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Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Our first attempt at a review...Troegs Troegenator



I like drinking and discovering new beer, but frankly am shit in describing and reviewing it. The below is my first ever attempt to review a beer so bear with me. In typical Skye fashion I jump into the deep end. The good news is Jolly Good Fellows has talented writers that are much better at this sort of thing.


The original plan was to take my own picture 
but I drank away the evidence so here is the
brewery's image
My notes on Troegs Troegenator Double Bock Beer:


This is a BIG beer.  Coming in with 8.2% alcohol, it poured nice brown and had some carbonation, no particles of note. Poured into my Hamm's chalice, it had arrived with minimal head and quickly dissipated.(Not what you seeing in the picture) Definitely more malt forward than originally expected, it drank smooth

While you can taste the alcohol it gives way to a slightly caramel taste with a slightly bitter after taste. The caramel became more noticeable as the double bock warms up.

This is a beer that improves as it warms slightly and continues to reward the drinker through the entire glass. Have a couch ready...this beer will fill you up. The Troegenator lives up to the double bock reputation of liquid bread. After a few you may wish to have a lie down because the potency of the beer will sneak up on you if you aren't careful. 



I like this beer, I always get at least a sixer of it when I see it on the shelves in the autumn. I have found that it has the rewarding character I enjoy out of beer; in other words I don't get bored with it. This year I am going to age the last bottle out one year. I believe it will enhance the character and flavor. 


I recommend this beer to folks who enjoy the bock style and looking for something that has bit more walking through the door. 



Here is the "propaganda" on the Troegenator:


The Troegenator Double Bock, is a dark, strong lager (8.2% abv). It pours into a glass with a bronze to brown color, fluffy white head and bready malt aroma. The Troegenator leaves a rich, warming feeling and subtle spicy flavors. The style, Double Bock, dates back a century or so ago. During periods of fasting without solid foods, the Monastic brewers relied on the double bock; a stronger, richer beer to fulfill their basic nutritional needs. Known to them as "liquid bread," a double bock has a strong malt aroma and chewy rich body. Traditionally these brewers ended the name of their double bock with the suffix "ator", ex. Celabrator, Illuminator, Subliminator... In the spirit of the tradition we give you the Troegenator to provide warmth and richness through the early spring months. A double bock of epic proportions, beware, the Troegenator is deceiving smooth and delicious.



A final note on reviews for this site. Jolly Good Fellows is not a review site. We will review beer we are enjoying but it is not the primary motivation for establishing this place. Reviews are only one piece of the bigger pie. Hopefully at a minimum we will bring you one beer review a week. Thanks again for stopping by! 

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

And now there is one...

A decent beer glass makes all the difference. In a nutshell it brings all the nuance and details out. The wine community has been all over this for years. The right beer in the right glass makes for a better drinking experience.
Early last week two of my partners in crime met their end, both in rather inauspicious ways. One was a Hacker Pschorr weisse glass I had acquired as a pack in with a six pack over a decade ago.  The other was a glass that I had received at Rock Bottom Brewery, I don’t remember the circumstances but I know it was acquired honorably. These were 2/3s of the stalwarts in my beer drinking glasses and now they had succumbed to the rigor of dishwashing and random sink collisions.  The last third has escaped unscathed…knock on wood.
The Hamm's chalice in action
My all time favorite beer glass is a Hamm’s beer chalice. (See photo on right) My little brother Cody found it at a garage sale for 50¢. It got packed up with a lot of his stuff when he shipped off to basic training. A few years later I had to go through my old memories and paraphernalia at my parents’ house. Since Cody’s and mine were all lumped together I uncovered the Hamm’s relic and made it mine. (This is still a minor point of contention between us brothers)
I have been using it ever since. For me it is my standard for a perfect glass. I love how it feels in my hand, how it drinks, how the beer pours into it, and aesthetically I find it appealing. Fortunately the Hamms chalice has proven to be built of sturdy stuff and has not suffered the catastrophic failures of the other two.  It is my go to glass when I am trying a new beer or ale at home.
Now it is time for another confession. The truth is while I have consumed a lot of beer I have rarely done so in the appropriate glassware. If one of the three was not available, and let’s be honest they weren’t always the right glass for the occasion either, I would pour the beer into a shaker glass or just drink it out of the bottle. Smacks of heathenism and blasphemy, but I still enjoyed it. (I’m a pragmatic drinker)
So here is an opportunity to upgrade my glassware. A fortune smile as it is the holiday season, but as mentioned above my knowledge in this area is slight. I find myself in a position where I can improve my drinking experience but I don’t know what to ask for. So in addition to me doing a little research I put the question to you the commentariat. What glasses do I need, what are nice to haves, and what are non-essentials?

