, try #PubJanuary instead.
Read More