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With detailed advice from Jim Crooks, master blender at Firestone Walker’s Barrelworks, you can brew complex but balanced mixed-culture beers meant for patient wood-aging and blending.

Whether clean and malty or dry and spicy, the beers that claim this category cover a wide range.

Courtesy of Tania Hewett-Mader and Nick Mader of Kansas City’s Alma Mader Brewing, this locally popular pilsner embraces Bohemian malt and Noble hops, including an aromatic burst of spicy Saaz in the whirlpool.

Whether it’s pinpoint pilsners, lush, juicy IPAs, or big, balanced stouts, the upstarts at family-run Alma Mader in Kansas City have something that just about any kind of drinker can love.

There wasn’t any one moment when David Walker knew that the brewery he founded with his brother-in-law was going to be successful. Instead, they’ve laid layer atop layer over 25 years to add reach while improving quality.

For Chris Lohring, founder of Notch Brewing in Massachusetts, there is real beauty to be found in beers that follow known traditions while offering character that makes them uniquely loveable.

From deceptively easy-drinking to weighty and ponderous, the comforts of these dark delights run the gamut. Here, five pro brewers share their favorites.

Microscopic and difficult to measure, thiols can nonetheless add up to big tropical aromas in IPAs and other beers. In this video tip, Alvarado Street brewing director J.C. Hill describes a way to free up more thiols using a special yeast.

Courtesy of Joe Bowden, head brewer at Munkle Brewing in Charleston, South Carolina, here is a homebrew-scale recipe for the beer that won GABF gold in 2018 in the category Belgian-Style and French-Style Ales.

As a niche style, bière de garde doesn’t always medal at the Great American Beer Festival—but Munkle’s 5 Branches took home gold in 2018, then Echo’s Junebug did it again in 2019. Here, the head brewers from both breweries sketch out the blueprints.