Happy Valentine’s Day!Thanks so much for listening and watching - it’s really been a gift to see more people discover the audio and video version of the podcast over the past week. Your eyes and ears are a gift to me - and I appreciate you so much! Another gift - the new logo and background from Symmytree, thanks to Double G - check out his work at Symmytree.com

Brought to you by The Real Voice - Mel Allen. Providing voice over for commercials, podcasts, explainer videos, and more. Samples and demos at https://therealvoice.com

Congratulations to all those who brought gold, silver, and bronze medals home - no I’m not talking about the Olympics - I’m talking about the Texas Craft Brewers Cup. Don’t get me started that they called it the first annual because, until it happens again next year - is there any way of knowing it might be the last annual too? Anyway - 81 medals were given to 57 small and independent brewers across the state out of 131 breweries that entered. That amounts to 27 medal categories covering 150+ different beer styles that were awarded gold, silver, and bronze medals. They had a tough job anonymizing 755 entries to make sure only a select few knew what anyone was even judging! For the full list head to https://www.craftbrewingbusiness.com/business-marketing/here-are-the-winners-of-first-annual-texas-craft-brewers-cup/

Blue Run Spirits is making a splash in the glass of the whiskey world. First - they picked up former Four Roses master distiller Jim Rutledge. That went off with a bang as the “liquid advisor” helped them sell out of some releases in minutes and win the 2021 San Francisco World Spirits Competition! Since then they have also added “the Buddha of Bourbon” protege of Wild Turkey master distillers Jimmy Russell, son, Eddie Russell. They’ve also named Blue Run’s first whiskey director - Shaylyn Gammon of Louisville - to help expand the brand’s portfolio. She created the Russell’s Reserve 13-year-old Bourbon, which was named the Best American Whiskey of 2021 by Fred Minnick. I don’t know what’s in the water - but apparently there’s magic in the whisky there! They’re expanding their reach too with 10,000 bottles now available in 14 states and across three countries. The full story at https://www.kentucky.com/lexgoeat/bourbon/article258165858.html

The code has been cracked! For years the issue has been that NA beers have been a bit lackluster. While some seem to have cracked the code their own way (like Athletic Brewing and Zero Gravity) researchers at the University of Copenhagen say "What non-alcoholic beer lacks is the aroma from hops. When you remove the alcohol from the beer, for example by heating it up, you also kill the aroma that comes from hops. Other methods for making alcohol-free beer by minimizing fermentation also lead to poor aroma because alcohol is needed for hops to pass their unique flavor to the beer.” Small molecules called monoterpenoids seem to be the reason and the process the researchers found should also allow more flavorful NA beers to be made with a much les energy intensive process - saving brewers big bucks! The method is already being tested in breweries in Denmark and the plan is to have the technique ready for the entire brewing industry in October 2022. Get the full story at https://phys.org/news/2022-02-non-alcoholic-beer-regular.html

Next Time: I’m putting together the next rounds of interviews and we’ll go Another Round this coming weekend - until then binge some back episodes of the weekday podcast and the Bonus interviews too!

The Boozebuddy Update continues on video! On Spotify, watch alongside the podcast, or head to the YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC033VXK28YhXgJAYpHS-C_w Head to BoozebuddyUpdate.com to comment or get in touch with me! Remember - don’t drink and drive, stay safe, drive sober and support the booze that supports your local community.

The Boozebuddy Update for #NationalVodkaDay October 4th 2021