Beer Run Blog

8 Under-the-Radar Beers You Need to Try at Collaboration Fest


Collaboration Beer Fest, which has staked its claim as being one of the five best beer festivals in Colorado, goes from 2 to 6 p.m. Saturday. Between the bomb cyclone and the college basketball conference tournaments, the event, which has more than 100 beers made together by anywhere from two to 10 breweries, seemed to sneak up this year.

"Sneak" is a term that rarely describes what's poured at this celebration of unity in the craft-beer industry, which often turns into a contest on who can make the strangest and yet most enjoyable experiment. This year, for example, Coal Mine Ave and Seedstock are making a margarita imperial gose, Jagged Mountain and 105 West have brewed a rum-barrel-aged imperial ice cream old ale, and eight RiNo-area brewers are presenting your run-of-the-mill mushroom schwarzbier.

But one of the secrets of the festival is that some breweries turn in another direction and go subtle - and they can often create some of the tastiest beers in the room. So, with that said, here are eight beers that are likely to fly under many attendees' radars but that should land solidly on yours if you are going (which you should).

1) Casey Brewing and Blending/Outer Range Brewing IPA
It's just a simple IPA, in a sea of double hazies, wood-added IPAs and blueberry protein milkshake IPAs (yes, that's an actual offering). But it's a simple IPA made by two of the finest brewers in Colorado who are not on the Front Range. And that sounds simply wonderful.

2) Ratio Beerworks/Revolution Brewing Southern Hemisphere Pilsner
The boom in recent years in Australian and New Zealand hops, particularly the wonderful and slightly woody Nelson Sauvin variety, typically have gone to create new tastes in IPAs. Having one of RiNo's best auteurs combine with one of Chicago's star breweries to spruce up a lighter-bodied pilsner with them should put the hops even more front and center for all to notice.


3) Cannonball Creek Brewing/Beer Media Pre-Prohibition Pilsner
Sure, I'm biased, since I was one of about a dozen beer writers who showed up at Golden's finest brewery on Feb. 1 to let Brian Hutchinson do the real work and then take turns between us stirring the mash (that's me above and Brian below). But Cannonball Creek has proven to have the magic touch with subtle beers, enough so that a bunch of hacks like us couldn't screw this up.

4) Living the Dream Brewing/Angry James Brewing Imperial Coffee Brown
You may not have made it up to Silverthorne yet to try Angry James' Two Tone Footer Stout, which is dry-hopped with coffee beans and takes on one of the least bitter, roasty mocha feels of any coffee brew in Colorado. But if you have, you know not to walk past another one of its coffee experiments, particularly when it's made with this underrated Littleton beer maker.

5) Tivoli Brewing/MSU Denver Belgian Tripel Brut
In a show full of daring professional brewers, you may not want to try the beer made partially by a bunch of college kids. But remember that Metro State has a program specifically for students to learn how to brew and to operate a brewery. And know too that this is a tripel spiced with orange zest, hibiscus flowers and Indian Coriander, so there's nothing dull about it.

6) Station 26 Brewing/Brink Brewing Imperial Milk Stout
Don't know Brink Brewing? The Cincinnati beer-maker just won Very Small Brewing Company of the Year at the 2018 Great American Beer Festival. And since Station 26 pretty much can't miss, this should be a fun, if semi-traditional, style.

7) Comrade Brewing/Epic Brewing Dry-Hopped California Common
Those who remember the Comrade/Uberbrew Triple IPA from Collaboration Fest 2017 were reinforced in their beliefs that this south Denver beer maker could do anything with hops. Dry-hopping a steam beer will put that statement to the test, but it and Epic have worked their own magic separately before.

8) Pikes Peak/Red Leg/Cerberus/FH Beer Works/Black Forest/Goat Patch/Dueces Wild/JAKs wine-beer hybrid with syrah grape must fermented with saison yeast
OK, there's nothing subtle about the beer here. But people may be tempted to overlook it because the eight breweries behind it are Colorado Springs-area crafters with limited to no distribution in Denver. In truth, the Springs scene has been improving significantly in recent years, and the breweries here (particularly Cerberus, Goat Patch and Pikes Peak) are among its stars.

Labels: Angry James Brewing, Cannonball Creek Brewing, Cerberus Brewing, collaboration beers, Comrade Brewing, Goat Patch Brewing, Pikes Peak Brewing, Ratio Beerworks, Station 26 Brewing, Tivoli Brewing

Five Things I Learned from the All Colorado Beer Festival


With 67 breweries and nearly 200 beers on hand, Colorado Springs' biggest annual beer event once again was a great way to get a snapshot of the state scene. And between tasting at the festival and participating as a celebrity judge, there are a few things one couldn't help but notice.

1) Pikes Peak Brewing is reaching new heights.
The best beer at the festival - and the one that seemed to generate the most conversation - was a Whiskey Barrel-Aged Stout from the Monument brewery that somehow took on sour characteristics. Both the complexity of the beer - it maintained a dark, sweet body even as it took on sour overtones - and the fact that brewery owner Chris Wright decided to run with an experiment gone differently than he expected shows just how mature this 3-1/2-year-old brewery is getting.  And its Penrose Private Reserve, a Belgian golden ale aged in red-wine barrels, wasn't too shabby either.

2) The next big Fort Collins brewery? How about Horse and Dragon?
The hall at the All Colorado Beer Festival often features a lot of newer beer makers looking to make their name. And it reinforced a thought that others have said for several months now - that Horse and Dragon, which opened in May, is worthy of grabbing attention even in one of the state's best beer towns. Particularly interesting was its Sad Panda Coffee Stout, a beer that wasn't just heavy on coffee but on creamy vanilla and caramel flavors, putting a new spin on the style.

3) It's time for more chai beers.
Yak and Yeti has earned well-deserved national accolades for its Chai Milk Stout, but for some reason other breweries have seemed slow to pick up on this interesting flavor profile. Avery's typically taproom-only Chai Brown, which was hidden back in the VIP tent, was every bit as good, though, cushioning the extra spice with a solid brown body that complimented it well. The only question: When will more breweries jump on this emerging bandwagon?


4) Biggest surprise: Shamrock Brewing
I got to judge the specialty category with two others this year, and it was only later that we discovered the highly flavorful, well-balanced winner we chose was Shamrock's Death by Coconut Chocolate Porter. But the Pueblo brewery, once an afterthought in southern Colorado's beer scene, also brought along a Big Papa double IPA that was simultaneously smooth and huge in flavor.

5) Colorado Springs' newest breweries are producing decidedly mixed results.
As a former Springs resident, I've been pleased to see the explosion of breweries down there over the past two years - but not all new breweries are equal. Iron Bird Brewing rolled out a crisp, well-made IPA. but Fieldhouse Brewing's watery Cranberry Saison and Nano 108's overly malted and oddly bitter Imperial IPA show there is certainly some work still to be done. That's not saying these breweries won't grow into great representatives of the local scene; they're just not all there yet.

Labels: All Colorado Beer Festival, Avery Brewing, Fieldhouse Brewing, Horse and Dragon Brewing, Iron Bird Brewing, Nano 108 Brewery, Pikes Peak Brewing, Shamrock Brewing

Labels: Pikes Peak Brewing