Our wine columnists chat about beer

BUZZ: Feeling left out this week, Marnie?

Marnie: Not particularly. Why?

Buzz: It's Philly Beer Week. That must really chafe you wine people.

Marnie: Not really, Buzz. Beer and wine are more alike than wine and spirits. Most wine lovers appreciate good beer, too.

Buzz: Really? I would think your friends would be too hoity-toity to be seen swilling beer. Let me guess — they drink only the fancy ales that come in bottles with a cork.

Marnie: Well, therwe is certainly appreciation in wine circles for well-crafted beers made with quality ingredients and for the most complex, "winelike" beers. Those Belgian-style, bottle-conditioned ales are stronger than the average lager and feature fruity-yeasty aromatics familiar to wine drinkers.

Buzz: The aromatics familiar to me are Old Crow and PBR.

Marnie: And wine-ophiles are just as likely to appreciate the crisp refreshment of classic German-style beers like the ones Pennsylvania is famous for, as long as they're made with quality ingredients.

Buzz: Wait, I thought we were famous for Gus the Groundhog.

Marnie: Possibly, but Pennsylvania leads the nation in German-style brewing thanks to our cultural heritage. Philly's craft-beer scene brims with German-style lagers and pilsners, weizens and bocks, while most others are more ale-centric, drawn primarily from British and Belgian styles.

Buzz: And that's a good thing for us because?

Marnie: Because the most popular beers on Earth are undeniably German-inspired. As folks discover that lagers aren't all mass-produced "swill," they're exploring other German styles that also prioritize refreshment over power, like kölsch and schwarzbier. Our region's unique mix of teutonic-tilting craft brewers like Victory and legacy lager houses like Yuengling makes us the leader of the pack.