I’m not sure where the source data comes from, but the latest issue of Playboy — in the Raw Data section — had an interesting Top 10 list of what they referred to as the “Tipsiest Towns in the U.S.” The list is “based on the average number of alcoholic drinks consumed per person.”
Zymurgy magazine, which is published by the American Homebrewers Association for its members, today released the results of their latest poll, asking their readers to “readers to send us a list of their 20 favorite beers. The only rule [was] that the beer [had] to be commercially available somewhere in the United States. A record number of votes were cast this year, with 1,192 different beers from 450 breweries represented in the poll.” So while the name of the poll is 2010 Zymurgy Best Beers In America, the list does include a few imported beers that are sold in the U.S.
For the second year in a row, Russian River’s Pliny the Elder took the top spot.
That’s the top 25, but the top 50 can bee seen at Zymurgy’s press release.
They also picked the top 25 favorite breweries, of which Rahr & Sons Brewing Co. of Fort Worth, Texas was number one and they “tabulated which breweries had the most brands in the voting. That honor went to Boston Beer Co. with 22 of its Samuel Adams brews getting votes. Dogfish Head was close behind with 20 brands.” You can also see the full list of Beer Portfolios and Favorite Breweries at the American Homebrewers Association website.
While I realize that I’m Mr. Negative and always see the pint glass as half empty almost every time craft beer is featured on mainstream television, I just can’t jump for joy when there’s so little respect paid to beer by the media and so much misinformation. If I have to be the lone voice in the wilderness, so be it. The GQ Top 50 Beer List that the recently released — and which I initially applauded for the most part — has morphed into something else entirely for television. In print, it was merely 50 Beers To Try Right Now but on CBS it has transformed into 50 Beers to Try Before You Die, a very different list indeed. I liked the idea of just suggesting some great beer to try, but making it a “bucket list” gives it too much gravity, too much pressure for the choices to be just right. Plus there’s the whole copyright issue. I recently contributed to a book, 1001 Beers You Must Try Before You Die, and this seems like a pretty blatant ripoff by CBS. It’s not really copyright infringement, I realize, it just seems like a bad idea given how good the original framing of the list had been. But give the video with host Harry Smith and GQ’s style editor Adam Rapoport a look.
Okay, it started out with the copyright infringing re-named list, which is just plain odd since the actual list they’re talking about is not beer to try before you die. Then, they can’t help but mention that it’s too early to drink and snigger about it like school children. What happened to being professional? Then there’s the horror of seeing an Allagash White with a lemon and orange wedge in the glass, which GQ’s Rapoport characterizes as a wheat or weiss beer, even though it’s a wit beer. With the second beer, Ommegang, the host remarks, surprised or incredulous. “Look at this, it even has a cork!” OMG, a cork. Alert the media. Oh, wait, he is the media. You’d think Harry Smith had never seen a beer with a cork before the way he overreacts. Then there’s his reaction to the glass. “Wow, look at the beer glass!” Rapoport: “It’s like a wine glass.” Harry Smith: “Almost.” Then he references tasting with Michael Jackson several years before and talks about how he tasted, calling it “like drinking wine, you do the nose….” Geez, I’m so tired of this analogy, as if wine holds the patent on how to taste liquids. You don’t think that absolutely every drink that’s tasted critically — be it wine, beer, whisky, cocktails, coffee, tea, whatever — is tasted by smelling it and tasting it in virtually the exact same way. Are their nuanced differences? Probably, but not enough to matter and the point is anytime someone tries to drink a beer by some other method than swilling it at a tailgate party, it’s compared to how wine is tasted because apparently the mainstream media seriously lacks any imagination.
