Sunday, January 01, 2017
Top 10 Colorado Beers of 2016
At a time when it seemed everyone was focused on something other than beer, Colorado breweries flew seemingly under the radar with their greatness during the year that just ended. The best and most memorable offerings came not from adding exotic new ingredients (with one exception) or from trying to ratchet alcohol or tartness to new levels, but from simplifying, aging a bit and just doing everything well.
So, before we bid goodbye to 2016 altogether, let's stop and admire once again the 10 beers that made the year one worth remembering.
10) 4 Noses Pump Action Imperial Pumpkin Ale
When your beer takes gold in the pumpkin categories for both the World Beer Cup and Great American Beer Festival in the same year, you know you have something special on your hands. What makes Pump Action stand out so much is its offering of a significant body (nearly 8 percent ABV) without overbearing alcohol or spice content. It's just smooth and silky.
9) Trinity Saison Delivery
One of Colorado's true saison specialists broke new ground even by its lofty standards with this gem, first made for the 2016 Craft Brewers Conference. Colorado apple, grains of paradise and dark candy sugar made this decidedly fruit-forward, while the Chardonnay-barrel aging gave it a slight pucker. Wrap it up, and it became a pretty eye-opening combination.
8) Great Divide The Smoothness
Black lager can be a forgettable style - right up until you decide to age it in Jameson barrels and imbue the lighter-bodied beer with a whiskey flavor that was perfectly balanced and managed to breathe new life into the simple malts in the beer. I'll come back to Great Divide at more length later, but this beer was shocking in its simplicity and tastiness.
7) Beryl's Beer Trent's Plums
If plum was a favorite new additive in 2016, no one made it sing more than this too-often-overlooked Denver brewery that brought out the fruit's tart properties by letting it age for two years in red-wine barrels with a sour brown ale. It took your taste buds right up to the edge but walked that delicate line of being significantly sour without being too acerbic.
6) AC Golden Kriek Noir
Speaking of pushing sour taste to the edge, Coors' experimental brewery - which also did some excellent work on the lighter end of the spectrum this year - made its own statement with this wine-barrel-aged Belgian ale with sour cherries added (pictured above). Almost sweet on the nose, this was aggressive and cutting in its flavor profile, rewarding drinkers with a constantly evolving complexity that was simultaneously edgy and refreshing.
5) Comrade Yellow Fever
Colorado's new poster child for hop-drenched beers showed off its versatility by ramping up the flavor profile of this Citra blonde ale infused with jalapenos and nabbing a World Beer Cup medal for it. With a mild look and less-than-fiery nose, this beer surprised twice. First, it announced its rising heat only as you swirled Yellow Fever in your mouth. Second, it let that heat cool just when you thought it might be too much, creating an exhilarating experience.
4) Weldwerks Double Dry Hopped Juicy Bits
You may love or hate the "New England IPA" trend, but you can not walk away from this beer (pictured above) - a hopped-up version of the Greeley brewery's hazy IPA - without feeling like you have somehow found a new frontier of a style of beer (IPA) that leaves few surprises anymore. It pelts you with fruity and grassy overtones without any lingering bitterness, allowing you to enjoy the hops for all the flavor they can impart. It's the kind of IPA that can make hop haters rethink their sentiments.
3) Crooked Stave Raspberry Petite Sour
While Crooked Stave is known rightly for its astringent, taste-bud-pushing creations, it may have found its greatest success yet by stepping just slightly off the pedal and letting the fruit and wild yeast mingle in a pleasing, almost soft way here. Eye-poppingly pink in its pour, this is both sweet and tart, both bullish on its wild side and more concerned with its fruit than its acid. It simply is delicious.
2) Spangalang Anniversary Ale
To celebrate its first birthday, this rising Denver star blended several of its hop-forward beers, combining barrel-aged and fresh IPAs in one big, never-again-reproducible batch. In doing so, it produced the most interesting one-off beer made in this state in years, a taste-bud-wowing experiment that was simultaneously hoppy and woody, earthy and pleasingly bitter. Before it turns two, Spangalang already is making some of the best beer in Colorado; this was evidence of just how much better it can be.
1) Great Divide Barrel-Aged Hercules
Ever since my book "Mountain Brew" came out in 2011, I've been asked what is my favorite brewery in Colorado. I usually duck the question but, when cornered, have tended to identify Great Divide as the single best in this state. By the end of 2015, though, I was starting to question that long-held assumption, wondering if the long-time experimental brewery was starting to lose ground to others that were innovating more. Then, everything changed this year.
Great Divide's barrel-aging program, which has been in place for years but got a major boost with the 2015 opening of its Barrel Bar on Brighton Boulevard, elevates this brewery into a class of its own for several reasons. First, it allows it to rediscover and reinvent already top-tier offerings and bring out new flavors in them, from its Old Ruffian barleywine to the aforementioned black lager. But second, it does so without simply dropping beers into wild-yeast-ridden barrels and turning everything sour. Its usage of oak and whiskey barrels that deepen the flavor and body of the beers gives it a real personality in an atmosphere when even great breweries begin to seem a little bit like each other in their experiments.
Putting its Hercules Double IPA into whiskey barrels for two years before unleashing this beast at its 22nd anniversary party this summer was the best beer idea of the year. The hops retained an amazingly out-front presence despite their age, and the whiskey took on just a supporting role, as wood and vanilla notes blended seamlessly with Cascade and Simcoe hops. Like much of the best of 2016, this didn't break new ground in flavor profiles. It just brought a classic recipe to bear in a new and better way that will set the mark for this brewery and all others going forward.
At a time when it seemed everyone was focused on something other than beer, Colorado breweries flew seemingly under the radar with their greatness during the year that just ended. The best and most memorable offerings came not from adding exotic new ingredients (with one exception) or from trying to ratchet alcohol or tartness to new levels, but from simplifying, aging a bit and just doing everything well.
So, before we bid goodbye to 2016 altogether, let's stop and admire once again the 10 beers that made the year one worth remembering.
10) 4 Noses Pump Action Imperial Pumpkin Ale
When your beer takes gold in the pumpkin categories for both the World Beer Cup and Great American Beer Festival in the same year, you know you have something special on your hands. What makes Pump Action stand out so much is its offering of a significant body (nearly 8 percent ABV) without overbearing alcohol or spice content. It's just smooth and silky.
9) Trinity Saison Delivery
One of Colorado's true saison specialists broke new ground even by its lofty standards with this gem, first made for the 2016 Craft Brewers Conference. Colorado apple, grains of paradise and dark candy sugar made this decidedly fruit-forward, while the Chardonnay-barrel aging gave it a slight pucker. Wrap it up, and it became a pretty eye-opening combination.
8) Great Divide The Smoothness
Black lager can be a forgettable style - right up until you decide to age it in Jameson barrels and imbue the lighter-bodied beer with a whiskey flavor that was perfectly balanced and managed to breathe new life into the simple malts in the beer. I'll come back to Great Divide at more length later, but this beer was shocking in its simplicity and tastiness.
7) Beryl's Beer Trent's Plums
If plum was a favorite new additive in 2016, no one made it sing more than this too-often-overlooked Denver brewery that brought out the fruit's tart properties by letting it age for two years in red-wine barrels with a sour brown ale. It took your taste buds right up to the edge but walked that delicate line of being significantly sour without being too acerbic.
6) AC Golden Kriek Noir
Speaking of pushing sour taste to the edge, Coors' experimental brewery - which also did some excellent work on the lighter end of the spectrum this year - made its own statement with this wine-barrel-aged Belgian ale with sour cherries added (pictured above). Almost sweet on the nose, this was aggressive and cutting in its flavor profile, rewarding drinkers with a constantly evolving complexity that was simultaneously edgy and refreshing.
5) Comrade Yellow Fever
Colorado's new poster child for hop-drenched beers showed off its versatility by ramping up the flavor profile of this Citra blonde ale infused with jalapenos and nabbing a World Beer Cup medal for it. With a mild look and less-than-fiery nose, this beer surprised twice. First, it announced its rising heat only as you swirled Yellow Fever in your mouth. Second, it let that heat cool just when you thought it might be too much, creating an exhilarating experience.
4) Weldwerks Double Dry Hopped Juicy Bits
You may love or hate the "New England IPA" trend, but you can not walk away from this beer (pictured above) - a hopped-up version of the Greeley brewery's hazy IPA - without feeling like you have somehow found a new frontier of a style of beer (IPA) that leaves few surprises anymore. It pelts you with fruity and grassy overtones without any lingering bitterness, allowing you to enjoy the hops for all the flavor they can impart. It's the kind of IPA that can make hop haters rethink their sentiments.
3) Crooked Stave Raspberry Petite Sour
While Crooked Stave is known rightly for its astringent, taste-bud-pushing creations, it may have found its greatest success yet by stepping just slightly off the pedal and letting the fruit and wild yeast mingle in a pleasing, almost soft way here. Eye-poppingly pink in its pour, this is both sweet and tart, both bullish on its wild side and more concerned with its fruit than its acid. It simply is delicious.2) Spangalang Anniversary Ale
To celebrate its first birthday, this rising Denver star blended several of its hop-forward beers, combining barrel-aged and fresh IPAs in one big, never-again-reproducible batch. In doing so, it produced the most interesting one-off beer made in this state in years, a taste-bud-wowing experiment that was simultaneously hoppy and woody, earthy and pleasingly bitter. Before it turns two, Spangalang already is making some of the best beer in Colorado; this was evidence of just how much better it can be.
1) Great Divide Barrel-Aged Hercules
Ever since my book "Mountain Brew" came out in 2011, I've been asked what is my favorite brewery in Colorado. I usually duck the question but, when cornered, have tended to identify Great Divide as the single best in this state. By the end of 2015, though, I was starting to question that long-held assumption, wondering if the long-time experimental brewery was starting to lose ground to others that were innovating more. Then, everything changed this year.
Great Divide's barrel-aging program, which has been in place for years but got a major boost with the 2015 opening of its Barrel Bar on Brighton Boulevard, elevates this brewery into a class of its own for several reasons. First, it allows it to rediscover and reinvent already top-tier offerings and bring out new flavors in them, from its Old Ruffian barleywine to the aforementioned black lager. But second, it does so without simply dropping beers into wild-yeast-ridden barrels and turning everything sour. Its usage of oak and whiskey barrels that deepen the flavor and body of the beers gives it a real personality in an atmosphere when even great breweries begin to seem a little bit like each other in their experiments.Putting its Hercules Double IPA into whiskey barrels for two years before unleashing this beast at its 22nd anniversary party this summer was the best beer idea of the year. The hops retained an amazingly out-front presence despite their age, and the whiskey took on just a supporting role, as wood and vanilla notes blended seamlessly with Cascade and Simcoe hops. Like much of the best of 2016, this didn't break new ground in flavor profiles. It just brought a classic recipe to bear in a new and better way that will set the mark for this brewery and all others going forward.
Labels: 4 Noses Brewing, AC Golden, Beryl's Beer, Comrade Brewing, Crooked Stave, Great Divide, Spangalang Brewery, Top Beers of Year, Trinity Brewing, Weldwerks Brewing
Sunday, May 29, 2016
The Time of the Saison
Tucked back into the corner of Saturday's Funk and Farm Fest at Nighthawk Brewery, Trinity Brewing and Mu Brewery had an intriguing duo of beers on tap. Trinity was pouring a Saison Delivery - made with apples and grains of paradise and aged in chardonnay barrels - that was blowing everyone away by being tart and fruit-forward without being either blistering or cloying. And Mu was serving up a Key Lime Saison with Brett aged in Merlot barrels that, if slightly less polished, was a bold experiment at amping up both the sweetness and the pucker factor.
While different, the two beers offered great examples of just how many exciting directions the world of saison brewing is going. Surrounding them were farmhouse ales that tasted vaguely of cotton candy that cut through your taste buds with a sour golden bite and that clashed a sharp tartness with the big taste of the whiskey barrel in which they were aged - each one worthy of kudos.
