Welcome To Chicago, The Beer Belly Of America

By John Dodge

CHICAGO (CBS) -- Chicago, once the Hog Butcher For The World, has evolved into the Beer Belly Of America.

California is called the nation's Salad Bowl, we get the Beer Belly.

That's not simply based on the explosion of craft breweries in Chicagoland.

There are more than 60, many of which have been recognized among the nation's best.

Researchers at floatingsheep.org examined the data for several years, and found some interesting trends:

Chicago had the highest mention of "bars" on Google maps in the country.

Starting in Illinois, the beer belly expands up into Wisconsin and first spreads westward through Iowa/Minnesota, according to the research.

In most of Illinois and nearly all of Wisconsin, there are more bars than grocery stores in many areas.

Goose Island is the most popular regional beer, based on an analysis of Twitter.

According to a Gallup Poll, which was visualized on this map below, beer is more popular that wine here, too.

In the suburbs, more people tweet about beer than about church.

Floating Sheep's work is also featured in the book "The Geography Of Beer."