Beer sales have been down during the current economic slump, but Eliane Quijano found a pair of brothers whose craft brewery has been creating jobs along with their signature beers.
Archive for December, 2011
Credit: World of Coca-Cola
Ever wonder where Coca Cola hides their secret recipe? Since 1925 it had been stored in a vault at the SunTrust Bank in Atlanta, Georgia but it has recently moved a little closer to home where it is now hidden in plain sight. The heavily guarded recipe is now part of an exhibit entitled The Vault of The Secret Formula at the Coca Cola Museum, a grand finale of the celebration for the 125th anniversary of Coca Cola. Visitors won’t be able to see the secret recipe, but they will be put into the mystery of the recipe as they experience an interactive multimedia presentation about the vault, the recipe and the history of Coca Cola.
More than 1 million people annually visit the World of Coke, which turns 5 in May 2012.
It’s true, Frank Thomas has his own beer. The future hall of famer known as The Big Hurt has a beer called Big Hurt Beer, a “crisp, full flavored American lager.” He, apparently, also (unofficially) has a song about it.
This story is pretty simple and starts with a small town in Utah. Pleasant Grove, which is predominately Mormon, recently had an ordinance on the table that would ban Sunday beer sales. Thankfully for the townspeople and non-Mormons, it was rejected by a 4-1 vote by the city council as some of the council members felt that while Pleasant Grove may be mostly Mormon, the city should not impose the majority’s religious views on the minority through legislation. This leads me to Councilman Jeffrey Wilson, the one man wolf pack and the only council member to have voted in favor of the city ordinance. His reaction to the vote? “What’s next? Are we going to legalize marijuana?” Oh Jeffrey, that cracks me up every time I read that and that’s EXACTLY what will happen, because allowing beer to be sold on Sundays is basically like legalizing marijuana.
Cedar Hills, just four miles away, tried limiting beer sold in their town several years back as well by attempting to block a grocery store from being built that would carry beer. They also pushed another ordinance that would require businesses to close on Sundays in observance of Sabbath. Both failed miserably.
Check out these Utah craft breweries:
All famous touring acts have riders, which are essentially a list of demands that an artist must have in order to perform. These can be basic things like the colors of a room to very specific things like certain brands, what people can and can’t do, and even as far as saying they only want a specific color of M&M’s.
For megastar Adele, hers includes everything from “squeezy” bottles clear honey (not organic) to a pack of Marlboro Lights cigarettes with a disposable lighter. But what about for beverages? Well, she has some specific demands about those as well starting with three bottles of the very best red wine (Italian, French, Australian or Spanish). Next, she asks for twelve bottles of “best quality European lager, i.e. Becks, Stella Artois, Peroni, etc. North American beer is NOT acceptable. Picky picky!
In addition to that, she asks for 24 bottles of still mineral water at room temperature, two quarts of San Pellegrino sparkling mineral water, 1 liter fresh orange juice, 1 liter fresh apple juice, and a quart of fresh 2% milk.
Her band gets in on the action too. Their beverage demands? Still water, San Pellegrino sparkling mineral water, orange juice, Coke, Diet Coke, Sprite, Red Bull, “best quality European lager, i.e. Becks, Stella Artois, Peroni, etc. North American beer is NOT acceptable, best quality California red wine, best quality California Sauvignon Blanc white wine NO CHARDONNAY!, and one bottle of Grey Goose. For her band, that’s just for the dressing room. For the bus, they add a lot of the same and add fruit smoothies, milk, orange juice and this time instead of a European lager, they ask for “good quality local lager (chilled) (NOT Budweiser, Miller or similar ‘national’ brand). I can dig that.
Click here to view the entire rider.
This week’s installment of The Cocktail Spirit with Robert Hess brought to you by the Small Screen Network brings you the Spencer Cocktail. According to Robert Hess, this is“Another drink from The Savoy Cocktail Book by Harry Craddock, and one that isn’t seen hardly at all as far as I can tell. Apricot Brandy can be a bit of a challenging ingredient to understand when used in a recipe like this, since it could either mean a true brandy distilled from Apricot juice, or it could also mean a sweet liqueur flavored with apricot flesh and seeds. We are going to assume that it is the liqueur “
The Spencer Cocktail
- 1 1/2 oz gin
- 3/4 oz Bitter Truth Apricot Brandy
- dash Bitter Truth Old Time Aromatic Bitters
- 1 dash orange juice
Instructions
- stir with ice
- strain into a cocktail glass
Image: Sarah Rae Trover
An Alaska man has recently found himself in the news after crashing his truck into a snowbank and getting stuck for three days. He had no food and he had no water, but he had a fleece sleeping bag liner to keep him warm at night with temperatures that dipped as low as -18.4 degrees F. He also had a few cans of Coors Light in the cab of his truck. Why they were there, who knows, but they were frozen and to survive he cut the lids off and ate the frozen solid beer with a knife.
Three days later, his boss realized something was wrong and contacted emergency crews who soon found him.
At only 102 calories per Coors Light, his survival kit should carry some bigger beers like Sierra Nevada Bigfoot Ale, which weigh in at a lofty 330 calorie per 12 ounces and should keep him warm on those cold Alaska nights.
“Source water at four of ACR’s school installation sites prior to filtration through our systems. Water high in terribly unsafe contaminants is evident in every part of the cities in Nepal.” (Kathmandu, Nepal)
Not sure what to get that special someone for Christmas this year? Since they’re already likely subscribed to Mutineer Magazine, why not make a donation to A Child’s Right on their behalf and give the gift of water to a poor child in a developing country? Here are just a few reasons why you should help:
- 80% of diseases in the developing world are caused by contaminated water.
- Waterborne diseases are the single biggest threat to children around the world.
- Of the 3 million people who die every year due to waterborne diseases caused by unclean water, 90% are children under the age of 5.
- Right now, one billion people on the planet don’t have access to safe, clean drinking water.
- Every 20 seconds, a child dies from a water-related disease.
- In Africa alone, people spend 40 billion hours every year just walking to their source contaminated water, equivalent to the entire yearly workforce of France.
- Unsafe water and lack of basic sanitation kill more people every year than all forms of violence, including war.
- One in eight people on the planet drinks water that’s likely to make them sick.
These are just a few of many scary statistics about the global water crisis and children are especially vulnerable to waterborne diseases, as their bodies aren’t strong enough to fight diarrhea, dysentery and other illnesses.
Donating is easy. Visit the donation page at A Child’s Right and using your credit card you can make a donation on behalf of yourself or dedicate it on behalf of, in honor of, or in memory of someone else. You can even choose which country your donation goes to or you can opt for it to be used for water projects where it’s needed most.
Water is the fundamental building block of life. Without water, we wouldn’t just be without wine, whiskey or beer, we couldn’t even survive.
To donate, visit AChildsRight.org.
Want to see how bad the global water crisis is? Check out Mutineer Alan Kropf’s documentary Thirsty Children, which documents his trip to Nepal to install five Mutineer purchased water filtration systems.
Looking to purchase wine? Why not purchase it through Cellar Angels and opt to have a portion of the proceeds donated to A Child’s Right.
About A Child’s Right
Their mission is simple: to change the lives of vulnerable children in impoverished urban areas by providing clean, safe drinking water to orphanages, schools, children’s hospitals, street shelters and rescue homes. They envision a world with clean water for all children — and a museum telling of when it was not so.
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