Monday, March 26, 2018
Collaboration Fest: Where the Stories Behind the Beers Matter
Speaking about collaboration beers to Jordan Fink, co-owner and head brewer of Denver's Woods Boss Brewing, is a little like talking about throwing the greatest party you can imagine. It's not an act of obligation, of somehow working with your cohorts to find a shared vision, to him so much as it is an inspired task, one that can leave you giddy with the possibilities of what you can create.
"I can't speak for anyone else. But for me, I have so many friends in the industry. We get together and drink together and talk about what we'd like to do together," Fink shared Thursday night at an industry gathering to welcome Thirsty Monk brewery to town. "It's an official opportunity for us to mind-meld and do things that we'd never do alone ... I love being with other brewers."
If Fink gets you excited about the idea of what can come from brewery collaborations, you're not alone. On Saturday afternoon, 200 breweries will unveil more than 100 beers that are the products of their unions at the fifth annual Collaboration Fest at the Hyatt Regency Denver. The gathering, put on by Two Parts and the Colorado Brewers Guild, is one of the best in the state at showing off the daring and creativity that sometimes only comes when two or more friends masquerading as pseudo-competitors poke each other enough, saying, "Is that all you've got?"
The beers that will be on display are worth mentioning and will be dissected in a column later this week. But the spirit of the festival is more than the liquid that is poured into your taster glass. It's the "why" behind the beers that are going into that glass.
So, after streaming through countless emails and sharing a few beers recently with some of the participants in the event, here are five of the best stories of how collaborations came together.
1) Escaping from a Desert Island
Denverites Baere and Mockery Brewing originally decided to brew together because they opened just a few months apart, but their experiment has turned into a four-year odyssey of beers that tell the story of someone being stranded on a desert island and then working to escape. Following efforts like a smoked pineapple saison, this year's edition, Intercontinental When I Eat French Toast, is a huge pastry stout imagining the story's hero fleeing from the island on rum barrels and floating all the way to France, co-owner Kevin Greer shared.
2) Beer-Crowd-Sourcing
For its collaboration with organizer Two Parts, Little Machine Beer wanted to let ticket holders to the festival have a say. So, after deciding the style would be a saison, it's been having attendees vote on most of the rest of the ingredients for months, and the result (shown in production above) will be the aptly named People's Beer.
3) Getting the Band Back Together
Fink began his brewing journey at Tommyknocker Brewery, and to celebrate his heritage, he invited as many former fellow beer makers from the Idaho Springs icon back to craft a collaboration. The resulting baltic porter, 10K Alumni, involved eight breweries and was the 10,000th batch made on Tommyknocker's system.
4) A Cross-Border Experiment
Upslope Brewing of Boulder and Santa Fe Brewing (shown at right) wanted to craft a beverage that showed off the
best of each of their states. Thigh Five, a "southwest common" includes huitlacoche, a plant fungus that grows on the ears of corn and has a slightly smoky flavor. Bet you didn't see that coming.
5) Let the Music Play
Any shared set of interests, from a common neighborhood to a common distributor, can bring about a reason to craft a collaboration beer. But when you are the two breweries in Colorado most closely associated with love of music — the former-punk-rock-promoters-turned-impromptu-concert-hosts at Ratio Beerworks and the guys from Ska Brewing whose name reflects the tunes blaring over their speakers when they began to brew — the Magnetic North Norwegian white IPA can only be a melodious product (as shown in the photo at top).
Speaking about collaboration beers to Jordan Fink, co-owner and head brewer of Denver's Woods Boss Brewing, is a little like talking about throwing the greatest party you can imagine. It's not an act of obligation, of somehow working with your cohorts to find a shared vision, to him so much as it is an inspired task, one that can leave you giddy with the possibilities of what you can create.
"I can't speak for anyone else. But for me, I have so many friends in the industry. We get together and drink together and talk about what we'd like to do together," Fink shared Thursday night at an industry gathering to welcome Thirsty Monk brewery to town. "It's an official opportunity for us to mind-meld and do things that we'd never do alone ... I love being with other brewers."