To think, when New Belgium tried to introduce a saison 20 years ago - a story I recounted in my book, "Mountain Brew" - beer drinkers didn't take to it because they largely weren't ready for the traditional Belgian style to blend with the rising flavors of hops and roasted barley in America. Now no major brewery is without one in its portfolio, and the best are rolling out more and more variations - Great Divide's full, fruity and slightly flowery Nadia Kali hibiscus saison being the latest really tasty one to hit the market - just to keep up with demand.
To what should we attribute the saison boom? A big factor is the demand among beer geeks for more that is different and cutting edge. Saison as a style allows for greater experimentation that most, presenting a slightly estery, slightly spicy base that lends itself to a ton of different adjuncts. But it also is a medium-bodied beer that can appeal to a wide range of drinkers, depending on what is thrown into the brew kettle.
I think back to my birthday party in 2015, when I asked friends to bring a saison and we did a blind taste testing to determine our favorite. That a Casey Brewing and Blending Saison won the general poll was not a surprise, as the Glenwood Springs beer auteur has managed to craft a version of the style that is bright and slightly tart and excites the taste buds continually. But the variety of saisons that scored high in our tallies - from Epic's Sour Apple Saison to Three Barrel's peppery Pemba Sherpa Saison - made it clear that there was a lot to like on the market.
Similarly, Nighthawk's farmhouse festival left few stones un-turned. Wynkoop's Forethought Barrel-Aged Sour Saison was a jolting and fascinating combination of strong flavors. Atom Brewing's Arlo farmhouse-inspired ale presented a huge sweetness developed surprisingly through open-air fermentation. Spangalang's Ethel, a sour saison, was bright and eye-opening without being punishing on the taste buds.
There is a lot to enjoy in the greater saison field today. But what is more exciting is the nearly blank slate from which brewers can develop more creative and more challenging saison varieties to come. The style may have originated with farm owners in Belgium and France. But what American brewers are doing with it is taking it to a whole new level.
Tucked back into the corner of Saturday's Funk and Farm Fest at Nighthawk Brewery, Trinity Brewing and Mu Brewery had an intriguing duo of beers on tap. Trinity was pouring a Saison Delivery - made with apples and grains of paradise and aged in chardonnay barrels - that was blowing everyone away by being tart and fruit-forward without being either blistering or cloying. And Mu was serving up a Key Lime Saison with Brett aged in Merlot barrels that, if slightly less polished, was a bold experiment at amping up both the sweetness and the pucker factor.
While different, the two beers offered great examples of just how many exciting directions the world of saison brewing is going. Surrounding them were farmhouse ales that tasted vaguely of cotton candy that cut through your taste buds with a sour golden bite and that clashed a sharp tartness with the big taste of the whiskey barrel in which they were aged - each one worthy of kudos.
To think, when New Belgium tried to introduce a saison 20 years ago - a story I recounted in my book, "Mountain Brew" - beer drinkers didn't take to it because they largely weren't ready for the traditional Belgian style to blend with the rising flavors of hops and roasted barley in America. Now no major brewery is without one in its portfolio, and the best are rolling out more and more variations - Great Divide's full, fruity and slightly flowery Nadia Kali hibiscus saison being the latest really tasty one to hit the market - just to keep up with demand.To what should we attribute the saison boom? A big factor is the demand among beer geeks for more that is different and cutting edge. Saison as a style allows for greater experimentation that most, presenting a slightly estery, slightly spicy base that lends itself to a ton of different adjuncts. But it also is a medium-bodied beer that can appeal to a wide range of drinkers, depending on what is thrown into the brew kettle.
I think back to my birthday party in 2015, when I asked friends to bring a saison and we did a blind taste testing to determine our favorite. That a Casey Brewing and Blending Saison won the general poll was not a surprise, as the Glenwood Springs beer auteur has managed to craft a version of the style that is bright and slightly tart and excites the taste buds continually. But the variety of saisons that scored high in our tallies - from Epic's Sour Apple Saison to Three Barrel's peppery Pemba Sherpa Saison - made it clear that there was a lot to like on the market.
Similarly, Nighthawk's farmhouse festival left few stones un-turned. Wynkoop's Forethought Barrel-Aged Sour Saison was a jolting and fascinating combination of strong flavors. Atom Brewing's Arlo farmhouse-inspired ale presented a huge sweetness developed surprisingly through open-air fermentation. Spangalang's Ethel, a sour saison, was bright and eye-opening without being punishing on the taste buds.
There is a lot to enjoy in the greater saison field today. But what is more exciting is the nearly blank slate from which brewers can develop more creative and more challenging saison varieties to come. The style may have originated with farm owners in Belgium and France. But what American brewers are doing with it is taking it to a whole new level.
Labels: Atom Brewing, Casey Brewing, Epic Brewing, Great Divide, Mu Brewery, Nighthawk Brewing, Saisons, Spangalang Brewery, Three Barrel Brewing, Trinity Brewing, Wynkoop Brewery
Thursday, September 17, 2015
What to Do During GABF Week 2015
The time has come again to put down your instruments of work, abandon your everyday life and prepare your taste buds for adventure. Yes, it's Great American Beer Festival week. And activities continue to multiply even faster than the breweries that are opening at a rate of more than one a week in Colorado.
Once again, I offer a summary of some of the highlight and can't-miss events leading up to and going around the four sessions of the GABF, which happens from Sept. 24-26 at the Colorado Convention Center. To get the rundown of absolutely everything that's on the calendar, I'd suggest you check out the good work being done by my friends at Porch Drinking, Brewtally Insane and Westword. But if you, like I, have a little less time to try to plan out a full week, let this serve as the 30,000-foot-level directory to the things you should consider hitting.
Without further ado, enjoy. And if you see me out at any of these places during the week, please say hi - and tell my wife and son back at home that I love them and will see them soon.
Friday, Sept. 18
5:15 p.m.: Denver Mayor Michael Hancock officially kicks off the 10-day celebration known as Denver Beer Fest at Factotum Brewhouse, with about 20 other brewers present. He promises to don his "brewing attire." Bring a camera.
Saturday, Sept. 19
* All day: Many bars will have tap takeovers throughout the week. But on the Saturday before the festival, I like to recommend the Thirsty Lion by Denver Union Station, as it's arguably the best sports bar in town to start. And for the next week, it is featuring six Odell beers.
* 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.: Flying into town for the event? Running today through Sept. 27, you don't even need to hop in a car before you start your beer journey. For $10, you get 10 2-oz. pours from your choice of 20 Colorado breweries right at Denver International Airport, ranging from Fate's easy-drinking Laimas Kolsch to Telluride's barrel-aged double IPA.
* 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.: Golden's Barrels and Bottles has carved a unique niche by serving its own beers and an outstanding cadre of outside beverages. Today, it turns two and celebrates with barreled and sour beers galore.
Sunday, Sept. 20
* 10 a.m. to 11 p.m.: The first specifically sour event of the increasing number is happening at Backcountry Pizza in Boulder. It promises 55 taps of sour beer of both the Belgian and American variety, some of which will be out before people finish lunch.
* 11 a.m.: Trinity Brewing of Colorado Springs starts a ridiculous week of events with a tapping of its Red Swingline wild ale raised on peaches and apricots. This precedes its Swingline horizontal tapping at noon Wednesday, its sour beer tapping at noon Thursday and its big beer tapping at noon Friday.
* 6 p.m.: Fiction Brewing of Denver taps its Sunny Boy Saison - a Brett saison brewed with rose hips - to launch a week of experimental tappings. Watch out too for a salted caramel wee heavy on Tuesday and a 100% Brett raspberry quad on Thursday.
Monday, Sept. 21
* 5 p.m.: The GABF kickoff party at Falling Rock Taphouse represents the unofficial shotgun start to the week. There will be vintage beers and beers made just for the occasion by local brewers. Just as fun, there will be a heck of a lot of brewers here.
* 6 p.m.: Those who live in Denver or may be flying in for the festival may not know that the city's south suburbs are going through a revolution in terms of craft beer. Living the Dream Brewing will be holding a bomber release party for its Bourbon Barrel Aged Helluva Caucasian Stout, and this may be a good time to check out it and its neighboring breweries.
* 7 p.m.: Freshcraft will kick off its week with a massive sour tapping. No, I don't have the exact list yet. But this is one of Denver's premiere beer bars, so expectations should be set very, very high.
Tuesday, Sept. 22
* All day: It takes some guts to open up your beer bar during GABF week. But that's exactly what Henry's Tavern, a Portland-based small chain promising 100 beers on tap, is doing in the old Virgin Megastore space in the Denver Pavilions after a few days of soft openings.
* 5 to 8 p.m.: Miss the Falling Rock party last night? Paramount Cafe is offering a slightly smaller one with 20 breweries expected but with a $15 cover charge that will get you access to good beers and good brewers wanting to talk about their beer.
* 5:30 to 7:30 p.m.: Want to really talk about beer? I will be moderating a panel discussion/debate at RiNo's Industry workspace about which European country has the best craft beer culture - Belgium, Germany or Italy. A suggested $20 donation gets you access to international beers plus locally made foreign-style ales from debate participants Grimm Bros. Brewhouse and Lost Highway Brewing. And I promise to keep this event, sponsored by the Belgian Consulate, lively.
Wednesday, Sept. 23
* 3 p.m: Those who live outside Denver may not realize that River North Brewery is one of the hidden gems of the city. This afternoon it offers up vertical tastings of its barrel-aged Avarice, a Russian imperial stout. And at noon Thursday, it will serve up its Quad five different ways, including four types of barrel aging.
*4:30 p.m.: Focus on the Beer has come up with one of the most unique annual events around the festival. Beers Made by Walking showcases libations made by brewers who were inspired to use wild ingredients they discovered on hikes. This year's showcase takes place at Our Mutual Friend, and tickets are $30.
* 6 to 10 p.m.: You should drink enough beer during GABF week to think everyone around you is funny. But Renegade Brewing teams with Sexpot Comedy to offer two hours of sampling beer, followed by two hours of brewers and brewery workers actually taking the stage and giving their best to be comedians. Tickets cost $45.
* 6:15 to 10 p.m.: Another great tradition is one put on by the folks at Crooked Stave Artisans. What the Funk? offers some 60 of the country's most experimental breweries dishing up their rarest and wildest offerings. VIP tickets are sold out, but regular-entrance passes can still be had for $90.
* 6:30 p.m.: The craft beer rock stars from Avery, Allagash, Dogfish Head, Lost Abbey and Russian River are teaming up to put on a five-course beer-pairing meal in the restaurant at the new Avery Brewing facility. At $125, it might be a bargain.
Thursday, Sept. 24
* 11 a.m.: Evil Twin Brewing has built a cult of followers around its variety of specialized and often wonderfully weird experiments like its Imperial Biscotti Break. Today it takes over every tap at World of Beer LoDo to show them off.
* 2 p.m.: Melvin Brewing of Jackson, Wyoming may make the best hoppy beers in America. Good luck trying to find them most of the time outside of the country's smallest state, however. Today, though, Falling Rock will be featuring them for an hour.
* 7 p.m. to midnight: Epic Brewing's 50 Firkin Fiasco is exactly what it seems - more than four dozen firkin barrels mixed with every ingredient the brewery can find to blend with its voluminous offerings. And the fiasco part? Well, many people do drop in after the GABF session ends.
*10 p.m.: Dogfish Head will be celebrating its 20th anniversary in style at Avanti Food & Beverage. Sam Calagione will break out 2006 vintages of 120 Minute IPA and Raison D'Extra, among other goodies, for the occasion.
* 10:30 p.m.: Avery's midnight breakfast at Euclid Hall is the stuff of legend after the first GABF session. It's $125, so, like the Brett Pack dinner, it's not for the light of wallet. But you will not leave hungry or thirsty.
Friday, Sept. 25
* Noon to 4 p.m.: Pints for Prostates puts on its annual Rare Beer Tasting at the McNichols Civic Center Building, offering 50 of the country's best breweries the chance to dust off long-forgotten beers from their cellars and pour them for charity. The event is sold out, however, so you'll need to find someone with tickets and kiss a lot of ass to get into this one.
