Greetings readers. Did you keep yourselves sufficiently hydrated this summer (with something containing water, malt, yeast and hops)? Before we dive into autumn, let’s take a pause to look back over beer happenings these last three months. In Japan, the busy summer festival season wound down, and we’re not just talking about straight-up beer festivals.…

Is your jetpack fueled? Ready for high-stakes adventure? No? Well then, at least grab a beer, if you aren’t holding one already, and let’s take a look at what’s been happening in the beer world these past few months. The World Beer Cup (WBC) and Craft Brewers Conference (CBC), held this past spring in Nashville,…

One of the more interesting revelations from the recent winter Olympics for many people was that German athletes were drinking non-alcoholic beer as a recovery drink following their races. This isn’t a recent development, either. For years, German athletes have been drinking quite a lot of it after training and competition. The popularity of this…

The world of beer is a creative one. Which means it’s a slightly zany one, too. New ideas and innovation go hand in hand with quirkiness and seemingly nonsensical behavior sometimes. Let’s take a look at what’s going on. But first, the more straightforward news… The Brussels Beer Challenge is a competition founded in Belgium…

Since its debut we’ve primarily used this Round Up column to recap beer events and related news in Japan. In more recent years, we’ve regularly included news from overseas as well. We’d now like to make that the primary focus–as well as other quirky, entertaining reports with some relation to beer. There are few resources…