If Fink gets you excited about the idea of what can come from brewery collaborations, you're not alone. On Saturday afternoon, 200 breweries will unveil more than 100 beers that are the products of their unions at the fifth annual Collaboration Fest at the Hyatt Regency Denver. The gathering, put on by Two Parts and the Colorado Brewers Guild, is one of the best in the state at showing off the daring and creativity that sometimes only comes when two or more friends masquerading as pseudo-competitors poke each other enough, saying, "Is that all you've got?"
The beers that will be on display are worth mentioning and will be dissected in a column later this week. But the spirit of the festival is more than the liquid that is poured into your taster glass. It's the "why" behind the beers that are going into that glass.
So, after streaming through countless emails and sharing a few beers recently with some of the participants in the event, here are five of the best stories of how collaborations came together.
1) Escaping from a Desert Island
Denverites Baere and Mockery Brewing originally decided to brew together because they opened just a few months apart, but their experiment has turned into a four-year odyssey of beers that tell the story of someone being stranded on a desert island and then working to escape. Following efforts like a smoked pineapple saison, this year's edition, Intercontinental When I Eat French Toast, is a huge pastry stout imagining the story's hero fleeing from the island on rum barrels and floating all the way to France, co-owner Kevin Greer shared.
For its collaboration with organizer Two Parts, Little Machine Beer wanted to let ticket holders to the festival have a say. So, after deciding the style would be a saison, it's been having attendees vote on most of the rest of the ingredients for months, and the result (shown in production above) will be the aptly named People's Beer.
3) Getting the Band Back Together
Fink began his brewing journey at Tommyknocker Brewery, and to celebrate his heritage, he invited as many former fellow beer makers from the Idaho Springs icon back to craft a collaboration. The resulting baltic porter, 10K Alumni, involved eight breweries and was the 10,000th batch made on Tommyknocker's system.4) A Cross-Border Experiment
Upslope Brewing of Boulder and Santa Fe Brewing (shown at right) wanted to craft a beverage that showed off the
best of each of their states. Thigh Five, a "southwest common" includes huitlacoche, a plant fungus that grows on the ears of corn and has a slightly smoky flavor. Bet you didn't see that coming.
5) Let the Music Play
Any shared set of interests, from a common neighborhood to a common distributor, can bring about a reason to craft a collaboration beer. But when you are the two breweries in Colorado most closely associated with love of music — the former-punk-rock-promoters-turned-impromptu-concert-hosts at Ratio Beerworks and the guys from Ska Brewing whose name reflects the tunes blaring over their speakers when they began to brew — the Magnetic North Norwegian white IPA can only be a melodious product (as shown in the photo at top).
Labels: Baere Brewing, collaboration beers, Colorado Brewers Guild, Little Machine Beer, Mockery Brewing, Ratio Beerworks, Santa Fe Brewing, Ska Brewing, Two Parts, Upslope Brewing, Woods Boss Brewing
Sunday, December 29, 2013
Santa Fe's Brewing Scene - A Work in Progress
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There are several reasons you head to Santa Fe - the art, the food, the history, the beautiful churches. But on a trip down there earlier this month, I also wanted to take some time to understand whether the rumors of a resurgent New Mexico brewing scene were true.
After a week imbibing in Taos and the "City Different," it becomes apparent that while there are a few gems to be found in northern New Mexico, the quality and consistency of the beer remains hit-and-miss. And the scene, however growing, still lags behind that of the one south in Albuquerque.
Nothing embodied these traits quite like Blue Corn Café & Brewery, a locally loved brewery/restaurant that recently took home two medals at the Great American Beer Festival. Both of those honored beers - the End of the Trail Brown Ale and Gold Medal Oatmeal Stout - are solid offerings that are smooth and, in the case of the stout, pleasantly sweet. But much of the rest of the menu ranges from dull to cloying (the 40K Honey Wheat Ale especially), and you leave without any specific memories of the products.
Santa Fe Brewing, which distributes some of its beers in the Denver area, left a similar feel. While the Freestyle Pilsner is classically German and largely enjoyable, its resonance is offset by beers like a Pale Ale that seems little more than a dressed-up copper ale with a slightly stale-tasting malt.
