Tuesday’s ad is for Rheingold, from 1951. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Rheingold recruited a number of prominent celebrities to do ads for them, all using the tagline: “My beer is Rheingold — the Dry beer!” In this ad, American actress Shelley Winters explains that she can in fact make up her mind when choosing paint colors, and she always chooses the red from cans of Rheingold Extra Dry.
For our 132nd Session, our host will be John Abernathy, who writes about beer at The Brew Site website. For his topic, inspired by the news that BA and AHA founder Charlie Papazian recently announced his retirment, has been thinking about homebrewing and is calling his topic Homebrewing Conversations. Essentially he’s calling for anything about “homebrewing — the good, the bad, your experiences, ideas, (mis)conceptions, or whatever else suits you, as long as it starts the conversation!”
Here are some suggestions Jon has about how you could approach the topic:
- Do you homebrew, and if so, for how long? How did you get started?
- Talk about the best beer you ever brewed at home—and your worst!
- Are you a member of a local homebrew club (or even the AHA)? Tell us about your club.
- Describe your home set up: do you brew all grain? Extract? Brew in a bag? Unusual mashing/sparging/etc. methods?
- Have you ever judged a homebrew competition? Talk about that experience.
- Are you a BJCP or other accredited beer judge? Talk about the process of becoming certified/official.
- Never homebrewed/not a homebrewer? No problem! Consider these questions:
- Do you know any homebrewers?
- Have you ever tasted someone’s home brewed beer?
- Would you ever be interested in learning how to brew? Why or why not?
So by this Friday, February 2, or thereabouts, start your homebrewing conversation. To participate in the February Session, simply leave a comment at the original announcement and leave the URL to your post there, or tag him on Twitter or on Facebook (or even Instagram) with your post, and I’ll round up all the entries early next week.
Monday’s ad is for Rheingold, from 1951. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Rheingold recruited a number of prominent celebrities to do ads for them, all using the tagline: “My beer is Rheingold — the Dry beer!” In this ad, Spanish-American bandleader and native of Spain who spent his formative years in Havana, Cuba, Xavier Cugat says how happy he is, and that he’s always happiest when he comes back from the road to his adopted home of New York City, which also has his favorite beer. And no it’s not Hatuey but Rheingold Extra Dry.
Sunday’s ad is for Rheingold, from 1951. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Rheingold recruited a number of prominent celebrities to do ads for them, all using the tagline: “My beer is Rheingold — the Dry beer!” In this ad, American film and television actress Joan Crawford says she likes to discover up and coming actors when she makes films, just like she discovered Rheingold Extra Dry.
Saturday’s ad is for Rheingold, from 1948. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Rheingold recruited a number of prominent celebrities to do ads for them, all using the tagline: “My beer is Rheingold — the Dry beer!” In this ad, American actor, Farley Granger who says he like one kind of art, while friends often like a different type, but that they all agree on Rheingold Extra Dry beer.
Friday’s ad is for Rheingold, from 1948. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Rheingold recruited a number of prominent celebrities to do ads for them, all using the tagline: “My beer is Rheingold — the Dry beer!” In this ad, American stage, film and television actress Joan Bennett who speculates that a successful or popular movie is one “that more people want to spend an evening enjoying,” which is true for a book, a band or a beer, like Rheingold Extra Dry beer.
This month’s Session was last minute to say the least. I woke up the first Friday of the month, January 5, to people on Twitter asking who was hosting and what the topic of the January Session was. Which for me was a facepalm moment because in the business of the holidays I hadn’t even noticed that no one had signed up to host the Session. So I scrambled to put one together, and tried to come up with something quick and easy.
So in my announcement, I asked three simple questions that could have very short answers, or with explanations a bit longer, that I thought could be fun to ponder. Since time was short, I wanted something that people could answer without thinking too much about it, out of necessity, and just go with their gut. Many people referred to this as an “Emergency Session,” which I guess is true. Anyway, here’s what everybody had to say:
Normally, the round-up gives a short description of each person’s take on the topic, but since I posed three questions, I thought it made more sense to break the round-up into separate round-ups, so to speak.
