Tag: Los Angeles

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Keep Up

Not to toot my own beer horn or to impose my L.A. brewery bona fides but I recently did a little Excel work to keep track of the breweries that I have visited of the Official (currently) 90 breweries in the L.A. County Brewers Guild orbit.

Here are the statistical takeaways…

As Los Angeles draws closer to the century mark in breweries, it will probably mean an increase in the “just once” category and I expect the not visited yet total to stay around the 10 mark since many will probably head the way of selling from their taproom only. Of course this does not count the breweries not part of the guild that I have been to or the bottle shops frequented. There is room for improvement. I hope to knock off a couple from the unvisited list before summer is over.

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Broken Bread

I don’t talk to often about the non beer related life but since this is also a Los Angeles centered blog that also touches on food, I feel I am within boundaries to give a recommendation to the KCET/Tastemade/Roy Choi show, Broken Bread.

If you are not hooked by the first two episodes then, I do not know what to say. Food is the common language but the issues are all tied together in such a way that it seems they cannot be untied. But Choi has found people really making a difference and he got the Mayor to talk in non sound bites too. Check it out.

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Biting Tires

Every once in a while, a beer menu for an unknown new brewery explains in ways that vagueness elsewhere on a website does not. Such is the case with Tirebiter Brewery which came onto my radar via Hopped LA.

Notice the SABInBev stable of beers. Tirebiter made a distributor happy with the easy order. Also notice the high prices. Who would pay $8 for Spacedust when you can get at least 8 bottles of it at almost any grocery store in SoCal. Dollars to donuts, this place has no physical brewing space. Not that contract brewing is bad but I have a feeling this place ain’t gonna lure people from the DTLA core to USC.

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In the Tap Lines for May 2019

header_attractionsYesterday, I re-capped the 3rd Anniversary of the Propagator branch of Firestone Walker and that was just a small taste of the FWIBF coverage that will appear in the run up to the 2019 festival as well as my coverage of the actual fest itself.

~ e-visits to three breweries that will be pouring at FWIBF 2019
~ special featured reviews of from Four Corners Brewing
~ Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events
~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark
~ A Book & A Beer reads The Best Mystery Stories of 2018
~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.

Here are two events to get your May started in the Los Angeles craft beer world:
1) May 4th – Yorkshire Square 2nd Anniversary
2) May 15th – May 22nd – Naja’s Place IPA Festival

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Closed Triangle

Yesterday it was reported that Iron Triangle Brewing was looking for a buyer. If I was macabre enough to have a list of Los Angeles breweries that would make such an announcement, Iron Triangle would have been on it from the beginning.

Not that the beers were bad. They were fine. Their Belgian Pale was my favorite due to the relative Hefe shortage in a time of IPA. And that is where I think they stumbled and fell. Mumford has the collabs and the hazy’s. Boomtown has the artist series of IPA’s. Angel City has Sunbather. IT had?

Blame can be laid at the turbulent start. A brewery that encounters roughness out of the gate with the beer nerds will be a step behind but I think that it is very telling that the reason being given for selling is that as told to The Full Pint was, “The owners have decided that their capital would be better invested in their other businesses.” That reads as we thought craft beer would make us money but it is still costing us money three years in and we are getting out while there is still a window of opportunity to sell.

It is a great space on the inside. Foot traffic, nearby condos and location aren’t horrible. They are nowhere near Arts District levels but other breweries have nothing. It is large but with reconfiguring it could be used for multiple events

Let’s hope the next chapter is a longer and fruitful one for this location.

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A Book & A Beer – The Library Book


This is a sad but fascinating topic for a book. The 1986 fire at the main branch of the Los Angeles Public Library. Books burnt, books waterlogged and so much knowledge lost. Thankfully Susan Orlean is more than up to the task with The Library Book.

The book toggles from Orlean’s library memories, to the possible culprit of the fire, to the City of Los Angeles library history and to the fire itself. The book is nimble and still easy to follow. I found the roster of head librarians to be the most fascinating section of the story followed by how the main branch recovered to become the low slung showplace that it is today which I still try to walk through whenever I am close enough to it.

Since we didn’t really have a brewery downtown in the time frame that the fire occurred, I will have to pick from current spots.

First up is the close by Karl Straus DTLA outpost. Wreck Alley Imperial Stout. The stacks of books had to be sent to industrial food warehouses and kept cold to keep mold out. I can imagine aisles of wrecked biographies and mysteries.

There are beers named Library. Such as Hopworks Urban Brewery and their Library Lager, or The Local Library German Pils from Books & Brews in Indiana. But maybe, and not to be morbid, you should find a smoke beer to sip while reading this fascinating slice of Los Angeles history.

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In the Tap Lines for November 2018

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As Los Angeles makes the slow transition from summer to late summer before heading to early summer, we can start to look at the bigger beers, the snifter beers. While also searching for the perfect beer to go with the fall sports season. Stay tuned for both this month.

~ e-visits to three breweries in NBA cities.
~ special featured reviews of beers over 10% ABV
~ Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events
~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark
~ A Book & A Beer reads Big Game by Mark Leibovich
~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.

Here are two events to get your November started in the Los Angeles craft beer world:
1) November 10 – Three Weavers 4th Anniversary
2) November 16 to 18 – Brewery Draconum 1st Anniversary

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In the Tap Lines for October 2018

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It’s time to PSL your world! Now that we are in October it is officially BSP sanctioned that you can drink pumpkin beers. It is also Doctor Who season as Jodie Whitaker takes the controls of the Tardis and my Blazers start the 18/19 campaign as well.

~ e-visits to three 2018 GABF winning breweries: Cloudburst Brewing, Smylie Brothers Brewing and Wolverine State Brewing
~ special featured reviews of Non-LA beers
~ Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events
~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark
~ A Book & A Beer reads Miss Subways by David Duchovny
~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.

Here are two events to get your October started in the Los Angeles craft beer world:
1) October 5th – Hoptoberfest: West Coast vs New England style IPA at 38 Degrees in Monrovia
2) October 6th – Enegren Oktoberfest 2018

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Hand Brewed and Now Open!


Finally! Hand-Brewed Beer has broken through all the red tape and typical build out delays to get their taproom open. I remember the L.A. Beer Bloggers group making a trek to try out the Beers even before their brewery location was even chosen.

Congratulations on your patience and a first visit to the Chatwsorth brewery is being planned.