It may not be uppermost in the minds of pub goers eager to slake their thirst, but could aid negotiations on the domestic front. A regular pint, it turns out, helps strengthen the bones and prevent fractures in old age (so long as you don't drink too much of it and fall over). Beer is a significant source of silicon, which is a key ingredient of the diet that helps to improve bone mineral density. The National Institute of Health in the United States says silicon may be important for the growth and development of bones, and beer "appears to be a major contributor" to the amount of silicon in the diet. -Full Story-

Thousands of people are hurt each year in violent attacks where broken beer glasses are used as weapons. Could two new pint glass designs be the answer?

Nearly 87,000 injuries are caused by glass attacks each year in England and Wales, according to the Home Office. Many more are hurt as a result of accidents.

The worrying figures have prompted a redesign of the classic pint glass, with police, facial surgeons, pubs and brewers all voicing concern about the high number of glassings.

The government hopes introducing safer pint glasses, still made of glass, will help reduce injuries. As well as the human cost, it also hopes it will reduce the financial burden of alcohol-related crime, which currently costs the NHS £2.7bn a year.

Label approval has come through for the first beer of Sierra Nevada's 30th Anniversary Series, and it starts the series off with a bang. This beer is the collaboration of two of the most infuencial people in the craft beer business that really paved the way for what we have today. -Full Story-

The idea of beer drinkers as all weird beards clutching their CAMRA membership certificates to their anoraked chests is well put to bed these days. British ales are to be enjoyed and cherished, especially in the face of fizzy lager, alcopops and other disgusting drinks. Fullers have brought out the 2008 Gales Old Prize Ale. -Full Story-


Submitted by Beer-Pedia

MANDEVILLE, LA - Red Mountain Entertainment and Blue Deuce Entertainment are proud to announce the inaugural Top of the Hops – North Shore Beer Festival presented by Abita Beer, Saturday, March 20th at the Fontainebleau State Park in Mandeville, Louisiana.
–Full Story-

Mikkeller is now available in Germany at the small but excellent online-store Bierkompass.de. They ship to Germany and other European countries and carry a small, but excellent selection, including some rarities....

Brewer and pubs chain Marston's today reported "robust" Christmas trading but said like-for-like sales slumped nearly 6 per cent during this month. The group, which has 2.200 pubs in England and Wales and brews cask ales including Pedigree and Hobgoblin, said several days of snow impacted on its managed pubs arm, slowing growth to 1.5 per cent for the 16 weeks to last weekend. -Full Story-

Germans may be famous for their beer, but domestic sales of the amber nectar slumped last year to their lowest level since 1989, according to official statistics published on Thursday. Sales of German beer, which include the world-famous Becks, Warsteiner and Bitburger, dropped to just under 2.2 billion gallons in 2009, a fall of 2.8 per cent on the previous year. -Full Story-

Swamp Head Brewery is owned and operated by Luke Kemper. The brewmaster, Craig Birkmaier, brewed the first batch for SHB in April 2009. Since that time they have been diligently working on creating the best beer possible to sell here in Gainesville and its surrounding areas. –Full Story-

For a while I’ve toyed around with the idea of making a “Top XX Rarest Beers in the World” list – but in a rigorous way. I don’t believe anyone’s done so, in part because it would be a numerical nightmare, and in part because it would imply that the person making it had a concerning amount of free time. My last article included bottles with cutout boxing gloves, so that second point’s kinda moot.

You would need two things: a honest valuation or market value for a particular beer, and a way to evaluate that beer’s current availability. The former could take into account trade forum history (what it was traded for; what wasn’t enough), its Ratebeer rankings, number of people listing the beer on their want lists, etc. The latter would have to account for initial bottling numbers (or volume produced, or something!) and include a time-dependent degradation model, i.e. some method of predicting how much of a beer made years ago still exists. Boggles the mind.

And any such list, of course, would be constantly changing.

Havi ng spent the last few years trying to track down many of these elusive beers, I seem to be in a reasonably appropriate position to offer, at the very minimum, an overview of them – of highlighting some of the greatest beers ever produced that you’ll never find at your local bottle shop. Beers that you’ve possibly never heard of. Beers that, should you ever happen to find them, you’ll probably never forget.

Full story here:
Part 1 – The Classics
Part 2

The waiting list is growing and so is the anticipation.It is almost time for the annual and very limited release of Full Sail'sbourbon barrel beer. Top Sail Bourbon Barrel Porter rested in oakbourbon barrels for close to one year will finally be ready to pourearly this February. – Full Story -

"Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy." -- Benjamin Franklin

We take our beer seriously here in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave. Not only is our society a melting pot of cultures from every corner of the Earth, we're a melting pot of beers, too. Those aforementioned cultures brought their beer-making expertise and technology to the New World, and bequeathed it to their posterity. The British and Irish, the French and Spaniards, the German and Austrians, the Belgian and Dutch, the Asians and Africans -- they all contributed to the variety that is American beer today. We've even stolen a few ideas from the ancient Sumerians. - Full Story -

Submitted by Beer-Pedia

A new seasonal beer created by Sharp's Brewery and the Eden Project has been flavoured with some special ingredients - berries picked from bushes at the project's site in Bodelva. -Full Story-

LA-31 Bière Pâle is crafted with imported Belgian malts and American hops and yeast. “This is a distinct new style of beer - no one else in the country makes anything like it,” said brewmater Knott. -Full Story-