Beer Birthday: Masaharu Morimoto

May 26, 2025 By Jay Brooks Leave a Comment

Today is the 68th birthday of Masaharu Morimoto, who “is a Japanese chef, best known as an Iron Chef on the Japanese TV cooking show Iron Chef and its spinoff Iron Chef America.”

He’s also collaborated with Rogue Ales to create a line of beers known as “The Signature Series.” They were launched in the Spring of 2003.

The Pan Asian restaurant is also celebrating Spring by featuring a Morimoto Sakura beer, $9 that is a cherry blossom Kolsch exclusively brewed at Winter Garden-based Crooked Can Brewery and available for a limited time. The brewers at Crooked Can used imported Sakura (cherry blossoms) to dry hop their award-winning Kolsch to create this specialty brew.

This is his biography from the Food Network:

Born in Hiroshima, Japan, Iron Chef Japanese Masaharu Morimoto trained in a sushi restaurant before moving to the U.S. in 1985 at the age of 30. After working in several restaurants, he joined the highly acclaimed Nobu restaurant in New York City.
Morimoto polished his craft in New York’s melting pot and became a state-of-the-art world chef. His cutting-edge cuisine attracted the attention of Iron Chef producers, who invited him to become a Japanese Iron Chef. His skill, which outshines the trademark diamond stud in his left ear, has been recognized all around the world. While his cooking has Japanese roots, it’s actually “global cooking” for the 21st century. His unique fusion cuisine takes advantage of Japanese color combinations and aromas and uses Chinese spices and simple Italian ingredients, while maintaining a refined French style of presentation.
“Cooking is entertainment,” proclaims the revolutionary. Morimoto’s attitude is evident in his dishes, which retain a sense of fun and a bit of spice.
Morimoto opened his own restaurant, Morimoto, in Philadelphia in 2002 and a second one in New York City in 2006.

Historic Beer Birthday: William Copeland

January 10, 2025 By Jay Brooks

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Today is the birthday of William Copeland (January 10, 1834-February 11, 1902). He “was a Norwegian-American brewer. In 1869 he established the Spring Valley Brewery in Yamate, Yokohama, Japan. Spring Valley Brewery was one of Japan’s first beer breweries, and in 1907 became the founding production facility of Kirin Brewery Company, one of Japan’s largest domestic beer producers.”

Here’s his basic biography, from his Wikipedia page:

Copeland was born Johan Martinius Thoresen in Arendal in Norway. In the 1840s, Copeland worked for five years as an apprentice to a German brewmaster a few blocks from his home before immigrating to the United States and changing his name to William Copeland.

Moving to Yokohama, Japan in 1864, Copeland first worked in the dairy business and then set himself up as a brewer in 1869 with the Spring Valley Brewery, which was located at the site of a natural spring next to the Amanuma Pond below the Yamate foreign residential neighborhood, where he dug a 210-meter cave into the side of a hill and used its low fixed temperature to help the beer mature. After Louis Pasteur invented pasteurization, Copeland was quick to adopt the new technique in his factory. Copeland produced three varieties of beer: a lager beer, a Bavarian beer, and a Bavarian Bock beer. His beer was principally sold in casks to local Yokohama taverns with a small amount of bottled beer being made available to foreign residents in Yokohama, and then was shipped to Tokyo and Nagasaki. He went back to Norway and married Anne Kristine Olsen in 1872. They lived in Japan but she became sick and died seven years later. Although Copeland showed talent as a beer brewer, he was a poor manager, and in 1884 Spring Valley Brewery was put up for public auction.

With the assistance of Scottish merchant Thomas Blake Glover, the Spring Valley Brewery was sold in early 1885 to a group of Japanese investors and renamed The Japan Brewery. German brewmaster Hermann Heckert was hired to oversee production. Glover was also instrumental in establishing a sales agency contract with Meidi-ya for the relaunched brewery, Kirin Beer, which was launched in May 1888.