* 1 to 4 p.m.: Ratio Beerworks (with its owners shown above) is considered by many (including me) to be the best new Denver brewery of 2015. It will be busy all week in its River North taproom. But today, it does a special tap takeover just a few miles away at Avanti Food and Beverage that will show off its range.
* 2 p.m.: Colorado Plus offers the largest selection of only-Colorado beers in the area. And today it will put on the "Co-loveration Saisonation," a celebration of saison collaborations led by Trinity Brewing, in its Wheat Ridge brewpub.
* 3 to 9 p.m.: Denver Beer Co. once again hosts its Collaboration Celebration, offering up beers that it made with five breweries stretching from Montana to Michigan to upstate New York. The block is closed down, so the atmosphere should be lively.
* 10:30 p.m.: By the time Friday night rolls around, a lot of people will start to wind down their weeks with mellower but still beer-laden after parties. Left Hand Brewing and Fremont Brewing of Washington will host just such a gathering at Monkey Barrel.
Saturday, Sept. 26
* 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m: Need to get out of Denver at this point? Oskar Blues is offering excursions up to its facilities in Lyons and Longmont by bus on Wednesday and Friday too. But today's field trip - which features stops at both the Lyons and Longmont breweries, as well as the CyclHOPS Cantina and Homemade Liquids & Solids restaurant, may be the crown jewel for $100.
* Noon: Did you know that Upslope Brewing has become one of the 10 largest craft breweries in Colorado? Its tap takeover at Hops & Pie will give you a chance to experience an often-overlooked brewery at a west-of-downtown gem of a beer bar/pizza joint.
* 5 p.m.: Speaking of harder-to-find gems, Casey Brewing and Blending (that's Troy Casey pouring for me in the below picture) will be pouring its exquisite saisons at Falling Rock Taphouse. Faced with the choice between hitting the Saturday-night GABF session or coming to this, skip the GABF in a heartbeat.
Sunday, Sept. 27
* If you still have any taste buds left, you're among the lucky ones. But there are a couple of brunches and recovery parties across town that are worth checking out. Among the two best-looking: A special menu at Brazen with River North at 10 a.m. for $30 and a general recovery effort at 11 a.m. at Avanti, which features seven restaurants to help you claw back into normal life.
The time has come again to put down your instruments of work, abandon your everyday life and prepare your taste buds for adventure. Yes, it's Great American Beer Festival week. And activities continue to multiply even faster than the breweries that are opening at a rate of more than one a week in Colorado.
Once again, I offer a summary of some of the highlight and can't-miss events leading up to and going around the four sessions of the GABF, which happens from Sept. 24-26 at the Colorado Convention Center. To get the rundown of absolutely everything that's on the calendar, I'd suggest you check out the good work being done by my friends at Porch Drinking, Brewtally Insane and Westword. But if you, like I, have a little less time to try to plan out a full week, let this serve as the 30,000-foot-level directory to the things you should consider hitting.
Without further ado, enjoy. And if you see me out at any of these places during the week, please say hi - and tell my wife and son back at home that I love them and will see them soon.
Friday, Sept. 18
5:15 p.m.: Denver Mayor Michael Hancock officially kicks off the 10-day celebration known as Denver Beer Fest at Factotum Brewhouse, with about 20 other brewers present. He promises to don his "brewing attire." Bring a camera.
Saturday, Sept. 19
* All day: Many bars will have tap takeovers throughout the week. But on the Saturday before the festival, I like to recommend the Thirsty Lion by Denver Union Station, as it's arguably the best sports bar in town to start. And for the next week, it is featuring six Odell beers.* 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.: Flying into town for the event? Running today through Sept. 27, you don't even need to hop in a car before you start your beer journey. For $10, you get 10 2-oz. pours from your choice of 20 Colorado breweries right at Denver International Airport, ranging from Fate's easy-drinking Laimas Kolsch to Telluride's barrel-aged double IPA.
* 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.: Golden's Barrels and Bottles has carved a unique niche by serving its own beers and an outstanding cadre of outside beverages. Today, it turns two and celebrates with barreled and sour beers galore.
Sunday, Sept. 20
* 10 a.m. to 11 p.m.: The first specifically sour event of the increasing number is happening at Backcountry Pizza in Boulder. It promises 55 taps of sour beer of both the Belgian and American variety, some of which will be out before people finish lunch.
* 11 a.m.: Trinity Brewing of Colorado Springs starts a ridiculous week of events with a tapping of its Red Swingline wild ale raised on peaches and apricots. This precedes its Swingline horizontal tapping at noon Wednesday, its sour beer tapping at noon Thursday and its big beer tapping at noon Friday.
* 6 p.m.: Fiction Brewing of Denver taps its Sunny Boy Saison - a Brett saison brewed with rose hips - to launch a week of experimental tappings. Watch out too for a salted caramel wee heavy on Tuesday and a 100% Brett raspberry quad on Thursday.
Monday, Sept. 21
* 5 p.m.: The GABF kickoff party at Falling Rock Taphouse represents the unofficial shotgun start to the week. There will be vintage beers and beers made just for the occasion by local brewers. Just as fun, there will be a heck of a lot of brewers here.* 6 p.m.: Those who live in Denver or may be flying in for the festival may not know that the city's south suburbs are going through a revolution in terms of craft beer. Living the Dream Brewing will be holding a bomber release party for its Bourbon Barrel Aged Helluva Caucasian Stout, and this may be a good time to check out it and its neighboring breweries.
* 7 p.m.: Freshcraft will kick off its week with a massive sour tapping. No, I don't have the exact list yet. But this is one of Denver's premiere beer bars, so expectations should be set very, very high.
Tuesday, Sept. 22
* All day: It takes some guts to open up your beer bar during GABF week. But that's exactly what Henry's Tavern, a Portland-based small chain promising 100 beers on tap, is doing in the old Virgin Megastore space in the Denver Pavilions after a few days of soft openings.
* 5 to 8 p.m.: Miss the Falling Rock party last night? Paramount Cafe is offering a slightly smaller one with 20 breweries expected but with a $15 cover charge that will get you access to good beers and good brewers wanting to talk about their beer.
* 5:30 to 7:30 p.m.: Want to really talk about beer? I will be moderating a panel discussion/debate at RiNo's Industry workspace about which European country has the best craft beer culture - Belgium, Germany or Italy. A suggested $20 donation gets you access to international beers plus locally made foreign-style ales from debate participants Grimm Bros. Brewhouse and Lost Highway Brewing. And I promise to keep this event, sponsored by the Belgian Consulate, lively.
Wednesday, Sept. 23
* 3 p.m: Those who live outside Denver may not realize that River North Brewery is one of the hidden gems of the city. This afternoon it offers up vertical tastings of its barrel-aged Avarice, a Russian imperial stout. And at noon Thursday, it will serve up its Quad five different ways, including four types of barrel aging.
*4:30 p.m.: Focus on the Beer has come up with one of the most unique annual events around the festival. Beers Made by Walking showcases libations made by brewers who were inspired to use wild ingredients they discovered on hikes. This year's showcase takes place at Our Mutual Friend, and tickets are $30.
* 6 to 10 p.m.: You should drink enough beer during GABF week to think everyone around you is funny. But Renegade Brewing teams with Sexpot Comedy to offer two hours of sampling beer, followed by two hours of brewers and brewery workers actually taking the stage and giving their best to be comedians. Tickets cost $45.
* 6:30 p.m.: The craft beer rock stars from Avery, Allagash, Dogfish Head, Lost Abbey and Russian River are teaming up to put on a five-course beer-pairing meal in the restaurant at the new Avery Brewing facility. At $125, it might be a bargain.
Thursday, Sept. 24
* 11 a.m.: Evil Twin Brewing has built a cult of followers around its variety of specialized and often wonderfully weird experiments like its Imperial Biscotti Break. Today it takes over every tap at World of Beer LoDo to show them off.
* 2 p.m.: Melvin Brewing of Jackson, Wyoming may make the best hoppy beers in America. Good luck trying to find them most of the time outside of the country's smallest state, however. Today, though, Falling Rock will be featuring them for an hour.
* 7 p.m. to midnight: Epic Brewing's 50 Firkin Fiasco is exactly what it seems - more than four dozen firkin barrels mixed with every ingredient the brewery can find to blend with its voluminous offerings. And the fiasco part? Well, many people do drop in after the GABF session ends.
*10 p.m.: Dogfish Head will be celebrating its 20th anniversary in style at Avanti Food & Beverage. Sam Calagione will break out 2006 vintages of 120 Minute IPA and Raison D'Extra, among other goodies, for the occasion.
* 10:30 p.m.: Avery's midnight breakfast at Euclid Hall is the stuff of legend after the first GABF session. It's $125, so, like the Brett Pack dinner, it's not for the light of wallet. But you will not leave hungry or thirsty.
Friday, Sept. 25
* Noon to 4 p.m.: Pints for Prostates puts on its annual Rare Beer Tasting at the McNichols Civic Center Building, offering 50 of the country's best breweries the chance to dust off long-forgotten beers from their cellars and pour them for charity. The event is sold out, however, so you'll need to find someone with tickets and kiss a lot of ass to get into this one.
* 2 p.m.: Colorado Plus offers the largest selection of only-Colorado beers in the area. And today it will put on the "Co-loveration Saisonation," a celebration of saison collaborations led by Trinity Brewing, in its Wheat Ridge brewpub.
* 3 to 9 p.m.: Denver Beer Co. once again hosts its Collaboration Celebration, offering up beers that it made with five breweries stretching from Montana to Michigan to upstate New York. The block is closed down, so the atmosphere should be lively.
* 10:30 p.m.: By the time Friday night rolls around, a lot of people will start to wind down their weeks with mellower but still beer-laden after parties. Left Hand Brewing and Fremont Brewing of Washington will host just such a gathering at Monkey Barrel.
Saturday, Sept. 26
* 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m: Need to get out of Denver at this point? Oskar Blues is offering excursions up to its facilities in Lyons and Longmont by bus on Wednesday and Friday too. But today's field trip - which features stops at both the Lyons and Longmont breweries, as well as the CyclHOPS Cantina and Homemade Liquids & Solids restaurant, may be the crown jewel for $100.
* Noon: Did you know that Upslope Brewing has become one of the 10 largest craft breweries in Colorado? Its tap takeover at Hops & Pie will give you a chance to experience an often-overlooked brewery at a west-of-downtown gem of a beer bar/pizza joint.
* 5 p.m.: Speaking of harder-to-find gems, Casey Brewing and Blending (that's Troy Casey pouring for me in the below picture) will be pouring its exquisite saisons at Falling Rock Taphouse. Faced with the choice between hitting the Saturday-night GABF session or coming to this, skip the GABF in a heartbeat.
Sunday, Sept. 27
* If you still have any taste buds left, you're among the lucky ones. But there are a couple of brunches and recovery parties across town that are worth checking out. Among the two best-looking: A special menu at Brazen with River North at 10 a.m. for $30 and a general recovery effort at 11 a.m. at Avanti, which features seven restaurants to help you claw back into normal life.
Labels: Avery Brewing, Barrels and Bottles, Denver Beer Co, Epic Brewing, Factotum Brewhouse, Fiction Brewing, Great American Beer Festival, Oskar Blues, Ratio Beerworks, River North Brewery, Trinity Brewing
Monday, March 23, 2015
A Quickie Guide to Colorado Craft Beer Week
Do you really need an excuse to celebrate locally made beer? The guess is that if you're enough of a beer geek to read this blog, you probably get twitchy if it's been over a week since you've been to a brewery or beer bar, and you use that as reason enough to go back out.
But if you need that extra push — like, purely hypothetically, if you have a 7-month-old at home and feel a little guilty calling home and telling your wife that you have to go support the craft-beer industry before you can feed him and put him to bed — this week gives that to you. It's Colorado Craft Beer Week, and a whole bunch of breweries and bars are offering one-of-a-kind or only-once-in-a-while activities that hold great interest.
This is not a comprehensive guide to what's out there; you can find that on the Colorado Brewers Guild's official event page. But for those who want the CliffsNotes version, here's a couple of the most interesting offerings over the next six days.