If you want to read their full answers, and the rationale behind them, here’s who participated in the January Session:
So that’s fourteeen participants, not to shabby considering it was posted last minute, on the day it was due.
For our first question of the new year, what one word, or phrase, do you think should be used to describe beer that you’d like to drink. Craft beer seems to be the most agreed upon currently used term, but many people think it’s losing its usefulness or accuracy in describing it. What should we call it, do you think?
And the answers are:
By and large, a majority felt a return to simply calling all beer just “beer” is the way to go, and I’m in that camp, as well. A close second, others felt “good beer” was a good (pun intended) way of marking the divide, and I have certainly used the term on numerous occasions. It avoids the politics but also conveys a certain fluid meaning that we all sort of understand.
For our second question of the new year, what two breweries do you think are very underrated? Name any two places that don’t get much attention but are quietly brewing great beer day in and day out. And not just one shining example, but everything they brew should be spot on. And ideally, they have a great tap room, good food, or other stellar amenities of some kind. But for whatever reason, they’ve been mostly overlooked. Maybe 2018 should be the year they hit it big. Who are they?
And the answers are:
Not surprisingly, given that we’re all over the map geographically, so were the answers to this one. An interesting mix of breweries to explore.
For our third question of the new year, name three kinds of beer you’d like to see more of. It’s clear hoppy beers, IPAs and all of the other hop-forward beers they’ve spawned, are here to say. There seems to be a few other styles that are popular, too, like saisons, barrel-aged beers, anything imperial and also sour beers of all kinds. But lots of other previously popular beers seem sidelined these days. What three types of beer do you think deserve more attention or at least should be more available for you to enjoy? They can be anything except IPAs, or the other extreme beers. I mean, they could be, I suppose, but I’m hoping for beers that we don’t hear much about or that fewer and fewer breweries are making. What styles should return, re-emerge or be resurrected in 2018?
And the answers are:
Happy to see so many people lamenting the scarcity of Milds, but there were plenty of other kinds of beer represented, and only a single mention of anything super hoppy (which, to be fair, was from outside hoppyland USA) although the more restrained and balanced Best Bitter (or English Pale Ale) did get a few mentions.
If you know of any Session posts I missed, or if I missed yours, please drop me a note at “Jay (.) Brooks (@) gmail (.) com.” Thanks.
According to the Session calendar, the next Session still has no host. If you’d like to host February’s Session, please let me know as soon as you can. Thanks. The date for the next Session will be Groundhog Day, February 2, 2018.
Thursday’s ad is for Rheingold, from 1953. In the early 1950s, Rheingold recruited a number of prominent celebrities to do ads for them, all using the tagline: “My beer is Rheingold — the Dry beer!” In this ad, American singer, actor, film producer, film director and studio head Dick Powell who by this time was working as a director talked about how many things are just better “with someone,” like “sharing a favorite sport” or “a favorite beer” like Rheingold Extra Dry beer.
Wednesday’s ad is for Rheingold, from 1953 and 1958. In the early 1950s, Rheingold recruited a number of prominent celebrities to do ads for them, all using the tagline: “My beer is Rheingold — the Dry beer!” In this first ad from 1958, American actress and singer Vivian Blaine sang the virtues of New York City and especially Broadway, where she is a frequent star of musicals there, before singing about another NYC great, Rheingold Extra Dry beer.
In this first ad from 1953, she talks about “going on record,” first musical records of the shows she’s performed in, and second in professing her admiration for Rheingold Extra Dry beer.
Tuesday’s ad is for Rheingold, from 1952. In the early 1950s, Rheingold recruited a number of prominent celebrities to do ads for them, all using the tagline: “My beer is Rheingold — the Dry beer!” In this ad, which is a second ad that American actor and filmmaker John Wayne did for Rheingold in this campaign series, he claims to be a simple man with simple tastes. His favorites include a fast car, a friendly dog, an informal home and his beer to be Rheingold Extra Dry.
