NYC Beer & Brewery Blog

Any fans of French beer in the Brooklyn area should check out this really cool event happening tomorrow, July 24th. From France Avec Love at Brouwerij Lane will feature disco music selected by DJ Jim “Bock Monsieur” Barnes and three great French beers on tap: Page 24 Barrel-Aged Brune Bretagne Celtika Bourganel Miel de Châtigner It’s all going down at 78 Greenpoint Avenue in Brooklyn tomorrow. Let us know if you plan to stop by! Santé! By Nick Whitmer

A new profile at CNN covers the increasing prevalence of Latino-owned craft breweries in the US. These entrepreneurs are working against the stereotype of Latin beer as being less refined than European styles. And, of course, some of them are right here in New York, like Juan Camilo, founder of Dyckman Beer Company. What an exciting time for beer lovers in New York City! By Gina Ginsberg

Season 2 of Brew Dogs premieres tonight on the Esquire Network. If you haven’t checked it out, the show follows James Watt and Martin Dickie, the founders of BrewDog, as they travel the US, exploring local beer culture and using it to inspire their own brews. BrewDog is Scotland’s largest craft brewery, and has won a number of international awards for its excellent and innovative beers since its founding in 2007. The show is a must-watch for craft beer fans. Check it out on the Esquire Network tonight at 9/8c. By Nick Whitmer

Very interesting article from The New York Times about yeast. Beer is said to pair better with food than wine. The complexity of flavors that beer yeast generates has a lot to do with that. Here’s a blurb from the article: “After thousands of years of unwitting domestication, brewing yeasts — the microorganisms that ferment a brewer’s tepid slop of grain, water and hops into beer — are as diverse as the beer they make. And now two research teams, from White Labs and a Belgian genetics laboratory, are mapping out their sprawling genealogy, creating the first genetic family tree for brewing yeasts and the beers they make. To understand why beer varies in taste, you need to know its yeasts. William Herkewitz The laboratories have sequenced the DNA of more than 240 strains of brewing yeasts from around the…

We’re so stoked about this! Flag Ship Brewing Co. in Staten Island is open, and the New York Times did a great piece on them. Here’s a blurb: As the craft-beer festival wore on and beer flowed, guests offered uninhibited opinions on Staten Island’s arrival in the community. Justin McNeil, a Staten Islander, paused at the Flagship table to sample the beer. “This is going to be the Brooklyn Brewery of Staten Island,” he said with the unassailable logic that can emerge after several hours at a craft-beer fest. “Besides our parks and the Wu-Tang Clan,” he added, “we don’t have anything.” Sam Forman, 24, saw irony in the brewery’s branding. “I’m not shocked Staten Island is the last to enter the craft beer market,” Mr. Forman said. “I’m from Manhattan. I carry all those prejudices.” “I think for them…

We visited Other Half Brewery this week in Red Hook, Brooklyn. Matt and Sam were nice enough to show us around and let us sample a few of their beers. If you’re an IPA fan, do yourself a favor and get your hands on some Other Half brews. The All Green Everything Triple IPA and Green Diamonds Imperial IPA were absolutely delightful! They distribute their beer to over 150 bars in the New York City Area, including Birreria, who always have a few of their beers on tap. Also, keep and eye out for their Red Wine Barrel-Aged Imperial Stout coming very soon. Sam(pictured above) explained that their name came from the famous book How The Other Half Lives, by Jacob Riis. The name alludes to the gritty little guys that make up the other half of the brewing industry….

Just in time for summer, Birreria released their new seasonal brew – The Primavera. I talked with Fred Avila, the brewer at Birreria, about the new brew and here is what he had to say, “The Primavera, which is Italian for “Spring”, is our take on a Belgian Wit. It’s brewed with 60 lbs of blood oranges, coriander, lavender, and buckwheat. What makes this brew special for all the beer geeks out there is that I brewed it with Dogfish’s Brewmaster Tim Hawn. It clocks in it at 5% abv.” I couldn’t resist having the other two casks brewed on the beautiful rooftop beer garden located in the heart of the Flatiron District. I enjoyed a flight of a few of Birreria’s great beers. The first beer was the Wanda, an English mild ale brewed with smoked Italian Chestnuts. The…