William Copeland’s grave, maintained by Kirin Brewery Company, is located in the Foreigner’s Cemetery in Yamate, Yokohama. The site of the former Spring Valley Brewery is now occupied by Kitagata Elementary School. Monuments and water wells visible at the edge of the school grounds attest to the site’s history.

The tourist website Japan Travel has an article, Yokohama Beer Pub, Spring Valley, which gives some additional details about Copeland:

Copeland was born in Arendal Norway in 1834. His original name was Johan Bartinius Thoresen. There was a beer brewery near his house and he was apprenticed to the brewery for five years. After working there, he immigrated to America and changed his name to William Copeland. In 1864 he came to Japan and invested in some companies for a few years. He saved some money and eventually established his own beer brewery, Spring Valley Brewery, in 1870. He came up with various ideas on how to brew delicious beer; He dug a 210-meter cave into the side of a hill and used its low fixed temperature to help the beer mature. After Pasteur invented pasteurization, Copeland soon adopted the new technique in his factory. His beer rose in popularity among foreign residents in Yokohama and then was shipped to Tokyo and Nagasaki as well. He went back to Norway and married Anne Kristine Olsen in 1872. They lived in Japan but she became sick and died seven years later. Although Copeland showed talent as a beer brewer, he wasn’t a good manager. In 1884 Spring Valley Brewery was put up for public auction.
Kirin took over Copeland’s brewery and eventually expanded the business worldwide. The place where Spring Valley Brewery used to stand is now called Kirin-en Park. There is a big monument there to commemorate the brewery.
Copeland remarried a Japanese woman, Umeko Katsumata, in 1889 and took trips to Hawaii and then Guatemala, trying to establish new businesses but chronic heart disease and arthritis, as well as financial difficulties, prevented him from doing so. Finally the couple came back to Yokohama in January 1902, and Copeland passed away the following month at the age of 68.
By the way, his wife Umeko was the second daughter of the proprietors of Ise-ya—a famous, long-established inn in Hakone’s Ashino-yu district. These days, Ise-ya is called Kakumei-kan and is still doing very well.

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William, his Japanese wife Umeko and her parents.

In 2014, the Kirin Brewery reopened a new Spring Valley Brewery as a brewpub, and there are currently two locations, one in Tokyo and another in Yokohama, which is near where the original brewery was built.

The new Spring Valley Brewery website has this history of Our Brewer’s Passion:

150 years ago, one beer brewer stepped foot on a newly opened seaport of Yokohama. His name William Copeland, a Norwegian-born American, founded the Spring Valley Brewery in Yokohama located far from his homeland.
During the time, Japan was in the midst of cultural enlightenment and supplies of ingredients and equipment for brewing beer was scarce. However, he exercised his ingenuity to overcome these struggles by installing a naturally powered water wheel to mill malt and prepared wort during the winter season to keep it cool.
His beer attracted the interest of many foreigners who lived in Yokohama’s foreign settlement, which eventually caught on to the Japanese locals. This popularity made Spring Valley Brewery become the first brewery in Japan to achieve commercial success.
Copeland devoted his life to his passion for beer, not just as a brewer, but also by making Japan’s first beer garden in his own yard, later passed down to Japan Brewery, the forerunner of Kirin Brewery.
Brewers who studied under Copeland found their own paths to cultivate the production of domestic beer, thus often, William Copeland is referred to as the father of Japanese beer.

Beer In Ads #3672: Boog Powell & Koichi Numazawa For Miller Lite

March 20, 2021 By Jay Brooks

Saturday’s ad is for “Miller Lite,” from 1985. This ad was made for the Miller Brewing Co., and was part of their long-running “Tastes Great!…Less Filling!” advertising campaign. It was created in 1973 by the McCann-Erickson Worldwide ad agency and was ranked by Advertising Age magazine as the eighth best advertising campaign in history. They were primarily television commercials but they did create print ads to support the TV spots. They began with a trend of using former athletes along with a few notable celebrities that continued throughout the campaign. This one features American former professional baseball player Boog Powell, who was a first baseman and left fielder from 1961 through 1977, most notably as a member of the Baltimore Orioles dynasty that won four American League pennants and two World Series championships between 1966 and 1971 and former Japanese baseball great Koichi Numazawa.

