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Beer Myth Busted Despite it being a commonly held belief, tapping a beer can won’t prevent it from exploding, according to the results of a new study. Researchers at the University of Southern Denmark meticulously experimented with shaken and unshaken beer cans before coming to their conclusion. The theory behind the tapping is that when a beer can is shaken, it causes bubbles to form in the liquid. When the can is opened, the bubbles rush to the top and cause the liquid to fizz out of the can. Tapping the can is supposed to cause the bubbles to release from the side of the can and rise to the top prior to the can being opened. Unfortunately, the research shows tapping the can doesn’t cause the bubbles to rise at all.Researchers had two sets of cans--one that was vigorously shaken and one that wasn’t. The cans were weighed before being opened and afterward. Regardless, the tapping showed no impact on the amount of liquid lost when the can was opened. . Possible reasons for this may be that the tapping doesn’t release enough energy to move the bubbles, that the bubbles don’t rest on the side of the can, but instead sit in the bulk of the liquid, and that certain proteins in the beer may prevent the bubbles from rising. |
| Wash Dishes With Beer The next time you wash your dishes, you could find yourself up to your elbows in soap suds spiked with leftover alcohol, if the world’s largest brewer and an environmentally friendly detergent firm have their way and they just might. Growing interest in alcohol- free lager, driven by demand for healthier drinks, had left Anheuser-Busch InBev with a problem — what to do with all the alcohol sucked out of its beer. So it sealed a deal with Belgium-based Ecover to create a dishwashing liquid with a quarter of its content derived from the zero-alcohol versions of theLeffe and Jupiler beer brands. AB InBev's brewing facility in Leuven — Europe’s largest with a maximum capacity of 1.2 billion liters of beer a year — is being used to extract alcohol InBev plans to spread the practice worldwide. The alcohol, which serves as the active cleaning and preservative component, is extracted, cleaned and sent to Ecover for use in its “Too Good to Waste” detergent. AB InBev said it was looking at ways to re-use other waste. Spent grains may be the next big thing. Most of the 1.3 million tonnes it produces per year worldwide is currently used as cattle feed. But it said it had potential partners in the pipeline and was looking into turning it into a plant-based meat substitute for humans. |
January 2020
| QUICK HITS Fido’s Taphouse In Tigard, Oregon, doubles as a foster home for dogs that were rescued from kill shelters in California. The bar has helped 70 dogs find forever homes since it opened last year. The venue can hold up to eight dogs at a time which stay in separate area from where food is served. But because alcohol can sometimes affect people’s judgment, Fido’s has a rule in place that potential adopters must wait three days after they decide to adopt a pup. SpaceX has just aunched a 3-ton shipment to the International Space Station containing a miniature of a brewery's malt house. The barley grains were sent into space for a beer-malting experiment by Anheuser-Busch. It's the latest in a series of Budweiser experiments to explore how barley germination is affected by weightlessness. How that will improve their beer is unclear to us. Sales of domestic beer slipped 4.6% between December 2018 and December 2019..Microbrew and craft beers are also in a minor slump, down 0.4%, The biggest winner of the year was White Claw a spiked seltzer whose sales cracked $1.2 billion for 2019— a nearly 200% jump in growth over the prior year. in early 2016, there were only 80 locations in the U.S. [that sold self-serve. At the end of 2019 there's over 400 in the U.S. It's not just beer. Self-serve wine bars are popping up around the country too., |
Edited by Jim Attacap
| A Billion Dollars Down The Drain Constellation Brands just cut bait on a mega dollar craft beer bet that fell far short of expectations, but the seller of Corona and Modelo in the United States says it plans to ride out an even heftier investment in cannabis -- even though it, too, hasn't panned out as initially hoped. Four years ago Constellation paid $1 billion for the fast-growing Ballast Point Brewing, That is still a record amount for a craft brewer. Now they have unloaded the iconic craft beer brand to little-known Chicagoland brewer Kings & Convicts taking a huge loss. Kings & Convicts, a tiny firm, is, a 2-year-old microbrewery that employs only nine people and annually produces about 600 barrels of beer. They will move their headquarters from the Chicago suburbs to San Diego. It's the deal of the century for them. Maybe. Constellation struggled to grow Ballast Point nationally as it competed against established local breweries and shifting consumer tastes. They also did nothing to improve the brand, did not innovate, or produce popular styles such as New England IPA. During the past two years, Constellation shut down brewhouses and wrote down the San Diego brewery's trademark value by more than $200 million to $17 million, regulatory filings show. Constellation cutting its losses from a once-splashy acquisition doesn't mean similar moves are in store for its $4 billion wager in cannabis, a company spokesperson says. Constellation shelled out more than $4 billion for a 38% stake in Canopy Growth (CGC), a Canadian cannabis firm that has -- along with other North American cannabis companies -- hit significant headwinds in efforts to expand and be profitable. Companies and investors were overly bullish in how quickly the Canadian recreational program and international cannabis markets -- notably the United States -- would develop. As Canopy's losses started to mount, they've put a drag on Constellation. For the nine-month period that ended on Nov. 30, 2019, Constellation recorded $544 million in non-cash equity in earnings losses attributable to Canopy, which translated to a $125.4 million net loss on a comparable non-GAAP basis adjusted for one-time items. ----------------------------- |