italian beer

[hewynz]

does anyone know of any organic brewerys in italy?

[james]

I don't know of any organic brewers, but the question reminds me of a good story. We know someone who works for Vernacia wine growers association in San Gimignano, and she says that most of the farming around that part of Tuscany is about 85% of the U.S. standard for "organic" through their basic, on-going farming practices. That always made me feel really good about the food supply there. The organic sections in an Italian supermarket (called Bio) are very small, because the every day food is so good. The U.S. food market seems to have a great divide. The mass produced foods are pretty scary, and very cheap. The stuff that Whole Foods sells is nice, but wildly expensive. We seem to be missing the middle. :-)

That's my rant for the day.

Slightly related, there is an Arbequina olive oil from Catalan in Spain (the one with the bird on the label), that is marketed as USDA Organic in the U.S., but they sell the same oil in Spain without any special labels on it.

All interesting. I buy Morelli at Trader Joe's.

James

[Mojoe]

Might be able to find something here:

maeib's Beerblog: Italian Beer

Rome Brewing looks like it has a good links page despite the Home page stating *riginal American brewed: Starbess

http://www.thefoodworld.com/food_exp...orters/26/159/

[gjbingham]

Digging though older posts....

Hmmm,
Italy and beer, words not normally spoken in the same sentence. After five /years on the "rock" (Sicily), Peroni and one other Italian brand (the name escapes me) and a lot of German/Euro imports are all you see in the markets.

Southern Italy is certainly different from Northern, kind of like Mexico and California. The lifestyles and histories are different but cerainly related. From my POV, water and wine are the drinks of choice in Italian restaraunts, at least Southern Italy.

The orange soda and peach ice tea in the markets is absolutely killer though. Nothing better on a hot hot summer afternoon. More sugar, I think.