Big Apple Beer

Beer, it's the best, simply put.  Over the past few years my appreciation, as well as my association, with beer has changed dramatically.  Now, living in one of the biggest cities in the world, it has taken on even more of a life affirming meaning.

I grew up in a household of displaced-midwestern parents.  Coming from Wisconsin, beer to them was a way of life, it came hand and hand with meeting new people, or even just congregating within the household.  I have memories of them sharing a beer at dinner, or at least my mom would always want to split one with someone, she still does to this day.  I always found that endearing, whether it was the sheer fact she didn't want a whole one or, as I see it, sharing the moment with someone.  I grew up in Kentucky and when we traveled to visit family in the Midwest I found that type of mentality all over the place, sharing with one another and beer being something special within a community.  Even the most seldom of drinkers know the local brewery or the local watering hole around the corner, they can tell you immediately the best place to get a drink dependent on wherever you are and whatever you are looking for.

I carried that with me to college.  I moved with my family to North Carolina for high school and went to college there as well.  Like any other stereotypical high schooler, beer was there to party, and you could always trust beer for that.  Even amongst those hazy years of becoming acquainted with beer I could still see what it can do to a group of people, whether it was adversely or not.  Transitioning into college and becoming of age, the great state of North Carolina was a great place to begin ones expedition into beer.  When I turned 21 I wanted to get my hands on anything and everything I could.  Different, styles, different tastes, different bars, wherever it was I wanted to try it, responsibly of course.  It started to take on new meaning, the craft of it all, the art, seeing what it can do to people.  Beer started to take shape as something more important to me than just a glass of (delicious) liquid.  I saw it as something I had to be involved in.

Leaving one of the most populated southern beer states, and soon to be secondary homes of major breweries like Sierra Nevada, New Belgium and Oskar Blues, I moved with my girlfriend to New York City to hopefully plant my foot in the beer industry.  Upon arriving I found the scene to be quite different.  For a city filled with so many people, beer is an afterthought.  Obviously you can get a beer within 10 feet of wherever you are standing anywhere in the city, albeit a bar or bodega, but the respect I had been weened on was missing.  It was described to me as "New York is a liquor town, that is what the celebrities drink so that's what everyone else drinks."  That is not to say you can't find a good beer in the city though.

Through a brief stint working for a brewery I found some great places to enjoy beer. The best slash worst slash best again thing about the minority of beer is the camaraderie you'll find between those others out there seeking a fine ale.  There are plenty of people in New York that enjoy good beer, but they pale in comparison to the ultimate population the city commands.  From what I have seen, this then creates what would resemble a secret society, a community of people displanted from North Carolina, Southern California, Colorado, Michigan and other beer locales that all want to promote and create a new beer distinction within the big apple.  Compared to the number of bars in the city, the ones that you can get a really great beer with someone who knows what they are doing, as far as storing it, and serving it and promoting it, is minuscule.  However, these places will also know where else you can go, which is to say if you get the name of just one place the people there will be able to point you to the next destination and so on and so far, everyone wants to spread the word and spread the love.

That has been one of my favorite things so far when it comes to living in Brooklyn, seeking out the best places to enjoy a beer.  It truly makes you feel a part of the city.  You know where the best place in any neighborhood is to get a beer, you know the best place to send others and the people you send them to appreciate it, they know it's not just another person in the millions that live here, it is something more.  I know that I will run into them again, and that hopefully I'll be able to share a beer with them sometime.