Building Your Beer Bookshelf – Memoirs and Travelogues

I’m going to make a couple of assumptions to start off this post, if I could be so bold.  First, I’m operating under the theory that you’re the type of person that likes doing a little reading for your own enjoyment.  After all, you’re spending some of your valuable time reading the ramblings of a second-rate blogger on a first-rate beer site.  Second, I’m assuming that you’re someone who enjoys reading about beer, and wouldn’t mind finding a few books on the wonderful libation.

If these assumptions are correct, you’re likely to enjoy the next couple of Wednesdays.  For my first few columns for the Hop Press, I’ll be introducing you to some of the best, the most compelling and the most readable books on the world of beer.  In the next month, you’ll read able to read all about homebrewing manuals, beer cookbooks and beer guides.  This week, I’m starting things off with memoirs and travelogues from the world of hops and barley.  If you’re looking to read drunken ramblings from Ireland, stories about bouncing from brewery to brewery around the US, or books about starting your own craft brewery, you’re in the right place.

There’s no better place to start in the world of brewing memoirs than with Brewing Up a Business and Beer School, the inside stories of Dogfish Head and the Brooklyn Brewery.  The first, by Dogfish founder and craft beer rock star Sam Calagione, is helped immensely by Sam’s English degree.  We follow Calagione from his early homebrewing days to his current place at the top of one of the country’s most popular breweries, with anecdotes about his family, employees, beers and brand along the way.  Anyone that’s ever seen the author in action knows he can tell an entertaining story, and this charisma translates onto the page well.

In Beer School, Brooklyn founders Steve Hindy and Tom Porter tell a story that reads much more like a traditional business book, practically a prose business plan for opening a brewery.  This isn’t to say the book isn’t entertaining (any time you read about Garrett Oliver, you have gold) or exciting (New York mobsters, anyone?), but Hindy and Porter’s lingo is business rather than … off-centered.  The authors are brutally honest about the trials of the business and with each other, and offer some real insight into the day-to-day of opening a business like a brewery.

Now that we’ve got the inside stories of brewing out of the way, we can hit the road with Brian Yaeger, author of Red, White and Brew.  Part personal travelogue, part beer history lesson and part brewery handbook, Yaeger drove around the county, visited 37 different breweries, and did in-depth profiles and interviews at fourteen of them.  This is one of my favorite beer books, and offers an awesome look at the wild range of personalities that make up the craft brewing landscape.

OK, so we tooled around America and saw the beginnings of a couple craft breweries.  Now, let’s jump across the pond for Round Ireland with a Fridge and Pint-Sized Ireland.  Both books owe their existence to that classic Irish brew, Guinness.  In Round, author Tony Hawks makes a ridiculous bet with a pal that he can hitchhike around the isle of Ireland with a mini-fridge in tow.  Among his other beer-fueled adventures circumnavigating the island, Hawks finds himself at one point being baptized with, you guessed it, Guinness.  McHugh, the author of Pint-Sized Ireland, circles the country with a different goal – finding that elusive perfect pint of Guinness.  Now, I know there are plenty of beer geeks who turn up their noses at the “pedestrian” Guinness stout.  Even if you’re one of these folks, give these books a chance – I can give the writing no higher praise than that it will really make you want a Guinness.

Finally, we can move onto a book that covers the whole world of beer!  Charlie Papazian, author of the Complete Joy of Homebrewing and founder of the American Homebrewers Association, takes you to every corner of the brewing world in Microbrewed Adventures.  One of the truly original voices in the world of beer writers, Charlie profiles Cuban, Latvian, American, Belgian, and Zimbabwean beer (along with many others) in his inimitable style.  As a bonus for us homebrewing types, Papazian concludes each section with recipes – both grain and extract – for the beers domestic and exotic.  And it’s a good thing, too, because this is definitely a book to be enjoyed with a homebrew in hand.

Alright, so these are the first few must-haves for your bar-side shelves.  Next week, I’ll be diving into general beer guides and beer history.  While these are my favorite beer travelogues and memoirs, I’m sure there are more out there – feel free to chime in with your favorites in the comments.