SINGHA’S HOPS ‘N SPICE TOUR PRESS RELEASE

Tour: September 18th though the 25th
Dinner: Sunday, October 14th, Whist at Viceroy Santa Monica

Singha Beer is proud to present the first “Hops ‘n Spice Tour” featuring highly acclaimed Chef Chris Crary (Top Chef Season 9 Fan Favorite, Chef de Cuisine for Whist at Viceroy Hotel, Santa Monica) and food blogging tour de force Jo Stougaard (MyLastBite.com).

Chris and Jo, accompanied by our own Tom Sopit and a filmcrew, will they make their way through Thailand, from September 18th to the 25th, visiting historic cities, experience local cuisine and drop by for a tour of the Singha Brewery. They will experience the lifestyle and culture of Thailand that influenced Singha.

Throughout the trip Chris Crary (@ChrisCrary) and Jo Stougaard (@MyLastBite) giving updates via their Twitter and Facebook pages. We’ll also be sending out Tour updates on our website (SinghaBeerUSA.com), Twitter (@Singha_Beer) and Facebook page (Facebook.com/SinghaWorld). Use #SinghaHnS to join in on our adventure on Twitter. Jo will also be putting up blog posts on MyLastBite.com.

About Chris Crary, Jo Stougaard and Tom Sopit
Chris Crary is the Chef de Cuisine at Whist located in the Viceroy Hotel in Santa Monica, CA. He was recently featured on season 9 of Top Chef where he cracked the Final 16 and ultimately came away as the winner of the Fan Favorite award. But don’t let his boyish good looks and laid back demeanor fool you, he’s a beast in the kitchen with his creative imagination and attention to detail. His love for cooking was first realized in his grandmother’s kitchen in Ohio and refined at Johnson & Wales. The Hops ‘n Spice Tour will be his first time traveling overseas and it will be a unique experience to have someone with no expectations yet sharp culinary talent express their experience with diving head first into a foreign culture. We hope it sparks just as much creativity in Chris as when he was cooking alongside his grandmother.

Jo Stougaard is a force to be reckoned with in the food blogging world. You can say she’s a foodie’s foodie. Her adventurous spirit and sharp wit is due to her well-traveled past and present and (with us) future. Having been born to a Japanese mother and Scottish father. She’s been everywhere including every U.S. state, throughout Europe, Greece, Turkey, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Belize, St. Barths, the British and US Virgin Islands, photographed polar bears in the Artic to lions in East Africa and has not been afraid to chow down with the locals at each destination. Click through her blog, MyLastBite.com, and you’ll get a bit of everything from late night hole-in-the-wall greasy goodness to Michelin star fine dining or cooked up entrails to molecular gastronomy. With each blog post she writes up you get the intriguing yet honest story behind each meal along with great photography (no lazy cell phone flash photos that make food look grey and gross here, folks) that’ll get you salivating the more you scroll down. To bring along someone that’s seen and eaten it all, it’s a little intimidating to have Jo with us knowing she’s got a wealth of life experiences but an adventure is only as fun as the most daring member of the group. Indeed, she’s the perfect yang to Chris’ yin.

Tom Sopit is Singha’s marketing wiz and the person responsible for coming up and putting together the Hops ‘n Spice Tour. Think of him as the tour manager, making sure Chris and Jo get to their destinations on time as well as interpreting and translating for them. He is Thai but grew up in Los Angeles so don’t be surprised when be breaks a sweat and is the first to reach for a Singha when consuming gratuitous amounts of spicy foods.

Singha’s Hops ‘n Spice Dinner at Whist at Viceroy Santa Monica
The culmination of the Hops ‘n Spice Tour will end where it began, in Los Angeles. On Sunday, October 14th, members of the media and special guests will be invited to our Hops ‘n Spice Dinner hosted by Jo Stougaard at Whist at Viceroy Santa Monica. Chef Chris Crary, Whist’s Chef de Cuisine, will present dishes inspired by his time on the Hops ‘n Spice Tour. A special screening of our documentary short film about the Hops ‘n Spice Tour will also be shown.

RSVP info coming soon.

To keep up with the latest happenings of the Hops ‘n Spice Tour keep checking our blog at SinghaBeerUSA.com/blog/ for updates from the Hops ‘n Spice Tour. Also follow us on Facebook (Facebook.com/SinghaWorld), Twitter (@Singha_Beer) and Instagram (SinghaBeer) for additional updates.

About Singha
Singha Corporation Co., Ltd. is a subsidiary of Boon Rawd Brewery Co., Ltd., the first and largest brewery in Thailand, which was founded in 1933. Singha Beer is a German style lager brewed with Hallertau, Perle and Saaz hops imported from Germany and the Czech Republic. Singha Beer is available in over 50 countries.

Press and Media Inquiries
Tom Sopit, Singha North America, Tom_S@SinghaBeer.com