To the uninitiated, it might not be easy to spot Brouwer’s Café. Its presence in the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle is only marked over the front door with a metal Leo Belgicus, the lion depicted on Belgium’s coat of arms. But that sign is just about all that is subtle about Brouwer’s Café.

Take one step inside the dark entryway and you are transported to Brussels; there is even a replica of the landmark Manneken Pis fountain (Dutch for “little man urinating”) to greet you as you enter. A few more steps inside and the space opens up, with a bar that runs nearly the length of the room on the far wall, cozy booths on the other side, a second bar devoted to single malt Scotches in the back and tables scattered throughout. A staircase near the Scotch bar takes you up to a second level loft, with extra table seating. Skylights fill the room with natural light, giving it an airy atmosphere, even on a drizzly Seattle day.

The owners, Matt Bonney and Matt Vandenberghe, met while working at the local Maritime Pacific Brewing Company. A dozen years ago, their first business venture together was the well-respected beer store, Bottleworks, situated not far from Brouwer’s Café, which opened in 2005.

When asked to describe the essence of Britain, a stodgy English statesman replied recently, “tea and biscuits.” Many members of Britain’s Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) responded immediately with a resounding cry of “balderdash!” Compared to cask-conditioned “real ale,” which originated in the British Isles before pagan times, tea is a relatively recent import. What could be more quintessentially British than an authentic English ale in a personable, comfortable English pub?

In stark contrast to soulless, fizzy, kegged beers that almost took over England in the 1970’s, traditional real ale (a.k.a. cask ale or cask-conditioned ale) springs from the profoundly English tradition of racking young, unfiltered beer with yeast, hints of residual sugar and finings into sealed metal or wooden casks. A typical English pub stocks 10.8-gallon casks called “firkins” that are filled with ale served by gravity spout or hand pump. Real ale travels from brewery to glass without pasteurization or the addition of artificial carbon dioxide gas, and the beer evolves in interesting ways over a day or two of serving, due to interaction with air in the cask.

There are two large cities on the western shore of Lake Michigan that formed my previous impression of Wisconsin. One has a famous NFL team whose fans wear yellow triangular hats, and the other one is as important to the history of American brewing as the chapter containing World War II would be to any history book. There is, however, another Wisconsin that beckons less than two hours from that historic shoreline.

My drive started south of Chicago that day last summer. After donating a hubcap to the Illinois Tollway, I exited the fast lane of urban sprawl and downshifted to a more relaxing journey. The towns give way to farmland very quickly near the state line. Each farm reflects the family that owns it, and there is a degree of care apparent in the maintenance of the buildings and equipment as well as the stewardship of the animals and crops. The grass is extremely green on this June day and the cows are casually grazing randomly across the countryside. There is still the fresh smell of spring in air, and I roll down a window to enjoy it.

Fergal Murray, Brewmaster for Guinness, has been with the brewery for 26 years now, but he began his time at the St. James’s Gate Brewery in Dublin as a research chemist. Now he’s the face of the 250-plus-year-old brewery, whose black nectar is currently produced in 44 countries around the globe. With the title of head brewmaster and brand ambassador, he stays busy preaching the gospel of Guinness, which – it goes without saying – undoubtedly reigns as the world’s most ubiquitous high-quality beer.

“If Arthur Guinness was around today he probably would be doing what I’m doing, out there speaking about what he’s produced and how he produces across different markets around the world,” Murray said in an interview earlier this week at the Fado Irish Pub in Buckhead. He’s been busy lately traveling the world in celebration of the brewery’s milestone anniversary, which was marked by a limited-edition brew, released only in America, Australia and Singapore, that employs carbonation rather than the usual nitrogen to add more effervescence to the iconic beer.

You might think it would be good to have your company held up in business schools as a famous example. But that wouldn't be the way the people behind the Schlitz brand feel about it. Schlitz is held up as a dreadful warning of how not to do it.

Indeed, the company that now owns Schlitz, once "the beer that made Milwaukee famous," is currently telling drinkers that "our classic 1960's formula is back," the sub-text being that it "now tastes the way it did before we started disastrously mucking about with it 40 years ago, ruining the beer and wrecking the company along the way."

