Jackd #10: Woodchuck isn’t bad, actually. I’d take it over strongbow or woodpecker, which is damning with faint praise, but also over most other ciders I’ve had.

I was astonished to find Newcastle Brown on tap in San Francisco a few years ago. Very good it was too and the local Anchor Steam was excellent. Why do you chaps only export the rubbish ?

Europe has excellent, in some cases masterful, traditional beers. American corporate beer is like having sex in a canoe: f*ing too close to water…

But the finest American craft beers are of a quality equal to or greater than at least those European beers which are imported to the US, and they are much more innovative. The craft beer rennaisance blossomed in Northern California and the Pacific Northwest and is now spreading across the country, with hotspots in the same semicountercultural regions that are also ahead of the curve in organic foods, etc – pretty much every funky college town has a craft brewery now. Here in Portland (oregon) it seems like there’s a new one every week. Some are quite abysmally bad, most are decent to good – certainly better than any corporate beer – and the best are simply beyond description.

A big part of the reason is simply that we grow hops here, including organics, so it’s very fresh…

Rogue brand, led by famous innovator John Maier, is somewhat widely distributed, and is well known for its unique and sometimes very complex flavors. If you get a batch brewed by Maier these are perhaps the finest commercially available, bottled beers in the world, if you like nonstandard beers that is…but even a generic batch of Rogue is excellent. I favor Dead Guy Ale. If you want a speaker for your Science of Beer thing, get Maier to come. The guy’s a freakin’ genius.

I think Fat Tire is very overrated, but a lot of ppl like it…

Sierra Nevada is a large-production craft brewer whose product has remained consistent. Same for Anchor Steam.

But of course if you want the best you have to come to Oregon and tour the pubs. The best stuff is always made in small batches and rarely publicized. A good time to come would be in July – it’s lovely here then, and there’s the Brewer’s Festival…http://www.oregonbrewfest.com/

BTW we also have the best coffee on the planet. Bite my used grounds, Seattle! Stumptown Roasters has started a new revolution in micro-roasting and ultra-fair-trade single-origin coffees that make existing “gourmet” coffees taste like Folger’s. You’ll need the coffee, too, after spending a night or two sampling the beers.

Oregon: home of the finest biochemistry-altering agricultural products on Earth. *ahem*

At my local bottle shop I can obtain four or five different brands and several varieties, plus some flavored stuff and a couple of pear ciders (perry to the cognoscenti).

Common brands around here: Cider Jack, K, Hard Core, Woodpecker, Hornsby’s, and my favorite, Woodchuck. Some places carry Strongbows. I recommend avoiding the ‘regular’ version of Hornsby’s. Tastes like apple-flavored Jolly Rancher candy.

I’ve kept my eyes open for real artisanal ciders, but none of them seem to be distributed here in Georgia (USA), alas!

The good ones can be found in Europe, namely in Denmark, Belgium and Czech Republic.