1) New Kids on the Block
Imbibe once again is bringing together many of the breweries that opened in the past two years, to show off what is new and what is experimental in the Colorado scene. Scheduled for 7:30 to 10 p.m. Thursday at The Lobby, the $45 event serves as a great opportunity (last year's is pictured above) to catch up with some of the non-Denver innovators especially that you might not find in every bar or liquor store yet.
2) 2nd Choice Collab Fest
Those who missed Saturday's Collaboration Fest missed one of the most audacious collections of beers in one room in a long time, from fascinating new takes on the IPA style to Basil blonde/cherry kriek combos. The Terminal Bar at Union Station will be serving a number of the offerings all week — and it might be the last chance you'll have to try them.
3) Fuss Off
Speaking of collaborations, the most intriguing event of the week will be a Wednesday-night gathering of a number of breweries that decided to make a pumpkin-peach ale of some sort after Budweiser's Super Bowl ad mocked the style. Only people who buy a ticket will be informed of the location of the get-together. That's planning something the hard way.
4) New Beer Tappings
Countless ales will make their debut this week. A few of the more intriguing ones are:
• Denver Beer Co. releases its Cocoa Creme Graham Cracker Porter at 4 p.m. Thursday;
• Also at 4 p.m. Thursday, Odell will tap a smoked juniper and pepper version of its classic 90 Shilling at Stapleton Tap House; and,
• At 5 p.m. Friday, Trinity Brewing taps a 45th Parallel Oregon-style IPA.
5) Book Festival
From 4 to 7 p.m. Friday, Dry Dock is hosting a Book Showcase at its North Dock facility. Signing and selling their wares will be beer authors Emily Hutto, Dan Rabin and ... well, me. So, seriously, stop by and say hello, even if you already have your copy of "Mountain Brew."
Do you really need an excuse to celebrate locally made beer? The guess is that if you're enough of a beer geek to read this blog, you probably get twitchy if it's been over a week since you've been to a brewery or beer bar, and you use that as reason enough to go back out.
But if you need that extra push — like, purely hypothetically, if you have a 7-month-old at home and feel a little guilty calling home and telling your wife that you have to go support the craft-beer industry before you can feed him and put him to bed — this week gives that to you. It's Colorado Craft Beer Week, and a whole bunch of breweries and bars are offering one-of-a-kind or only-once-in-a-while activities that hold great interest.
This is not a comprehensive guide to what's out there; you can find that on the Colorado Brewers Guild's official event page. But for those who want the CliffsNotes version, here's a couple of the most interesting offerings over the next six days.
1) New Kids on the Block
Imbibe once again is bringing together many of the breweries that opened in the past two years, to show off what is new and what is experimental in the Colorado scene. Scheduled for 7:30 to 10 p.m. Thursday at The Lobby, the $45 event serves as a great opportunity (last year's is pictured above) to catch up with some of the non-Denver innovators especially that you might not find in every bar or liquor store yet.
2) 2nd Choice Collab Fest
Those who missed Saturday's Collaboration Fest missed one of the most audacious collections of beers in one room in a long time, from fascinating new takes on the IPA style to Basil blonde/cherry kriek combos. The Terminal Bar at Union Station will be serving a number of the offerings all week — and it might be the last chance you'll have to try them.
3) Fuss Off
Speaking of collaborations, the most intriguing event of the week will be a Wednesday-night gathering of a number of breweries that decided to make a pumpkin-peach ale of some sort after Budweiser's Super Bowl ad mocked the style. Only people who buy a ticket will be informed of the location of the get-together. That's planning something the hard way.
4) New Beer Tappings
Countless ales will make their debut this week. A few of the more intriguing ones are:
• Denver Beer Co. releases its Cocoa Creme Graham Cracker Porter at 4 p.m. Thursday;
• Also at 4 p.m. Thursday, Odell will tap a smoked juniper and pepper version of its classic 90 Shilling at Stapleton Tap House; and,
• At 5 p.m. Friday, Trinity Brewing taps a 45th Parallel Oregon-style IPA.
5) Book Festival
From 4 to 7 p.m. Friday, Dry Dock is hosting a Book Showcase at its North Dock facility. Signing and selling their wares will be beer authors Emily Hutto, Dan Rabin and ... well, me. So, seriously, stop by and say hello, even if you already have your copy of "Mountain Brew."
Labels: collaboration beers, Colorado Craft Beer Week, Denver Beer Co, Mountain Brew book, New Colorado breweries, Odell Brewing, Stapleton Tap House, Trinity Brewing
Monday, March 16, 2015
Finally, a Session IPA Done Right
The session IPA trend has been one of the most perplexing of recent years. Tons of breweries have tried to create a low-alcohol hop bomb, but even those that make exceptional IPAs have, for the most part, produced beers that taste like watered-down pale ales short on the hop characteristic that makes their regular offerings shine.
It has been a great relief, then, to discover Oskar Blues' Pinner IPA, which is the first session IPA that seems to have nailed the goal for which this style was reaching. And while it may not be that surprising that the Longmont beer maker did something remarkable with hops, it is, frankly, a little shocking that a brewery that considers 7 percent ABV the low bar for most of its creations has come up with one of the most successful beers to date in the lower-alcohol genre.
To start, cracking open a can of Pinner is equivalent to sticking one's nose into a freshly crushed hop flower. The vibrant pine-tinted grass scent that comes at you is half of the battle to master the session IPA niche — it tells you this is a hop-forward beer, even if the 4.7-percent ABV level noted on the label makes you think otherwise.
Then the taste itself follows with an eyebrow-raising combination. The body is appropriately lighter than the brewery's flagship Dale's Pale Ale, and the hops are not as pronounced or astringent. But there is a full-mouth feel to signature ingredient — not a biting or acidic taste but one that makes its hop presence felt all the same.
Others have put unique twists on successful session IPAs. Trinity Brewing's sour session IPA, Super Juice Solution, is one that gives you some hops blended with a lot of other complex flavors, for example. But no one longing for the straight-up bitter bite of an IPA has yet written to me to suggest that they are getting the flavor they need out of a beer with the word "session" on it.
Pinner won't replace the big-bodied grittiness of Dale's or the blow-your-palate bravado of Gubna Imperial IPA, if that's what you're craving. But it may change your perception of what a lower-alcohol IPA can do.
The session IPA trend has been one of the most perplexing of recent years. Tons of breweries have tried to create a low-alcohol hop bomb, but even those that make exceptional IPAs have, for the most part, produced beers that taste like watered-down pale ales short on the hop characteristic that makes their regular offerings shine.It has been a great relief, then, to discover Oskar Blues' Pinner IPA, which is the first session IPA that seems to have nailed the goal for which this style was reaching. And while it may not be that surprising that the Longmont beer maker did something remarkable with hops, it is, frankly, a little shocking that a brewery that considers 7 percent ABV the low bar for most of its creations has come up with one of the most successful beers to date in the lower-alcohol genre.
To start, cracking open a can of Pinner is equivalent to sticking one's nose into a freshly crushed hop flower. The vibrant pine-tinted grass scent that comes at you is half of the battle to master the session IPA niche — it tells you this is a hop-forward beer, even if the 4.7-percent ABV level noted on the label makes you think otherwise.
Then the taste itself follows with an eyebrow-raising combination. The body is appropriately lighter than the brewery's flagship Dale's Pale Ale, and the hops are not as pronounced or astringent. But there is a full-mouth feel to signature ingredient — not a biting or acidic taste but one that makes its hop presence felt all the same.
Others have put unique twists on successful session IPAs. Trinity Brewing's sour session IPA, Super Juice Solution, is one that gives you some hops blended with a lot of other complex flavors, for example. But no one longing for the straight-up bitter bite of an IPA has yet written to me to suggest that they are getting the flavor they need out of a beer with the word "session" on it.
Pinner won't replace the big-bodied grittiness of Dale's or the blow-your-palate bravado of Gubna Imperial IPA, if that's what you're craving. But it may change your perception of what a lower-alcohol IPA can do.
Labels: IPA, Oskar Blues, Session beers, Trinity Brewing
Tuesday, December 30, 2014
Ten Best Colorado Beers of 2014
If the past few years have been a period when Colorado brewers went bigger and bolder every year, 2014 could be called a settling - not a settling for lesser beers, but a settling back into more traditional styles or ABV strengths, leading to a resurgence in less complicated but tastier offerings.
That's why this fourth annual edition chronicling one beer geek's thoughts on the best the Centennial State had to offer includes lost gems like a session beer, a brown ale and more pale ales than double IPAs. But it also includes some intensely complex beers and one-off gems, proving that Colorado's beer scene is hard to put into a box - but easy to put into your stomach.
Here, then, are my thoughts on the 10 beers that most shined and defined 2014 in Colorado - both new beers and beers that may have debuted previously but grabbed a new spotlight this year.
10) Odell/New Belgium FOCOllaboration
Fort Collins' two largest craft breweries seemed overdue to combine forces on a product. But it proved worth the wait - a pale ale with the flower and citrus bite of an IPA and the smoothness of two beer masters who know how to do beer without overdoing it.
9) Crazy Mountain Neomexicanus Native Pale Ale
In a year when pale ales made a resurgence, the best thing found in them was completely new - the Humulus Lupulus Neomexicanus hop, a style that is native to North America but never had been used in a Colorado beer. It offered a lemony profile that blended perfectly with Crazy Mountain's approach to letting the hop do all of the talking and not over-malting the beer.
8) Caution Brewing's The Earl
Tea-infused beers aren't made widely enough to be considered a trend just yet. But anyone who tries this dynamo will think they should be. Despite its lighter body - the base beer is a low-alchohol dark mild ale - this creation zings to life with an aggressive addition of Earl Grey tea. It is highly aromatic and can take over your palate without destroying your taste buds.
7) Strange Craft Beer Fresh-Hopped 1000 Barrels Imperial IPA
The regular version of 1000 Barrels is no slacker. But adding pounds upon pounds of CTZ, Cascade and Chinook hops to it cut down the malt sweetness and accented the grassy beauty of the hop like no beer in Colorado did in 2014. Here's hoping that the crew there bring this back for a 2015 encore.
6) River North Grand Unified Theory
Maybe the most unique Colorado beer of 2014, this version of River North's imperial wit aged in cocktail barrels added a sour zing plus the eye-opening tastes of sweet vermouth and bitter liqueur to a body that already was heavy in flavor while being slightly lighter in weight. Coming in near 10 percent ABV, it was the rare beer whose flavor was aided by the clear presence of alcohol, as that just piled on to its complexity.
5) Telluride Face Down Brown
This offering from Telluride Brewing has been around for a few years. But 2014 was the year that it announced that it not only was the best American-style brown ale in the country - it won gold in a Colorado sweep of that category at the Great American Beer Festival - but that it has become one of the state's most essential beers. With noticeable hops backing a solid roasted body, this has started showing up on a lot more beer menus this year, and for good reason.
4) Great Divide Barrel-Aged Grand Cru Cuvee
Known for its dark and its hoppy treasures, Great Divide took a new pathway to excellence at the start of this year by churning out a Syrah-barrel-aged version of its already bulky Grand Cru that added a pungent but not pucker-worthy tartness and somehow remained amazingly drinkable at 12% ABV. Like Strange's offering, this is a one-off that needs to come back.
3) Copper Kettle Snowed In
The debate may be over in regard to Colorado's best winter seasonal. Copper Kettle followed up its fascinating 2013 version of this beer, a barrel-aged imperial oatmeal stout, by adding a heavy dose of coffee and a heavier presence of underlying roasty malt that made this not only the talk of Denver Festivus but the hands-down best Christmas beer in the state. This is technically the only holdover beer from the 2013 top-beers list, but with its makeover it feels brand new.
2) Trinity Super Juice Solution
No brewery in Colorado breaks more new ground more consistently than Trinity Brewing. But for all its high-gravity and barrel-aged experiments, nothing hit the bulls-eye - or, more correctly, created a new bulls-eye further down the road for everyone else to catch up to - like this sessionable sour IPA. First it presented a raw grassiness, then a second layer of punch bearing both cherry and apple tartness. Finally, it left you considering not only what was in it but where session beers could go next if this is their experimental standard-bearer.
