The Syracuse Post-Standard ran a nice article entitled “Good beer deserves the right glass” by staff writer Don Cazentre, who’s also a homebrewer. He provides a good rudimentary introduction to the importance of drinking beer not just from a glass, but from the proper glass. It’s another good example of better beer coverage by the media.

There was an excellent article in today’s Dallas Morning News entitled “What beer geeks know,” that details a number of the finer points of enjoying better beer, such as the importance of the glassware, how to pour it, the head, temperature, etc. It’s a really nice overview of several concepts that generally only a beer geek would get right or even care that much about, so it’s especially promising to see them spelled out in so useful a manner.

Feargal McKinney of The Old Monk in Dallas. (photo by Evans Caglage, Dallas Morning News)

I’ll be in Dallas in two weeks, visiting some friends the week after the Craft Brewers Conference. It’s actually not a bad place for beer, but it’s also not on my top ten list. But the fact that an article this good shows up there is a very good sign indeed. You’d never see something like it in my local paper, the San Francisco Chronicle, because their management is very hostile to craft beer, preferring California wines to ales and lagers. But by and large, it seems the tide is indeed beginning to turn. The mainstream media is definitely paying greater attention to craft beer again, and if these sales trends continue it will be harder and harder for the segment to be ignored. Then there was also the excellent news yesterday that craft beer was up in grocery store sales an astonishing 17.8% for 2006. As Stan Hieronymus so elegantly put it, it’s like there’s “no news here.” As he points out, we’ve been reporting strong sales growth for craft beer now for six straight years, hardly making it newsworthy anymore. I think at this point we can safely identify it as a trend. Having sat through years of depressing, despondent conferences where all the bad news seemed a shared failure and any glimmer of hope was disproportionately shouted out just to keep everybody positive and give us something to hold on to during those darker times, it’s such a relief to see everyone so giddy as the good news just keeps getting better. So it occurs to me that we may be witnessing Malcolm Gladwell’s “Tipping Point” at work. It’s been several years since I read it, but Gladwell has a nice summary on his own website, gladwell.com. My own memory about what I took away from the book is that things that were formerly quite small or underground suddenly hit the big time when they reach a certain point in society’s collective conscious. Nobody’s sure exactly where that point is for any specific thing, movement, idea, meme, etc. but once it reaches that peak, it “tips over” and what once moved relatively slowly suddenly moves like wildfire, and I believe Gladwell gives the example of how a virus moves through the body. With craft beer, those of involved with it often forget that our passion is shared by only a tiny fraction of the world’s population. But lately it feels more and more like we’re slowly crawling up to the top of the roller coaster. With every new year of growth, increasing attention, and positive mention in the media you can almost hear that steady click, click, click as the car nears the crest of the ride. Are we there yet? I don’t know, but I’m certainly ready to stop being such a curmudgeon and just enjoy the ride.

UPDATE: I also stumbled upon this piece, “Understanding beer can make it better,” on a Virginia television station. It’s not as thorough or in-depth as the Dallas article — it is TV after all — but it’s very positive and seeks to educate its audience, which seems yet another good development.

There’s a post today on the Seattlest with the provocative title “Do You Hate Beer?” It begins:

Do you just absolutely hate beer? Have you ever been amazed that people would actually prefer to drink beer with their nice dinner, rather than the typical bottle of expensive red wine? If you are set in your beer-hating ways, try these libations. They may change your mind.

The author then lists five beers: Manny’s Pale Ale, Rochefort Trappistes 10, Lindemans Framboise, Duchesse De Bourgogne and Rogue Chocolate Stout. For each there is an explanation of the beer, what food to pair with it and even where in Seattle you can find it. I may not agree with every suggestion, but it’s a great idea to simply challenge people who believe they don’t care for beer to explore the diversity in beer that they probably aren’t even aware exists.

It might be a worthwhile project for some of us to put together a list of beers in a variety of styles to suggest for the person who doesn’t like beer to try, with this same sort of basic information. I like the idea of being able to give someone a list or give them a link to a ready-made list of suggested beers they might try. Who’s with me?

For trivia’s sake, the Seattlest is part of the Gothamist, a network of fifteen city blogs that do a good job of covering each city using local bloggers. Here on the left coast, in addition to Seattle, there’s also one for San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Today’s Wilton Villager, serving the town of Wilton, Connecticut, reprinted an item from the Fort Worth/Dallas Star-Telegram. It’s a pretty basic twenty questions that tell readers about many of the basics of beer that the non-beer geek will likely be unfamiliar with. So while it’s old hat for even the most casual beer fans, it’s a great overview for the 95% of the population who don’t drink craft beer. The author, Daniel Cooper, even listed his sources, which included Michael Jackson’s Beer Companion, Real Beer and All About Beer. One of the first steps in conversion is education, so it’s great to see this making the syndication rounds.

No one in his right mind would argue that it’s better to drink beer directly from the bottle or can, yet thousands — perhaps millions — of people do that every single day. So getting people to first pour their beer into some type of vessel, preferrably a glass one, is job one. The advantages should be obvious. The head produced when you pour beer into a glass releases carbon dixoide (CO²) and makes the beer much less gassy. That’s why bottle drinkers burp and … well, you know. Also, the CO² gets in the way of whatever flavor is in the beer because it overpowers it, so it’s absoluetly essential that you let the beer breathe. Usually that one big exhale when you pour it is enough, but what’s the best way to pour your beer into the glass?

On this point, many people differ, often bitterly. Today’s Sun-Sentinnel (which covers south Florida) has an article entitled “Beer foam foments flavor,” which explores this idea of a right way to pour a beer in surprising detail.

