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Podcast Episode 437: Happy Birthday Simcoe! Vinnie Cilurzo and Jason Perrault Look Back on 25 Years of the Groundbreaking HopBy Jamie BognerIn this special episode, recorded out in the experimental hop fields of Perrault Farms, Russian River’s Vinnie Cilurzo and hop breeder and grower Jason Perrault tell the story of Simcoe—from the early days of breeding through its near disappearance to the current context, where it’s used in Pliny the Elder in modern flowable formats.
Recipe: Craft Coast XPAThis extra pale ale is a crowd favorite at Craft Coast Beer & Tacos in San Diego’s North County. It’s also found success at the highest levels of competition, winning two straight World Beer Cup medals—bronze in 2024, then silver in 2025.
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Recipe: Sapwood Cellars Hidden Thiols Hazy Double IPABy Scott JanishThis lush, Riwaka-heavy IPA was a collab that linked the American East Coast with New Zealand’s South Island.
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Wildcatting for Hop Oil: Decoding the Aroma MatrixBy Josh WeikertIn recent years, the brewing world has learned a lot about terpenes, thiols, biotransformation, survivables, and more. Now, let’s zoom out to consider the essence of hop aroma—the oils that contain all those compounds—and make sense of them in a way that any brewer can use.
Beer Lovers in Northampton, Massachusetts, Know the Dirty TruthFrom our Love Handles files on beer bars we love: Hip but unpretentious, the Dirty Truth in central Massachusetts draws a crowd of students and bartenders there for a stacked selection of local lagers, saisons, Belgian gueuze, and more.
Podcast Episode 436: Blake Masoner of Craft Coast Strives for Excellence Beer After Beer, Taco After TacoBy Jamie BognerThe eight World Beer Cup and GABF medals earned over their first four years of existence isn’t the first thing people mention when talking about Craft Coast—it’s the tacos. But whether they’re making Mexican-style lager, dark lager, XPA, West Coast IPA, or even hazy IPA, they won’t stop iterating and improving as they blend brewpub flexibility with production brewery rigor.
Recipe: Sour City Hua Lamphong Somtum AleFeaturing dried shrimp, salted crabs, fish sauce, fresh lime juice, tamarind paste, tomatoes, peanuts, and bird’s eye chiles, this one’s not for vegetarians... or anyone with a peanut allergy... or a shellfish allergy... or anyone who doesn’t like “spicy.” But that’s Thai food for you.
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Incorporating Coffee into High-ABV Beers | Video TipBy Matt MalloyFor River North’s coffee-infused beers, it’s whole beans, fresh and medium-roasted. In this clip from their video course, founder Matt Hess explains the method.
Special Ingredient: SomtumBy Joe StangeThis fresh, vibrant, spicy Thai dish is a powerhouse of flavor, from its lime-driven acidity to its fiery chiles, crunchy peanuts, and briny little sea creatures. Should you put it in beer? Yes, obviously, you cowards.

Recipe: Altitude Outward Bound NZ IPAFrom Altitude Brewing in Queenstown, New Zealand, here’s what the team there calls a “mountain IPA,” featuring an aromatic punch from Nelson and Riwaka.
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Podcast Episode 435: Josh Penney of Threes Brings a Bicoastal Sensibility to Hoppy Lager, Hazy IPA, and MoreBy Jamie BognerThe head brewer of this Brooklyn craft beer innovator brings an iconoclastic approach to hoppy beer honed through years of brewing in Southern California.
From the Library
Best in Beer 2025
Conclusion | Last Word
Innovation | Never Stop Learning
Quality | Limiting Oxygen
Hops | Products, Pellets & Process Tips
Yeast | Controlling for Clean, Bright Hop Expression
pH | Making Adjustments, from Mash to Fermentation
Water | Chemistry that Supports the Hops
Malt | Building a Base that “Gets out of the Way”
Introduction | The Origins of Hop-Saturated Recipes