1) Boulder Shake Chocolate Porter
Complexity be damned, the best Colorado beer of 2014 had an absurdly simple premise: Add cacao nibs to a traditional American porter and see what happens. The result was the smoothest but arguably most pleasing beer ever from the nation's oldest craft brewery - a mouth-filling waft of cocoa, caramel and balanced body that was equally good in the summer and winter. And it was every bit as good on nitro as it was in standard form. Dark-beer lovers lauded it, and even those who tended toward more complex beers - me included - had to step back and challenge their assumptions about what makes a beer memorable. It will set a high bar for porters and should jump-start the chocolate-porter trend to match the vanilla-porter wave that's rolled across the state.
If the past few years have been a period when Colorado brewers went bigger and bolder every year, 2014 could be called a settling - not a settling for lesser beers, but a settling back into more traditional styles or ABV strengths, leading to a resurgence in less complicated but tastier offerings.
That's why this fourth annual edition chronicling one beer geek's thoughts on the best the Centennial State had to offer includes lost gems like a session beer, a brown ale and more pale ales than double IPAs. But it also includes some intensely complex beers and one-off gems, proving that Colorado's beer scene is hard to put into a box - but easy to put into your stomach.
Here, then, are my thoughts on the 10 beers that most shined and defined 2014 in Colorado - both new beers and beers that may have debuted previously but grabbed a new spotlight this year.
10) Odell/New Belgium FOCOllaboration
Fort Collins' two largest craft breweries seemed overdue to combine forces on a product. But it proved worth the wait - a pale ale with the flower and citrus bite of an IPA and the smoothness of two beer masters who know how to do beer without overdoing it.
9) Crazy Mountain Neomexicanus Native Pale Ale
In a year when pale ales made a resurgence, the best thing found in them was completely new - the Humulus Lupulus Neomexicanus hop, a style that is native to North America but never had been used in a Colorado beer. It offered a lemony profile that blended perfectly with Crazy Mountain's approach to letting the hop do all of the talking and not over-malting the beer.
8) Caution Brewing's The Earl
Tea-infused beers aren't made widely enough to be considered a trend just yet. But anyone who tries this dynamo will think they should be. Despite its lighter body - the base beer is a low-alchohol dark mild ale - this creation zings to life with an aggressive addition of Earl Grey tea. It is highly aromatic and can take over your palate without destroying your taste buds.
7) Strange Craft Beer Fresh-Hopped 1000 Barrels Imperial IPA
The regular version of 1000 Barrels is no slacker. But adding pounds upon pounds of CTZ, Cascade and Chinook hops to it cut down the malt sweetness and accented the grassy beauty of the hop like no beer in Colorado did in 2014. Here's hoping that the crew there bring this back for a 2015 encore.
6) River North Grand Unified Theory
Maybe the most unique Colorado beer of 2014, this version of River North's imperial wit aged in cocktail barrels added a sour zing plus the eye-opening tastes of sweet vermouth and bitter liqueur to a body that already was heavy in flavor while being slightly lighter in weight. Coming in near 10 percent ABV, it was the rare beer whose flavor was aided by the clear presence of alcohol, as that just piled on to its complexity.
5) Telluride Face Down Brown
This offering from Telluride Brewing has been around for a few years. But 2014 was the year that it announced that it not only was the best American-style brown ale in the country - it won gold in a Colorado sweep of that category at the Great American Beer Festival - but that it has become one of the state's most essential beers. With noticeable hops backing a solid roasted body, this has started showing up on a lot more beer menus this year, and for good reason.
4) Great Divide Barrel-Aged Grand Cru Cuvee
Known for its dark and its hoppy treasures, Great Divide took a new pathway to excellence at the start of this year by churning out a Syrah-barrel-aged version of its already bulky Grand Cru that added a pungent but not pucker-worthy tartness and somehow remained amazingly drinkable at 12% ABV. Like Strange's offering, this is a one-off that needs to come back.
3) Copper Kettle Snowed In
The debate may be over in regard to Colorado's best winter seasonal. Copper Kettle followed up its fascinating 2013 version of this beer, a barrel-aged imperial oatmeal stout, by adding a heavy dose of coffee and a heavier presence of underlying roasty malt that made this not only the talk of Denver Festivus but the hands-down best Christmas beer in the state. This is technically the only holdover beer from the 2013 top-beers list, but with its makeover it feels brand new.
2) Trinity Super Juice Solution
No brewery in Colorado breaks more new ground more consistently than Trinity Brewing. But for all its high-gravity and barrel-aged experiments, nothing hit the bulls-eye - or, more correctly, created a new bulls-eye further down the road for everyone else to catch up to - like this sessionable sour IPA. First it presented a raw grassiness, then a second layer of punch bearing both cherry and apple tartness. Finally, it left you considering not only what was in it but where session beers could go next if this is their experimental standard-bearer.
1) Boulder Shake Chocolate Porter
Complexity be damned, the best Colorado beer of 2014 had an absurdly simple premise: Add cacao nibs to a traditional American porter and see what happens. The result was the smoothest but arguably most pleasing beer ever from the nation's oldest craft brewery - a mouth-filling waft of cocoa, caramel and balanced body that was equally good in the summer and winter. And it was every bit as good on nitro as it was in standard form. Dark-beer lovers lauded it, and even those who tended toward more complex beers - me included - had to step back and challenge their assumptions about what makes a beer memorable. It will set a high bar for porters and should jump-start the chocolate-porter trend to match the vanilla-porter wave that's rolled across the state.
Labels: Boulder Beer, Caution Brewing, Copper Kettle Brewing, Crazy Mountain, Great Divide, New Belgium Brewing, Odell Brewing, River North Brewery, Strange Brewing, Telluride Brewing, Top Beers of Year, Trinity Brewing
Tuesday, October 21, 2014
Best of the 2014 GABF
After a couple of weeks of reflection, the theme statement from this year's Great American Beer Festival finally is coming into focus. It wasn't the year of any one style - like with imperial IPAs, bold sours or barrel-aged dark beers as in years past — but the year in which each of the 700 breweries there put forth something original, something bold that distinguished it from its neighbors and from the growing cacophony of beer makers nationwide.
This is wonderful for its variety of offerings— on Thursday night alone, I was able to taste a Bourbon Carrot Cake, a banana beer and a brew made with Szechuan popcorn. But it makes the job of finding a definitive beer of the GABF — or even choosing best beers in specific categories — hard to the point where such categorization is almost moot.
That said, here as always is one man's thoughts on the best of the very best that breweries had to offer at this year's gathering.
Best in Show: 2x4, Melvin Brewing
For once, even in a year of such diversity, this award wasn't hard, as a number of people seemed to come to the same conclusion. Rarely, if even, has a double IPA been so smooth and so aggressively hoppy at the same time. A spectacularly accessible palate of grassy hops rolled over the taste buds in a way that jolted you and pleased you. It showed why, even without winning a medal, this Wyoming brewery is becoming known as one of the national kings of hops.
Runner-up: Teche Hombres, Bayou Teche Brewing
Out of Louisiana came this Belgian-style wit brewed with agave nectar and aged in French white wine barrels with orange peel. Yes, it was as good as it sounds — and even more complex.
Best Sour Beer: Blue Sunday, New Holland Brewing
An anniversary blend of several previously made sour beers, this shouted a message of sharp, tart cherry and packed more a punch than any similar beers at the festival.
Best Hop Bomb: Notorious, Boneyard Beer
If 2x4 was the best hoppy beer of the show, this was the most mind-blowing: a triple IPA whose flavor seeped into every crevice of your tongue but that still was phenomenally balanced.
Best New Hop Taste: Hop Drip IPA, Magic Hat Brewing (pictured above)
Adding a local coffee to an already bold body created a contrasting and yet strangely complimentary blend of bitter flavors that resulted in a new style of complexity for the genre.
Best Use of Fruit: Serendipity, New Glarus Brewing
This slightly sour ale blending apples and cranberries with a smaller amount of Wisconsin brewery's traditional cherries during a cherry shortage was heavy with apple and an eye-opener.
Best of the Unusual Beers: Roxie's Golden Bananas, Saucony Creek Brewing (at top)
Fifteen pounds of bananas went into this Pennsylvania brewery's 15-barrel batch of beer, producing a pleasant and interesting beer whose most impressive trait is that it's not overpowering.
Best in Show from Colorado: Swing Se Pliser, Trinity Brewing
Colorado Springs' most innovative beer maker continues to break new ground, this time with a tart and hoppy barrel-aged sour IPA that requires you to think about what you're tasting.
After a couple of weeks of reflection, the theme statement from this year's Great American Beer Festival finally is coming into focus. It wasn't the year of any one style - like with imperial IPAs, bold sours or barrel-aged dark beers as in years past — but the year in which each of the 700 breweries there put forth something original, something bold that distinguished it from its neighbors and from the growing cacophony of beer makers nationwide.
This is wonderful for its variety of offerings— on Thursday night alone, I was able to taste a Bourbon Carrot Cake, a banana beer and a brew made with Szechuan popcorn. But it makes the job of finding a definitive beer of the GABF — or even choosing best beers in specific categories — hard to the point where such categorization is almost moot.
That said, here as always is one man's thoughts on the best of the very best that breweries had to offer at this year's gathering.
Best in Show: 2x4, Melvin Brewing
For once, even in a year of such diversity, this award wasn't hard, as a number of people seemed to come to the same conclusion. Rarely, if even, has a double IPA been so smooth and so aggressively hoppy at the same time. A spectacularly accessible palate of grassy hops rolled over the taste buds in a way that jolted you and pleased you. It showed why, even without winning a medal, this Wyoming brewery is becoming known as one of the national kings of hops.
Runner-up: Teche Hombres, Bayou Teche Brewing
Out of Louisiana came this Belgian-style wit brewed with agave nectar and aged in French white wine barrels with orange peel. Yes, it was as good as it sounds — and even more complex.
Best Sour Beer: Blue Sunday, New Holland Brewing
An anniversary blend of several previously made sour beers, this shouted a message of sharp, tart cherry and packed more a punch than any similar beers at the festival.
Best Hop Bomb: Notorious, Boneyard Beer
If 2x4 was the best hoppy beer of the show, this was the most mind-blowing: a triple IPA whose flavor seeped into every crevice of your tongue but that still was phenomenally balanced.
Best New Hop Taste: Hop Drip IPA, Magic Hat Brewing (pictured above)
Adding a local coffee to an already bold body created a contrasting and yet strangely complimentary blend of bitter flavors that resulted in a new style of complexity for the genre.
Best Use of Fruit: Serendipity, New Glarus Brewing
This slightly sour ale blending apples and cranberries with a smaller amount of Wisconsin brewery's traditional cherries during a cherry shortage was heavy with apple and an eye-opener.
Best of the Unusual Beers: Roxie's Golden Bananas, Saucony Creek Brewing (at top)
Fifteen pounds of bananas went into this Pennsylvania brewery's 15-barrel batch of beer, producing a pleasant and interesting beer whose most impressive trait is that it's not overpowering.
Best in Show from Colorado: Swing Se Pliser, Trinity Brewing
Colorado Springs' most innovative beer maker continues to break new ground, this time with a tart and hoppy barrel-aged sour IPA that requires you to think about what you're tasting.
Labels: Bayou Teche Brewing, Boneyard Beer, Great American Beer Festival, Magic Hat Brewing, Melvin Brewing, New Glarus, New Holland Brewing, Saucony Creek Brewing, Trinity Brewing
Sunday, September 21, 2014
Toasting the Beers of Summer 2014
As hard as our current weather makes it seem to believe, summer officially ends Monday. And so, it is with a tear in my eye and a buzzy smile on my face that I give a last shout to the best beers of the summer of 2014 and a few bold ideas that just missed — hoping that drinkers can pick up some of the last of the offerings of this season and start lobbying brewers on what to bring back next year.
The Winners
FOCOllaboration Ale
Maybe it should come as no shock that when New Belgium and Odell combined to make an beer, their union produced a stunningly good American pale ale — one that brought a big, grassy hop taste with almost no residual bitterness. The only surprise was that I had so many people asking me which brewery's version I tasted; it was the Odell product, and that one at least was great.
