Interesting
Facts About Beer
·
14 The number of years that Prohibition lasted in the US,
ending. Dec 5, 1933 (1920-1933) To be exact 13 years, 10
months, 19 days, 17 hours, 32.5 minutes.
·
36,000gallons: The
amount of beer consumed at GABF 2011 by 49,000 attendees.
·
2 minutes The amount of time it took Avery SourFest to sell out
in its 3rd year(2012).
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74. The number of
breweries that attended this year’s Savour Food and Beer Pairing Experience in
Washington, DC with nearly 150 different beer and food pairings.
·
2000, The number of guests that were served at the 2012, 5
course, World Beer Cup Awards
dinner. A total of 10,000 plates
were served to 2,000 guests in 2 hours.
·
1596. The number of
craft breweries operating in the US in 2009. There are currently (as of July 2012) over 2000 craft
breweries operating in the US with nearly 250 opening in 2010.
·
31 The number of gallons in a “Beer Barrel” A full sized keg is 15.5 gallons
and is considered a Half Barrel of beer.
Kegs also come in 1/6th barrels that contain 5.16 gallons.
·
11,468,152. The number of barrels of domestically produced
craft beer that were sold in 2011.
That would amount to nearly 3,795,958,312 12 oz bottles/cans of beer
packed into 158,166,668 cases.
·
1814: The year that a brewery tank containing
3,500 barrels of beer ruptured causing a tidal wave of beer through a London
Parish demolishing 2 houses and killing 9 people.
·
103,585 The number of people that the Craft Beer industry employs.
·
8 seconds. The amount of time that it takes to
pour a pint of beer.
·
32 Roughly the
number of kegs of beer that Euclid Hall serves in a week.
The History Of Beer
Early Times
By Stan Hieronymus
The People's Beverage
History is never farther away than your next glass of beer. "If
(beer) is…the people's beverage…its history must of necessity go hand in hand,
so to speak, with the history of that people, with the history of its entire
civilization," historian John Arnold wrote at the beginning of the
twentieth century.
Sometimes that history comes full circle. In 1989, nearly 4,000 years
after an anonymous poet wrote a "Hymn to Ninkasi," the Sumerian
Goddess of Brewing, Anchor Brewing used the verse as a guide, making a beer
(visit Sumarian Beer Project) that included bread,
honey and date syrup as ingredients to emulate one brewed another millennium
before the hymn was written.
So how old is beer? From the time men first domesticated grains about
8000 B.C. they might have brewed beer and inhabitants of various parts of the
world certainly were brewing by 3500 B.C. Soon it was the most popular
alcoholic beverage in Mesopotamia—beer idioms became part of language and the
government took to taxing beer consumption—a position it has enjoyed in most of
the world ever since.
We're not drinking beer like Anchor brewed for its Sumerian Beer Project
anymore. Although one document from about 400 B.C. names at least 15 different
kinds of beer that pales in comparison to the number of varieties, generally
known as styles, available today. Many such beers come with their own history.
For instance, porter was the first one produced on an industrial scale, and the
wood vats it matured in were so large UK breweries christened them by holding
dinner parties for hundreds within their confines.
The American Story
By Stan Hieronymus
Native Americans made a corn beer long before Europeans found their way
to America, bringing with them their own version of beer. Although most of that
was brewed in the home during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries a
fledgling industry began to develop from 1612, when the first known New World
brewery opened in New Amsterdam (now Manhattan).
Our "modern era" began in the nineteenth century. In 1810 only
132 breweries operated and per capita consumption of commercially brewed beer
amounted to less than a gallon. By 1873 the country had 4131 breweries, a high
water mark, and in 1914 per capita consumption had grown to 20 gallons
(compared to about 21.5 today). Then came national Prohibition.
American beer was already changing before Prohibition. When German
immigrants began arriving in the middle of the nineteenth century they brought
with them a thirst for all-malt lagers and the knowledge to brew them. But by
the end of the century a) drinkers showed a preference for lighter-tasting
lagers, ones that included corn or rice in the recipe, and b) consolidation
began to eliminate many small, independently operated breweries. In 1918 the
country had only one quarter the number of brewers that operated 45 years
before.
National Prohibition (individual states had prohibition as early as
1848) began January 16, 1920 when the 18th amendment, also known as the
Volstead Act, went into effect. It effectively ended in April of 1933 with the
return of 3.2% beer, and in December the 21st amendment officially repealed the
18th. Within a year 756 breweries were making beer, but the biggest companies
remained intent on expansion, using production efficiencies and marketing to
squeeze out smaller breweries.
The number of breweries shrunk quickly, to 407 in 1950 and 230 in 1961.
By 1983 one source counted 80 breweries, run by only 51 independent companies,
made beer. As British beer writer Michael Jackson observed at the time, most
produced the same style: "They are pale lager beers vaguely of the
pilsener style but lighter in body, notably lacking hop character, and
generally bland in palate. They do not all taste exactly the same but the
differences between them are often of minor consequence."
Making History
Something else was happening as regional breweries closed. Not only were
Northern Californians nurturing the rise of "California cuisine" and
local wineries but also small breweries so new people didn't know what to call
them. What started when Fritz Maytag bought Anchor Brewing in 1965 continued
when Jack McAuliffe opened the short-lived New Albion Brewing Company in 1976.
