One More Road for the Beer: Budapest.

When the variety-beer thing has blown up everywhere around the world, you might as well go somewhere beautiful to enjoy it -- preferably somewhere with really fatty pork and voluminous comfort food.

So, the eighth episode of our radio pod program cast show is on lovely Budapest. Mangalitza pork, ruin pubs, strudel, taphouses, goulash, pinball, and more. Find those smoked-and-fried rib tips in salted caramel sauce, my dudes. Also we name-drop Roger Protz.

Where we go:
Szimpla Kert
First Craft Beer & BBQ
Élesztő
Neked Csak Dezső
Hedon Taproom
Flippermúzeum



Besides the Hedon Taproom, we discuss the Hedon Brewery & Playground down on Lake Balaton. I wondered aloud about whether it could be a day trip from Budapest. It could be -- it's about 80 minutes' drive southwest of the city, says Google Maps -- but obviously driving back from a brewery is not ideal. There are holiday rentals and resorts nearby though. I think you should do this.

One More Road for the Beer: Postcards from the Bar (Wild Card Edition).

We are not slaves to gimmickry. So far each episode has focused on one major city. A fun thing to do, but also limiting, no? What about all those in-between places?

How can we not mention, eventually, cycling around Flanders? Or drinking cask ale in Lancashire? Or the burgeoning beer and food scene in Costa Rica?

Do not answer those questions, for they are rhetorical. The point is, via careful experimentation, we have discovered an elegant answer: the wild-card episode. It's a hodge-podge. It's like a little stack of breezy postcards that take 30 minutes to read in total, instead of just one postcard with 30 minutes worth of teeny-tiny but no doubt very insightful writing upon it.

In this, the seventh installment of our episodic radio-cast program, we talk about cycling around a bit of West Flanders, Belgium; visiting a few traditional/neighborhood pubs in Lancashire; and a blossoming scene for food and beer around my old friend Chepe, a.k.a. San José, Costa Rica.

So, as you can imagine, this map looks different.

Cycling around Poperinge & Watou:
Palace Hotel
Brouwerij St. Bernardus
Wethuys
Poperinge Hop Museum

Lancashire:
Prince of Wales (Chorley)
Bob Inn (Chorley)
Beer School (Westhoughton, Bolton)

Costa Rica:
Costa Rica's Craft Brewing Co.
Treintaycinco
Barrio Escalante
Al Mercat
Mercado Central

And here is Ignacio from Treintaycinco in Ciudad Colon, Costa Rica. Tell him we sent you.