Monday, November 28, 2011

Cyber Monday beer links!

Beer Links this week are brought to you by Cyber Monday!
This was the first image that popped up
when I googled "cyber monday beer" 


In the News!
Beer Or Sugar Water? For Flies, The Choice Is Pale Ale (NPR) But which pale ale?! Science demands an answer...To The Lab!


Social agency hoping to preserve beer-delivery jobs Day-old business closed by complaint (The Ottawa Citizen) Growler delivery would be awesome, I hope they can save this both for the people and the brewery.


Beer supply chain should be strengthened (Supply Management) Sometimes we break out the hardcore nerdery.
  
3 years after InBev deal, a new Anheuser-Busch (Los Angeles Times) Hard lessons being learned in a new beer environment but I wonder if they are the right lessons.


Australia approves $11 billion Foster's sale to SABMiller (Reuters) The big get bigger. 
Crooked Stave to move brewing to Denver (The Coloradoan)
Guess where I am going next time I'm in Denver.


Taste Regina: Beer Brothers develops unique niche (Regina Leader-Post) For our food fans north of the border...on a side note, my grandfather was born in Regina. 


Blogs
6 Ways To Drink Craft Beer Smarter (Huffington Post) Here is your daily dose of pretension. 


The Craft Beer Newsletter (The Audacity of Hops)
This past Saturday's "Welcome to Your Weekend" image made the grade.


Beer Baron: Batch 19 taps into the nostalgia market (Wisconsin State Journal Beer Baron blog) 
Recommend reading this, I do have to say I agree with the comment that this beer feels like "history is being written by the victors." 


Admin Notes
This week you can expect some fresh beer commentary, a review, our 1st annual gift guide for beer lovers, and another edition of "To The Lab!" 


We are now on Untappd! Find us under beerfellows. 
We are sorting through blogs to add on the roll; if you have any suggestions let us know in the comments. Remember to follow us on twitter.


Stick around folks, we are glad you stopped by!

Saturday, November 26, 2011

Welcome to Your Weekend! (Small Business Edition)

Welcome to your weekend brought to you by pointsetta, Charlie Brown tree, and empty growler*.
In recognition of "Small Business Saturday" Jolly Good Fellows recommends supporting your local craft / micro brewer and your local homebrewing supply store. 

*growler will be filled at local brewery this afternoon.

Friday, November 25, 2011

To the Lab!


Channel surfing and drinking beer fit together like a hand in glove (as long as you aren’t on trial for murder in LA) and a recent weeknight was no exception. Rather than having a beer in my hand, my favorite brew was on the tube (do you say that with a flat screen, but I digress) in the form of History Channel’s Modern Marvels episode on brewing. Originally airing on 16 November 2005, the episode covers a wide range of topics in the history of our frequent beverage of choice from its archaeological record to the modern process of brewing. I have tried brew created by Dogfish Head Brewery in Lewes, DE, derived from an ancient Chinese recipe, but that is for another post.

What strikes me most in this program is the relationship between beer and science. Fermentation has had a profound impact on our global society. Defined as “any of many anaerobic biochemical reactions in which an enzyme (or several enzymes produced by a microorganism) catalyzes the conversion of one substance into another; especially the conversion (using yeast) of sugars to alcohol or acetic acid with the evolution of carbon dioxide,”[1] it is the basic scientific process that generates many of the foods we associate with everyday and celebratory menus.

So, in recognition of the role of science in our discussion of brewing and beer, Jolly Good Fellows is introducing our section, “To the Lab!” where we will be discussing the relationship between beer and science, the science of brewing, some brewing techniques and anything else that comes to mind when you mention “beer” and “science” in the same breath.

Now you might think that our poster child for this series of posts might be Louis Pasteur, whose application of heat to beer made our favorite beverage safer to drink and easier to distribute worldwide. But with all due respects to Messier Pasteur, and in keeping with the more light hearted character of our discussions, we’ve elected to go with two less distinguished, but imminently more recognizable scientists.

So, without further adieu – To the Lab!


[1] http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fermentation

Thursday, November 24, 2011

Happy Thanksgiving!

We here at Jolly Good Fellows hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday.

