Move over, Merlot. Craft beer has finally found a place at the fine dining table. Renowned beer sommeliers Hallie Beaune and Christina Perozzi offer a down-to-earth guide to craft and artisanal brews that celebrates beer for what it truly is: sophisticated, complex, and flavorful. Beaune and Perozzi cover everything from beer basics to the science behind beer, food and beer pairings, home brewing, and tips for perfecting one s palate. This edgy, no-nonsense guide exposes hidden truths, debunks every misconception, and reveals the power that comes with knowing an ale from a lager."

    So You Want to Start a Brewery? is the thrilling first-person account of his gut-wrenching challenges and unexpected successes.Based in Petaluma, California, the Lagunitas Brewing Company makes craft beer that is simple and flavorful and defies categorization. The same could be said for this book. Equal parts memoir, narrative, and business story—with liberal dashes of pop culture and local color—this honest yet hilarious account of a one-of-a-kind, made-in-America journey just happens to culminate with the success of one of the nation’s most popular craft beer brands. In twenty years, Lagunitas has grown from a shoestring operation to be the fifth largest—and the fastest growing—craft brewer in the United States. First published in a limited edition two years ago by a tiny California press, So You Want to Start a Brewery? has here been revised and updated to include Lagunitas’s establishment of a new brewery in Chicago, set to open in 2014. So You Want to Start a Brewery? is unglamorous and full of entertaining digressions, but it’s never afraid to mess with the nuts and bolts. This is a must-read for all who have considered starting their own business—or have sweated blood working to get one on its feet. Told in the vibrant voice of Tony Magee—the man closest to the process—this blow-by-blow chronicle will introduce beer drinkers and entrepreneurs to the reality of starting a craft brewery from the ground up.

    All about beers

    Finally, a book that treats beer as seriously as wine! This latest volume in the acclaimed 1001 series supplies the connoisseurs' scoop on ferreting out the best among an ever-increasing array of available brews--from exotic foreign beers to the constantly evolving world of American microbrews and homebrews. The book focuses on the world of premium beers--from obscure labels to such traditional yet supremely local brands as Shiner (Austin, Texas), from Czech pilsners to German lagers, Belgian wheat beers, and Trappists ales, not to mention the classic British porters and Irish stouts--every type of beer is covered, making this the go-to volume for serious beer lovers. No mere catalogue or encyclopedia, the volume features critical tasting notes and subjective assessments that will help match the right beer to the right occasion. Is this beer light, crisp, and refreshing (good for a picnic), or dry, bitter, and appetizing? Each description includes notes on the flavor and body of the beer, explains why it tastes the way it does, and describes strength and ideal serving temperature.

    Are you overwhelmed by the selection of beers available at your local pub or favorite restaurant? Do you know the difference between a lager and an ale? Would you like to try brewing your own beer but are too afraid that you'd blow up the kitchen? Well, fear no more! "Beer For Dummies™ " is your prefect introduction to the world of beer, covering everything from microbrews to homebrewing -- with tips for how to match beer with food, how to pour and store beer properly, and how to enjoy your beer at its fullest! Inside, you'll find barrels of information on how to: Taste beer and evaluate its hops, malt, color, and clarity Decipher beer labels and read a beer menu like a pro Understand the "technical stuff" about beer and homebrewing techniques Recognize the characteristics of ales, lagers, and other beer styles Try beers from all over the world Pour, store, and drink beer from the right kinds of glassware Brew your own beer in the basement or kitchen Locate cool beer festivals, tastings, and events held around the world Join beer clubs or associations and subscribe to beer publications, online forums, and more

    Marnie Old and Sam Calagione divulge the secrets of their trades (sommelier and brewmaster, respectively) in this fully illustrated instruction book on how to successfully pair both beer and wine with a wide variety of foods.

    With expert advice on choosing and maintaining the best plants for your needs, Joe Fisher and Dennis Fisher show you how to turn a small patch of backyard, or even a few window boxes, into a renewable brewing supply store. Discover the satisfaction that comes from brewing tasty beers using fresh homegrown ingredients.

    Learn to use ingredients from your farmers’ market, grocery store, or even your own backyard to make deliciously fermented drinks. Lemon-Thyme Metheglin, Rose Hip Melomel, and Pineapple-Orange Delight are just the beginning of an unexplored world of delightfully natural wild wines. Cheers!

    Just what are jizake, namazake and ginjoshu? The Sake Handbook answers all these questions and much more about sake wine and will help you enjoy Japan's national beverage in style. Author John Gauntner is recognized as the world's leading non-Japanese sake expert. A longtime Japan resident, he is well known among sake brewers and others within the sake industry. He wrote the Nihonshu Column in the Japan Times for many years before writing a weekly column on sake in Japanese for the Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan's and the world's most widely distributed Japanese newspaper. In 2006, John received the Sake Samurai award. He has published five books on sake including Sake ConfidentialThis sake book features:This new edition has been completely revised and updatedGives you all the information you need in a handy, portable formatOffers a detailed explanation of the sake brewing processReviews over a hundred sake brands, with illustrations of their labels for easy identificationProfiles over 50 Japanese izakaya or pub-style restaurants in Tokyo and the surrounding environsLists specialty shops in Japan where you can purchase hard–to–find Japanese wine brandsLists specialty retailers in the United States and elsewhere

     Beer might seem as American as baseball, but that has not always been true: Rum and whiskey were the drinks of choice in the 1840s, with only a few breweries making heavy, yeasty English ale. When a wave of German immigrants arrived in the middle of the nineteenth century, they promptly set about re-creating the pleasures of the biergartens they had left behind. Just fifty years later, the American-style lager beer they invented was the nation’s most popular beverage—and brewing was the nation’s fifth-largest industry, ruled over by fabulously wealthy titans Frederick Pabst and Adolphus Busch. But when anti-German sentiments aroused by World War I fed the flames of the temperance movement (one activist even declared that “the worst of all our German enemies are Pabst, Schlitz, Blatz, and Miller”), Prohibition was the result. In the wake of its repeal, brewers replaced flavor with innovations like marketing and lite beer, setting the stage for a generation of microbrewers whose ambitions reshaped the drink. Grab a glass and settle in for the surprising story behind your favorite pint.

