Co-founder, CTO, and Lead Developer Greg Avola of the social beer sharing service Untappd stops by to discuss their newest feature- Brewery Pages, where drinkers will be able to follow breweries of their choosing and interact with them directly after checking into a brew. Over 300 breweries have already claimed their pages, including: Dogfish Head, Stone, Bell’s, Boston Beer Co. and many more. Greg explains the mechanics and benefits from both the consumer and brewery perspective, and talks about other changes and improvements they are working on for the popular service.
Ryan from the Chicago-based blog Guys Drinking Beer checks in to talk about the difficult circumstances Anheuser-Busch InBev now finds itself with the Illinois Secretary of State’s office, when it was recently revealed their wholly-owned subsidiary WEDCO (owners of large ABI distributor City Beverage) has never been registered to do business in the state. We speculate on possible repercussions the upcoming decision could have on AB-InBev and the beer distribution landscape in Illinois, talk about the recent influx of exciting new breweries in the state, and get an update from a local on how Goose Island is perceived since they were acquired by ABI.
Slouch welcomes Jenn Coyle and Lindsey Herrema, founders of The Can Van to the show. What started as a business school project is turning into a mobile craft beer canning operation in Northern California that will go live this month. Join us as we talk about sustainability, the challenges of starting a small business, and of course canning delicious craft beer.
Slouch likes to talk about beer. Lew Bryson REALLY likes to talk about beer. They discuss his new “American Beer Blogger” Kickstarter project, the future of craft beer, the proposed changes to the Pennsylvania liquor laws and more.
Want more Lew? For our western Pennsylvania listeners, Bocktown Beer and Grill is hosting a meet and greet on January 3rd in their new location in Monaca to help Lew Bryson raise awareness and funding for ”American Beer Blogger”. Join him for an ‘edutasting’ where he shows us his new project, a television series that will highlight our favorite industry! Details will post soon on Bocktown’s website, Facebook page and Twitter.
Slouch sits down with Jamie Rice, Justin Waters, and Kyle Branigan, the guys behind Milkman Brewing. Milkman made a name for themselves at last month’s Pittsburgh Brewfest, taking home top honors with a Peppercorn Rye that had everyone in the local beer community talking. They discuss the trials and tribulations of starting a boutique brewery on a shoestring budget, their philosophy about creating recipes that push the boundaries of beer, the upcoming first Pittsburgh Craft Beer Week, and a lot more.
Slouch sits down with Erik Lars Myers of Mystery Brewing Company to talk about the invasive tactics of some larger craft breweries, transitioning from homebrewer to pro, successfully funding a brewery on Kickstarter, equal representation at the Brewers Association for small breweries, his upcoming book North Carolina Craft Beer and Breweries, and a heck of a lot more. Listen in and share a pint with us.
In another gloriously disastrous Maltercation, the boys discuss overrepresented and underrepresented styles of beer. Which styles do they want to see more of on their package store shelves and which styles just need to go away? Tune in to find out!
As per usual, we had a litany of technical issues with this Maltercation. Dropped participants, headphone issues, and brutal feedback made it a nightmare to edit. Try to ignore the jarring “cuts” and just enjoy the soothing sounds of a bunch of assholes jabbering to each other about beer.
In mid-August, Doc, Magnus and I got on the horn for a Maltercation about beer news and the utility of BeerAdvocate, the biggest beer forum/rating website on the intertubes. We ran into a host of technical issues and the vast majority of our rambling, shambling discussion was lost to the ages. But while sifting through a backlog of audio files on the ol’ desktop, I found a surprise treat…roughly 30 minutes of audio from this “lost” Maltercation.