Here is what we Fellows have on our table for today.

Sarah from Beermeetscheese.com

St. Bernadus Abt 12
New Glarus Uff-Da
Deschutes Black Butte Porter

Rob

New Glarus Cran-bic
Souther Tier Pumking
Sam Adams Black Lager

Brian

Sam Adams Winter Lager
Troegs Mad Elf
Shock Top Wheat Ale

Skye

Yazoo Sly Rye Porter
Troegs Troegenator Double Bock
Brooklyn Oktoberfest
New Belgium Frambozen

Have a great day and be safe. Let us know what you are having for Thanksgiving beer down in the comments!

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

The Desert Makes You Thirsty

Skye here, I'm posting this for my brother-in-law Rudy. Enjoy!

******************************************************************************
Rudy:

I can say without a doubt that beer has always been a fixture in my life. From the earliest memories to the current day beer has always been around. I grew up in a very male dominated social environment. When I was younger, my mother’s family always seemed to be at the park or someone's house for a party or birthday; any excuse for a gathering to eat and drink. Being Hispanic there was a pretty distinct hierarchy when I was growing up. The women cooked and talked in the kitchen with the younger kids close by; while the men sat outside on the porch next to the Coleman coolers that were loaded with beer.

The older kids were allowed to hang around outside to help watch the little ones that escaped the kitchen and ran amuck outside, staying just out of reach of the men and their beer swilling circle. If you got lucky you were allowed to sit and listen to the men talk telling stories about senseless jabber, all the while hoping they would allow you to get them a beer, so you could crack it open and taste the foam. Beer is a rite of manhood in the Hispanic culture.

There were not many events that beer was not a focal point. I grew up in the 70's, hearing and seeing adds for Schlitz Malt Liquor, Colt 45, Coors, Budweiser, Pabst and many more. I had my first beer when I was 10 at my Tia's (aunt) wedding and it didn't go so well. 

When I was 15 I started drinking Budweiser because I could always count on my Teo (uncle) to forget he had an extra six pack in the truck bed. By the time I was in my late teens I had drank most every type of beer I could think of. We weren’t picky and the beer revolution really hadn’t hit just yet. Often beer was stolen from someone's parents’ fridge brought to the bonfire or social gathering in the desert. Eventually single beers became less important and kegs took their place in my education of mass consumption. Domestic consisted of the usual: Bud, Coors, Miller, Schlitz, Mickey's Big Mouth, Lone Star, Blatz, Pabst and so on, Imports at the time where Lowenbrau, Heineken, St. Pauli and Grolsch to name the few available. The Mexican beer around still has never really changed too much even today; Tecate, Superior, Negra Modelo, Dos Equis XX's and of course the ever present Corona.

It was not until I reached my early twenties that beer took on a whole different meaning for me.  The craft brew revolution started and microbrewery's started to pop up everywhere. Chefs (my line of work) found creative and inventive ways to spruce up old dishes with these new found beers. It was suddenly ok to be snobbish in your beer selection, having a beer that no one had heard of was the new cool. My ventures in cooking and cruise ships only solidified my relationship with beer, going to a new pub in the Caribbean and ordering an unknown beer and then bringing that back for your chums to taste was god like.

TodayI love beer, in all its forms, from strong to weak, colorful to pale, unique to boring, nutty to fruity. There is always a beer for any occasion and any taste, beer has been and always will be a staple in my life. I drink not for the drunk anymore, but for the taste and the celebration that beer has brought to my life...and ok, the occasional drunk.....

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Where we stand – The Jolly Good Fellows Manifesto (Updated!)

Now that we are up and running and the JGF writing team has been mostly introduced; it is time to make a stand, to draw our proverbial line in the sand, and tell our beliefs on beer.

I personally believe there is a time and place for every beer; from the stankiest and nastiest of swills to the ambrosia of the gods. Every beer has something to tell you if you are willing understand the context it was produced and consumed. That doesn’t mean that this has to be the time or the place where its strengths or weaknesses are made clear.

That being said, Jolly Good Fellows falls pretty heavily down on the side of the craft and microbrew side of things.  Below is a simple Venn diagram that shows a visual representation of where we want to stake our claim. We realize there is a lot more diversity in the beer world but this gets the point across. (It is important to note that we have a strong favorable impression of imports also.)



We will spend a majority of our time exploring and celebrating the diversity of beer, reveling in the fact that for most of its existence beer has a heterogeneous history.  We are witnessing the rise of this again right before our very eyes in America where micro and craft brewers have placed an emphasis both on creativity and quality.

