Story Archives of 'Alcohol'

Thanksgiving is just over a week away. A day when many of the grateful wash down turkey and stuffing with a glass of wine, or celebrate visits from old friends over a cold beer, or two.

One New Hampshire farmer hopes we’ll try sipping on artisanal cider instead. Hard cider is a New England tradition that dates back to the Founding Fathers, and as falling apple prices leave orchard owners struggling to stay afloat, a cider revival could provide a lifeline to New Hampshire growers.

Word of Mouth producer Avishay Artsy went to taste for himself.

(Photos by Scott McIntyre)

You can live on Park Avenue or a park bench and be addicted to alcohol. Of the eighteen million alcoholics in this country, one in five function so highly that no one would confuse them with a falling-down drunk. They show up at work, take care of their families, and get promotions - looking good on the outside while concealing their battle with booze.

Sarah Allen Benton knows. She’s a mental health counselor at Emmanuel College in Boston. Prior to becoming sober, she got a master's degree and held down several professional jobs, all while struggling with a drinking problem. She joins us to discuss her new book Understanding the High-Functioning Alcoholic.

And for many heavy drinkers, the road to alcoholism begins in college. Binge drinking can be a tough habit to break, but Augsburg College in Minneapolis has one of the country's few on-campus drug and alcohol recovery programs. It's called Step Up. The students don't just stay away from drugs — they have to get good grades, attend 12-step meetings, and keep their residence hall clean. Independent producer Hillary Frank brings us the story of one of Step Up's students, who uses only his first name, Sam. You can hear this story at the Public Radio Exchange.

(Photo by Joseph Nicolia via Flickr/Creative Commons)

Picking up a six-pack at your local grocery store is more complicated than it used to be. Sure, there’s the old stand-bys: Budweiser, Miller Hi-Life, PBR and Heineken. But you’ll also find pumpkin ales, chocolate stouts, and the absurdly-named, like Skull Splitter, Old Leg Humper, Moose Drool, He’Brew, and Ale Mary Full of Taste.

The craft beer movement has caught up with America’s foodie and wine snob culture and invaded the local liquor store. In 1965, the United States had one single craft brew – Anchor Steam, from San Francisco. Today, there are over 1,500. Burkhard Bilger is staff writer for The New Yorker, and wrote about the rise of extreme beer in its recent food issue.

It's a quickly growing market in the U.S., where sales of craft beer grew by twelve percent last year. But the movement really has roots that stretch back thousands of years, drawing inspiration from the fermented beverages of ancient Egypt, and of the Aztecs and Mayans.

Bilger profiles Sam Calagione, a vibrant character, savvy marketer, and founder of Dogfish Head Craft Brewery in Delaware. Dogfish's motto is "off-centered ales for off-centered people," and it makes everything from elegant Belgian-style ales to experimental beers brewed with fresh oysters or arctic cloudberries.

But not everyone is crazy about what Calagione is doing – making beer with blue-green algae, or cardamom, curry and lemongrass. There are people within the craft beer movement who see "extreme beers" as detrimental to the craft beer brand. Bilger traces this debate over what constitutes beer back nearly five centuries, to the battle between German and Belgian brewers. And he notes that this isn’t the first time America’s experimented with odd beers - in 1873, the country had some four thousand breweries.

While craft beer still makes up a tiny part of the market – only four percent, or equalling about as many bottles as the Michelob brand, the small brewers hope they'll grow to make a much larger dent in the industrial beer market.

(Photo by Hawkins)

Few have more finely-tuned taste buds than wine lovers. They can detect the faintest tones of raspberry and cherry, blends of leather and fresh-cut grass, hints of apple and pear. The descriptions can frankly get a bit silly.

But wine is not only for the connoisseur. This year, America is expected to become the largest wine market in the world, surpassing France and Italy. Another new trend: wine from a box.

Boxed wine, long associated with sorority parties and bad hangovers, is slowly gaining acceptance worldwide. Joining Word of Mouth to clue us in on this and other ticks in the wine business is Tyler Colman. He runs the popular wine blog DrVino.com, and has just written a book called Wine Politics: How Governments, Environmentalists, Mobsters and Critics Influence the Wine We Drink. He also teaches wine classes at New York University and the University of Chicago. Tyler says boxed wine has a lower carbon footprint than bottles, and makes more sense economically.

We also hear from design curator Ellen Lupton on why boxed wine deserves a second look. Her piece was produced by Katie Rolnick for Studio 360’s Design for the Real World series.

(Photo by Richard Winchell)

Governor Lynch’s latest plan to address the state’s budget shortfall would involve raising taxes on cigarettes, reducing the state discount to wine retailers, and introducing a brand new tax on charity poker games. We’ll unpack the economics of so-called “sin taxes” and explore what these increases could mean for consumers, businesses and the state budget.

Guests

• Brian Gottlob , Principal at PoliEcon Research
• Charlie Arlinghaus , President of the Josiah Bartlett Center for Public Policy
• Dan Eaton, Democratic State Representative from Stoddard and longtime member of the House Finance Committee

We'll also hear from

• John Lynch , Governor of New Hampshire
• John Ganos, owner of Tobacco Haven in Brookline