Beer In Ads #2943: Suntory Beer

March 24, 2019 By Jay Brooks

Sunday’s ad is for Suntory Beer, from 1985. From the late 1800s until the 1960s, poster art really came into its own, and in Europe a lot of really cool posters, many of them for breweries, were produced. Swiss artist Herbert Leupin did a series of posters promoting beer by both the Swiss Breweries’ Association and the German Brewers Association. that began in the 1950s. He also later did work for specific breweries, such as Japan’s Suntory Beer.

Sapporo Buys Anchor Brewing

August 3, 2017 By Jay Brooks

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This morning Anchor Brewing and Sapporo anounced that Sapporo Holdings Limited was acquiring all of the equity interest in Anchor Brewing Company, and that they’ll take over at the end of the month, August 31. As large as the beer industry is, it’s also a small community where everybody knows everybody, and everybody talks. As a result, there are few secrets. This was one of those rumors that has been circulating around the beer world for months. It’s a rumor everybody was talking about but no one could confirm, though no one was denying it either. Anchor’s press release holds back the amount of the sale, but the news release from Sapporo gives the transaction as $85 million, which seems like a bargain. Sapporo bought only the brewery; Anchor’s distillery business will be spun off into a separate company.

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Here’s Anchor’s press release:

San Francisco, CA (August 3, 2017) – Anchor Brewing Company announces that Sapporo Holdings Limited will be acquiring the company with plans to continue Anchor’s traditions and legacy in San Francisco while growing the brand globally. Anchor Brewing Company’s flagship beer, Anchor Steam® Beer, has been brewed in San Francisco since 1896. Sapporo has a long-standing history in Japan dating back to 1876 and an appreciation for tradition, craftsmanship and provenance which are all fundamental tenets of Anchor.
“Sapporo shares our values and appreciates our unique, time-honored approach to brewing,” said Keith Greggor, Anchor Brewing Co-Owner. “With both a long-term vision and the resources to realize it, Sapporo will keep brewing Anchor’s beers in San Francisco while expanding to new markets worldwide.”
“Anchor Steam Beer is a San Francisco original, inspiring a new generation of brewers and beer lovers around the world,” said Masaki Oga, President and Representative Director, Sapporo Holdings LTD. “Both companies share a brewing philosophy backed by long histories and this transaction enables both Sapporo Group’s US business and Anchor Brewing Company’s global business to make a further leap forward.”
More than 50 years ago, Anchor started the modern craft beer movement with a series of innovations. Anchor brewed the first post-prohibition Porter, ignited todays IPA boom when it introduced dry-hopping and the cascade hop and created the industry’s first seasonal beers. Since then, the emergence of thousands of craft breweries within the United States and around the world has created the need for scale and synergies to compete in a growing global market for craft beer.
Anchor’s experienced management team will continue to run the business but now benefit from superior financing and additional resources. Sapporo is committed to preserving and maintaining Anchor’s operations in San Francisco, including the historic Potrero Hill brewery. Sapporo will invest in the brewery to improve production efficiencies and will strengthen all aspects of management and production to ensure the highest quality of beer is consistently delivered. In addition, Sapporo is fully supportive of Anchor’s new public taproom concept that will be opening soon. Sapporo will also export Anchor to new international markets using its global distribution resources.
The transaction is expected to close on August 31st; subject to customary closing conditions. Terms are not disclosed. Anchor Distilling Company is not part of this transaction and will now become a fully independent company in its own right.
Sapporo first made its way to America in 1964. In 1984, SAPPORO U.S.A., INC. was founded to help preserve our high standard of quality throughout the country. Today, Sapporo stands alone as the best-selling Asian Beer in the United States for more than 30 years.

