Tag: Wine

Alsace is France’s brewing powerhouse: Around 60 percent of the beer drunk in the country is brewed here, and the vast majority of its hops are grown here, too. Now the region is enjoying a revival.

At Brick and Barrel, the Cleveland neighborhood taproom that launched in 2014, Karl Spiesman applies his wine-making background to classically inspired European ales executed with a creative American sensibility.

Grape must—either a canned concentrate or direct from a local vintner—mingles with Belgian yeasts to create a magical Saison with little extra effort.

Brouwerij Rodenbach brewmaster Rudi Ghequire talks about the beverages that inspired a new beer designed to be paired with food: a Flanders Red aged for an additional six months on cherries, raspberries and cranberries.

There’s a growing wine-beer movement across the country, from the coasts of Oregon to Midwestern prairies and even Texas hill country. Brewhouses stacked high with barrels are increasingly looking and acting like wineries.

Figueroa Mountain’s CEO and founder, Jaime Dietenhofer, knew out of high school that he wanted to start a brewery. But his parents and eventual co-founders, Jim and Judie, said, “Go to college.”

Here’s something homebrewers can do that the pros typically can’t: fortify. Winemakers have categories of “fortified wines,” like Port, where the addition of a spirit stops fermentation short.

The proliferation of new beer names is hitting a point of absurdity. But there’s a simple solution to the trademark problem, one that would also help consumers: Just use a style name.

An effervescent drink inspired by a dish at The Catbird Seat in Nashville that needed a pairing: a raw abalone course that involved sour beer as part of the sauce.

Beer didn’t always take a back seat to wine. In the 19th century, British brewers were powerful people. The ales that made us famous, such as Porter, Strong Stout and India Pale Ale, ruled export markets every bit as much as Britannia ruled the waves.

Cultism is giving beer a bad name and is driving a wedge between brewers, beer lovers and a certain class of scarcity-seeking tickers.

The Beer Geek defends his methods on storing an already opened beer.

There are still unknown beers and craft breweries out there that are slowly emerging to find a following in America. Take the new craft beers being produced in a country not typically thought of when it comes to beer: Italy.

Resveratrol, a chemical found in red wine, has been proven to reduce heart disease and curb some cancers in lab animals, which makes red wine the darling of healthy-minded drinkers. But a group of students at Rice University might be knocking red wine off its lofty pedestal.

The progression of the American beer industry from its Animal House days shouldn’t have to result in Frasier-like airs.

Don’t compromise taste; light means light; residual sugar in beer and wine; and laughably basic question answered vs. laughed at.

Ten years ago, Vinnie Cilurzo and his wife, Natalie, brought aggressively hopped beer to the heart of California’s wine country. Since then, they’ve taken Russian River Brewing Company independent, won an unimaginable number of awards and launched a revolutionary line of barrel-aged sour Belgians.

Beer is expropriating one of wine’s most sacred rituals—the high art of methode Champenoise—and coming up with a whole new beer style: Bière de Champagne.