Jack Curtin’s LIQUID DIET

So superb on Tuesday, so wrong today.

It’s fascinating how things even out.

The other half of this story is now available at Keystone Edge.

Bud Light!?

Bud Freakin’ Light?

The President of the United States, who made a point of campaigning in brewpubs and served Stoudt’s at his party for the press, is going to pour a watery, tasteless beer brewed by a Belgian-owned corporation at the silly get-together in the White House tomorrow between him and the two guys who got into that foolish “mine is bigger than yours” contretemps in Cambridge last week?

That’s Cambridge, Massachusetts, by the way, the state that is home to what is now the largest American-owned brewery.

Who the hell is advising this man?

That anything other than Sam Adams Lager was chosen for this made-for-TV event is embarrassing.

That a crap beer made by a foreign-owned corporation is what actually will be served is an abomination.

Lew Bryson on Gary Bredbenner’s funeral yesterday and the subsequent wake at One Guy Brewing.

Jennie Hatton, never missing a clever PR ploy and well aware of my weakness for posts that don’t make me work too hard, sends along the below video of the opeing of Iron Hill Maple Shade last week, which occurred while I was working and you were lolling around doing something else.

It’s a highly professional job by Jeff Linkous and, aside from a couple of intruders in loud and scary shirts, really makes you wish you were there. Or am I just projecting?

Tom Kehoe and Jon Bovit, founders of Yards Brewing Company in early summer 1995, just as Yards ESA was exploding into cult status in Philadelphia.

The photo was the lead one accompanying this article…

…which, as I have said many times around here, was the real start of my beer writing career. As I have also said around here a whole lot, you can read that little bit of history here.

I had to do these scans for a film project (though I’m not sure they will be good enough to be of any value) and figured I might as well share them here.

It was a long time ago, ground zero for craft beer in Philly.

Suzy Woods called me from her car this afternoon, breaking the law and risking her life to tell me she’d pulled off a coup.

Exciting news, eh? I figure she’d used Lance Romance’s keys to get into Iron Hill World Headquarters and was going to offer me a brewpub of my own with my choice of brewers. Hmmm…. She’s surely got dibs on Lance, Barrar scares me…got it. A chance to boss Elton John Larry Horwitz around? Pure gold.

Ah, but the lady was just a tease. Ain’t that always the way?

What our gal has done is taken over Foobooz. Arthur Etchells has gone off to Oregon and is probably operating under the illusion that the old homestead will still be standing when he returns.

Risky business, that.

At the very least, he should be prepared to find it booted for parking illegally.

Gary Bredbenner unexpectedly died on Tuesday and that “we” speaks for a lot of the Philadelphia beer and food community who came to know this truly nice guy over the years.

Gary was a recognizable figure at a host of beer events, most memorably for me, at the classic ones at the Grey Lodge Pub, where he always seemed to be right inside the door whenever I showed up. I stood him to a few pints over the years but probably not nearly so many as he provided to me. He was a regular reader and supporter of Liquid Diet and I never saw him without a smile.

The funeral will be Monday at 11AM at the Roat Kriner Funeral Home in Danville, PA. It is likely that he will be wearing an Eagles jersey for his final time with his friends. His friend Daniel Cosper also hopes to send a bottle of Gary’s homebrew to the afterlife with him, something I’m sure he would appreciate.

For anyone who wants to try and be there to say goodbye, Danville is about a two and half hour drive from Philadelphia, roughly ten miles west of Bloomsburg. The Roat Kriner Funeral Home is located at 1715 Bloom Road and the phone number is 570.275.0412.

UPDATED 25 July with corrected date of death.

Anent the last post…

And here’s a vintage version from the year it was written…

Beer mega-brands, with the exception of Coors Light, which is up minimally, are taking the hit in this economy that everybody predicted for the beer biz. Information Resources Inc. (IRI) scanner data for April, May and the first two weeks of July shows Heineken down over 15% and Bud down over 11%, while Bud Light, Miller Lite, Corona and Coors are all down 5% or more.

You know who isn’t down? Craft beer, which continues strong and is becoming more and more where retailers turn to try and keep up their profit levels. I just turned in a story to New Brewer magazine last week about how the distribution landscape looks for craft brewers these days and I wish I’d had this info to bolster the already strong argument that it might put them in the best position ever even though the two big consolidations have limited the options overall.

A certain well-known brewer from Delaware is looking like a bit of a genius as all this unfolds. Some folks scoffed at his argument that he could bring wine drinkers over into the beer world and others still jest, some with a bit of envy, about the “cult of personality,” but let them chew on this from Beer Business Daily (my emphasis added via the underlining):

Craft brews, particularly big hoppy flavorful craft beers, are still growing big…Crafts also appeal to people because there is a real person behind many of the brands. One distributor pointed out to me yesterday that her wine snob friends, who would crow about Duckhorn because they met Mr. Duckhorn, now crow about Dogfish Head because they’ve met Sam Calagione. The trade over from wine to craft beers is indeed having an impact.

How you gonna keep ‘em down at the vineyard after they’ve seen Rehoboth Beach?*

*A riff on an old song lyric that I bet less than 5% of you will get. I grow old, I grow old.