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Sapporo’s announcement on their website is more perfunctory and all-business, but in some ways more illuminating:

Sapporo Holdings Limited (hereinafter “Sapporo Holdings”) will acquire all of the equity interest of Anchor Brewing Company (California, US; hereinafter “Anchor”).
The Sapporo Group plans to further expand its US beer business by adding Anchor, a prominent beer manufacturer which produces the leading brand “Anchor Steam® Beer,” to its group.
1. Equity transfer agreement
Sapporo Holdings will enter into an equity transfer agreement with Anchor’s parent company Anchor Brewers and Distillers, LLC (hereinafter “ABD”). The transaction will be conducted through Sapporo Holdings’ subsidiary, to be established for the purpose of entering into the agreement. Sapporo will obtain all of ABD’s equity interest in Anchor which will join its group companies.
Execution date of agreement: August 3, 2017 (Thursday)
Equity transfer date: August 31, 2017 (Thursday)
2. Rationale behind Agreement
Last year, the Sapporo Group formulated the new Long-Term Management Vision “SPEED 150” through 2026, the year marking the Group’s 150th anniversary since its founding. The vision set forth in Speed 150 is for the Sapporo Group to be a company with highly unique brands in the fields of “Alcoholic Beverages,” “Food,” and “Soft Drinks” around the world.
Regarding its “Promote Global Business Expansion” policy, a key driver of its group growth strategy, Sapporo Group is pushing forward a distinctive plan that designates North America its business base and the rapidly growing “Southeast Asian” region as its highest-priority markets. In the US where the SAPPORO brand has maintained its position as the No. 1 Asian beer in the country over 30 years, the Group has been considering expanding its beer business through the acquisition of a new brand as well as further growing the SAPPORO brand.
Anchor is a prominent and historic US beer producer founded in 1896 in San Francisco. “Anchor Steam Beer,” its flagship brand, is said to be an icon that ignited the current craft beer boom in the US. Armed with its strong brand power primarily in San Francisco, where it is based, as well as other areas across the US, it has been enjoyed by countless beer lovers throughout the years.
The addition of Anchor’s strong brand power and network to the Sapporo Group’s US beer business portfolio through the conclusion of this agreement is expected to accelerate its speed of growth in the US.
3. About Anchor
Name: Anchor Brewing Company, LLC (beer manufacturing and sales)
Location: 1705 Mariposa Street, San Francisco, California, USA
Year founded: 1896
Representative: CEO Matt Davenport
Num. of employees: 160 (as of December 2016)
Production plant: One plant (San Francisco, California state)
Sales volume Approximate: 1.75 million cases (equivalent to 355ml × 24 bottles in 2016)
Annual sales Approximate: 33 million U.S. dollars (about ¥3.7 billion in fiscal 12/2016)
(Note 1) Sapporo Holdings acquired Anchor Brewing Company’s “equity” instead of its shares due to the fact that the latter is a limited liability company.

This is, of course, big news, especially locally. The Chronicle got the exclusive on the story because Fritz Maytag had a good relationship with his local paper and after the Griffon Group bought Anchor they continued that tradition. So my newspaper group, like everyone else, was a little behind, and while their reporters are working on the story itself, they asked me to write an analysis of what the sale means for beer lovers, written for a mainstream audience, so please forgive the explanations of everyday things known by most beer aficionados. After an introduction similar to the one that began this post, here’s my initial thoughts on the acquisition of Anchor:

