Barley & Me

Hoops & Hops is a beer and basketball podcast co-hosted by Phil Webster and Barley & Me's Ben Rice. In this episode, we talk about round one of the 2020 NBA Playoffs, the stunning Heat-Bucks series, find out what kind of player Jimmy Butler is, and take a deep dive on the coaches of the remaining teams. Ben's beer this week is Monk's Cellar's West Coastin', while Phil imbibes a Russian River Pliny...

In this special episode, host Ben Rice talks to absolutely no one! Oak Park Brewing in Sacramento had the good fortune of collaborating with the first Black-owned brewery in America, People's Brewing in Osh Kosh, Wisconsin! So OPB's head brewer Rodg interviews the son of the owner, Theo Mack, Jr. We'll hear about how Theo Mack, Sr., came into the beer business, his journeys in the military and thr...

Barley & Me host Ben Rice joins co-host and chef Phil Webster for episode 3 of Hoops & Hops, a discussion of old- and new-school NBA basketball and beer. Episode 3 was recorded at New Helvetia Brewing in Sacramento, CA. As we discussed the NBA reopen, we drank a Crowns & Hops Black Is Beautiful Pecan Pie stout. We then crowned our best performers from the first 10 days of NBA action, before delvin...

Host Ben Rice chats with Matt Vincent, owner/operator of Durango, Colorado's Oh Hi Beverage Company. Oh Hi is a beverage company focused on CBD and THC infused beverages with a current focus on seltzers. We chat about Matt's initial foray into the infusion game, as well as his past/current beer-related enterprises, Ska Brewing and Ska Fabrication, as well. Find out why Oh Hi started, why you can't...

Leonard Malting is the beer-focused movie review offshoot of the Barley & Me Podcast, featuring B&M host Ben Rice, plus co-hosts Corky McDonnell (Dare Daniel Podcast) and Paulina Olivares (Pink Boots Society). In this episode, we discuss the 1993 indie stoner comedy classic Dazed & Confused. Known as a weed movie, Ben argues it might actually be a beer movie. We break down break-out roles, high sc...

Host Ben Rice chats with "Doctor" Bill Sysak of San Marcos's Wild Barrel Brewing about their recent distribution expansion, fatherly love, the "San Diego style" of brand building, and failed homebrew experiments. Plus! The secrets about hazy IPA that no brewer wants you to know, shared love of saisons and Berliner weisse (it might finally be a THING!), and turning fandom and friendship into career...

Barley & Me host Ben Rice teams up with Sacramento chef Phil Webster to talk basketball and beer, in episode 2 of Barley & Me Presents: Hoops & Hops! Today, we build on the foundation of episode one by selecting the Sacramento Brewery Dream Team's version of Isiah Thomas, who was infamously left off the original Dream Team for a variety of alleged reasons. Then we tackle the new craft beer hotness...

Host Ben Rice travels to Claimstake Brewing in Rancho Cordova, CA, to talk to Marcus Baskerville, brewer at Weathered Souls Brewing in San Antonio, TX, about his history with beer, from hating it to tolerating it to home brewing to professional brewing to ownership, and the creation of the wonderful worldwide Black Is Beautiful Initiative and Black Is Beautiful Imperial stout. We talk first beers,...

Introducing Barley & Me's first-ever foray into movie reviews! Barley & Me host Ben Rice (codename: Leonard Malting) discusses the 2013 "romantic comedy" "Drinking Buddies" with co-hosts Paulina Olivares (Pink Boots Society Sacramento) and Corky McDonnell (co-host of the Dare Daniel Podcast) to break down this star-studded (Olivia Wilde! Jake Johnson! Anna Kendrick! Ron Livingston! Jason Sudeikis!...

Barley & Me host  Ben Rice is using this COVID-19 shutdown to give brewers time to re-focus their businesses to handle this new reality. So, he's reached out to some of his friends to experiment with beer-ish content! Hoops & Hops, with co-host Phil Webster (@culinarylando on IG), pairs the aggressive defense and death-defying dunks of 80s and 90s NBA basketball with aggressively-hopped IPAs. Toda...

Host Ben Rice gets his chance to talk to a few craft hop growers, Carla Wosoba (Wosoba Farms Hops) and Clinton Hirschfeld (Hirschfeld Hops), as well as comedian Amy Estes. We discuss side hustles (fun fact: hop farmers, comedians, and podcasters need primary sources of income when they're starting out), getting started in a secondary project, and how they found their true calling. Plus! How the ho...

Host Ben Rice chats with Canadian musician/producer/craft beer enthusiast Jordon Zadorozny of pop-rock band/solo project Blinker the Star, to discuss Canadian craft beer, as well as the parallels and dichotomies of the craft beer scene and the music scene from the early 90s to today. We go down Ben Rice's rabbit hole of fandom, as a means to end regarding a discussion of creativity, growth, expans...

