Supporting Beer Media & This Weekend's Beer Events: More than a Great Taste
Powered by so many preparties
Yesterday, Vox laid off 15 members of the Vox Media Union. While we’re awaiting official word on what’s up with Eater Chicago and its Midwest properties, the release of editor Ashok Selvam was recently reported as confirmed on the Chicagofood subreddit. This serves as just another reminder that food and beverage media has never been in a worse place than right now.
Which is why I want to highlight some good beer writers (mostly independent ones!) providing valuable work, especially as we’re on the cusp of one of the biggest weekends for the Great Lakes beer community.
This of course leads us directly to Chris Drosner at the Wisconsin State Journal, who has been our go-to source for so much Wisconsin beer news, most recently for the changes to this weekend’s Great Taste.
I highly encourage you to check out his deep dive (linking to Bluesky but he’s on X too) into the big adjustment to in-state and out-of-state breweries attending GTMW which sees 25 fewer breweries attending this year overall, and only 25 out-of-state attendees - which I think represents something like a 75% YOY drop thanks to the new state fees. Wow.
I have also been learning more about the Madison area thanks to
who has a GTMW Guide that just went up yesterday, while further south, I also want to make mention of who has been doing a lot of STL-based beer writing in the past couple months.In addition, let’s shout out the return of Courtney Iseman’s
which came back this week after a 16-month absence, and I will be subscribing to her podcast posthaste, largely to hear the conversation between her and our friends at .Finally, a big cheers to the gents of ABV Chicago who celebrated their 600th episode this week by interviewing Matt Gallagher at Suncatcher Brewing. Quite a milestone and a very fun conversation about one of my favorite new breweries.
Of course, I’m guessing if you read this you also follow
and and listen to the Beer Temple Podcast, but if you don’t, you probably should! And while we’re at it, please also consider supporting our friends at , the greatest food writer in all existence and my favorite Chicago restaurant reviewer and shit-stirrer: .Whew. With all that said, I certainly missed some people here; tag or share your favorites with us on our Substack Notes or on Instagram!
Reminder: Only Premium Subscribers get to see behind the paywall for the rest of these newsworthy social media updates! They’re also the only ones being sent Wednesday label updates via email. Lite Subscribers can click here to see who’s cruising the Autoblonde.
This Friday / Starting Friday:
Food! Beer! Music! Games! Juggling! A DIY cookie designing station for the kids! Skeleton Key kicks off their Summer Skelebration today, which carries over into tomorrow as well. Go get one of the very first pours of Blume & Ferris beer.
There are plenty of GTMW pre-parties tonight in Madison, including the Catalyst Preparty at Karben4 and the Great Taste pre-party at Working Draft but there are so, so, so many more of them going on. Quite a roundup at the GTMW site.
Saturday, August 9:
Great Taste of the Midwest, of course, but there’s lots more!
Around Chicagoland, you’ve got Wolfden’s Seventh’ Anniversary and Maplewood’s Back Alley Bash.
Down in Alton, you can head to the Rock the Hops music/art/beer festival with Old Bakery Brewing Company.
Over in Ohio, Great Lakes Brewing Company has their first Beer and Music Bash.
Sunday, August 10:
Still in Madison? Surly hosts a Great Taste Hangover Brunch and Meat Raffle at Jordan’s Big 10 Pub.
Our Events Listings remain free and unrestricted to all readers, because we want to give you a reason (or three) to visit a local brewery or beer event every week.
These listings usually skew Chicagoland-centric but I love to include events from around the Midwest! If there’s something you’d like to submit for inclusion, send me an email.
Our Social Updates section is now exclusively for Premium Subscribers. We’re so very thankful for all your ongoing support. You keep these emails going.
Unfortunately, one of the out-of-state breweries on Chris Drosner’s list up there actually won’t be in attendance at Great Taste this weekend…