We know why Sapporo wanted Anchor. Their 150th anniversary is coming in 2026, and they’ve made it policy “to be a company with highly unique brands in the fields of ‘Alcoholic Beverages,’ ‘Food,’ and ‘Soft Drinks’ around the world.” They call it “Speed 150,” or the “Promote Global Business Expansion” policy. For the last thirty years, Sapporo has been the number one beer in the Asian market, but they have plans to expand worldwide through the acquisition of new brands. For example, in 2006, Sapporo bought the third-largest brewer in Canada, Sleeman Breweries.
Sapporo considered Anchor a prime target, characterizing the brewery as “a prominent and historic US beer producer founded in 1896 in San Francisco. ‘Anchor Steam Beer,’ its flagship brand, is said to be an icon that ignited the current craft beer boom in the US. Armed with its strong brand power primarily in San Francisco, where it is based, as well as other areas across the US, it has been enjoyed by countless beer lovers throughout the years.”
So what about Anchor? Why were they interested in being part of Sapporo? According to the rumors, Anchor’s been looking for funding to help fuel their growth for at least a year, as sales faltered somewhat in recent years. They’ve remained a strong brand, but the many new beers they’ve been releasing haven’t all done as well as hoped, and it’s been widely rumored that capacity has been down. Capacity is the maximum amount of beer a brewery can brew in a year, and the closer to 100% a brewery is, the more profitable they are. According to Anchor’s president, Keith Greggor, they’re currently operating at between 55 and 60 percent. The grand Pier 48 plan to build a new brewery and event space near AT&T Park has been on hold for a while now, and it’s unclear if that will change. What will change is Anchor will have access to expansion money and other resources that a company as large as Sapporo can make available for them. For example, they’ve already announced a new public taproom on De Haro St., across the street from the existing brewery will go forward as planned.
As is almost always the case, initially nothing will change at Anchor Brewing. None of the beers will change, they’ll continue to brew at their location on Potrero Hill and the current management team will remain at the helm. When Fritz Maytag sold Anchor to the Griffin Group in 2010, very little changed initially, though many hardcore beer lovers were concerned. As the beer industry is going through a period of time where breweries being bought by other breweries or financial groups is becoming commonplace, these deals are often met with a backlash. After an announced sale, many vow to no longer drink beer from the acquired brewery. It was particularly strong when Anheuser-Busch InBev bought 10 Barrel Brewing, Golden Road Brewing and several others recently or when Constellation Brands bought Ballast Point.
Most beer drinkers will be unaffected. Most don’t follow the beer industry’s news at all, and just buy the beer they like to drink. That’s what recent history has shown. There’s a small subset of all craft beer drinkers who really do follow the beer news, and care deeply about whether or not the brewery is independent. They’re often vicious on social media and once a brewery has “sold out,” they become dead to them. But in almost every case, the new markets and increased distribution that resulted from the acquisition more than makes up for losing their business and sales overall increase, often dramatically.
The trade association for craft breweries — The Brewers Association — has been promoting the value of independent breweries for many years, and rewrote their definition of a “craft brewery” in part to reflect that but also to determine who can be a member. They also recently rolled out an “Independent Craft Beer Seal” that members can put on their labels to indicate that they’re not owned by another company (or at least not more than 25 percent).
Being bought by Sapporo will make Anchor no longer eligible to be a member of the Brewers Association, which is particularly strange since Anchor Brewery is credited with starting the entire craft beer movement that resulted in the conditions that led to a trade group representing small brewers being viable. So as the days and weeks unfold, it will be interesting to see how hardcore beer lovers react. So far this morning, after the announcement, reactions have been fairly tame, at least compared to previous sales. Maybe we’re getting used to these things. They’ve definitely become part of the maturing of the craft beer industry, and we’ll continue to see many more in the coming years. This is simply part of the ups and downs of any industry.
But many beer lovers tend to be more emotional and feel an attachment to their favorite brewery, much more so than seems to happen in other businesses. Many breweries, in addition to their beer, sell a brand lifestyle that’s a part of the brand’s identity. Small brewers regularly promote themselves as being mavericks, rebels, independent or just different as a way of distinguishing themselves from the larger breweries. And it often works too well, so much so that their fans sometimes feel betrayed when they reveal themselves to have been a savvy business all along. I think with Anchor Brewery, who’s been around since 1896, they’ll be less of a backlash than in some of the more recent high profile sales. Anchor, and Fritz Maytag, re-invented itself in 1965 and sparked a revolution in beer-making. No one can take that away from them as they start the next chapter of their journey. As long as I can still get a fresh Liberty Ale the next time I stop by the brewery, everything will be fine.

anchor-liberty-label

As I’m sure many people are wondering, I asked Anchor’s press contact whether or not Fritz was consulted — not that they’d have to, of course — but just as a courtesy, and if so, what his thoughts were. As far as I can tell, I don’t think they did talk to him (again, not that they had to at all) and this was the response I got:

We think they would recognize the difficult decision we had to make and would approve of the care and diligence we have made in the route chosen. This acquisition and investment insures that Anchor will be able to continue its time-honored brewing tradition in San Francisco for a long time, which was Fritz’s goal when he sold the brewery.

