Three Cheers for Organic Beers

Like chocolate, peanut butter, and everything else that is good and right, beer has gone organic too. What's organic beer, you ask? The ingredients and production processes must be certified organic by the Department of Agriculture.

There are lots of options for your pleasure, from Wolaver's in Vermont to Roots in Portland through Wisconsin's New Glarus and California's Butte Creek. Many breweries also commit to other sustainable measures, like Wolaver's, which sends its spent grains to feed local livestock. Also awesome? The Beer Mapping project lets you look up local craft breweries and shops selling craft beers by plugging in an address. I had no idea so many were within a 20 minute drive of my apartment.

To learn more about the sustainable beer movement, pick up "Fermenting Revolution: How to Drink Beer and Save the World," a tome that includes chapters on organic beer, globalization and beer, and bio- (or beero) diversity, or just hop over to the author's blog at Beer Activist.