It's no secret that Louisville is one of America's bourbon capitals, but the Derby City once thrived as a brewing mecca as well, rivaling even St. Louis and Milwaukee with its crisp lagers and Kentucky Common Ale. German settlers arrived with centuries-old brewing traditions and beer gardens, cementing beer and barrooms in Louisville's culture. Following Prohibition, the "big three"--Falls City, Fehr's and Oertel's--kept traditions alive while ingraining iconic brands into the city's fabric and heritage. More recently, craft brewers like BBC, Apocalypse Brew Works and New Albanian Brewing Company have drawn on this rich history. Kick back with Louisville food and beverage journalist Kevin Gibson as he traces Louisville's beer history with stories from the past, interviews and plenty of photos that bring this intoxicating story to life.

With more than 1,800 entries, The Encyclopedia of Louisville is the ultimate reference for Kentucky's largest city. For more than 125 years, the world's attention has turned to Louisville for the annual running of the Kentucky Derby on the first Saturday in May. Louisville Slugger bats still reign supreme in major league baseball. The city was also the birthplace of the famed Hot Brown and Benedictine spread, and the cheeseburger made its debut at Kaelin's Restaurant on Newburg Road in 1934. The "Happy Birthday" had its origins in the Louisville kindergarten class of sisters Mildred Jane Hill and Patty Smith Hill. Named for King Louis XVI of France in appreciation for his assistance during the Revolutionary War, Louisville was founded by George Rogers Clark in 1778. The city has been home to a number of men and women who changed the face of American history. President Zachary Taylor was reared in surrounding Jefferson County, and two U.S. Supreme Court Justices were from the city proper. Second Lt. F. Scott Fitzgerald, stationed at Camp Zachary Taylor during World War I, frequented the bar in the famous Seelbach Hotel, immortalized in The Great Gatsby. Muhammad Ali was born in Louisville and won six Golden Gloves tournaments in Kentucky.

Sara Havens is The Bar Belle for LEO Weekly and writes about everything from the Louisville, Ky., nightlife and hangover cures to the latest in bars, cocktails and watered-down American swill. A personality-driven column that runs every other week in LEO, The Bar Belle was created in 2006, which is, ironically, the year Sara's mother stopped reading the paper. The Bar Belle was named Best Column (for a circulation under 50,000) at the 2011 AltWeekly Awards. This book features 100 of her best columns from 2006-2010.

“The only book you need to understand the world’s most popular beverage. I swear on a stack of these, it’s a thumping good read.”––John Holl, editor of All About Beer Magazine and author of The American Craft Beer Cookbook Imagine sitting in your favorite pub with a friend who happens to be a world-class expert on beer. That’s this book. It covers the history: how we got from gruel-beer to black IPA in 10,000 years. The alchemy: malts, grains, and the miracle of hops. The variety: dozens of styles and hundreds of recommended brews (including suggestions based on your taste preferences), divided into four sections––Ales, Wheat Beers, Lagers, and Tart and Wild Ales––and all described in mouthwatering detail. The curiosity: how to read a Belgian label; the talk of two Budweisers; porter, the first superstyle; and what, exactly, a lager is. The pleasure. Because you don’t merely taste beer, you experience it. Winner of a 2016 IACP Award “Covers a lot of ground, from beer styles and brewing methods to drinking culture past and present. There’s something for beer novices and beer geeks alike.”––Ken Grossman, founder, Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. “Erudite, encyclopedic, and enormously entertaining aren’t words you normally associate with beer, but The Beer Bible is no ordinary beer book. As scinitillating, diverse, and refreshing as man’s oldest alcoholic beverage itself.”––Steve Raichlen, author of Project Smoke and How to Grill

The ingredients are simple -- beer, cheese, and spices -- and the result is delicious. Still, beer cheese is a rarefied dish not common in cookbooks or on menus. Since the 1940s, this creamy appetizer with a kick, traditionally served with pretzels, has quietly found its way into pubs and restaurants throughout the South and Midwest. The original recipe is cloaked in a mystery nearly as deep as the JFK assassination. Ask most makers and they'll act demure about the contents of their dip. Some refuse to disclose what kind of beer or cheese they use or which extra spices they add. Others keep their preparation instructions secret. Garin Pirnia traces the history of beer cheese from its beginnings at the Driftwood Inn in Winchester, Kentucky, to today, situating it alongside other dishes such as the German cheese spread obatzda, queso dip, and pimento cheese. She surveys the restaurants that serve this distinctive dip, highlights points of interest along the Beer Cheese Trail, and includes dozens of recipes, from the classic original, to new twists like Pawpaw Beer Cheese, to dishes that incorporate the spread, such as Crab Broccoli, Beer Cheese Casserole, and Beer Cheese Buttermilk Biscuits. Packed full of interviews with restauranteurs who serve it, artisans who process it, and even home cooks who enter their special (and secret) recipes in contests, The Beer Cheese Book will entertain and educate, all while making your mouth water. Fortunately, it will also teach you how to whip up your own batch.

Beer has never been a stranger to North America. Author Stan Hieronymous explains how before European colonization, Native Americans were making beer from fermented corn, such as the tiswin of the Apache and Pueblo tribes. European colonists new to the continent were keen to use whatever local flavorings were at hand like senna, celandine, chicory, pawpaw, and persimmon. Before barley took hold in the 1700s, early fermentables included corn (maize), wheat bran, and, of course, molasses. Later immigrants to the young United States brought with them German and Czech yeasts and brewing techniques, setting the stage for the ubiquitous Pilsner lagers that came to dominate by the late 1800s. But local circumstances led to novel techniques, like corn and rice adjuncts, or the selection of lager yeasts that could ferment at ale-like temperatures. Despite the emergence of brewing giants with national distribution, “common brewers” continued to make “common beer” for local taverns and pubs. Distinctive American styles arose. Pennsylvania Swankey, Kentucky Common, Choc beer, Albany Ale, and steam beer—now called California common—all distinctive styles born of their place. From its post-war fallow period, the US brewing industry was reignited in the 1980s by the craft beer scene. Follow Stan Hieronymous as he explores the wealth of ingredients available to the locavores and beer aficionados of today. He takes the reader through grains, hops, trees, plants, roots, mushrooms, and chilis—all ingredients that can be locally grown, cultivated, or foraged. The author supplies tips on how to find these as well as dos and don'ts of foraging. He investigates the nascent wild hops movement and initiatives like the Local Yeast Project. Farm breweries are flourishing, with more breweries operating on farms than the US had total breweries fewer than 50 years ago. He gives recipes too, each one showing how novel, local ingredients can be used to add fermentables, flavor, and hop-like bitterness, and how they might be cultivated or gathered in the wild. Armed with this book, brewers in America have never been better equipped to create a beer that captures the essence of its place.

Discover the German influence on the Derby City in this collection of historical essays. The first German immigrants arrived in Louisville nearly two hundred years ago. By 1850, they represented nearly twenty percent of the population, and they influenced every aspect of daily life, from politics to fine art. In 1861, Moses Levy opened the famed Levy Brothers department store. Kunz’s “The Dutchman” Restaurant was established as a wholesale liquor establishment in 1892 and then became a delicatessen and, finally, a restaurant in 1941. Carl Christian Brenner, an emigrant from Lauterecken, Bavaria, gained notoriety as the most important Kentucky landscape artist of the nineteenth century. C. Robert and Victoria A. Ullrich edit a collection of historical essays about German immigrants and their fascinating past in the Derby City.