Moving on to Dale’s Pale Ale, Rapoport tells us that hops cause bitterness … and sourness? But apart from beers made sour on purpose from the specific yeast used, sour or acedic flavors are almost always a defect, usually a bacterial infection. Can there be a sour undertone from certain varieties of hops? Maybe, but it’s usually in combination with other factors and it’s certainly not the second thing you think of when listing hops’ effects on beer. Next up is Rodenbach Grand Cru, in the “fancy bottle” and then Anchor Steam Beer. Rapoport at this point claims he loves Budweiser, but says there’s “a role beyond Budweiser,” also stating that Anchor Steam is a lager. And while California Commons do use a lager yeast, nothing else about brewing one is like a typical lager, or anywhere close to a Budweiser or any other adjunct macro lager. Most people, if designating them at all, would place them in a hybrid category. They continue to laugh and joke their way through Samuel Smith Oatmeal Stout. Now the last time I ranted about one of these shows, somebody commented that he wanted them to have fun and not be too serious. Fun, yes, I’m all for that, but laughing at the beer they’re tasting and acting immature is just not that fun to me. Couple that with the misinformation, and I’m not entirely convinced these shows do more good than harm for craft beer. Yes, the exposure is good, but it always seems to be at a steep price.
Finally, mainstream magazines are learning. A number of them, usually men’s magazines, publish an annual list of their picks for good beers, whether global or just American, and varying in the number on the list. But they go wrong by trying to call their lists the “top,” “best” or some similar hyperbole. With such a subjective sensation as taste, getting people to ever agree on a list is a fool’s errand, and ends up pissing people off whose favorite wasn’t included or wasn’t high enough on the list. Personally, I love lists but have found they can be dangerous enterprises.
GQ published one today they’re calling I’d Tap That! 50 Beers to Try Right Now. And despite the awkward “I’d tap that” beginning (why do mainstream beer stories always start with a bad pun?) I think they’re taking the right approach. Just presenting 50 beers they think are worth trying to an audience who may not be familiar with many of them is, I think, the way to go. There’s no rankings, no suggestion that these are the beers, or that they’re better than all the rest. They’re just suggestions. And there are some pretty good ones, too. Of course, there are some I wouldn’t have put on the list, but that’s the nature of these lists.
Then there are five more “bonus beers” under the sub-heading “In Defense of Bodega Beer,” which presumably means the downscale contrast to the upscale first fifty.
Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma, also a frequent contributor to the New York Times, in March asked for reader’s food rules. Over 2,600 people (2,681 as of this morning) posted a comment with their own food rules. On Tuesday, Pollan published a piece in the Times’ The Food Issue section of their magazine called Rules To Eat By where he discussed food rules philosophically and more practically. He’s still asking for your food rules, if you want to contribute. Some will be used in his forthcoming book, Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual.
Today, Pollan posted his 20 favorites from the thousands contributed. (Actually, the post is dated Oct. 11, so presumably it will be printed in this Sunday’s New York Times Magazine but was posted online early. Also, thanks to Lisa Morrison, the Beer Goddess, for tweeting this my way.) Here are a few of my favorites from his list:
Men’s Journal yesterday released their annual lists of beer, both America’s Best Beers and The Top Five Beer Towns in the U.S.. Let’s look at the top five cities first.
It’s nice to see San Diego get some much-deserved love. While I think New York has improved in it’s beer scene over the last few years, I still have a hard time seeing it as being superior to Portland or Philly. Of course, Men’s Journal, like many periodicals, is published in New York and it’s been my experience (I lived there for several years once upon a time) that New Yorkers have an over-developed sense of their central position in the world. Naturally, I would have liked to see San Francisco on the list, but really it’s the Bay Area in total that’s most deserving, not that just the city’s scene isn’t good, too.
As for the beers they highlight this year, it’s a pretty good list, I’m happy to say. I especially love their introduction, where they reveal what many of us in the beer world have been saying for a few years now: “American craft brews now dominate” around the world. Finishing with “[n]ow there’s no reason to travel farther than your nearest specialty grocery store for a perfect beer.” If only the grocery chains would catch up and stock a wider range of good beer.
The list is divided into five broad categories; ales, lagers, dark beers, Belgian-style and cutting edge. Authors Christian DeBenedetti and Seth Fletcher then chose three beers of each kind to come up their top 25. As subjective at these lists can be, I have to say Men’s Journal is getting better at picking their top beers. While there are plenty of other beers I might have put on such a list — as any two people would undoubtedly choose different beers — I can’t really quibble with any of the beers they picked, save one or two, but not even enough to mention. I’ll have to do my own list one of these days.