Host Ben Rice remote-calls Teri Fahrendorf, the founder of the Pink Boots Society, to talk about the creation of this wonderful program, its expansion, and why she had to fire herself. Joining us are Alyssa Steger, the President of the Sacramento Pink Boots Society chapter and head brewer at Fort Rock Brewing, and Heidi Wilder, Fort Rock's director of fun-tivities. We discuss scholarship programs,...

Host Ben Rice practices shelter in place and social distancing by interviewing Mike Mraz of Mraz Brewing remotely. We chow down on chicken wings with various hot sauces while discussing Mraz's upcoming/postponed 7th anniversary, the coronavirus's effect on Mraz's business, as well as the craft beer industry and small businesses in general, as well as how to stay fit during this shutdown. Plus! Ben...

Host Ben Rice practices social distancing by ringing up Sacramento Beer Frontier's Aaron O'Callaghan to discuss the Coronavirus/COVID-19 and its potential effects on the beer industry and the world. With no medical background and no skin in the beer game, Ben & Aaron can talk freely about this topic. But for proper perspective, Ben created an anonymous industry survey, which gathered responses fro...

Host Ben Rice travels to Chico, CA, to talk to the town's second-ever brewery, Secret Trail Brewing, and owner/brewer Charlie Barrett, as well as Chico's indie-pop darlings Surrogate (represented by guitarist Michael Lee and keyboardist Daniel Martin). We talk consumption, creativity, and a change to the digital/internet era, as well as pesky ABC regulations, marketing tactics, and how to retain y...

Host Ben Rice travels to PRINCETON!, California, to sit down with Farmers Brewing's Bill Weller. We talk about the humble beginnings of Farmers Brewing and how random happenstance changed their initial trajectory tremendously. Plus! Rice in beer? What happens when a craft brewery makes that their grain of focus and what does it take to make medium grain japonica rice amplify the profile of a craft...

Host Ben Rice travels to Sacramento, CA's Tower Brewing to talk to TV/radio/podcast producer Cindy Baker, plus Tower Brewing crew Mike Ungerbuhler (head brewer), Micah Ochej (brewer), and Calvin Crawford (taproom manager) about creativity, commitment to passions, and how your backgrounds help you build to your present and future. Plus! Buying Rubicon IP(A), rum varieties, why it feels worse when s...

Host Ben Rice travels to the Art of Beer Invitational 2020 to conduct a handful of mini-interviews! In segment one, Ben sits down with Cynthia Lee and Trish Showen of DarkHeart Brewing (Sacramento) plus beer volunteer and secret Barley & Me MVP Scott Mills to talk the art and influence of Art of Beer, designing a pirate-themed brewery, releasing the Kraken, and the sunken costs and buried treasure...

Host Ben Rice travels to West Sacramento, CA, to chat with Jackrabbit Brewing's head brewer Rob Moreno and Sacramento-based improvisor Justine Lopez. We kick off 2020 with conversations about secondary businesses to drive success, Sacramento's growing arts and comedy communities, what 2020 holds for craft beer (and Jackrabbit in particular), plus brand management and business planning, marriage an...

Host Ben Rice travels to New Helvetia Brewing in Sacramento, CA, to sit down with friends of the pod and truly terrific comedians Stephen Furey, Emma Haney, and Becky Lynn, to talk about their accomplishments in 2019, their hopes and aspirations for 2020, and drink some beers we've never had before. We also all realize that to make a living in the arts, you have to be a corporate shill, so we rave...

Host Ben Rice travels to San Diego, CA, to conduct mini-interviews during Karl Strauss’s Collabapalooza 2019! This is the second episode in that series of mini’s. In segment one, Ben sits down with Craig Nelson of Resident Brewing and Nyle Molina of Abnormal Brewing, to discuss their strange shared history, lager collaborations, POGs, tribal tattoos, the brewpub model, and the similarities (and su...

Host Ben Rice travels to San Diego, CA, to attend Karl Strauss's Collabapalooza 2019, voted the best beer fest in West Coaster Magazine. This episode contains 2 mini-interviews and episode 116 will feature 3 more, recorded at Collabapalooza! In segment one, Ben talks to Doug Constantiner of Societe Brewing and Jeff Wiederkehr of Burning Beard Brewing. We talk friendship, collaboration, education,...

Host Ben Rice travels to Auburn, CA's Crooked Lane Brewing to sit down with brewmaster Teresa Psuty, plus Queen of Beer Competition coordinators Melissa McCann, Rebecca Steele-Wilkie, and Vickie Olson, to discuss the upcoming 26th annual Queen of Beer homebrewing competition, as well as Crooked Lane's humble beginnings to their current status as California's Craft Brewery of the Year. The Queen of...

Host Ben Rice travels to Sacramento, CA, to sit down with Porchlight Brewing's brewer John Prather, plus the Vice Chair of the Sacramento Arts Commission, Maya Wallace. We discuss everyone's history with Sacramento, plus their observations on the city's growth economically, socially, artistically, and beer-centrically, and how all of those intertwine. Plus! The housing crisis! The hidden morality...