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Booze News

I wonder if a Whiskey Fungus Apocalypse would turn people into Zombies?

A Jack Daniels building project is to be halted after a neighbour argued she was facing a plague of whiskey fungus caused by escaping alcohol vapours.

Christi Long, of Lincoln County, Tennessee, claimed her property was coated in the fungus, which appears as a black crust on surfaces.
It is a growing issue for people in the area, her lawyer told BBC News. The fungus, which consumes ethanol fumes, grows on surfaces near bakeries and distilleries around the world.

Mrs Long, who runs an events venue next to several Jack Daniels warehouses, including one under construction, says the invading fungus has required her to spend thousands on power washing. She is suing the local county zoning office, arguing it did not properly approve permits for the warehouses.

Some infuriated locals are now calling for Jack Daniel's Tennessee Whiskey, which is owned by Louisville-based company Brown-Forman, to install air filters to combat the problem.

Jason Holleman, a lawyer representing Mrs Long, says whiskey companies often speak about the evaporation process - dubbed "the angels' share" - without mentioning the resulting mould that comes with it.

"If you go on one of these distillery tours they will tell you about the angels' share that goes into the atmosphere," he says.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64819400
 
Swifty said:
He's not the sort of bloke who likes people 'having a word' with him.
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I know one of them as well who will only drink John Smiths. Actually it can be OK if the pub takes care of it, but typically because its a cheap drink for the (usually) non-discriminating they don't bother.

Sam Smiths, entirely different issue.
 
Cochise said:
I know one of them as well who will only drink John Smiths. Actually it can be OK if the pub takes care of it, but typically because its a cheap drink for the (usually) non-discriminating they don't bother.

Sam Smiths, entirely different issue.
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I was a massive fan of Sam Smiths with drinking in my local from 1994 till Covid when stopped going when he put an extra £1 on all products as I loved the Cask OBB and Stout ( Cask £2 to £3 and stout £2.40 to £3.40 ) also used to buy his whole bottled range from Fenwicks and yes stopped after a the bottels went up from £2.50 to £3.50 yet at my local Social Club the Sam Smiths Sovereign Keg Bitter is £2.70 and the Stout £3 ?, so I don't understand why charhes more in his pubs then the clubs.
 
It;s unchristian to ban booze!

Christian politicians in Iraq are attempting to overturn legislation banning the import and sale of alcohol.

Customs officials were given orders on Saturday to enforce the ban. It became law last month despite opposition. The group, which has five seats in Iraq's parliament, filed a lawsuit saying it was undemocratic.

Public alcohol consumption is frowned upon in Iraq, a predominantly Muslim country, but it can be bought at liquor stores or licensed bars.

The law, originally passed by parliament in 2016, imposes a fine of up to 25m Iraqi dinars (£14,256). It prohibits the sale, import or production of alcohol - and only became official last month, seven years since it was passed, after appearing in the official gazette.

It remains unclear how strictly the law could be enforced, and whether the country's Federal Supreme Court will knock it back. In their appeal to the court, members of the Babylon Movement insisted the legislation was unconstitutional because it ignores the rights of minorities and restricts freedom.

It also contradicts a government decree, adopted less than a week before the gazette was published on 20 February, setting duty at 200% on all imported alcoholic drinks for the next four years, they say.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-64858892
 
Belgium’s Trappist breweries in danger

Due to fewer people entering monastic life.

Westmalle is now one of only five Trappist breweries in Belgium, alongside Chimay, Orval, Rochefort and Westvleteren. These, along with foreign Trappist beers, remain “some of the best in the world”, said Luc De Raedemaeker, director of the Brussels Beer Challenge, an international brewing competition. He rates Westmalle Dubbel as one of the finest beers, for its combination of sweetness, lively carbonation and lingering bitterness from the hops.

Belgium’s Achel beer lost its Trappist status after being taken over by a private entrepreneur. The new owner has vowed to keep the recipe unchanged, but after the severing of ties with monks, Achel can no longer call itself a Trappist beer. “It must be admitted that the state of most monastic communities is precarious,” said Brother Benedikt, the abbot of Westmalle, in a rare media interview in which he answered the Observer’s questions in writing, translated from his native Dutch.

According to the International Trappist Association (ITA), beer, cheese or other goods can bear the “authentic Trappist product” label only if made inside an abbey, under the supervision of monks or nuns, with all profits destined for the upkeep of the religious community, the wider Trappist order and charities.

