Hey Brokaw, Joe Scum and the rest of you hacks - do you know why small breweries

[malaise]

are growing? Thank President Jimmy Carter who made it all possible.

Good Morning President Carter. You are loved and beloved!!

Fuck you Brokaw and Joe Scum!!!

[Kolesar]

1. Oh, yeah, I remember the announcement that people could legally brew at home

Teenagers focus on things like that.

[malaise]

2. There was a great thread on DU some time back

explaining the history.

[Kolesar]

3. & Now we have the best brews ever made to show for the effort

[malaise]

4. Indeed

[alcibiades_mystery]

5. +1000

[malaise]

6. Here's the original thread by GarroHorus Why James Earl Carter must be remembered as one

of the most visionary presidents in history.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002892137
<snip>
Jimmy Carter in 1978 signed into law an act that allowed people to brew up to 200 gallons of beer per year in the home. The illegality of home brewing beer prior to that time was a hold over from prohibition and was kept in place to allow large breweries to operate with very little competition.

From the home brew community that started in the country after home brewing was legalized, an entirely new industry formed that duplicated the styles of ales and lagers long brewed in Europe. This is, of course, the craft brew industry. With upstarts like Sam Adams to newer companies like Dogfish Head, the craft brew industry is booming and has not slowed down.

From just a few breweries in the country in 1978, there are now more than 1700 breweries.

Today, the culinary importance of beer is being recognized by food critics the world over. The beauty of beer is a chef does not need to develop a food to pair with a beer, as is the case for wines. A brewer develops a recipe to pair with a specific chef's creation.

So for his vision the next time you enjoy a good craft beer, lift a glass and toast the father of the modern American brewing industry, Jimmy Carter.

-----------------------
Not one of those scumbags mentioned Jimmy Carter's role in the spread of breweries.

[cali]

7. and the very best are right here in Vermont.

and the best brewery in the world, according to RateBeer is 3 miles down the road from me.

<snip>

Not that the craft beer movement is anything new to this tiny New England state, which sports the highest number of brewers per capita — roughly 25,030 people per brewery. But lately the attention those brewers have garnered is different. It’s not a hey-they-have-great-beers-in-Vermont. It’s a hey-they-have-the-best-beer-in-the-world.

No, really. Hill Farmstead Brewery recently was rated the world’s best brewer on the popular international consumer review website, RateBeer.com.

And that has triggered a rush of beer enthusiasm — and enthusiasts — that has bordered on fanaticism. Since Hill Farmstead opened three years ago, beer tourists have been coming from around the world to visit the microbrewery on a farm off a dirt road in Greensboro to buy growlers and bottles of brewer Shaun Hill’s creations.

<snip>

http://www.gosanangelo.com/news/2013/apr/23/vermont-brewers-set-beer-world-abuzz/


and then there's Heady Topper:

For someone in pursuit of a Heady Topper — the world's top-ranked beer at the moment my plane touched down in Vermont — I made the mistake of arriving on a Sunday.

I had driven directly to a bar in Burlington that research told me served Heady Topper. And sure enough, the beer was listed on the menu for $7 per 16-ounce can. Even more important than the price were the two words beside it: "Limited availability." This was, after all, the top-ranked beer in the world.

<snip>

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2013-04-22/travel/sc-trav-0421-vermont-beer-20130422_1_best-beer-beer-advocate-brew-pub

My tastes aren't that elevated, but I really dig every beer I've tried from Hill Farmstead.

[malaise]

8. Nice read

Thanks

[cali]

12. you're welcome.

Hill Farmstead is very cool. The land the guy has his brewery on has been in his family for 8 generations. It's typical hilly, rocky northern Vermont farm land. His logo is from his great grandfather's tavern.

[malaise]

13. Lucky fellow

One day we'll reach that beautiful state

[Throd]

33. We made our own beer in high school.

[pipoman]

9. Does anyone know if a

micro brewery with a single location, which doesn't sell beer outside of the gastro-pub it is connected to is subject to the federal excise tax on alcohol?

[malaise]

10. I don't know

[BeeBee]

30. I work at a winery and we have to pay federal excise tax

on wine we sell on-site as well as wine we distribute. I would assume it's the same with micro breweries.

[brewens]

11. For me it's now that I can't go pound down beers and drive, I'll take the time

to actually enjoy a couple of the craft brews. Back in the early 90's as a beer distributor employee, we hated the micro-brew thing. That was just yuppie stuff you couldn't make money on. Real beer was Budweiser. AB bought out Red Hook and made us handle that stuff. I can't tell you if that was any good or not. We never gave it a chance.

It's interesting how the trend reversed. The big breweries bought out and trashed all the smaller guys in the 70's-80's. Lucky Lager, Raineer and Olympia in the west. They kept selling the label but the beer wasn't the same. I live in a town where the Lucky owned the road. Old-timers swear it was really good beer up until the late 70's. By the time they were done with it, it was pretty much generic General Brewing Co. crap and you couldn't even buy a Lucky lager shirt anywhere.

[malaise]

14. Not just big breweries

The big distillers and multinationals also gobbled up indigenous brands across the globe. For example Guiness bought out Red Stripe.

[Throd]

23. General Brewing Company ruined west coast beer.

I have a beer can collection with 4000+ specimens. It provides great insight to long term trends in American brewing and packaging.