This is an example of an entrepreneurial act repeated a thousand times over and
in every state in the country. By
the end of the century more breweries operated in the United States than any
country in the world, the number climbing past 1,500 in 2009. Taking
inspiration from brewing cultures around the world Americans also brew a wider
variety of beer than anywhere. "I have no doubt that America is the best
place to be a brewer because we don't have the burden of having to carry on a
long brewing tradition," explains Phil Markowski, brewmaster at
Southampton Public House. "We have more freedom to be creative and can
gather influences from all over."
In turn Americans provided inspiration for like-minded brewers in other
countries. "For me the innovation in brewing in the USA…has been by far
the most exciting thing to happen in brewing, possibly ever," said James
Watt, co-founder of upstart BrewDog in Scotland. As American beer enthusiasts are fond of saying, there may
never have been a better time to be a beer drinker, at least until tomorrow.
The Revival
By Charlie Papazian, President of the Brewers
Association
Many refer to the phenomenon of beer flavor and diversity as the
"growth of craft beer" or "the culture of better beer." For
beer drinkers it's simply a journey of pleasure. We live in a golden age of
beer and currently it is a good time to be a beer drinker. It wasn't always so beer wonderful.
After US Prohibition ended with the enactment of the 21st Amendment to the US Constitution,
only about 300 breweries emerged to renew their brewing. More than 800 breweries
died during Prohibition. Between 1933 and about 1982, about 700 breweries (America's small heritage breweries
making beer for over 100 years - part 1) were reduced to close to 50. The prospect
for local and regional breweries seemed dire and bleak. But also at that time,
a brewing renaissance emerged. In 1982, there were about 6 newly-emerged
microbrewers.
A democratization (Beer Democracy and Open Source
Brewing)
of beer began in earnest during the late 1970's by homebrewers. It was then
that better beer began its journey, championed by individuals and not corporate
strategies. Homebrewers began learning how to make the beer types they could no
longer buy. A few homebrewers started their own small breweries, the first new
breweries to open since prohibition began in 1923. A revival had begun. Beer
drinkers learned to appreciate these new "microbrews." The term
microbrews has since evolved to "craft beer;" particularly from small
and independent brewers (see Small, Independent, Traditional). There are now 1,829
small and independent craft brewers in the USA.
The "Beer Revival" of the past 30 years is a phenomenon
attributable to one of the first (if not the first) "open-source"
collaborative experiences in modern history. The community of homebrewers, beer
enthusiasts and craft brewers made the pioneers of the democratization of
process. It is only anecdotal knowing that Steve Jobs was a member of the
"Homebrew Computer Club," from which the
seeds of the Mac Computer would emerge (visit Homebrew and How the Apple Came to Be). The fact is,
homebrewers were already fashioning their own revolution before a communication
technology emerged that would later enhance the means by which revolutionary
ideas and the process of democratizing innovation would be accelerated. Are homebrewers
and beer enthusiasts the true heroes of this and tomorrow’s day and age?
The professional craft brewing, homebrewing and beer enthusiast
community continues to be on the unequivocal cutting edge of beer’s creative
destiny. If you look back at the last 30- year history of better beer, beer
economics, beer enthusiasm and the beer marketplace, it is a mirror image of
how the rest of the world has embraced, reacted and adjusted to the pace of all
that it is involved in. Choice, diversity, information, education, grassroots
activism, quality, personality, passion, flavor (both in the real and
metamorphic sense), etc. These terms are new to most, but they were the
foundation of craft beer—30 years ago!
Craft brewers and craft beer enthusiasts have been and continue to be
pioneers in developing a world that contributes to the pleasure of our everyday
life, in more ways than beer. Craftbeer.com is a reflection of those who seek
the world of better beer.The unique beer history of the Brewers Association combines
a large brew-cauldron of activities and heritage. The result is a legacy that
has helped change the world of beer both in the United States and abroad.
Craft Beer Today
Today, +95% of the more
than 2,000 breweries in the US are small and independent. The 2010 Capita per Brewery list finds Vermont at the
top! American tastes are changing. Consider coffee, tea, cheese, chocolate,
bread and, yes, beer. We increasingly want choices of flavor in the foods that
we buy. For example, Nielsen Company research confirms that beer drinkers are
shifting to more robust beer styles and we know from Symphony IRI (SIG) that
seasonal beer is one of the top-selling craft beer categories. Small and independent craft brewers are
known for being passionate and innovative makers of full-flavored beer. The Brewers Association has defined 142
beer styles. The majority of these styles are all-malt based. Craft brewers are amazing community
citizens and have donated millions of dollars to local causes and provided
thousands of jobs across the US.
The average American lives within 10 miles of a brewery. Hundreds of
thousands of people have taken tours or sampled beers at their local brewery.
Beer Compared to Wine and Liquor
How does beer fair compared to wine and liquor?
·
The following headlines appeared in the Gallup Poll in the past three
years:
Beer Styles
There are hundreds of beer styles, or types of beer, defined by several
prominent organizations. Find out more in the Style Finder. The Brewer’s
Association 2012 Beer Styles Guidelines contain descriptions of over 130 styles
organized by country of origin. At
the 2011 Great American Beer Festival, judges evaluated competition beers in 83
GABF Beer Styles with 134 sub-categories.