At Westmalle, Belgium’s oldest Trappist brewery, staff are thinking about the future. “Nowadays, we don’t have a lot of vocations,” said Philippe Van Assche, the secular managing director of the brewery. He is not confident people will be seeking to become monks in 10 or 20 years’ time

Van Assche began working at Westmalle 25 years ago, just as the monks were handing over day-to-day production to secular staff. Increasingly, the demands of running a brewery – negotiating with retailers or marketing – were seen as incompatible with a monastic life that prizes the discipline of silence.
The monks, however, remain in charge. Alongside four secular independent administrators, they form a supervisory board to oversee the brewery, led by Brother Benedikt, who does not use a surname.
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Heineken sells off Russian beer business for €1​


'Heineken has finally sold off its Russian business for €1 - or 86p - nearly a year and a half after first pledging to do so.

The Dutch brewer said it will take a loss of €300m on the division, which is being offloaded to Russia's Arnest, which makes aerosol cans.
Many Western firms jettisoned their Russian operations when the country invaded Ukraine last February......... '


https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-66616161
 

France to spend €200m destroying wine as demand falls​




An image showing two glasses of wine
Image source, Getty Images
By Alex Binley
BBC News

The French government is allocating €200m (£171.6m) to destroy surplus wine and support producers.

It comes amid a cocktail of problems for the industry, including a falling demand for wine as more people drink craft beer.
Overproduction and the cost of living crisis are also hitting the industry.

Most of the €200m will be used to buy excess stock, with the alcohol sold for use in items such as hand sanitiser, cleaning products and perfume.

In a bid to cut back on the overproduction, money will also be available for winegrowers to change to other products, such as olives.
In funnelling the money into the industry, the French government aims to stop "prices collapsing... so that wine-makers can find sources of revenue again", Agriculture Minister Marc Fesneau said.

Despite the financial help - an initial EU fund of €160m which the French government topped up to €200m - the wine industry needs to "look to the future, think about consumer changes ... and adapt", he added.

European Commission data for the year to June shows that wine consumption has fallen 7% in Italy, 10% in Spain, 15% in France, 22% in Germany and 34% in Portugal, while wine production across the bloc - the world's biggest wine-making area - rose 4%.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66623636
 
Floyd1 said:

France to spend €200m destroying wine as demand falls​




An image showing two glasses of wine
Image source, Getty Images
By Alex Binley
BBC News

The French government is allocating €200m (£171.6m) to destroy surplus wine and support producers.

It comes amid a cocktail of problems for the industry, including a falling demand for wine as more people drink craft beer.
Overproduction and the cost of living crisis are also hitting the industry.

Most of the €200m will be used to buy excess stock, with the alcohol sold for use in items such as hand sanitiser, cleaning products and perfume.

In a bid to cut back on the overproduction, money will also be available for winegrowers to change to other products, such as olives.
In funnelling the money into the industry, the French government aims to stop "prices collapsing... so that wine-makers can find sources of revenue again", Agriculture Minister Marc Fesneau said.

Despite the financial help - an initial EU fund of €160m which the French government topped up to €200m - the wine industry needs to "look to the future, think about consumer changes ... and adapt", he added.

European Commission data for the year to June shows that wine consumption has fallen 7% in Italy, 10% in Spain, 15% in France, 22% in Germany and 34% in Portugal, while wine production across the bloc - the world's biggest wine-making area - rose 4%.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66623636
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What. A. Crime.
 
Floyd1 said:

France to spend €200m destroying wine as demand falls​




An image showing two glasses of wine
Image source, Getty Images
By Alex Binley
BBC News

The French government is allocating €200m (£171.6m) to destroy surplus wine and support producers.

It comes amid a cocktail of problems for the industry, including a falling demand for wine as more people drink craft beer.
Overproduction and the cost of living crisis are also hitting the industry.

Most of the €200m will be used to buy excess stock, with the alcohol sold for use in items such as hand sanitiser, cleaning products and perfume.

In a bid to cut back on the overproduction, money will also be available for winegrowers to change to other products, such as olives.
In funnelling the money into the industry, the French government aims to stop "prices collapsing... so that wine-makers can find sources of revenue again", Agriculture Minister Marc Fesneau said.

Despite the financial help - an initial EU fund of €160m which the French government topped up to €200m - the wine industry needs to "look to the future, think about consumer changes ... and adapt", he added.

European Commission data for the year to June shows that wine consumption has fallen 7% in Italy, 10% in Spain, 15% in France, 22% in Germany and 34% in Portugal, while wine production across the bloc - the world's biggest wine-making area - rose 4%.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66623636
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maximus otter
 
Stormkhan said:
Like the 'Butter Mountain' and the 'Sugar Mountain', it's never a good idea to maintain demand artificially. In effect, it's maintaining high profits by waste.
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The thing about the wine is that it could be kept in barrels, gradually maturing. It doesn't need to be destroyed.
 
