Sláinte!

Yeah, we're mostly wine people. But that doesn't exclude us from also being beer people! (And tequila people...and bourbon people...) Carl first got into fermentation as a homebrewer. It was a hobby he came by honestly, having watched his dad brew beer and soda while he was growing up in Kansas and Illinois. Early in our married days Carl and I would enjoy "Brew and Bake Nights" in our tiny kitchen in Oakland City, Indiana, where I would bake homemade cookies or bread while he brewed his latest batch of beer, mead, or cyser (apple cider mead).

Even after Carl graduated from fermenting things as as avocation to doing it as a vocation, beer still holds a special place in his heart. One of his favorite sayings during harvest is, "It takes a lot of beer to make good wine!" This refers to the practice of grabbing a cold one or two or three while slogging through the work of the harvest and grape processing.

We enjoy beer on other occasions and at other times of the year, too. This year, for St. Patrick's Day, we broke out the Guiness (of course!). In the summer, sometimes, nothing seems to hit the spot like a chilled IPA or German Pilsner or Köln-style Kölsch , something which immediately transports us to another place and time. 

So...cheers to all the beverages of the changing seasons!