Then there is the beer scene in Taos, a 5,700-person artists' community frequented by area skiers that can tout two breweries in the downtown area. But one, Eske's Brew Pub, offers 8 beers (see board at left next to the Beer Geekette) with only one real winner - a Taos Green Chile with a light, crisp body and a late-activating spice that flavors nicely without burning. And the other, Taos Ale House, offers mostly other breweries' beer (see picture at right), which may not be a bad idea after you gulp down the uneven malt sweetness in its West Coast IPA.
One of two real discoveries of the Santa Fe trip was Second Street Brewery, a brewhouse/restaurant that didn't push the envelope on styles but did them all very well. Its dark beers were terribly appropriate for enjoying while the snow fell outside, especially its easy-drinking Cream Stout fermented with an English yeast strain and its Old Pecos Porter with its solid, slightly roasted feel. And the Civil Rye - a new offering on the menu - is a keeper, with a nice punch of sweetness and bitterness in a medium body.
The other is a reminder of just how good some of the Albuquerque breweries are. La Cumbre Brewing's Elevated IPA, served at a number of local restaurants, had a gigantic mouth of citrusy-sweet but earthy hops. And Marble Brewery, which has a downtown taphouse, went beyond its normal offering to put out creative one-offs like Lambert's Pale Ale, giving you a huge mouth of grass and flowers in a body that is decidedly easy.
Certainly, the Santa Fe beer scene is coming along. But it still has improvements to make.
.jpg)
There are several reasons you head to Santa Fe - the art, the food, the history, the beautiful churches. But on a trip down there earlier this month, I also wanted to take some time to understand whether the rumors of a resurgent New Mexico brewing scene were true.
After a week imbibing in Taos and the "City Different," it becomes apparent that while there are a few gems to be found in northern New Mexico, the quality and consistency of the beer remains hit-and-miss. And the scene, however growing, still lags behind that of the one south in Albuquerque.
Nothing embodied these traits quite like Blue Corn Café & Brewery, a locally loved brewery/restaurant that recently took home two medals at the Great American Beer Festival. Both of those honored beers - the End of the Trail Brown Ale and Gold Medal Oatmeal Stout - are solid offerings that are smooth and, in the case of the stout, pleasantly sweet. But much of the rest of the menu ranges from dull to cloying (the 40K Honey Wheat Ale especially), and you leave without any specific memories of the products.
Santa Fe Brewing, which distributes some of its beers in the Denver area, left a similar feel. While the Freestyle Pilsner is classically German and largely enjoyable, its resonance is offset by beers like a Pale Ale that seems little more than a dressed-up copper ale with a slightly stale-tasting malt.
Then there is the beer scene in Taos, a 5,700-person artists' community frequented by area skiers that can tout two breweries in the downtown area. But one, Eske's Brew Pub, offers 8 beers (see board at left next to the Beer Geekette) with only one real winner - a Taos Green Chile with a light, crisp body and a late-activating spice that flavors nicely without burning. And the other, Taos Ale House, offers mostly other breweries' beer (see picture at right), which may not be a bad idea after you gulp down the uneven malt sweetness in its West Coast IPA.One of two real discoveries of the Santa Fe trip was Second Street Brewery, a brewhouse/restaurant that didn't push the envelope on styles but did them all very well. Its dark beers were terribly appropriate for enjoying while the snow fell outside, especially its easy-drinking Cream Stout fermented with an English yeast strain and its Old Pecos Porter with its solid, slightly roasted feel. And the Civil Rye - a new offering on the menu - is a keeper, with a nice punch of sweetness and bitterness in a medium body.
The other is a reminder of just how good some of the Albuquerque breweries are. La Cumbre Brewing's Elevated IPA, served at a number of local restaurants, had a gigantic mouth of citrusy-sweet but earthy hops. And Marble Brewery, which has a downtown taphouse, went beyond its normal offering to put out creative one-offs like Lambert's Pale Ale, giving you a huge mouth of grass and flowers in a body that is decidedly easy.
Certainly, the Santa Fe beer scene is coming along. But it still has improvements to make.
Labels: Blue Corn Café & Brewery, Eske's Brew Pub, La Cumbre Brewing, Marble Brewery, New Mexico beers, Santa Fe Brewing, Second Street Brewery, Taos Ale House