We've had cellars before. Used as non-damp sensitive storage.
We've one now that we've been told we "needn't worry about". This is where the damp is seeping up the walls into the ground floor, creating mould and paint to flake off.
"Don't worry about that. I had 'a bloke' in to drain water from the cellar and dry out the walls" said our landlord.
I despise the man.
 
Stormkhan said:
We've had cellars before. Used as non-damp sensitive storage.
We've one now that we've been told we "needn't worry about". This is where the damp is seeping up the walls into the ground floor, creating mould and paint to flake off.
"Don't worry about that. I had 'a bloke' in to drain water from the cellar and dry out the walls" said our landlord.
I despise the man.
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I think the only way to really cure it would be to put in a damp-proof course to stop the rising damp (not easy to do as it involves taking a few bricks out at a time, putting the damp course in, putting them back, and allowing the mortar to set) and then line the walls with a damp-proof membrane (visqueen) making sure it goes below the flooring at the edges), then building a wall of concrete blocks up to the visqueen.
 
Yep.
However, that was what the landlord should've done.
Instead, he hired a 'couple of lads' he knew to 'dry out the cellar. He then got a plasterer to skim over the damp bits.
Now, I'm looking at a special 'paint' from Polycell which seals the damp into the wall. Sure it's pushing the problem down the line but, frankly, the landlord won't do anything and we forsee a time soon when he kicks us out and sells the whole lot off to a builder.
 
If it was Budweiser no one would notice.

Tsingtao beer worker urinated into tank after argument

A Chinese worker urinated into a Tsingtao beer tank after having an argument with a colleague, it has emerged
.
The worker was filmed urinating into a tank used to store ingredients to make one of China's most popular beers last month. The video then went viral on social media, gaining tens of millions of views.

On Wednesday the worker was detained, an official report said.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-67296857
 
ramonmercado said:
If it was Budweiser no one would notice.

Tsingtao beer worker urinated into tank after argument

A Chinese worker urinated into a Tsingtao beer tank after having an argument with a colleague, it has emerged
.
The worker was filmed urinating into a tank used to store ingredients to make one of China's most popular beers last month. The video then went viral on social media, gaining tens of millions of views.

On Wednesday the worker was detained, an official report said.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-67296857
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Liking for the Budweiser comment. Tsingtao is decent, but I think I'll give it a miss for a while.
 
ramonmercado said:
If it was Budweiser no one would notice.

Tsingtao beer worker urinated into tank after argument

A Chinese worker urinated into a Tsingtao beer tank after having an argument with a colleague, it has emerged
.
The worker was filmed urinating into a tank used to store ingredients to make one of China's most popular beers last month. The video then went viral on social media, gaining tens of millions of views.

On Wednesday the worker was detained, an official report said.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-67296857
Click to expand...
He was probably warned 'urine big trouble now!'
 
Beresford said:
Liking for the Budweiser comment. Tsingtao is decent, but I think I'll give it a miss for a while.
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Back in the early 1990s when Budweiser first arrived in the UK in 330ml bottles and at 5% vol it wasn't a bad beer if you drank it ice cold. But since then the bottles have shrunk in size, it has become weaker and the last time I tried one it tasted of artificial sweeteners. And yet it is ranked second in the UK lager market:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1193557/leading-beer-brands-retail-sales-revenue-uk/#:~:text=Leading beer brands by sales revenue in the UK 2023&text=Budweiser was the brand with,British pounds worth of beer.

I am firmly a cider drinker now (the real stuff) but if I had to drink a lager then Peroni would be my choice.
 
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A bar staff member doing the shamrock design while they pour you a pint of Guinness is yesterday. Why you'd want to drink your own face is anyone's guess but now you can ..


 
Swifty said:
A bar staff member doing the shamrock design while they pour you a pint of Guinness is yesterday. Why you'd want to drink your own face is anyone's guess but now you can ..

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I remember the first time I got a Guinness with a shamrock in the foam... I was impressed.
 
Swifty said:
A bar staff member doing the shamrock design while they pour you a pint of Guinness is yesterday. Why you'd want to drink your own face is anyone's guess but now you can ..


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Speaking as a non-drinker myself, seems a bit 'in-your-face' and a bit of a novelty to boot! Though I suppose you could state that Guinness mostly does have a good Head on it!
 
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Swifty said:
A bar staff member doing the shamrock design while they pour you a pint of Guinness is yesterday. Why you'd want to drink your own face is anyone's guess but now you can ..


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It's called 'gimmick'. Sales departments don't retain their budget - or staff - unless they can 'sell' a *ahem* great idea to the senior management, to justify their wages.
Whether it succeeds or not is immaterial. The 'suits' who sit in their luxury apartments don't care, as long as their income continues*.

*Sad to say, I have personal and close experience of this attitude.
 
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