Boston Beer’s Jim Koch weighs in first, saying “A nice collar of foam around a glass of beer not only is aesthetically pleasing but serves a real function.”

He continues in the article:

“As the CO2 [carbon dioxide] rises in the glass, the beer will capture some of the hop aroma, and the foam releases this aroma,” Koch says. The more protein in the beer, the more sizable and durable the head.

The practice was so widespread, Koch says, that the ritual of pouring a glass with a good collar of foam practically disappeared, unless one happened on a knowledgeable bartender.

Pour the beer down the middle of a slightly tilted glass, straightening the glass gradually. If it is a bottle-conditioned beer, you can leave a half-inch of liquid in the bottle to keep the yeast sediment from clouding your beer.

Next up, Grady Hull, assistant brewmaster at New Belgium Brewing, who “agrees that the foam affects the flavor.” His take:

“Some aromas are released by the foam, and others are held in to be released as the beer is consumed,” Hull says. “It’s also an indication of the content of the beer. Beers made with cheap adjuncts like rice and corn are typically low in foam because they are low in protein.”

Lastly, Sam Calagione, of Dogfish Head Brewing, adds that “a good inch (two fingers) of froth on a glass of craft beer” is ideal.

CAMRA, unfortunately, while having done much else that is good, has been whining for years that a large head is cheating consumers out of their full pint of beer. They’ve been stubbornly demanding taller and taller glasses so that the liquid comes up to a pint line and the foam extends beyond it but still is in the glass. But the foam, of course, consists of a percentage of liquid which slides back into the glass as the bubbles dissipate. This argument for larger glasses always struck me as pedantic. A pint is 16 oz., not 20 oz., as is the British Imperial Pint. If pub owners want to end this argument, all they need do is stop selling pints and instead offer a glass of beer (which then could be of any size) for a set price. That the word “pint” is the trouble strikes me as fairly ridiculous. But I think this had led many to believe that a good-sized head is not desireable, and that is not the case at all.

Here in the states, the American-style lagers manufactured by the big breweries are all very highly carbonated, most likely to mask the lack of flavor underneath. One thing you can say about the big guys is they’re not stupid. These beers from the bottle have to be poured down the side of the glass, otherwise you’ll have foam everywhere. Notice you rarely, if ever, see their products in a glass in print or television ads. Letting an American-style lager breathe will reveal more of it’s actual flavor and that’s not necessarily something they want to do. So I was particularly puzzled to discover that the Beertender Guide to Serving Packaged Beer actually suggests the following:

Don’t pour the beer by the “down-the-side” method. This minimizes the foam, and the beer looks flat and will taste gassy. CO2 is retained in the beer and swallowed, so your customers fill up faster — and they may not have room for snacks or a meal.

The Beertender Guide is maintained by Anheuser-Busch for their wholesalers. It’s shared content that any of them can use on their individual websites and/or to train their employees. Their advice on pouring is also quite interesting.

For the smoothest taste, pour beer to produce a nice head or collar of foam.

• Place the neck of the bottle or lip of the can over the edge of a clean glass or cup.
• Quickly raise the bottom of the bottle or can to a high angle, causing the beer to agitate into the glass.
• Lower the bottom of the bottle or can to reduce the flow until the foam rises to the rim.

This flies in the face of some conventional wisdom, especially the 45° angle theory, which is quite prevalant among most craft brewers. Beer Advocate, for example, in their advice on How To Pour Beer, advocates this method and even has a little online video of founder Todd Alström pouring a glass of Mendocino’s Eye of the Hawk to show this technique. Go watch it. Go on, I’ll wait. Like most of the advice in Beer Advocate’s Beer 101 pages, there’s a lot of good information there but this I think illustrates why the 45° angle is partially flawed. He’s using an imperial pint glass, of course, which is for 20 oz. of liquid and the bottle is 12 oz. which is fine. I, too, like and often use imperial pint glasses depending on the beer style. But notice at the end of the video, where his fingers come to rest at the edge of the foam, that the head produced looks to be maybe one finger thick. But the ideal head is at least around 1-1½ in., which is about two fingers on most of us. Now personally, I like a good thick head, more on the order of 1½ to 2 inches. That’s how important I think it is to blow off the gasses in the beer and get to the remaining flavor. And the 45° angle method just doesn’t get it done. It’s not bad per se, but in many cases it’s simply ineffective for getting a thick, pillowy head going. I prefer the following:

1. Hold your bottle or can above a glass held straight up and pour it directly into the middle of the bottom of the glass, with an even, smooth pour rate
2. This will get the foam going early and big, but watch it carefully
3. If the foam becomes too volatile, then tilt the glass to roughly a 45° angle or less, as appropriate (this takes some practice)
4. As you reach the point where roughly two-third of the bottle’s contents are in the glass, begin bringing the glass back to an upright position to empty the remaining contents

This is a dynamic process that much be watched constantly and continually adjusted for to get the head just right. Maybe it requires more concentration but it’s well worth it in my opinion, because of how important the results are.

Now I realize I’ve ignored certain exceptions, like bottle-conditioned beers, and certain styles with their own peculiarities, such as stouts or hefeweizens, but for the majority of beers, I think my method works quite well. This is especially true if your goal is to produce a generous head, and I think that’s crucially important to getting the full enjoyment out of your bottle of beer.

UPDATE: SeattleBeerGuy sent me the following tidy little article entitled Pouring the Perfect Pint from Pacific Brew News, which is a similar method to mine, but also includes a bit more detail.