Mac Lamken co-founded Diametric Brewing and built something bigger than a taproom — he built a community. On Episode 135, recorded live at Diametric in Lee's Summit, Blake McCarter and Courtney and Dave Lamken join Nigel and Nick to preview "Worth the Climb," a 20-brewery collaborative lager series honoring Mac's life and raising money for veterans and first responders through the Battle Within. It's a beer release, a tribute, and a testament to how much one person can matter.

Nick and Nigel take the show on the road to the "ghetto burbs" for Episode 134, recording live at the home of Dan and Ashley Maloney — the couple behind Street Katz Brewing. The still was running when they arrived. It was still running when they left.

Dan's beer journey started with hot Budweisers at an Albuquerque frat house and bottomed out somewhere around a coolers original in 1983. These days he's running 30–50 gallon homebrew batches out of the garage with a nitro pull on the fridge. Ashley fills in the details Dan leaves out — including how they met at a brewery soft opening over a beat-up '77 Chevy, and how the Street Katz name came from a crew of mischievous brewery regulars with raccoon, skunk, and possum nicknames who made it their mission to terrorize local taprooms.

This episode includes a mystery beer pulled from a golf course cooler, a Martin House wine barrel-aged sour that nobody quite knew what to do with, a birthday toast to Nigel's 60th, Ron's legendary laugh apnea, and serious (well, semi-serious) talk about the long road to opening a brick-and-mortar Street Katz brewery.

The train was never on the tracks. That's kind of the point.

Steve Holle spent decades in real estate investment before walking away at 55, moving back to his Kansas City hometown and opening KC Bier Co. — one of the region's most distinctive breweries. Now 12 years in, Steve sits down with Nigel and Nick to talk about the brewery's German roots, the Reinheitsgebot purity law it follows, and why imported Bavarian malt changes everything in the glass. He also breaks down the realities of running a craft brewery today: tariffs on German ingredients, a softening wholesale market, and why the tasting room model is quietly winning. Plus — a second KC Bier Co. location is coming to Lenexa, Kansas, complete with a beer garden, live music stage, full scratch kitchen, and yes, an off-leash dog area. Three mystery beers round out the episode, including a Krampus winter warmer and a West Coast IPA that earns some genuine praise from a certified beer judge.