Category Archives: Beer
The Brewing of Bud
A tour of the Anheuser-Busch plant in Baldwinsville, N.Y., which first appeared in the Syracuse New Times, September 2-9, 1987 * * * The beer they brew in Baldwinsville begins as a handful of optimism and seed grain somewhere out in the Midwest, as green hop cuttings under blue skies in the northwestern United States […]
American Beer, 1975
This article appeared in the Syracuse New Times, September 28, 1975. The cliché has it that it is always darkest before the dawn, and that accurately described the state of American beer in 1975. The sun appeared to be setting on the last local and regional breweries and it had yet to rise on microbreweries […]
Revere Your Beer
I have long been fascinated by the meaning of beer; this is a piece written in that direction. * * * Beer begins in the grave. The seed from which barley springs is not meant for us, not for our nutrition or pleasure. Rather, the starch in the seed is meant to feed the seed’s […]
Red Beers
This article appeared in the Syracuse New Times, February 15-22, 1995. * * * Red blooded, red phone, red lips, red hot. Heat! Alarm! Passion! Beer! Beer? Yes, prodded by flat sales of traditional brands and envious of the Coors Brewing Company’s success with Killian’s Irish Red, the followers in the brewing industry are saddling […]
Kitchen Green
April 16, 2004 “I know exactly the shade of green you’re talking about,” she said. “I call it kitchen green.” It was a comfort to be talking with someone who understood my passion for a green, wood-handled bottle opener I had recently purchased for 25 cents at an estate sale. And she understood my excitement […]
Pierre Celis Visits
This piece was written for the Syracuse New Times in June of 1997. * * * On a recent sultry summer evening in Armory Square, the city’s malterati gathered at the Blue Tusk to welcome Pierre Celis, the Belgian brewer who saved the Witbier style and whose Celis Brewery in Austin, Texas, brews Celis White, […]
Brewing in New York
This article was written for Syracuse New Times, July 23, 1986, and rewwritten for the Song Mountain Brewfest program in 1997. * * * The Empire State’s recorded brewing history begins with the Dutch colonists on Manhattan Island, soon to be home to New Amsterdam and eventually New York City. The settlers’ homebrewed beer, which […]
Jury Duty
May 2001 The last time I was summoned to the Onondaga County Courthouse for jury duty, I got as far as the “voir dire.” The defendant’s lawyer asked, “What newspaper do you read?” I said, “The New York Ti…” “Excused,” he said. Last month, I didn’t even get that far, and it’s probably just as […]
The Bard of Beer Visits
October 1996 Being out with Michael Jackson is like being out with Santa Claus — everywhere, people are glad to see you. It is impossible to overstate Jackson’s influence on the worlds of beer and whiskey. He wrote the book, several of them in fact, and is the single best known beer writer on the […]
Long Nights, Strong Beers
This article was written for Zymurgy in 1987, rewritten for the Syracuse New Times in 1996. * * * Long Nights, Strong Beers: The Holiday Beer Tradition If, as the days grow shorter and the holidays approach, you feel an urge to put a little something extra into your homebrew, you are not alone. Rather, […]
