Liberty, Prosperity & Craftbeer — NJ’s Microbreweries 2013 Calendar featuring images from 13 NJ micros and brewpubs, including Flying Fish, Cricket Hill, Kane, Basil T’s, JJ Bittings and more. The perfect holiday gift for the beer enthusiast! Available while supplies last from GretchenBrew, www.gretchenbrew.com. $11.95 (+ shipping & tax.)

Beau, one of the founders of the project said that he feels

think the biggest thing the NJ Community can do to help out is support their local craft breweries and homebrew stores.  People can follow us on facebook and twitter for updates and we continue to post pics as the hop yard develops.

Check out this video and support them!

This is a petition to support a proposed bill that would create a brewery license for farmers who would be brewing with their own products. This would help NJ’s craft beer scene as well as support NJ’s agritourism. My fiance and I are both homebrewers who are in our second year of starting a small hop farm in Burlington County, New Jersey. We would love to eventually be able to start a small farmhouse brewery on premises and use our homegrown hops along with other homegrown ingredients. To do so currently, we would have to somehow get the farm to be licensed as a commercial property rather than just as a residential farm. This bill would help make this possible, along with also helping other farmers make beer, wine, and cider from their harvest. Below is the link to the petition along with a link to the bill. Thanks again!

Details are on the petition link online here.

The New Year will bring a wave of excitement to beer enthusiasts in New Jersey. Hunterdon Distributors is pleased to announce that they have reached an agreement to distribute the highly acclaimed beers of Port Brewing and The Lost Abbey. In addition to an assortment of their most well-known beers, the inaugural launch will feature a special draft-only release brewed exclusively for the New Jersey market. Official release parties have already been scheduled for the first week of 2012.

One of the locations for the launch parties is going to be Cloverleaf (that’s been confirmed) on January 1 and I hear rumors of Mohawk House.  Where do you want the parties to be and are you thirsty yet?

Thoughts?

In 1933 during the Prohibition Era, the Cullen-Harrison Act was signed into law by President Franklin Roosevelt on March 23rd. That law was enacted on April 7th allowing the brewing and sale of beer in the United States again as long as it was < 3.2% (4% ABV). It’s said that people waited in line overnight on April 6th outside Milwaukee breweries in order to legally buy beer for the first time in over 13 years. As a result, April 7th is known as National Beer Day and April 6th is called New Beers Eve. So this April, tell all your friends about this glorious new holiday, and raise a glass, bottle, can, or mug to the deliciousness that is beer.

I borrowed this from the National Beer Day Facebook group.  Join in today/tonight and earn your Untappd Badge! Leave a comment here on the site with what you are drinking to celebrate.

The Spoetzl Brewery, the country’s fourth largest craft brewer and maker of the legendary Shiner Bock, will begin distribution in New Jersey April 1. The first public appearance will be at the 2011 Atlantic City Beer Festival, with distribution to retailers and on-premise locations across the state beginning the same week.

Shiner will be represented by five leading beer distributors in the state: Hub City Distributing Co. in Lawrenceville, Kohler Distributing Co. in Hawthorne, Kramer Beverage Company in Hammonton, Peerless Beverage Co. in Union and Shore Point Distributing in Freehold.

The people of Shiner are very excited to see their beer in New Jersey. Shiner has been produced since 1909 in the small Texas town (population 2,070) of the same name. Every drop of Shiner beer is still brewed in the town by only 66 brewery workers.

The brewery gets its name from Kosmos Spoetzl, the Bavarian-born and trained brewmaster who was brought to Shiner by the German and Czech immigrants who settled the town and missed the beer they had left behind in their home countries.

“We’re an independent brand with an obsession for quality and a love of our craft; it’s been that way ever since the brewery opened 102 years ago” said Jimmy Mauric, Brewmaster for Spoetzl. “We’re proud to now be in New Jersey.”

Shiner is known for crafting beers true to the brewery’s German and Czech roots but also for creating new brews combining that heritage with innovative twists.

The first Shiner beers in New Jersey will be Shiner Bock, one of the top selling craft beers in the country and the brewery’s flagship brand, first brewed in 1917 and Shiner 102, a unique double wheat beer that is this year’s special anniversary beer. Also available will be the Family Reunion – a variety pack featuring six different Shiner beers. Other varieties and seasonals will follow.

The next beer in the Exit Series is the Exit 9.  It’s a richly flavored red beer crafted with a variety of domestic and imported malts and a classic American yeast strain. Assertively hopped with Amarillo, Centennial, Chinook and Citra, the bouquet has complex notes of citrus and tropical fruits, with an appropriate bitterness in the finish.

Stay tuned to the site for more and more updates of who’s going to be tapping Exit 9 as well as your local stores where the scarlet ale is making their way starting today.