This doesn’t mean that we will ignore macrobrews though. As a post-modern beer drinker, you simply can’t.  Macrobrewing still has hegemony in the market; both in what is consumed and how beer is created. Their sheer size alone and global reach means they have incredible influence and a dominate position in price for ingredients. (This is particularly true with hops.)  

They also wield incredible political clout. They are profitable big businesses that have survived for a long time and are marketing and lobbying powerhouses. At the very minimum they must be acknowledged for setting the “standard” to improve from and for serving as the monolith that micros and crafts needed to respond to.

So don’t be surprised when on occasion we explore these monoliths and their hold on the world, looking to understand their contributions, their context in the brewing world, and how they continue to influence how beer is both produced and enjoyed.

With all that out of the way, our main purpose here is to celebrate beer in all its wonderful diversity, creativity, history, future and our enjoyment of all of it.  Thanks for reading and as always please share your thoughts in the comments!

Monday, November 21, 2011

Beer links!

Links brought to you by Beer and Turkey this week!

This is our first weekly link dump with a small portion of the latest and greatest in the beer world.

In the News!

  Beer benefits health!  Huzzah! (International Business Times)

 Want to know what beer to bring for the holiday get-togethers, here are some recommendations (Thestreet.com)

 I think we may need to get an 18-wheeler and a Trans AM. (New York Post)

 Is homebrewing in Tennessee looked at as amateur league by Moonshiners? I’m just asking… (Knoxnews.com)

 Biological Warfare or Beer? (What are the after effects of drinking Blatz Alex?) (Isle of Man Today)

At least the baby Clydesdale is cute (Broward Palm Beach New Times)

Calendar of Events DC has some excellent beer tasting options before you split town for Thanksgiving

Tickets still available for the Washington Winter Beer Festival!

 In site news we have fixed the issue with commenting. It is now open to all parties so tell your friends! If you have recommendations or beer news tips let us know!

Saturday, November 19, 2011

But You Hate Beer...


"You used to hate beer - remember the time you told me that?"
My mother (bless her heart) likes to remind me of this statement, spoken when I was 16 years old.
What I like to remind her is that I still don't like beer...or at least what they called "beer" at that time. Honestly, what 16-year-old kid seriously enjoys the taste of Budweiser or Busch Light? Unless it's in the middle of a cornfield (I grew up in a rural small town in Southwest Wisconsin), and served from plastic cups for the sole purpose of getting you drunk (with an unbelievably bad hang over - not to mention the runs), why would I enjoy “beer?”

I sure didn't.

The first time I enjoyed beer was when I had a New Glarus Spotted Cow. The brewery opened in 1993, during the upswing of craft brewed microbreweries, and it was around 1998 when I had my first taste of this “real” beer. Its yeasty flavor with a mellow malt aftertaste made me realize beer is far more complex than the macro-brewed items made with corn and rice. I was spoiled by beer from this moment onward, and all the beers made in Wisconsin have only enhanced my curiosity in exploring the complexity and varieties of beer. If you want to know when I became more of a beer enthusiast, it was when I moved to Boston. Drinking the Cambridge Brewing Company’s Great Pumpkin Ale and their Heather Ale changed my beer life forever.

Now I study beer (my senior undergraduate thesis focused on how customer’s interact with beer), write about beer (www.beermeetscheese.com), and enjoy the beverage in all its aspects (especially when it’s a microbrewery beer I share with my mom). I can feel my German ancestors rejoice.

Prost! 



Welcome to your weekend!


Brought to you by rake, leaf blower, and falling leaves,
with special guest The Bruery Autumn Maple
Enjoy!

Friday, November 18, 2011

How Could I Not Avoid It and Didn’t Really Mind

Mine is a beer drinking family. Well, more accurately, half of my family is a beer drinking family. The Smith/Findley/O’Brien Clan, rooted in my father and his siblings have been known to put away plenty of fine golden liquid at any number of family functions. Well, lets back track a bit – not always “fine” golden liquid as golden liquid. Hamms was the main brew of the day – Grandpa liked it, so the family drank it. My rebel cousin who looks like Jesus and swears like a sailor was the rebel outcast who drank Coors. My uncle drank whatever was cheap and his son drank himself to an early grave. Generic beer was the worst, but beer always remained. It was a topic of conversation. It was always there. To this day, a reminder accompanies Smith Family functions that “there are cold ones in the fridge outside.”