    America now has more breweries than at any time since prohibition, and globally, beer culture is thriving and constantly innovating. Drinkers can order beer brewed with local yeast or infused with moondust. However, beer drinkers are also faced with uneven quality and misinformation about flavors. And the industry itself is suffering from growing pains, beset by problems such as unequal access to taps, skewed pricing, and sexism. Drawing on history, economics, and interviews with industry insiders, John Holl provides a complete guide to beer today, allowing readers to think critically about the best beverage in the world. Full of entertaining anecdotes and surprising opinions, Drink Beer, Think Beer is a must-read for beer lovers, from casual enthusiasts to die-hard hop heads.

    Beyond the Pale chronicles Ken Grossman's journey from hobbyist homebrewer to owner of Sierra Nevada Brewing Co., one of the most successful craft breweries in the United States. From youthful adventures to pioneering craft brewer, Ken Grossman shares the trials and tribulations of building a brewery that produces more than 800,000 barrels of beer a year while maintaining its commitment to using the finest ingredients available. Since Grossman founded Sierra Nevada in 1980, part of a growing beer revolution in America, critics have proclaimed his beer to be among the best brewed anywhere in the world.Beyond the Pale describes Grossman's unique approach to making and distributing one of America's best-loved brands of beer, while focusing on people, the planet and the product Explores the Sierra Nevada way, as exemplified by founder Ken Grossman, which includes an emphasis on sustainability, nonconformity, following one's passion, and doing things the right way Details Grossman's start, home-brewing five-gallon batches of beer on his own, becoming a proficient home brewer, and later, building a small brewery in the town of Chico, California Beyond the Pale shows how with hard work, dedication, and focus, you can be successful following your dream.

    Following a tantalizing trail of archaeological, chemical, artistic, and textual clues, Patrick E. McGovern, the leading authority on ancient alcoholic beverages, brings us up to date on what we now know about how humans created and enjoyed fermented beverages across cultures. Along the way, he explores a provocative hypothesis about the integral role such libations have played in human evolution. We discover, for example, that the cereal staples of the modern world were probably domesticated for their potential in making quantities of alcoholic beverages. These include the delectable rice wines of China and Japan, the corn beers of the Americas, and the millet and sorghum drinks of Africa. Humans also learned how to make mead from honey and wine from exotic fruits of all kinds-even from the sweet pulp of the cacao (chocolate) fruit in the New World. The perfect drink, it turns out-whether it be mind-altering, medicinal, a religious symbol, a social lubricant, or artistic inspiration-has not only been a profound force in history, but may be fundamental to the human condition itself.

    In fact, the origins of brewing involve a whole galaxy of wild and cultivated plants, fruits, berries, and other natural materials, which were once used to make a whole spectrum of creative, fermented drinks.Now fermentation fans and home brewers can rediscover these “primitive” drinks and their unique flavors in The Wildcrafting Brewer. Wild-plant expert and forager Pascal Baudar’s first book, The New Wildcrafted Cuisine, opened up a whole new world of possibilities for readers wishing to explore and capture the flavors of their local terroir. The Wildcrafting Brewer does the same for fermented drinks. Baudar reveals both the underlying philosophy and the practical techniques for making your own delicious concoctions, from simple wild sodas, to non-grape-based “country wines,” to primitive herbal beers, meads, and traditional ethnic ferments like tiswin and kvass.The book opens with a retrospective of plant-based brewing and ancient beers. The author then goes on to describe both hot and cold brewing methods and provides lots of interesting recipes; mugwort beer, horehound beer, and manzanita cider are just a few of the many drinks represented. Baudar is quick to point out that these recipes serve mainly as a touchstone for readers, who can then use the information and techniques he provides to create their own brews, using their own local ingredients.The Wildcrafting Brewer will attract herbalists, foragers, natural-foodies, and chefs alike with the author’s playful and relaxed philosophy. Readers will find themselves surprised by how easy making your own natural drinks can be, and will be inspired, again, by the abundance of nature all around them.

    The heart of the book is a journey along the Mississippi River, from Minnesota to Louisiana, in a quixotic search for the Perfect Beer Joint -- a journey that turns out to be the perfect pretext for viewing America through the prism of a beer glass. Along the river, you'll visit the beer bar once owned by the brewer Al Capone, glide by The World's Largest Six Pack, and check into Elvis Presley's Heartbreak Hotel to plumb the surprisingly controversial question of whether Elvis actually drank beer. But the trip also includes numerous detours up quirky tributaries, among them: a visit to an Extreme Beer maker in Delaware with ambitions to make 50-proof brew, a look at the murky world of beer yeast rustlers in California, and a journey to the portals of ultimate beer power at the Anheuser-Busch plant in St. Louis, where making the grade as a Clydesdale draft horse is harder than you might imagine. Entertaining, enlightening, and written with Wells's trademark verve, Travels with Barley is a perfect gift -- not just for America's 84 million beer enthusiasts, but for all discerning readers of flavorful nonfiction.