In August, 2010, I spent an afternoon driving around Brooklyn with one of the few remaining seltzer men left in New York City: Eli Miller. It was a remarkable experience. I traveled with Eli as research for Seltzertopia. What I experienced that day became a foundational experience for this project,Read More →
Tonight I had a blast “competing” on Stephen J. Dubner’s (of Freakonomics Radio) new podcast, Tell Me Something I Don’t Know. With guest host Alex Guarnaschelli, the Food Network personality and chef at Butter, I and four others presented at Symphony Space before a packed house, each sharing something weRead More →
Get ready! In the fall of 2018, Seltzertopia: The Effervescent Age will finally hit the shelves. After more than a decade and a half of original research, delving into texts both ancient and digital, resources human and imbibed, Seltzertopia covers the more than 200 year history of seltzer manufacturing, byRead More →
That’s right, on June 14, at 6pm. I’m going to be on the most powerful 500 watt station In America. It’s 1460 AM’s very own IN FOCUS With Dr. Dan & Friends on WVOX. The photo below tells the whole story. In the bottom is my daughter, wearing her baseballRead More →
As on-going research for my book, I track seltzer in the news. Who is drinking it? What are they drinking? Why, and with whom? The trends and highlights I observed I now package for you, my crew of seltzer lovers, as 2016: The Year in Seltzer. SELTZER IS STILL HOT (ANDRead More →
If you are coming to Seltzertopia through the recent Gastropod episode, welcome! For the past decade I have been writing the first book on seltzer, detailing both its fascinating history as well as the remarkable people who are leading us today towards what I like to call Seltzertopia. I haveRead More →
If you like food, then Gastropod is the podcast for you. Co-hosts Cynthia Graber and Nicola Twilley turned their microphones this episode on seltzer, and included yours truly to provide the historical sweep. As you well know, I am a harsh critic of seltzer coverage, as journalists so often getRead More →
I was in Pittsburgh for a work conference and took some time to call up John Seekings, the central figure throughout my seltzer book, to both meet him in person for the first time AND visit his seltzer works. It was a beautiful, hot summer day and I arrived atRead More →
I thought I would take a quick break from the writing to share a little about the status of the book. This Fall I have been working on strengthening the second half of the book, focusing on integrating in the story of Original New York Seltzer and it’s father/son founders.Read More →
I thought I heard them all before! In this clip, Michael Savage, a conservative radio host, tries to understand Bernie Sanders, and ends up on this bizarre rant about seltzer: “I still think the seltzer has something to do with it. If I had the time, I’d go back toRead More →