Asahi Buys Grolsch, Peroni & Meantime

April 19, 2016 By Jay Brooks

asahi grolsch peroni
Business Insider is reporting that Anheuser-Busch InBev, who’s in the process of closing the deal for SABMiller, agreed to sell off Grolsh, Peroni and Meantime Brewing, which is part of SABMiller’s portfolio, most likely in order to smooth the regulatory approvals necessary to close the transaction. In fact, this deal in contingent on the other one, so that if the ABI/SABMiller deals fall apart, then this one won’t go through either and they’ll remain part of SABMiller.

SABMiller posted a short press release today:

SABMiller plc (“SABMiller”) has been informed by Anheuser Busch InBev SA/NV (“AB InBev”) that following its announcement on 10 February, it has accepted the binding offer from Asahi Group Holdings, Ltd (“Asahi”) to acquire certain of SABMiller’s European premium brands and their related businesses (excluding certain US rights), following completion of the relevant employee information and consultation processes applicable to the sale of these brands and businesses.
The acquisition by Asahi of these premium brands and related businesses (comprised of the Peroni, Grolsch and Meantime brand families and related businesses in Italy, the Netherlands, the UK and internationally (“the Business”)) is conditional on the successful closing of the recommended acquisition of SABMiller by AB InBev as announced on 11 November 2015, which itself contains certain regulatory pre-conditions and conditions, and the approval by the European Commission of Asahi as a purchaser of the Business.

SABMiller-minus-GMP

Asahi Buys Mountain Goat

September 30, 2015 By Jay Brooks

mountain-goat-red asahi
So larger breweries buying smaller ones is not confined to the U.S., or even the Western Hemisphere. Australia’s Mountain Goat Beer announced on “Monday that Asahi Holdings (Australia) had taken a 100 per cent ownership stake in the company.” Co-founders Dave Bonighton and Cam Hines will be staying on although an Asahi employee, Matt Grix, has been “named as the new Mountain Goat general manager,” but they also added that “Mountain Goat will continue to operate as a stand-alone business.”

I first met Dave Bonighton either judging in Japan or in the U.S. at the World Beer Cup, although we also judged together in Australia last year at the AIBA. Dave’s a great guy and his beers are some of the best I’ve had from Australia.

The Australian magazine Beer & Brewer has the full story.

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Mountain Goat co-founder and brewmaster Dave Bonighton.

Patent No. 0472298B1: Keg For Draft Beer

September 13, 2015 By Jay Brooks

patent-logo
Today in 1995, US Patent 0472298 B1 was issued, an invention of Yutaka Fujimoto, Takaaki Furuhashi, Katsuoki Kawanishi, and Ryo Sakazume, assigned to Sapporo Breweries Limited, for their “Keg For Draft Beer.” There’s no Abstract, although in the description it includes this summary:

A keg for a liquid to facilitate cooling of the liquid retained in the keg and to keep the temperature of the cooled liquid in the keg, comprising:
a keg body for retaining the liquid therein and having an upper face (3), a lower face (5), a side face (4) and a mouth piece (2) for providing the liquid into the keg body and ejecting the liquid therefrom, said keg body being formed of a keg inner cylinder (1) for constituting a container for the liquid and a keg outer cylinder (6), said keg inner and outer cylinders being laminated together to form a space and air being removed from the space to form a vacuum adiabatic layer (VL) therebetween; characterized in that the keg outer cylinder (6) substantially covers the keg inner cylinder (1) except one of the upper and lower fades (3, 5) of the keg body, and in that a cooling face (Cz) is formed on said one of the upper and lower faces (3, 5) of the keg body where the inner cylinder (1) is not covered so that the liquid inside the inner cylinder (1) can be cooled through the cooling face and the temperature of the liquid inside the inner cylinder is kept by the adiabatic layer defined between the inner and outer cylinders.