IN THE LAST FEW YEARS, WE’VE WITNESSED AN EXPLOSION of new beer styles. Where sours were once obscure, today American wild ales and their fruited variants are the darlings of craft beer. Where session IPAs initially had us scratching our heads (How are they different from pale ales? Are they supposed to be less alcoholic or less bitter than IPAs, or both?), they’ve now distinguished themselves as one of the most popular beer styles on shelves. But 2016 was different: Unlike in years during which we celebrated wholly new styles, this time around we relished in a deepening and broadening of the ..read more

50. Cast Out Crux Fermentation Project (Bend, Oregon) ABV: 7.6% It’d be tough to select a more perfect beer to kick off our top 50, as Cast Out represents the best of several worlds. It’s heavy on the alcohol (7.6% is right near the 8% cutoff, above which we’d classify it as an imperial IPA) but drinks like a session beer. It’s heavily hopped with Galaxy, an in-vogue Australian hop that here contributes tropical melon and pineapple at first whiff, then sweet tangerine underlined by green grass and sweaty onion. It’s even illustrative of another growing trend among brewers: trademark issue ..read more

THE 50 BEST IPAS IN AMERICA – THE TOP 25 25. General Braddock’s IPA The Brew Gentlemen (Braddock, Pennsylvania) ABV: 6.8% The Brew Gentlemen get a lot of hype for their New England-style hoppy ales, and every bit of it is warranted. We seriously enjoyed Overgrowth, the brewery’s springtime pale ale, and the General here is nearly as impressive. Hugely aromatic, the beer’s bouquet blends pineapple, Orange Julius and a hint of chopped garlic, while smooth sips follow up tangerine zest with pineapple and chewy wheat dough at the sweetish swallow. The light-as-a-feather body smooths the ..read more

In 2009, when we first published our annual list of the year’s best beers, it was clearly a simpler time. Witbiers, Russian imperial stouts and newfangled American IPAs peppered the list. Fast-forward to 2014, and the landscape would seem downright alien to anyone who missed out on the last half-decade. This year’s list is all about brewing imagination, from Trinity’s Easy Swinger, a wine-barrel-aged Brettanomyces session IPA to Funky Buddha’s Maple Bacon Coffee Porter, inspired by breakfast at a roadside greasy spoon. We found 25 packaged beers, all new (or newly available) since last winter ..read more

  Jess Suworoff for DRAFT Legit technological advancement, or fancy-sounding gimmick? When breweries tout some new ingredient or process, I’ll admit I’m skeptical. (Blame vortex bottles and color-changing cans for my raised eyebrow.) So what are we to make of  estimable Sierra Nevada’s Hop Hunter, an IPA that debuted earlier this year and touts its “farm-distilled hop oil?” I asked Tom Nielsen, the brewery’s hop guru and scientist who helped develop the new hop-extracting process  (technically, he’s the manager of raw material development and quality). He explain ..read more

  Dan Suarez; photo courtesy of Suarez Family Brewery Suarez Family Brewery has been in planning for years. Not many people know that, though; husband-and-wife duo Dan Suarez and Taylor Cocalis Suarez have pushed back the brewery’s opening date thanks to equipment mishaps, and it’s a select group of tapped-in people who would notice. (“That’s what happens when you have a brewery three years in the making. You’re sort of stringing people along,” Taylor says.) Now that the brewery finally and officially opened its doors to the public last Saturday, though, wor ..read more

Join us for a weeklong beer lover’s dream trip as we cruise along the canals and waterways of Belgium & France in our private canal cruiser, complete with our own first class private chef! Unpack only once, then relax and enjoy a one of a kind beer tour. Taste some of Belgium and France’s world renowned beers, frites and chocolates; visit and taste the famous Trappist beers from Westvleteren and Chimay, see some unique & world class breweries, such as St. Bernardus and Rodenbach. Savor some authentic French Biere de Garde, Farmhouse Ales and some styles that you may not have expected t ..read more

Let your inner six-year-old rejoice: From the astounding popularity of Milk Bar chain’s cereal milk-flavored fro-yo, shakes, cream soda and cookies to the ever-growing number of actual restaurants that serve nothing but bowls of cereal, Saturday mornings are back, baby. Get your portion of a balanced breakfast with these six beers made with and designed to taste like breakfast cereal. It is the most important meal of the day, after all. Somerville Saturday MorningPeople freaked when Massachusetts-based Somerville launched this Belgian tripel with Cap’n Crunch Crunch Berries in March, and it’s ..read more

You can’t really call yourself the Beer Runner if you don’t run the beer mile from time to time. But my last beer mile adventure was six years ago. I was way overdue. For the uninitiated, an official beer mile race is four quarter-mile laps with four full-sized beers interspersed between each lap. Over time, it has become an underground running and beer-drinking phenomenon. Today there’s even a site devoted to chronicling beer mile performances all over the world at http://www.beermile.com. My baptism by beer mile came courtesy of a Wisconsin chapter of the Hash House Harriers, the ..read more

  Left to right: Bartender at Snekutis Stepono // Jovaru Alus brewer Aldona Udriene // Brewers at Pakruojo Dvaras // Photos by Joe Stange Aldona Udriene sat at her dining room table near a painted portrait of herself. As the undisputed queen of Lithuanian farmhouse brewing, she is allowed to have a painting of herself. She offered us glass after glass of a strong, spiced brandy that was distilled from Jovaru, the beer she brews. If we finished one, another would appear. My guide had warned me about the local etiquette: “You have to drink, because if you do not drink, it means you hate he ..read more