Schlitz's roots were in a Milwaukee restaurant started by 34-year-old August Krug, an immigrant from Bavaria, in 1848. Two years later Krug hired Joseph Schlitz, another German immigrant, from Mainz, to be his bookkeeper. When Krug died in 1856, Schlitz took over the management of the brewery, marrying Krug's widow Anna two years later and changing the name of the business to his own. That same year Krug's 16-year-old nephew, August Uihlein, began working for the brewery. Over the next two decades the brewery grew to be one of the two or three biggest in Milwaukee. Then in 1875 Schlitz was drowned after the ship in which he was travelling on a voyage back to Germany struck rocks off the Scilly Isles. Control of the brewery was inherited by August Uihlein and his three brothers, who had joined him in the business.

Ever notice that when you’re organizing a beer tasting or pairing a beer with a dinner course, someone always wants to have other drink options “for the people who don’t like beer?" So why is it, then, that when a wine event is organized, no one ever suggests getting in a few good beers for the people who don’t like wine?

Nobody is really interested in touring a winery or a brewery. We all just want to get to the tasting room at the end.

Corks, artificial corks, screw caps... Hey guys, the pry-off cap works just fine!

Restaurant truth: It’s always easier to get a decent glass of wine at a beer-focused place than it is to get a good beer at a joint with a great wine list.

And along those same lines: Why is it that restaurateurs who would never consider stocking Yellow Tail think that it’s perfectly acceptable to have Corona as the highlight of their beer list?

Locavores take note: Local beers are often a whole lot better than local wines, unless you’re living in Georgia and consider Sonoma wines to be “local.”

A bottle of 2002 La Tâche from Domaine de la Romanée-Conti at New York City’s Gramercy Tavern: $1,100. Two bottles of the classic 1997 Harvest Ale from the British brewer J.W. Lees at the same place: $40. Who’s laughing now?

Wine distilled is brandy. Beer distilled is whiskey. Okay, we’re even on that score.

This unusual beer, particularly by German standards, is a decidedly tart, low alcohol wheat style enjoyed year-round but particularly popular in the summertime due to its effervescent and refreshing character. Lest you think that Berliner Weisse is a typically dull, ubiquitous wheat beer, however, know that this beer is something of a challenge to most when taken in its unadulterated form. In fact, most Berliners drink this beer only when it’s tamed down a bit with a shot of sugary syrup. For the beer purist, though, Berliner Weisse can provide a terrifically tart and surprisingly complex experience without the aid of additional flavorings to mask the true nature of the beer.

The term “Lawnmower Beer” gets a lot of work around this time of year, usually in reference to a beer that’s light on flavour and heavy on hype, such as you might drink for refreshment following a particularly hot and sweaty activity, such as mowing the lawn. The typical characteristics displayed by such a brew are as follows: cold, wet, thirst quenching.

In other words, pretty much like water, except with four or five percent alcohol.

What I’ve never really been able to understand, however, is why the beers usually grouped under the “Lawnmower” banner are either bland or sweet. Where the former is the case, I’m more inclined to have a glass or two of water followed by a beer with real flavour, while in the latter instance, well, I don’t find that sweet drinks of any sort really refresh.

Don’t believe me? Try this test: The next time you’re feeling hot, sweaty and parched, try slaking your thirst with a room temperature cola. My bet is that it won’t work, primarily because sweet drinks tend to be cloying and palate coating unless they’re cold. You don’t get an “Ahhh, that hits the spot” moment of refreshment; you get a phlegmy feeling in the back of your throat.

Long before the appearance of the widely-accepted standard for the style - Genesee Cream Ale - nearly fifty years ago, this hybrid-style beer was something of an enigma to many beer lovers. The ambiguity, however, isn’t to be found in the style’s deep complexity or inexplicable origins. In fact, the style is very much a product of pure American pragmatism. You might even say that Cream Ale – also known throughout its comparatively short history as sparkling or present use ale – is a reaction beer, pure and simple.