Tag: barley

Inside craft beer with AMA Insider

Getting the craft beer story outside the craft beer bubble

I think craft beer is an amazing story in Alberta. I wouldn’t have written a book on the subject if I didn’t.

I has it all: passionate Albertans, entrepreneurship, local ingredients, creativity, growth, risk, national and international acclaim.

This is why I try to get that story into a wide variety of forums, rather than just craft beer media outlets. (I know I’m not the only one doing this; just look at Jason van Rassel’s work in Edify every month.) I really believe that the makings of our craft beer industry show a new way forward in this province. Just sayin’.

I was very pleased, then, to be able to tell that story in the spring 2021 issue of AMA Insider. In addition to editor Craig Moy, I owe thanks to

for helping to tell the tale and spread the word about one of the most exciting industries to hit Alberta in decades: barley refining.

Thank you GrainsWest for featuring Tapping the West!

malting barley at rahr, alix alberta

One of the great discoveries for me in writing Tapping the West, my book about the rise of Alberta craft beer, was the close connection between the industry and local agriculture.

Everyone knows that the main ingredient in most beers is barley. What might be a surprise to the majority of Albertans is that that ingredient comes from right here: we produce more barley than any other province in Canada, and more than all of the U.S. And it’s world-class stuff, used in some of the best beers on the continent (including Alberta craft beers, of course) and around the world.

How nice was it, then, that Ian Doig of GrainsWest came calling one day to chat about the book. Ian is a thoughtful interviewer and we had a great conversation about everything from the growing popularity of craft in rural Alberta to beer as a cultural commodity. Thanks again, Ian!

Homebrewing in the time of COVID-19

With a book coming out, and no chance of a launch anytime soon thanks to the pandemic, I was asked by my publisher to pull back the curtain on what I was up to at home these days. Here’s the big reveal.

This blog post doesn’t have a lot to do with Tapping the West: How Alberta’s Craft Beer Industry Bubbled Out of an Economy Gone Flat (now available for pre-order!). Writing it, however, got me thinking about the potential for COVID-19 to teach us something about ourselves. If this thing doesn’t kill us, it might indeed make us stronger somehow.

And if the proof doesn’t turn up in the pudding, maybe it will in the homebrew.