Intellectual Ferment of a Different Kind
For your shopping list
Accounting for My Tastes in Beer It’s axiomatic that we drink what we like. But what shapes our tastes? And how do we account for our tastes in beer? In the first part of these reflections, I considered taste on a general level before …
Beer before hops, Or, What Is Gruit? Gruit conjures up images of medieval goblets and mysterious mixtures of herbs and spice. Gruit is also a reminder that the ale Europeans drank right up to the dawn of the early modern era was worlds …
~Or, what do Melville’s white whale, a cathedral in Prague, and Weihenstephan’s Vitus have in common?~ I’ve been drinking Weihenstephan’s lush and expansive Vitus for years now, especially when the weather turns cool. I can’t get enough of that subtly spiced honey and …
Bruges is Brussels’ alter ego. Swans floating languidly on canals, quiet cobblestone lanes, and magnificent Flemish architecture add up to a far cry from the gritty bustle of Brussels. But in things beer, the two cities are equals. Bruges boasts a few breweries and …
For those who just want to get things over with and sign up for my Beerscapes Newsletter, here’s a link that’ll take you to the subscription form. For those who want to know what’s in store, read on! It’s been awhile since I …
Kölsch is part of the very fabric of Cologne, an element of the city’s cultural heritage as important as Carnival. Kölsch is a relatively young style, and it wasn’t until after WWII that Kölsch cemented its status as the premier beer in the city. …
~Beers, breweries, and beer gardens in Bad Tölz, Tegernsee, Kloster Reutberg, and Benediktbeuern~ Munich has it all for the beer drinker. And if that’s not enough, breweries like Ayinger, Kloster Andechs, and Weihenstephan fan out at various points along Munich’s regional train network. …
Kloster Andechs occupies a central place in the pantheon of German brewing. Founded by Benedictine monks in 1455, Kloster Andechs has been offering hospitality to weary pilgrims ever since. Now run by the Benedictine Abbey of St. Boniface in Munich, Kloster Andechs is the largest …
“I’m heading off on the Fünf Seidla Steig beer hike next weekend,” I said to a friend back home last spring. “A beer hike?” he asked rather incredulously. “There’s such a thing?” Indeed, there is. And it’s a wildly popular pastime in the Alpine …
Weissenohe at the Gateway to Franconian Switzerland It’s a gloomy afternoon in late spring made slightly brighter by the cheerful yellow canola in full bloom and the several shades of green fields spread over the hills like a patchwork quilt. The bus from Forchheim …