I thought nothing of it. My schoolmates and teachers were a little different. For a class project in 1st grade, we needed to collect pull tabs. My mother dutifully informed the family of the project. On our next trip to Grandpa and Grandma Smith’s house I was presented with a what would be a talisman, part of the right of passage – a brown paper sack filled with pull tabs from beer cans. The smell in the bag and the number of pull tabs brought a raised eyebrow from my slightly hippy, yet very cool, teacher, but I was proud to have brought in the most tabs for our chain.

My Dad was a bit of a “do it yourselfer” and that directly contributed to my first personal engagement with beer. Warm Sunday afternoons, ball game on the radio, Dad would be out working in the yard and would ask me to run inside and grab him a cold one from the fridge. Olympia was his beer of choice at that point. Bringing him a cold beer entitled me to a sip, a small sip, but my one swallow nevertheless. As I got older, I could open the can in the house, pour it into a glass and take my own sip before running it out to him. Dad eventually switched to Henry Weinhard’s Private Reserve and the sips came to an end. Halcyon days.

When I got to be a teenager, my relationship to beer changed, but not in the way one might expect. My mother had the first of several cancer related surgeries. One resulted in a nearly continuous bout of pain. It was a miserable time for her and I was frequently the target of long bouts of listening. I had always been a pretty good kid and she was under terrible stress, as was my Dad in the construction recession of the early 1980s, so my response was to minimize my teenage rebellion and deciding that I wanted to see if I could wait until I was 21 before actually drinking. I was allowed a glass of wine at the dinner table and could still have a mouthful of beer, but never one of my own, and so it stayed until I turned the legal age. Two years in a Bud friendly fraternity put it to the test, but I did manage and enjoyed that first beer of my own.

Now some would argue that I didn’t hold to the pledge completely. The beer that I had in the back of the bus at Dave’s house was no more than the sip that I had from Dad’s glass. Being tanked at my cousin’s wedding when I was 9 is completely out of the question because that was champagne raided from my tee-totaling aunt and her daughter. God loves them and so do I, but a hungover 9 year old is not pretty.

I would say my tastes have evolved as I got more exposure courtesy of the micro-brew explosions on the West Coast. Sierra Nevada and Anchor Steam are the “home town” brews thought there are many that I am sure to have missed. Today Yuengling is the house beer in my home with Dogfish Head mixes providing a little variety. Oly holds a special place, maybe it was the tee-shirt entitled “Artesian Search and Rescue Team” or just the special treatment I had I got getting a good mouthful of cold beer on a hot day – being a big guy with my Dad.

Thursday, November 17, 2011

The Confession

I didn't come to beer easily.   My family upbringing was relatively dry, my mother's drink of choice is sloe gin and coke (It's a Wisconsin thing) and my father prefers vodka sours. Beer was something my grandfather drank and that was limited to a fine selection of Red, White and Blue, Blatz, Old Milwaukee, and Old Style. I remember the first time I ever drank it as a kid, I was about 8 or 9, the beer was Old Style, and it didn't go well. I instantly disliked it to such an extreme that I had no interest in it for damn near the next decade. 


It took enlisting in the Marine Corps to change my opinion, and even then it took awhile to captivate my interest. While I drank beer over in Okinawa, it wasn't until I went on deployment to the Mediterranean where I had my revelation that the beer world was a big and wonderful place. Hindsight being 20/20, the European beers I drank were not top shelf by any means but they were better than the Buds and Millers I had been putting down. The real stroke of luck though was the timing of this event.

This happened in 1996 and the micro and craft brewing scene was picking up steam in America. When I returned there was no looking back. Pete's Wicked Ale served as a gateway beer for me and I started trying more and more styles and types. Returning to Wisconsin for college only served to further whet my appetite as I fell for New Glarus and Central Waters. The best part was and still is that there is no end in sight for beer creativity.   It has been fifteen years since the light switch went on for me. The beer world is continuing to evolve and mutate and that is thrilling. I can't wait to see what comes next.

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

I came to beer the easy way - Dad

I actually had to sit and think about it for a minute, and then I remembered!! My first beer I actually remember tasting was from my Dads cup at an "Anaheim Angels (Not California Angels)baseball game. I must have been about 6 or 7 years old. I remembered I loved the taste, the texture, that smooth crisp taste. I don't remember what beer it was, probably Budweiser, I just remember that I liked it; and I wanted more of it.

