Bruce Aidells

The difference in the number and types of craft beer available between when I first found this book, in 1994, and now frankly astounding. At the time you'd have been hard-pressed to find most of the beers recommended for the various recipes if you didn't live near the particular brewery. Now you might not find that beer, but you can certainly find a few (or many) equivalents.

There is a bit of history of beer and brewing in the US, a bit of information on the (then) new beers that may or may not trace back to old traditions, all interspersed with wonderful recipes.… (more)

The recipes so far seem pretty good. I wish more had tied in the recipes to where they came from. It seems like they were developed by tasting sausages and recreating them. A little more history and description would have been nice. There's a few "stories" about traveling and sausages but they seem strangely disconnected.

One huge glaring issue is several of the recipes have "mystery measurements". By that, I mean some letter where a number should be. Sloppy editing work, I can only guess it's some sort of technical error. (Like people who used to use 1 for l due to how it appeared in certain fonts).

So if you don't mind a book just full of recipes and some typos, it'll serve you well. If you're hoping for more, it's a little bare. There is some info, but still you'll find yourself wondering why for one sausage you use one grind but for another something else. Nothing is quite explaind.… (more)