The podcast for those who make and drink great beer.
With characterful, medal-winning lagers and a decidedly West Coast approach to “foggy” IPA, Humble Sea is navigating craft beer’s choppy waters out of Santa Cruz, California, with quality as their North Star and an appetite for exploring new routes.
The West Flanders brewery, launched in 1946 to brew the beers for a nearby (and equally well-known) monastery, has adapted decade by decade as ingredients fluctuate and technology progresses. But their goal—to faithfully produce these abbey beers in a way that’s true to the original recipes—remains the same even as the tools change.
Brouwerij ’t Verzet infuses brash rock ‘n’ roll attitude and a penchant for experimentation into their studied, methodical approach to developing their own takes on traditional Flemish beers.
For the brewmaster of Timmermans—the three-century-old lambic brewery in Itterbeek, just west of Brussels—studying and understanding the dynamics of spontaneous fermentation and wood-aging is the key to making beer with captivating flavor.
This Minneapolis brewery keeps a separate, non-public production facility for its award-winning, spontaneously fermented beers while delivering crowd-pleasing classics such as Midwest (and West Coast–style) IPA from their sprawling production facility and beer hall.
Lagers are fine, but ask Tim Johnson of Minnesota’s Barrel Theory what he likes to drink most, and he’ll toast you with a hazy IPA. His love of the style drives an ongoing, methodical quest for constant improvement.
Despite opening in the throes of the pandemic in late 2020, Austin’s Meanwhile has bet big on a sprawling beer garden and well-appointed taproom, quenched by World Beer Cup and GABF medal–winning pilsner, helles, and San Diego–style IPA.
In his quest to understand the impact of every ingredient in their ever-widening family of hazy IPAs, no test is off-limits for Burlington Beer founder Joe Lemnah. From malts and adjuncts to the impact of yeast strains on surprisingly classic hop combos, the Burlington team haven’t stopped learning and tweaking in their pursuit of optimized flavor.
Lessons learned from many years of saison brewing have informed Freak Folk’s signature approach to brewing Vermont’s marquee style—hazy IPA.
In a fast-moving era, Switchback founder Bill Cherry bucks the trend by choosing slow growth and less-popular niche styles—such as smoked beer—that afford time to learn and focus through iterative brewing.