It’s nothing special…the discussion was fairly tame and we lost whatever narrative thread we had roughly 10 seconds after starting. The plan was to talk through BeerAdvocate’s Top 100 beers…which we quickly edited down to 20 once we realized how slowly we were progressing. The audio I salvaged is very truncated…it doesn’t even get us to the #5 beer. Normally, I would just chalk it up to bad luck and not bother posting the piece. But since this recording gives our readers one last chance to listen to Magnus’s melodious voice, I decided I had no choice but to post it. Read the rest of this entry »
The days are getting shorter. The temps are dropping. People are beating the shit out of each other to get whatever this year’s “it” Christmas present is (I assume an iPad…or a Tickle-Me Slouch doll). In other words…it’s Winter. Read the rest of this entry »
We have been Maltercation-less for many, many weeks now at Aleheads. That’s partly because of some technical issues that left our last two podcasts unlistenable. It’s also partly because trying to schedule more than two of us to be available at the same time (with the pressure of jobs, wives, kids, and our incessant drinking) has proven to be remarkably challenging. Nevertheless, we have doggedly attempted to cast some pod every few weeks and after the first week of the NFL season, we were finally able to get enough Aleheads together to record one of our patently stupid conversations. Our ridiculous topic? Equating each NFL team with a beer and then predicting the standings based on the teams’ beer analogs. Read the rest of this entry »
After weeks of hype, rumor, and hearsay, Sir Magnus Skullsplitter is finally ready to tell the world which NBA franchise he will be playing for next year. As an Alehead, his decision is based strictly on which NBA city will provide him with the easiest access to high-quality brews. In Part 1 of The Decision, we chat about Eastern Conference teams as we try to find a suitable home for Magnus’s “unique” athletic skill-set.
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Stay tuned for the Western Conference and the big announcement in Part 2 tomorrow.
And now, the thrilling conclusion to our Homebrewin’ Maltercation cliff-hanger! Will Doc and the Professor agree on the proper fermentation temperature for ale yeast? Will Barley enjoy the Sam Adams Old Ben Ale? Will the Professor’s evil twin, Associate Professor U.R. Drunk, carry out his nefarious master plan to flood Gotham City with boiling wort?! Stay tuned!
In order to truly appreciate beer, you first have to learn how it’s made. And there’s no better way of getting to the heart of the malt-matter than by diving head-first into the addictive world of home-brewing. Doc and The Professor review the basics with Brother Barley in this two-part Maltercation (Part 2 will be up in a couple of days). The trio also simultaneously samples some suds as they crack into Sam Adams 2009 Longshot brews and offer up some tasting notes.*
*Longshot is Sam’s home-brewing competition where the winners get their submissions scaled up for commercial sale.
1. Owns a IPhone, Android, Blackberry, or Palm WebOS mobile device with data plan.
2. Would listen to “The Maltercation BeerCast” on Aleheads.com but:
a) too lazy
b) don’t know how
c) too lazy to learn how
d) some or all of the above.
If this sounds like you, get thy ass to your phone’s app store and download the awesome, totally free Stitcher mobile application. Search “beer”. Make “The Aleheads” a favorite, and voilá…
The latest episode of “The Maltercation” streaming live on your phone, no downloading or syncing required. Listen whenever/ wherever you want. Tune out friends and family. Waste time at work. Feel less femme on the treadmill. Make the mornings’ beer shits more tolerable. Tell me, why would you not do this? How can you be so obtuse? Is it deliberate?
In today’s BeerCast, Barley and Slouch dip into their vast stores of beer knowledge (aka Google and BeerAdvocate) to determine the answer to one of life’s most pressing questions. Namely, if you had a functionally useless friend named Goose, and he was shortly to be wed, what kind of beer should he serve at his nuptials? This question has vexed some of our greatest philosophers and scientists throughout the ages. Socrates once famously said, “Only the Oracle at Delphi truly knows whether or not Goose should serve a hefeweizen at his wedding.” Robert Hooke often angrily quipped at Isaac Newton, “If you’re so damn smart, why can’t you answer the notorious Goose Wedding-Beer Condundrum?” And, of course, Stephen Hawking once eloquently stated at a colloquium in Cambridge, “Who the motherfuck is Goose?” Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Slouch Sixpack 
Slouch likes to talk about beer. Lew Bryson REALLY likes to talk about beer. They discuss his new “American Beer Blogger” Kickstarter project, the future of craft beer, the proposed changes to the Pennsylvania liquor laws and more.