Super Juice Solution
Trinity Brewing's sour session IPA was easily the most interesting beer of the summer. It was head-scratching in both its complexity and in how much flavor it could pack into so little ABV. The best news: It's still out there on liquor-store shelves.
Franklin's Belgian-Style Strong Golden
Mountain Sun's big-bodied offering was both smooth and surprisingly alcoholic, sweet and solidly clean. And it served as a reminder that a brewery known best for its stouts and IPAs can do some pretty impressive things in other styles as well.
Oats McGoats Oat Malt Rye Stout
Brewery Rickoli won a national "Brewing the American Dream" competition last year that allowed it to learn from and then make a beer with Boston Beer Co. What came from that was the young brewery's best effort yet - a thick, dark ale with a creamy center that combines both warming malt with easy drinking and resembles no gluten-reduced beer that you have tried before.
Barefoot Runaway
Odd 13's summer IPA was a great example of how to tone down the hops but make a beer smooth and light and appropriate for the weather. At 5.6% ABV, it was the right beer for the right time; if this had come out in the winter, it would have seemed too light.
Heyday
As usual, Great Divide put out some seriously challenging seaonsals, including a sharp rye IPA and the always burly Oatmeal Yeti. But the summer star was a Belgian white ale that came with just a hint of orange zest and was as good a patio sipper as any new creation.
Honorable Mentions
Spontaneous Saison
Strange Craft Beer and five other breweries participated in an experiment by where they all brewed saisons with similar recipes but slightly different additives at the same time. Loved the idea. And the lemongrass backtones make Strange's offering spunky, though a bit short of spectacular.
Buddha's Hand Witbier
Breckenridge Brewery's experimentation created one of the most interesting summer beers of the past half-decade in 2011: The Cabernet-barrel-aged Summer Cab Ride. This year's new creation, made with the Buddha's Hand fruit, is mundane in comparison to that masterpiece - admittedly a high bar to reach - but zingier than most of the summertime ales on the market.
As hard as our current weather makes it seem to believe, summer officially ends Monday. And so, it is with a tear in my eye and a buzzy smile on my face that I give a last shout to the best beers of the summer of 2014 and a few bold ideas that just missed — hoping that drinkers can pick up some of the last of the offerings of this season and start lobbying brewers on what to bring back next year.
The Winners
Maybe it should come as no shock that when New Belgium and Odell combined to make an beer, their union produced a stunningly good American pale ale — one that brought a big, grassy hop taste with almost no residual bitterness. The only surprise was that I had so many people asking me which brewery's version I tasted; it was the Odell product, and that one at least was great.
Super Juice Solution
Trinity Brewing's sour session IPA was easily the most interesting beer of the summer. It was head-scratching in both its complexity and in how much flavor it could pack into so little ABV. The best news: It's still out there on liquor-store shelves.
Franklin's Belgian-Style Strong Golden
Mountain Sun's big-bodied offering was both smooth and surprisingly alcoholic, sweet and solidly clean. And it served as a reminder that a brewery known best for its stouts and IPAs can do some pretty impressive things in other styles as well.
Oats McGoats Oat Malt Rye Stout
Brewery Rickoli won a national "Brewing the American Dream" competition last year that allowed it to learn from and then make a beer with Boston Beer Co. What came from that was the young brewery's best effort yet - a thick, dark ale with a creamy center that combines both warming malt with easy drinking and resembles no gluten-reduced beer that you have tried before.
Barefoot Runaway
Odd 13's summer IPA was a great example of how to tone down the hops but make a beer smooth and light and appropriate for the weather. At 5.6% ABV, it was the right beer for the right time; if this had come out in the winter, it would have seemed too light.
Heyday
As usual, Great Divide put out some seriously challenging seaonsals, including a sharp rye IPA and the always burly Oatmeal Yeti. But the summer star was a Belgian white ale that came with just a hint of orange zest and was as good a patio sipper as any new creation.
Honorable Mentions
Spontaneous Saison
Strange Craft Beer and five other breweries participated in an experiment by where they all brewed saisons with similar recipes but slightly different additives at the same time. Loved the idea. And the lemongrass backtones make Strange's offering spunky, though a bit short of spectacular.
Breckenridge Brewery's experimentation created one of the most interesting summer beers of the past half-decade in 2011: The Cabernet-barrel-aged Summer Cab Ride. This year's new creation, made with the Buddha's Hand fruit, is mundane in comparison to that masterpiece - admittedly a high bar to reach - but zingier than most of the summertime ales on the market.
Labels: Boston Beer Co., Breckenridge Brewery, Brewery Rickoli, Great Divide, Mountain Sun, New Belgium Brewing, Odd 13 Brewing, Odell Brewing, Strange Brewing, Summer beers, Trinity Brewing
Monday, August 04, 2014
Five Things I Learned From Sesh Fest
Saturday's event, hosted at Sculpture Park by Imbibe Denver and Colorado Brewers Guild, was a time of experimentation, both for better and for worse. Here are a few lessons drunken in from it:
1) Sour + Session Beers = Powerfully Good
It could be said that the most talked-about beers at just about any festival are the sour experiments, but that was especially true this weekend - and specifically because everything had such a big taste and ran in at less than 5% ABV. Fate's tart but refreshing Uror Gose and Great Divide's eminently drinkable Berliner Weisse were just a couple of examples of what you could do with subtle tartness without tearing apart your taste buds or leaving you with a hangover from trying too much.
But the big winner of the sour experiments was ...
2) Trinity Brewing Scored Again
Hands down the best beer of the festival was the Colorado Springs brewery's Super Juice Solution, a sour session IPA that mingled the sharp orange/grapefruit tart flavors with an earthy hop in a way that married the seemingly disparate tastes very well. I enjoyed it so much I had to stop by Stapleton Taphouse the next day to get a full pour, and I'm still impressed at how the flavors blended so artfully and also were measured enough that they meshed together rather than seemed to compete for being the loudest taste in your mouth.
3) The "Session IPA" Remains a Work in Progress
Before the festival, Ska's Dave Thibodeau made the case that low-alcohol IPA was a legitimate style rather than just a watered-down version of America's most popular beer, and it was easy to find examples that both proved and disproved his theory. But for every "hopped lager" that seemed to offered only a hint of grass or citrus over a light biscuit body, there also were beers like Black Bottle's Doby Session IPA and Upslope's Session IPA, which offered big squirts of hop juice in a light body and made you think there is hope for this style yet.
4) The Uber-Tasty Low-Alcohol Malt Bomb is a Thing of the Past ...
... Or maybe all of the other high-alcohol specialty festivals have ruined all of our taste buds. But efforts to find the next Guinness in the crowd were not met with success. Red ales were dull, dry stouts were more dry than stout and when another member of the Fearless Tasting Crew suggested that a dark mild I was drinking would be much more appealing if I paired it with fried chicken, I really felt someone was stretching it. Aside from TRVE's American ESB, a dusty beer with a charming bitter backbite of hops, the beers most likely to pass for traditional English session beers didn't jump out.
5) Bring Enough Beer For Everyone.
This can not be emphasized enough. Crooked Stave ran out of beer in less than an hour. One entire side of the festival was tapped just over two hours into the four-hour event. With 40 minutes left, there were all of three breweries still serving beer (see picture below). When you're the Great American Beer Festival and 75 of your 700 breweries are out of beer by the end of one session, you'll be forgiven; when 90 percent of your breweries are tapped with an hour left, it leads to a heck of a lot of grumbling in the crowd.
In a rush to judgment - one that I've been called on - I assumed that this was the fault of the organizers, especially when a fellow beer writer told me a similar beer drought occurred at the Collaboration Fest also sponsored by CBG and Imbibe earlier this year. But one of the organizers scolded me and pointed the finger at brewers, saying very few brought enough beer. And one brewer that I ran into simply shrugged and said his whole side of the event got slammed with people in a hurry. So, without placing blame on anyone, I'd just ask that everyone involved learn something from this and fix the problem so that the murmurs that cascaded through the hard-core beer drinkers Saturday don't grow into cries that could endanger any future festivals - especially ones like these that showcase a creative side for breweries who otherwise might be content with pouring their standards and calling it a day.
Saturday's event, hosted at Sculpture Park by Imbibe Denver and Colorado Brewers Guild, was a time of experimentation, both for better and for worse. Here are a few lessons drunken in from it:1) Sour + Session Beers = Powerfully Good
It could be said that the most talked-about beers at just about any festival are the sour experiments, but that was especially true this weekend - and specifically because everything had such a big taste and ran in at less than 5% ABV. Fate's tart but refreshing Uror Gose and Great Divide's eminently drinkable Berliner Weisse were just a couple of examples of what you could do with subtle tartness without tearing apart your taste buds or leaving you with a hangover from trying too much.
But the big winner of the sour experiments was ...
2) Trinity Brewing Scored Again
Hands down the best beer of the festival was the Colorado Springs brewery's Super Juice Solution, a sour session IPA that mingled the sharp orange/grapefruit tart flavors with an earthy hop in a way that married the seemingly disparate tastes very well. I enjoyed it so much I had to stop by Stapleton Taphouse the next day to get a full pour, and I'm still impressed at how the flavors blended so artfully and also were measured enough that they meshed together rather than seemed to compete for being the loudest taste in your mouth.
3) The "Session IPA" Remains a Work in Progress
Before the festival, Ska's Dave Thibodeau made the case that low-alcohol IPA was a legitimate style rather than just a watered-down version of America's most popular beer, and it was easy to find examples that both proved and disproved his theory. But for every "hopped lager" that seemed to offered only a hint of grass or citrus over a light biscuit body, there also were beers like Black Bottle's Doby Session IPA and Upslope's Session IPA, which offered big squirts of hop juice in a light body and made you think there is hope for this style yet.
4) The Uber-Tasty Low-Alcohol Malt Bomb is a Thing of the Past ...
... Or maybe all of the other high-alcohol specialty festivals have ruined all of our taste buds. But efforts to find the next Guinness in the crowd were not met with success. Red ales were dull, dry stouts were more dry than stout and when another member of the Fearless Tasting Crew suggested that a dark mild I was drinking would be much more appealing if I paired it with fried chicken, I really felt someone was stretching it. Aside from TRVE's American ESB, a dusty beer with a charming bitter backbite of hops, the beers most likely to pass for traditional English session beers didn't jump out.
5) Bring Enough Beer For Everyone.
This can not be emphasized enough. Crooked Stave ran out of beer in less than an hour. One entire side of the festival was tapped just over two hours into the four-hour event. With 40 minutes left, there were all of three breweries still serving beer (see picture below). When you're the Great American Beer Festival and 75 of your 700 breweries are out of beer by the end of one session, you'll be forgiven; when 90 percent of your breweries are tapped with an hour left, it leads to a heck of a lot of grumbling in the crowd.
In a rush to judgment - one that I've been called on - I assumed that this was the fault of the organizers, especially when a fellow beer writer told me a similar beer drought occurred at the Collaboration Fest also sponsored by CBG and Imbibe earlier this year. But one of the organizers scolded me and pointed the finger at brewers, saying very few brought enough beer. And one brewer that I ran into simply shrugged and said his whole side of the event got slammed with people in a hurry. So, without placing blame on anyone, I'd just ask that everyone involved learn something from this and fix the problem so that the murmurs that cascaded through the hard-core beer drinkers Saturday don't grow into cries that could endanger any future festivals - especially ones like these that showcase a creative side for breweries who otherwise might be content with pouring their standards and calling it a day.
Labels: Black Bottle Brewing, Colorado Brewers Guild, Fate Brewing, Festivals, Great Divide, Imbibe, Session beers, Trinity Brewing, TRVE, Upslope Brewing
Thursday, January 30, 2014
The Sweet Song of Saisons
Interviewing New Belgium's Kim Jordan while writing "Mountain Brew," I was struck by a comment she made about brewing a saison in 1996 and receiving such a bad reception that they didn't brew one again until 2008. What a strange beer world, it would seem, that didn't want the refreshing taste of a saison in it.