As I grew older I didn't really didn't have another beer until I was about 12. After school my friend and I would go back to his Dads apartment in Fountain Valley, Ca. We would grab his Mickeys wide mouths that he bought for himself and we proceeded to get shit housed. I don't know what it is about being 12 and drinking Mickeys, but it felt soooo cool. Today, I realize that I don't like Mickeys very much at all. It could be because the few times that I went over to my friends house to drink, I would inevitably get drunk. My Mom would pick me up and like all good Mothers , would know that I was drunk. My mother would take me to get the Market Broiler, a fish restaurant (Bad Idea!!!!) or she would take me to get a chili burger. There were a few occasions that this would cause me to puke.
.
In 1996 I joined the Marine Corps; this afforded me plenty of opportunities to experience beers from all of the world. It seems like Skye (the gentleman that I met at the Marine Corps Ball last week) I was fondly addicted to Petes wicked Ale. Man, that stuff was good. However on your low military pay in 1996 I would have to mostly settle for Pabst Blue Ribbon (PBR) and good ol' Budweiser, which I refer to as "Mudweiser". Because after you drink to much of that stuff, it gives you mud-butt.

Drinking beer overseas afforded me the ability to open my pallet to beers from different nations. Tasty beers like Tiger or SingHa - WOW!!! Now that's a beer; Tiger, not so much... Of course these far away locations always had the Heineken, the Bud and whatever else came from the US, but the cheap dropped off my radar overseas.

Now that I'm older, I find that I 'not' to drink the ordinary stuff. I will every once in a while, but I really try to stay away from it. I really like getting different beers from different places around the world, even just getting something from Stone Brewery out of Escondido, Ca. Stone is great because not only are they close, but they are a great local craft brewery. I am not fond of every beer they make, But I will definitely try what they have to offer. I like the fact that California and the west have so much to offer in the craft beer arena, not to mention all of the little local micro brews.

My brother-in-law Gregg will attest to this; you can make so many friends over a Pint. Gregg and I will try several different beers in one sitting and we're even going to start brewing together. He's actually a huge influence on my openness for trying new beers. So "cheers" to you G.

By no means am I a 'Beer Snob', but I know what I like and I enjoy a nice hoppy IPA (India Pale Ale) or a good Hef.

If anyone has anything to add I'm all ears. Tell me your stories, your beers that you like and what you don't like.
Me, Skye and the rest of the gang here at "Beer Fellows" look forward to pouring a tall one and telling some tales.

Introductions!

Over the next few days the Jolly Good Fellows writing team will be introducing themselves. Instead of sharing how we love moonlight nights and long walks on the beach though (and really who doesn't, especially with a tasty beverage in hand) we will be introducing ourselves through how we came to beer. Up first is Jeremy, aka JustLeftofNormal.

One other note, we are up on twitter and can be found here: @beerfellows. Follow us for updates and commentary though in little sips, not giant quaffs.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Welcome to Jolly Good Fellows


Over the last year I have tossed around the idea of setting up a blog about beer. At first I toyed with writing reviews on types of beer and ales that I tried from the book, 1001 Beers You Must Taste Before You Die, but I soon realized there was a whole lot more to say. (Plus there are many fine and established review sites already on the internet; BeerAdvocate.com is one of my favorites.)

The blog that we envision here at Jolly Good Fellows is about beer as a pillar of civilization, a conversation topic, a lubricant for the social engine of progress, a beverage that is worth holding up, analyzing, defending if necessary, and above all enjoying. Heady stuff, but worthwhile for a beverage that has been with us for over 10,000 years. As beer drinkers we are living in a renaissance. (Be advised readers of this blog will be subject to occasional hyperbole) New breweries are springing up everywhere and the styles produced only limited by the bounds of imagination (and the realities of budget.)

American beer drinkers, whether they realize it or not, have never had the selection available they do now. While America has only recently matched the pre-Prohibition levels in brewery numbers, modern transport and refrigeration allow us to have a selection never before possible. Toss in the fact that beer is breaking through its own class barrier we now have a beverage that is reinventing itself again right in front of our eyes.

What you can expect as readers and members of the commentariat is a blog that is a mishmash and hodgepodge of commentary, reviews, history, events (both current and calendar), stories, half baked experiments, suggestions, and anything else that we can tie in with beer, all served up with equal parts of exaggeration and understatement.

Over the next few days we will square this joint away and get settled. So pull up a stool, grab a pint and join us. We’re glad you are here.