Recently, my friend Paul told me he’d found a “beer channel” on Roku, which sounded like a neat idea. I don’t know what the ratio of original programming to “recycled” material it plays, but it got me thinking. There are a lot of beer-related videos on YouTube, of all sorts—travel, homebrewing, tasting, news, and so on. Why not seek these out and start a “Beer TV” category to share these videos and learn something along the way? And yes, have fun with it too.

So here we are. I’ll kick off this category with a couple of videos centering around Bend, Oregon (naturally) and Deschutes Brewery.

Beer in Bend – July 5, 2018 – 7:40

Brewers and brewery owners in Bend, Oregon, discuss the past, present, and future of the craft beer scene in this utopian wonderland for outdoor recreation and drinking.

This came out just a few months ago, and is a quick watch and touches on a good overview of the local beer scene. It’s a good primer but of course only scratches the surface.

Destination Beer, Episode 1: Deschutes Brewery, Bend, OR – Apr 7, 2015 – 30:09

In this episode, we travel to Bend, Oregon to visit Deschutes Brewery, the nations seventh largest craft brewery, celebrating their 27th anniversary. We’ll visit ‘Brew 1’ where it all started as a pub, visit the farm that helps complete the cycle of beer and burgers and of course we’ll hit the kitchen where Chef Jeff will create some amazing dishes prepared and paired with delicious beers. We’ll also take a tour of Bend and all of the awesome things that people do there like snowboarding and mountain biking and we’ll meet all the awesome people that make Bend the great destination it is. Join us on the trip!

This travel-style video came out three years ago so is a bit dated—yes, a lot can happen in three years in beer! It looks like it might have been a pilot concept because I don’t see more episodes on the YouTube channel. That’s okay though, it’s a good look behind the scenes at Deschutes.