A new series in our writing lineup relates to all of the shows, podcasts, and different media that we watch and listen to pertaining to craft beer. Contrary to the name, it doesn’t relate to inviting that special someone over for a little watching and, um, chilling. Brewflix & Chill is about celebrating who is doing the best at creating multimedia that is entertaining and educational. Our first spotlight focuses on the web series The Beer Diaries.
The Beer Diaries is a show hosted by Greg Zeschuk, better known as one of the co-founders of Bioware, a video game company well-known for games like Baldur’s Gate, Mass Effect, and Dragon Age. After retiring from gaming, his love of beer took him in a different direction; traveling around the craft beer meccas of Austin and Denver visiting some of the best breweries in the country.
One of the ways I got started watching this show, outside of being incredibly envious of where he was going, was by accident. I was on YouTube searching for something about Austin and the episode for Hops & Grain showed up in the results. Turned out, I spent most of the day watching almost all of the Austin episodes that were online.
In each episode, Greg talks with the owners and/or brewmasters of the breweries about the history of the brewery, how they got started in the business, and discussion about the brews. From Hops & Grain to Jester King to Independence to Austin Beerworks, you can learn about and see the incredible growth from all of the different Austin breweries.
My favorite episode was the first I ever watched – Hops & Grain. It’s a huge reason why I became such a fan of the brewery. The devotion to using spent grain to make dog treats, the old canning line that I’m sure the brewery is thankful to have upgraded, and the overall hippie outdoors vibe the folks give off is endearing and shows how far they’ve come.
More recently, the Austin 2.0 episodes focus on the Beer Diaries crew going back to some of the breweries first visited 2-3 years ago or spotlighting new ones that have popped up in the last couple of years. As these have premiered over the last few weeks, we’re excited to see what the next episodes will be.