Frost your glasses and grab your bottle opener because this is American Craft Beer Week. Let’s take a few minutes and give thanks for the goodness of craft beer in the USA.
You might think this country is soaked in cheap, flavorless beer, but be thankful you weren’t around in the ‘70s. In the spirit of a shiny, new national culture, low price and homogeneity took precedence over beer quality in a big way. There were less operating brewers and breweries in America than at any other time in history, and the vast majority of beer was bland, to say the very least. At one point, supermarkets carried generic “Beer,” a drink so terrible no company even put its name on the can.
Eventually, forces converged to propel us out of the craft beer stone age and into the sort of fine “beerscape” we see today.
Students started traveling and studying abroad. After drinking in Belgium or Germany, coming home to a relative wasteland of beverages was not acceptable.
Also, the late beer guru Michael Jackson (not that one), better known as “The Beer Hunter,” published his first book in 1977, “The World Guide to Beer.” The book became a best seller and influenced millions at home and abroad to put down that bland light beer and pick up something a little better.
Perhaps most importantly, then 28-year-old Fritz Maytag bought the ailing Anchor Brewing Company in San Francisco. After years of revamping the recipe and brewery and doing everything from bottling to making deliveries, Maytag turned the company around and profited. Once people saw that it was possible to make great tasting beer and make money doing it, the floodgates opened, and craft brewing was reborn.
Since then, craft brewing has taken the country and the world by storm. Hops have been elevated from an additive to the star of the show. Famous Old-World styles have been reproduced and improved with American brewers at the helm. It was like a new American manifest destiny, exploring and conquering the unknown to its limits with a mix of skill and spirit.
So raise a glass to all those that came before us, whether brewery owners, brewers, critics or simply the man on the street demanding something that tastes better. Our forerunners have done well for us, and the limitless choices of great beer available all over this country is one thing our parents’ generation won’t have to apologize for.
Come celebrate American Craft Beer Week at Stubbies & Steins tonight from 5 p.m. until 7 p.m. for $1 off all American craft beers and a chance to meet the guys from Gainesville’s own Swamp Head Brewery. If you can’t make it to the event, don’t sweat it – just grab the best tasting beer you can find.
