BeerAdvocate magazine - #127 (August 2017)

In this issue

On the Cover: Todd Steven Boera, brewer and co-founder of Fonta Flora, whose foraged and local- ingredient beers brought national attention to Morganton, N.C. Read more about how breweries are shaping small town America on pg. 58. Photo by Jack Sorokin.

Sensing Opportunity, Vietnam's Pasteur Street Brewing Expands

There’s a street for selling just about every kind of product or service in the Vietnamese capital of Hanoi. On Hang Bac, you’ll find silver jewelry, while Hang Duong is for desserts. There’s also coffin street, noodle street, and beer street. That last one isn’t surprising: Vietnam’s largest brewery, Sabeco, estimates that the country’s 90 million citizens will drink more than 4 billion liters (about 34.2 million barrels) of beer in 2017.

4 mins

Drinking Undercover

It all has an air of film noir: You enter the brewery tasting room, order a beer, and settle in. Inconspicuously, you note everything that’s going on around you: how the beer is poured, how the glassware is handled, how you and others are treated by the staff.

1 min

Tree Beer Brewing With Wafer Ash

Throughout brewing history, fermented beverages have used native ingredients. Plentiful and readily available, honey, dates, corn, as well as various herbs and spices often appeared in the recipes of historic or ancient beers. In much of Northern Europe, grog, Gruit, mead, and Braggot were commonplace before the German Reinheitsgebot, or purity law, of 1516 was instituted specifying that beer should contain nothing more than barley, yeast, hops, and water. 

3 mins

Lord Of The Barflies

Beechwood-aged Bourbon County Stout. Goose Island Light. A Shocktop-Honker’s Ale mash-up.

3 mins

Draught Bass A Neglected Icon

Here’s another sad tale of an iconic British beer that’s at best idling, more likely lingering, before death.

2 mins

An Uncanny Invention for Home Canning

What a difference a year makes. Last May, I wrote about getting a chance to can a beautiful home brew via a mobile canner operating in LA (issue #112). There’s something supremely satisfying about cracking open a can of your own. But let’s face it, there’s no way you or I could do this at home—or can we?

1 min

Chop and Wok

Those with an appetite for Chinese cuisine in Scottsdale, Ariz., are in for a surprise when they happen upon local institution Chop and Wok.

2 mins

Morgan Alexander Founder And Brewmaster, Tacoma Brewing Company

Tacoma Brewing Company was born as a side project out of a Tacoma, Wash., coffee shop, where owner Morgan Alexander sold his ales alongside his coffee. After 5 years of running the brewery like a commercialized homebrew venture and sweating out 10-gallon batches, Alexander moved into a new, larger space in May 2017. From the city’s historic Brewery District, he now has the fermentation capacity to satisfy demand for his bold, flavorful IPAs, and the elbow room to brew more of his sought-after Stouts and barrel-aged ales. “It’s definitely a labor of love,” says Alexander. “I like a good challenge. I’m stubborn. I don’t like giving up. For me, this has been all about the journey, and the people you meet along the way.”

4 mins

The Tank Brewing Company

In Miami, where local beer is now as ubiquitous as cigars, The Tank Brewing Company celebrates both. In its intimate cigar lounge, patrons can be found puffing a hand-rolled stogie while savoring Frank the Tank, a 10 percent Imperial Stout served in a tulip glass sporting the brewery’s catchphrase, “Sip & Discuss.”

4 mins

Greenwarden Banded Horn Brewing Company

Spruce tips are certainly not the first ingredient that comes to mind when thinking about brewing. Although with the growth of extreme brewing, I’ve heard of and tried more beers that use this subtle flavoring. The latest example I was lucky enough to stumble upon at my local packie is Green warden from Bidder ford, Maine’s Banded Horn Brewing Company.

1 min

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BeerAdvocate magazine Magazine Description:

BeerAdvocate is a quarterly magazine that celebrates beer, its culture, its history, and its community. Since launching in 2006, the goal of BeerAdvocate has been to provide fresh, honest, and insightful stories on beer and brewing. To date, our talented contributors have won 12 awards from the North American Guild of Beer Writers for their work.