Many states have great local beers these days. Here in the Twin Cities metro, we have some world-class beers that are as good as anything I've had... Surly Furi

Many states have great local beers these days. Here in the Twin Cities metro, we have some world-class beers that are as good as anything I've had... Surly Furious, Lift Bridge Farm Girl, Indeed LSD, Sidhe Greenman's Harvest, and the late great Harriet Divine Oculist (Harriet recently closed, sigh). Whenever I'm traveling, I go out of my way to try the local beers, relying on recommendations from bartenders and local friends. It's always a great experience. Some years ago, I was at a conference in San Francisco, attended by numerous Europeans. The vendor poured a lot of Anchor Steam beer into us. Some of the Europeans were shocked at how good it was. The only American beers they'd ever had were Bud and Miller Lite, and they thought American beer was awful, until they tried Anchor. I kept telling them we keep the best stuff for ourselves. In practice, that's true even of individual states.