But we are now living in the age of the saison - the classic, the crafty, even the absolute crazy. Want it with just a hint of spice to it? OK. Want it brewed with sarsaparilla, sassafras, coriander and hibiscus? That's fine too. Hell, they're both made by the same brewer, in fact.
At Vail Big Beers, Trinity Brewing's Jason Yester, that aforementioned brewer and the man who's made 60 different saisons with 80 different ingredients, pointed out the number of saisons judged at the Great American Beer Festival grew from 37 five years ago to about 90 in 2013. But he also noted one of the great key's to the style's success: There is little definition to what exactly a saison is, other than a beer in a genre that evolved from a non-specific style in Belgian farmhouses to one that allows for great creativity today.
One of the beers that the Fearless Tasting Crew kept in its fridge at that festival - you know, the beers you can drink even when your tastebuds are shot - was Trinity's La Capitaine, a blond saison regale brewed with pumpkin, cacao nibs and Buddha's Hand, then tossed about with some brett and lacto until it's done just right. It's sharp and pungent and slightly spicy, with a feel that oscillates wonderfully between grape and perfume.
But if Trinity is the known - and if you don't know it, you should get to - festivals like Big Beers allow for the exploration of the unknown as well.
Dann Paquette, owner of Pretty Things Beer & Ale Project, brought in his Jack D'Or, a smooth beer (with blurry label art above)
that's higher on the bitterness scale than most other saisons but still very dry. And it, like the style, was both intriguing and drinkable.
Then, there was Mystic Brewing - like Pretty Things, a Massachusetts brewery - which offered its Descendant, a black saison made with molasses that was sweet but not overdone.
And, staying in Massachusetts for a second, there is also Cambridge Brewing, which has found a way to make a black-pepper farmhouse ale in its Sgt. Pepper (at right) and feel welcoming without being overpowering.
More Colorado breweries too are cranking up saison offerings. Both Funkwerks - the 2012 GABF Small Brewery of the Year - and Black Fox are all-saison maestros, blending peppers, fruit and everything you might think shouldn't go into a beer. And doing it well.
And you see non-saison breweries experimenting more with their offerings too. From Great Divide's Colette - which it makes even more special by kicking it up with orange zest and pepper - to Crooked Stave's slightly tart Vieille Artisanal Saison, the variety out there can be stunning.
So, what's the point? Unlike 1996, it's a damn good time to drink saison, whether you're in Denver or Boston or anywhere in between. And if you encounter one that might seem a little strange, drink it all the same; chances are it will be dry, smooth and just exciting enough to make your night.
Interviewing New Belgium's Kim Jordan while writing "Mountain Brew," I was struck by a comment she made about brewing a saison in 1996 and receiving such a bad reception that they didn't brew one again until 2008. What a strange beer world, it would seem, that didn't want the refreshing taste of a saison in it.
But we are now living in the age of the saison - the classic, the crafty, even the absolute crazy. Want it with just a hint of spice to it? OK. Want it brewed with sarsaparilla, sassafras, coriander and hibiscus? That's fine too. Hell, they're both made by the same brewer, in fact.
At Vail Big Beers, Trinity Brewing's Jason Yester, that aforementioned brewer and the man who's made 60 different saisons with 80 different ingredients, pointed out the number of saisons judged at the Great American Beer Festival grew from 37 five years ago to about 90 in 2013. But he also noted one of the great key's to the style's success: There is little definition to what exactly a saison is, other than a beer in a genre that evolved from a non-specific style in Belgian farmhouses to one that allows for great creativity today.
One of the beers that the Fearless Tasting Crew kept in its fridge at that festival - you know, the beers you can drink even when your tastebuds are shot - was Trinity's La Capitaine, a blond saison regale brewed with pumpkin, cacao nibs and Buddha's Hand, then tossed about with some brett and lacto until it's done just right. It's sharp and pungent and slightly spicy, with a feel that oscillates wonderfully between grape and perfume.
But if Trinity is the known - and if you don't know it, you should get to - festivals like Big Beers allow for the exploration of the unknown as well.
that's higher on the bitterness scale than most other saisons but still very dry. And it, like the style, was both intriguing and drinkable.
Then, there was Mystic Brewing - like Pretty Things, a Massachusetts brewery - which offered its Descendant, a black saison made with molasses that was sweet but not overdone.
And, staying in Massachusetts for a second, there is also Cambridge Brewing, which has found a way to make a black-pepper farmhouse ale in its Sgt. Pepper (at right) and feel welcoming without being overpowering.More Colorado breweries too are cranking up saison offerings. Both Funkwerks - the 2012 GABF Small Brewery of the Year - and Black Fox are all-saison maestros, blending peppers, fruit and everything you might think shouldn't go into a beer. And doing it well.
And you see non-saison breweries experimenting more with their offerings too. From Great Divide's Colette - which it makes even more special by kicking it up with orange zest and pepper - to Crooked Stave's slightly tart Vieille Artisanal Saison, the variety out there can be stunning.
So, what's the point? Unlike 1996, it's a damn good time to drink saison, whether you're in Denver or Boston or anywhere in between. And if you encounter one that might seem a little strange, drink it all the same; chances are it will be dry, smooth and just exciting enough to make your night.
Labels: Big Beers, Black Fox Brewing, Cambridge Brewing, Crooked Stave, Funkwerks, Great Divide, Mystic Brewing, New Belgium Brewing, Pretty Things Beer & Ale Project, Saisons, Trinity Brewing
Wednesday, January 08, 2014
Big Beers Gets Bigger
Vail Big Beers, Belgians & Barleywines Festival, once one of the state's hidden gems, has grown in reputation to the point where it's now an accepted fact that it's the best non-GABF annual beer event in Colorado. That's enough to make any organizer rest on their laurels.
But resting is something that festival coordinator Laura Lodge doesn't do so well. And so, this year's event, scheduled for Thursday through Saturday, has added more sessions, more beer knowledge and, maybe most importantly, more room for both extra patrons and extra breweries.
The biggest news, if you haven't heard - and if you haven't heard anything about the event, I'll just say: Drop your plans for the weekend and head to Vail - is that the grand tasting has moved to a bigger area with space roughly twice that of the past two years. While lines have never been a problem at the festival, elbow-to-elbow maneuvering at times has been, and this will eliminate that and give more breweries a chance to strut their stuff.
That the festival will be accommodating to more beer makers is evident from the list of just how many small but talented brewers will be pouring at sessions throughout Saturday. Trinity Brewing and Mystic Brewery will be among those discussing experimental brewing at 9:30 a.m., sour savants Captain Lawrence Brewing will co-host two seminars with Deschutes and both Bell's Brewery and Cambridge Brewing - two of the best breweries not selling in Colorado - will be part of a featured early-afternoon talk.
And for those who like to divide their gigantic-beer drinking over multiple days, there is a Brewers Association-led Friday night talk on winter seasonals and a varied lineup of rare beers from Thursday through Saturday in the Cascade Lounge.
If this all sounds like some sort of commercial for the festival, it's no more so one than all the hype that I and other bloggers try to sort through before the Great American Beer Festival. But in the case of Vail Big Beers, it's all laid out in one location - the Vail Cascade Resort - and happens to center around an event about which too few people still seem to know.
Maybe I should keep quiet and go on acting as if I know a secret. But I'd rather shout about it - and spend the next month writing blogs based on things I learned this upcoming weekend. See you there.
Vail Big Beers, Belgians & Barleywines Festival, once one of the state's hidden gems, has grown in reputation to the point where it's now an accepted fact that it's the best non-GABF annual beer event in Colorado. That's enough to make any organizer rest on their laurels.
But resting is something that festival coordinator Laura Lodge doesn't do so well. And so, this year's event, scheduled for Thursday through Saturday, has added more sessions, more beer knowledge and, maybe most importantly, more room for both extra patrons and extra breweries.
The biggest news, if you haven't heard - and if you haven't heard anything about the event, I'll just say: Drop your plans for the weekend and head to Vail - is that the grand tasting has moved to a bigger area with space roughly twice that of the past two years. While lines have never been a problem at the festival, elbow-to-elbow maneuvering at times has been, and this will eliminate that and give more breweries a chance to strut their stuff.
That the festival will be accommodating to more beer makers is evident from the list of just how many small but talented brewers will be pouring at sessions throughout Saturday. Trinity Brewing and Mystic Brewery will be among those discussing experimental brewing at 9:30 a.m., sour savants Captain Lawrence Brewing will co-host two seminars with Deschutes and both Bell's Brewery and Cambridge Brewing - two of the best breweries not selling in Colorado - will be part of a featured early-afternoon talk.
And for those who like to divide their gigantic-beer drinking over multiple days, there is a Brewers Association-led Friday night talk on winter seasonals and a varied lineup of rare beers from Thursday through Saturday in the Cascade Lounge.
If this all sounds like some sort of commercial for the festival, it's no more so one than all the hype that I and other bloggers try to sort through before the Great American Beer Festival. But in the case of Vail Big Beers, it's all laid out in one location - the Vail Cascade Resort - and happens to center around an event about which too few people still seem to know.
Maybe I should keep quiet and go on acting as if I know a secret. But I'd rather shout about it - and spend the next month writing blogs based on things I learned this upcoming weekend. See you there.
Labels: Bell's Brewing, Big Beers, Cambridge Brewing, Captain Lawrence Brewing, Deschutes Brewing, Trinity Brewing, Vail Cascade
Saturday, November 09, 2013
All Colorado Beer Festival Ascending
With so many beer festivals in Colorado, a lot of them tend to blend together. And for the first six years of its existence, the All Colorado Beer Festival in Colorado Springs fell into that category of fun but unspectacular.
Something was different about this year's version, though - different enough where the ACBF might have to move into that don't-miss category in 2014. And it was a combination of things that elevated it.
First, the sheer number of breweries set the festival apart. Last year there were 37 beer makers pouring their products there. This year the number rose to 68 - all from Colorado, many small, some just barely open. Kudos to organizer Randy Dipner for that.
Second, one of the drawbacks of this fest in the past, like many massive beer gatherings, was that many of the breweries crammed into the space were offering the same beers you could find on any shelf all year long. That wasn't true this year.
From Gravity Brewing's intriguing Belgian Peppercorn Ale to Epic Brewing's fabulous coffee bomb Big Bad Baptist to Verboten Brewing's Good Day to You - a chocolate porter with sea salt - the Freedom Financial Services Expo Center floor was lined with new and different offerings. Even when a brewery brought something that missed wildly - such as Fort Collins Brewery's overwhelming Mesquite Chili Lime Ale - it missed by trying, not resting on its laurels.
Third, the VIP area continues to shine and is well worth the extra money. It was there that Grimm Brothers poured the tastiest beer of the festival, if not of the entire year, in its Devil's Riddle Ale, a strong ale aged nine months in Buffalo Trace barrels packed with Brettanomyces to complex effect. And it was there where the likes of New Belgium, Three Barrel and Trinity could happily turn an ordinary festival into a sour festival.
Finally, as a "celebrity judge" for the second year, I had the privilege of helping choose the winners in the IPA/imperial IPA category, and I noticed a huge difference in the quality of entrants just from last year. So when we blindly picked New Belgium's Rampant Imperial IPA for the gold medal and Dry Dock's Hop Abomination IPA for the silver (as shown in the photo at the top), it felt like we were honoring about the best in the state, not just the best there.
The ACBF typically occurs about a month after the Great American Beer Festival. If you haven't been yet, it's worth making a trip to Colorado Springs next year to do so.
With so many beer festivals in Colorado, a lot of them tend to blend together. And for the first six years of its existence, the All Colorado Beer Festival in Colorado Springs fell into that category of fun but unspectacular.
Something was different about this year's version, though - different enough where the ACBF might have to move into that don't-miss category in 2014. And it was a combination of things that elevated it.
First, the sheer number of breweries set the festival apart. Last year there were 37 beer makers pouring their products there. This year the number rose to 68 - all from Colorado, many small, some just barely open. Kudos to organizer Randy Dipner for that.