I have a lot of west coast cans from the early 70's that have the name and town of the brewery in small print somewhere on the can. By the late 70's, these same cans would say "General Brewing Co." Not only did they cut corners with what was inside the can, but you can easily spot the General Brewing cans from the originals because the graphics were of much poorer quality and had fewer colors. It took a while, but the craft brewing explosion is a direct effect of the legacy laid by lazy breweries in the 70's that put profit before product. Very similar to our automobile industry.

[malaise]

26. It's very interesting because taste is personal so we

don't have to accept their shitty products once we have options

Nice post

[brewens]

35. They tore down the Lucky San Francisco brewery and shipped it off to China

At least that's what I was told. It was supposed to have become one of the Chinese Tsintao breweries.

[frylock]

27. It's Lucky When You Live in the West

my cousin and I were recently lamenting the demise of Lucky Lager. That was one of Grampa's favorites, and there were times that we would sneak drinks from his beer. Good times.....

[brewens]

34. Remember the little puzzle things on the inside of the caps?

Those were called Lucky Stubbies. I heard the old-timer drivers tell stories. Guys that were retired or near retirement when I started in the early 80's. They would actually drive back from a run and throw empty boxes out the window for advertisement. SOP. I shit you not! That was 60's-early 70's.

Their trucks had rails around the roof for empty kegs. Those guys would throw the empty kegs up there. Old school beer guys were not to be messed with!

They all were authorized to buy rounds and drink on their routes too. You delivered grocery stores in the morning and the bars in the afternoon partly for that reason. Also because many bars weren't open to take delivery until later. The ones that did open early in the morning, you could have a little "eye opener", making sure to get it off your breath before you went to your first grocery store delivery. You didn't last long in that business if you couldn't handle your alcohol back then. I just caught the tail end of those days starting as a kid at 19. I'd go out as helper on big days with the full-time drivers. That might have been a close second to being a cop for ruining marriages.

[frylock]

38. loved those puzzles! i think that Ballantine had them too..

Ad-Rock referenced them in "High Plains Drifter."

[stonecutter357]

15. K&R

Home brewer right here?

[malaise]

16. How Jimmy Carter Saved Craft Beer

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/entertainment/2010/08/how-jimmy-carter-saved-craft-beer/19195/
<snip>
Kain writes, "When prohibition was lifted, government tightly regulated the market, and small scale producers were essentially shut out of the beer market altogether. Regulations imposed at the time greatly benefited the large beer makers. In 1979, Carter deregulated the beer industry, opening back up to craft brewers. ... You can see how the large brewers continued to consolidate and grow and absorb more and more market share right up to the point where Carter deregulated the industry."

Carlson concludes that craft brewers demonstrated an ability to challenge even the largest and most entrenched beer-making giants. "This is an interesting and crucial point, because as far as I can tell nothing else substantive changed about the market. Deregulation reopened the market to craft brewers and the industry blossomed through organic growth and the preferences of consumers. (Conclusion: Emerging small scale, distributed production can compete against an installed large scale infrastructure base.)"

Kain is careful to note that there are times when more regulation is a good idea--offshore oil drilling practices, for example. The difference, he says, is that oil industry deregulation was done probably at the behest of industrial lobbyists, whereas beer deregulation was in the service of mom-and-pop brewers.
-------------------
You should name a beer after Jimmy Carter

[stonecutter357]

17. My

My next batch will be Jimmy Carter Nut Brown ale.

[malaise]

20. Sweet

[brewens]

36. I have a buddy that brews, last name Hemphill. His Black Death Irish Stout is

something to behold! I first drank his early efforts bottled in 16oz Pepsi Bottles. There was never really anything wrong with it but he has it down to a science now.

[JNelson6563]

18. What a wonderful thread this became!

First of course I agree completely with the OP & opened thread just to chime in on that count. Then I read the whole thread and learned a great deal while enjoying the read!

It never fails, I just always learn stuff here.

Julie

[malaise]

21. You know I've never seen a bad Jimmy Carter thread on DU

and yes I learn something everyday on DU.
Beer also works.
I'd love to see Bill Moyers, Lawrence O'Donnell or Rachel Maddow interview Carter for the foll hour of their program.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

19. Jimmy Carter: Made middle east peace, saved small breweries and....

...helped rescue American citizens in Iran by using a fake movie script and nothing else.

Now he monitors elections worldwide and builds houses.

And his grandson helped to fell the most recent abomination to run under the GOP banner.

Kick-ass indeed!

[malaise]

22. and he's a decent human being to boot

I love Jimmy Carter.

[Gidney N Cloyd]

24. I assumed this was going to be a Billy Beer thread.

[malaise]

29. Wrong

[zeeland]

25. Jimmy Carter, my all time favorite president.

His efforts to conserve energy and for us to become more educated
consumers of the energy we took for granted was criticle. Our failure
to heed that message has cost us greatly.

[malaise]

28. And not one M$Greedia hack is brave enough

to discuss that speech.

[zeeland]

31. +1,000,000

Every single word reflects where we find ourselves nearly
a half a century later. As if Carter was looking into a crystal
ball and no one wanted to hear the truth.

Thank you.

[NutmegYankee]

32. Thanks Jimmy!

I have a batch fermenting right now! And thanks for opening up the market to all of these awesome micro brews. Beer with flavor, who'd have thought of such a thing back then?

[malaise]

37. Enjoy