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We back? It’s been a minute since our last episode, so we pay penance to the beer gods by drinking weird beers while we bring you up-to-speed with the state of affairs in craft beer and in our hoods. Tarot cards, anonymous Facebook posts, and Troy Aikman branded beer, all in the same episode?

It has been well established on our Podcast that host Ryan likes his beers (and other drinks) unadulterated.  So what did we do to him?  We made him face his fears and drink a wide range of beer mixed drinks for the first time ever, tournament style!  And let him talk about more conspiracy theories.

Ryan and Drew crack into some of the best beers from Belgium and Germany while sitting outside on the edge of the Austin, TX wilderness.  In an episode rife with bad accents and pronunciations, your hosts discuss why Euro beers have fallen down so far on the Beer Advocate ratings while paying homage to these classic styles.  Will Ryan learn to appreciate the Belgian quad? Will we be able to finish the episode without being interrupted by coyotes?  Tune in and find out.

In this episode, we do what we love best - beer news and blind tastings - but also answer some pretty important questions. Mexican Lagers are often considered basic beers, but are craft Mexican lagers an exception? And more importantly, could you pick them out of a lineup? And while we’re at it, where do you stand on putting fruit in your beer? It's time to take a stand.

The Beering Ain’t Easy podcast has evolved into a new form fueled by Chat GPT and Artificial Intelligence, or in short, Beer GPT. We test out the capabilities of current AI and whether it poses a risk to white collar jobs, the writer’s guild, or at a minimum the low-grade humor you come to love on our podcast. We play around with AI generated beer descriptions, movie descriptions, and even generate and record a Beering Ain’t Easy rap!

One of the earliest US craft beer icons from New Belgium, the one and only Fat Tire, has gone through a major overhaul. New recipe, new logo, and new branding with sustainability at the forefront. We pull out our last batch of the old recipe and drink it side by side with the new and debate which tastes better, what does it mean to be a carbon neutral beer, and whether sustainability actually sells. And in true podcast fashion we’ll go off track with trivia about the brewery, pop culture from Fat Tire’s original release in 1991, and popular songs that were hijacked by movies.

So, you’re supposed to drink IPA’s fresh, right? Well it may be common sense to you but we’re going to test it in an experiment anyway as is our tradition. We sample three Saint Arnold Art Car IPA’s at varying levels of freshness and answer why do IPA’s degrade, how do they degrade, and what are the best and worst types of beers to age? And just in case proving common sense beer facts is not your thing, we also provide a meticulous and entertaining recap of the Bud Light Culture War Saga from the month of April!

Asa Hanrahan, General Manager of the Houston Flying Saucer, joins the podcast to share his experiences spanning 16 years at the cornerstone beer bar and landmark of Downtown Houston!  We discuss the craft beer evolution in Texas, Houston new downtown patio space along Main Street, the staying power of the franchise, and the resurgence of Euro beers.  You’ll even find out the most famous people to step foot in the Houston Saucer!  And if that’s not enough, Drew finally joins the Ring of Honor after 18 years!

This week we talk about the one topic Ryan enjoys more than beer… conspiracy theories. We go through a series of wacky beer-related conspiracy theories and make up a few unsubstantiated theories of our own. Plus Ryan runs down Birds Aren’t Real and his favorite conspiracy theories of all time and Drew explains the myth of the Sumerian beer goddess Ninkasi. As Shania Twain might have said: Man, hops make me feel like a woman!

Adam returns on this episode to share some great beers from Austin and we gush all about the beer scene in Dripping Springs! And of course in addition to the beer we stray off course with some truly ridiculous and hilarious stories (as is tradition when Adam joins the podcast).

After we had so much fun tasting verticals and horizontals during our Eureka Heights episode, Ryan and Drew are back at it again with none other than the Negative Space Milk Stout from 11 Below Brewing! Come find out all about the awesome Negative Space variants and whether this beer is better fresh or slightly aged (and our thoughts on beer aging in general). And if that’s not all, we’ll bring you up-to-speed with our quest to visit all 70+ Houston breweries and make up excuses on why it takes so long to get to all of them!