Second, one of the drawbacks of this fest in the past, like many massive beer gatherings, was that many of the breweries crammed into the space were offering the same beers you could find on any shelf all year long. That wasn't true this year.
From Gravity Brewing's intriguing Belgian Peppercorn Ale to Epic Brewing's fabulous coffee bomb Big Bad Baptist to Verboten Brewing's Good Day to You - a chocolate porter with sea salt - the Freedom Financial Services Expo Center floor was lined with new and different offerings. Even when a brewery brought something that missed wildly - such as Fort Collins Brewery's overwhelming Mesquite Chili Lime Ale - it missed by trying, not resting on its laurels.
Third, the VIP area continues to shine and is well worth the extra money. It was there that Grimm Brothers poured the tastiest beer of the festival, if not of the entire year, in its Devil's Riddle Ale, a strong ale aged nine months in Buffalo Trace barrels packed with Brettanomyces to complex effect. And it was there where the likes of New Belgium, Three Barrel and Trinity could happily turn an ordinary festival into a sour festival.
Finally, as a "celebrity judge" for the second year, I had the privilege of helping choose the winners in the IPA/imperial IPA category, and I noticed a huge difference in the quality of entrants just from last year. So when we blindly picked New Belgium's Rampant Imperial IPA for the gold medal and Dry Dock's Hop Abomination IPA for the silver (as shown in the photo at the top), it felt like we were honoring about the best in the state, not just the best there.
The ACBF typically occurs about a month after the Great American Beer Festival. If you haven't been yet, it's worth making a trip to Colorado Springs next year to do so.
Labels: All Colorado Beer Festival, Dry Dock Brewing, Epic Brewing, Fort Collins Brewing, Gravity Brewing, Grimm Brothers Brewhouse, Three Barrel Brewing, Trinity Brewing, Verboten Brewing
Saturday, September 21, 2013
Cheers to the All-Colorado Beer Bars
While Colorado Plus gets a lot of well-deserved attention from the beer geeks on the west side of Denver, there is another recently opened all-Colorado beer bar on the east side meriting the same kudos.
Stapleton Tap House, which owner Michael Kearns (above left, with fearless assistant Justin) debuted seven weeks ago in the Northfield shopping center - and which the Fearless Tasting Crew visited last night - offers up 35 Colorado craft brews on tap. Kearns adds the twist, though, that not only will he not serve you out-of-state crap, but you won't even find the likes of the state's largest craft brewers - such as New Belgium, Breckenridge or Odell - on his tap list. (Kearns acknowledged, however, that he would think about tapping a rare or one-off beer from the "big" boys if offered.)
Instead, patrons get to choose from the likes of smaller gems, such as Trinity or River North, or even breweries you won't find at a lot of places yet, such as Copper Kettle or Echo. Upslope IPA is as mainstream as you get at Stapleton Tap House - and while that's a tasty brew, Kearns noted that he doesn't sell much of it, because people are keen to try things they haven't quaffed before.
Stapleton Tap House also eschews food trucks, but for a more practical reason - there's a half-dozen restaurants within steps of its front door happy to serve up to-go plates for you to bring back to the bar. While many are larger chains, one is Jim ' N Nick's BBQ, whose local owner, Paul Bestafka, is a big supporter of craft beer.
In its first visit, the tasting crew enjoyed a variety of quality beers that included Crabtree Cezanne Apricot Saison, Trinity Soleil Farmhouse Saison, Elevation Little 'Mo Porter and Twisted Pine Hoppy Boy IPA. The night was complete only when Stapleton kicked a keg of the excellent Copper Kettle Mexican Chocolate Stout but stifled our tears by replacing it with River North Hoppenberg Uncertainty Principle, arguably the tastiest beer made in Colorado.
One can question the business sense of opening a craft beer bar in shopping center surrounded by chains; several times we were shocked to see that there were a number of open tables at the taphouse on a Friday night. But you've got to give credit to what Kearns and his staff are doing, and it gives you a reason to head east for craft beer for a change.
While Colorado Plus gets a lot of well-deserved attention from the beer geeks on the west side of Denver, there is another recently opened all-Colorado beer bar on the east side meriting the same kudos.
Stapleton Tap House, which owner Michael Kearns (above left, with fearless assistant Justin) debuted seven weeks ago in the Northfield shopping center - and which the Fearless Tasting Crew visited last night - offers up 35 Colorado craft brews on tap. Kearns adds the twist, though, that not only will he not serve you out-of-state crap, but you won't even find the likes of the state's largest craft brewers - such as New Belgium, Breckenridge or Odell - on his tap list. (Kearns acknowledged, however, that he would think about tapping a rare or one-off beer from the "big" boys if offered.)
Instead, patrons get to choose from the likes of smaller gems, such as Trinity or River North, or even breweries you won't find at a lot of places yet, such as Copper Kettle or Echo. Upslope IPA is as mainstream as you get at Stapleton Tap House - and while that's a tasty brew, Kearns noted that he doesn't sell much of it, because people are keen to try things they haven't quaffed before.
Stapleton Tap House also eschews food trucks, but for a more practical reason - there's a half-dozen restaurants within steps of its front door happy to serve up to-go plates for you to bring back to the bar. While many are larger chains, one is Jim ' N Nick's BBQ, whose local owner, Paul Bestafka, is a big supporter of craft beer.
In its first visit, the tasting crew enjoyed a variety of quality beers that included Crabtree Cezanne Apricot Saison, Trinity Soleil Farmhouse Saison, Elevation Little 'Mo Porter and Twisted Pine Hoppy Boy IPA. The night was complete only when Stapleton kicked a keg of the excellent Copper Kettle Mexican Chocolate Stout but stifled our tears by replacing it with River North Hoppenberg Uncertainty Principle, arguably the tastiest beer made in Colorado.
One can question the business sense of opening a craft beer bar in shopping center surrounded by chains; several times we were shocked to see that there were a number of open tables at the taphouse on a Friday night. But you've got to give credit to what Kearns and his staff are doing, and it gives you a reason to head east for craft beer for a change.
Labels: Copper Kettle Brewing, Crabtree Brewery, Elevation Beer, River North Brewery, Stapleton Tap House, Trinity Brewing, Twisted Pine Brewing
Tuesday, September 03, 2013
The Beers of Summer
Saying goodbye to summer is never easy. But after a year like this one, in which Colorado brewers added ingredients to beer that were quite unexpected - and, in almost every case, succeeded - it is especially difficult to want to turn the page.
From new fruits to vegetables to combinations of styles and additives that were a bit off track, breweries experimented and seemed almost to one up each other.
There were, for example, the grapefruit wars, in which beer makers went beyond describing their hop bombs as "having a citrus taste" and actually imbued it with a specific citrus fruit flavor. Strange Brewing made a Grapefruit IPA impressive in its combination of traditional hop flavor and acidity. But the best of the bunch - and maybe the beer of the summer - was Bull and Bush's 4.0 Grapefruit Pale Ale, which tasted remarkably similar to a fresh squeezed glass of juice with a malt balance and a tiny 4.0% ABV.
It was the summer too for watermelon. Fate's sublime Watermelon Kolsch (pictured to the left)
was full of both refreshment and watermelon pulp, adding to the joy of discovering a new style. Strange, ever the experimenter, also offered a Watermelon Hefe that brought a twist of excitement to a sometimes dull category of beer.
Trinity Brewing kept rocking its new sours but may have turned more heads with its Electrick Cucumbahh, a summer saison that used the natural sugars in the cucumber to sweeten the beer and make you see the vegetable anew.
Not content to stick just with fruits and vegetables as the new darlings of the season, Colorado Plus whipped out a Cinnamon Almond Ale that let the almond cream feel mellow the sharp cinnamon quite expertly.
Peach isn't a new beer additive, by any means. But Odell Brewing's Tree Shaker Peach IPA used the fruit in a different way. And even if the peach was only slightly perceptible, you knew you were drinking a hop bomb that had a different edge to it.
The summer became so ubiquitous with new additive experiments, in fact, that more traditional efforts almost felt half-hearted. A trip to Yak and Yeti for its summer wheat series left the Beer Geekette and I disappointed in a Strawberry Wheat that just didn't feel unique anymore.
The experimentation should continue in the raft of pumpkin and Christmas beers that are coming out now and soon will be on the horizon. But it wouldn't hurt to drop into some of the brewers mentioned above and remind them that a good idea works all year round, not just when it's hot.
Saying goodbye to summer is never easy. But after a year like this one, in which Colorado brewers added ingredients to beer that were quite unexpected - and, in almost every case, succeeded - it is especially difficult to want to turn the page.
From new fruits to vegetables to combinations of styles and additives that were a bit off track, breweries experimented and seemed almost to one up each other.
There were, for example, the grapefruit wars, in which beer makers went beyond describing their hop bombs as "having a citrus taste" and actually imbued it with a specific citrus fruit flavor. Strange Brewing made a Grapefruit IPA impressive in its combination of traditional hop flavor and acidity. But the best of the bunch - and maybe the beer of the summer - was Bull and Bush's 4.0 Grapefruit Pale Ale, which tasted remarkably similar to a fresh squeezed glass of juice with a malt balance and a tiny 4.0% ABV.
It was the summer too for watermelon. Fate's sublime Watermelon Kolsch (pictured to the left) was full of both refreshment and watermelon pulp, adding to the joy of discovering a new style. Strange, ever the experimenter, also offered a Watermelon Hefe that brought a twist of excitement to a sometimes dull category of beer.
Trinity Brewing kept rocking its new sours but may have turned more heads with its Electrick Cucumbahh, a summer saison that used the natural sugars in the cucumber to sweeten the beer and make you see the vegetable anew.
Not content to stick just with fruits and vegetables as the new darlings of the season, Colorado Plus whipped out a Cinnamon Almond Ale that let the almond cream feel mellow the sharp cinnamon quite expertly.
Peach isn't a new beer additive, by any means. But Odell Brewing's Tree Shaker Peach IPA used the fruit in a different way. And even if the peach was only slightly perceptible, you knew you were drinking a hop bomb that had a different edge to it.The summer became so ubiquitous with new additive experiments, in fact, that more traditional efforts almost felt half-hearted. A trip to Yak and Yeti for its summer wheat series left the Beer Geekette and I disappointed in a Strawberry Wheat that just didn't feel unique anymore.
The experimentation should continue in the raft of pumpkin and Christmas beers that are coming out now and soon will be on the horizon. But it wouldn't hurt to drop into some of the brewers mentioned above and remind them that a good idea works all year round, not just when it's hot.
Labels: Bull and Bush, Colorado Plus Brew Pub, Fate Brewing, Strange Brewing, Summer beers, Trinity Brewing, Yak and Yeti
Monday, July 15, 2013
Colorado Brewers Rendezvous: Oh Yeah!
Sure, there were 73 breweries planted in Salida's Riverside Park - the largest gathering of beer makers at an outdoor festival in Colorado history. But it wasn't the number of brewers so much as the age; at least half of them, by my count, were less than three years old.
And it was that youth, that seeming camaraderie of spirit to define Colorado beer in their own terms, that just imbued this past Saturday's Colorado Brewers Rendezvous with a certain energy, a certain newness. And one couldn't help but walk away with a few trinkets of knowledge from the Colorado Brewers Guild's annual signature event about where the state of the craft brewing industry is going.
1) Tart sours were sooo 2012. Now, even the boundary-pushing beers are having their boundaries pushed in new directions.
Take, for example, Trinity Brewing's Damn It Feels Good to Be a Gangsta, an intriguingly dark and chewy sour that combines the tastes of roasted chocolate, raisin and a tart cherry strain. It's enough to make you stop and think a little longer than usual.
Or, if roasty sour wasn't quite enough, Three Barrel Brewing took it a step further and added ancho chile to the already jarring taste of a chocolate sour and might have made the intriguing beer of the festival with its Melaza. The Del Norte brewery is supposed to have beer in at least one Denver liquor store by the end of the summer, and it couldn't come soon enough.
2) The more herbs or spices in the beer, the more fascinating it gets.
Example A is Cannonball Creek's Rosemary Sourdough Saison, whose lighter body allows you to taste not only the floral flavor of the rosemary but just a hint of sour. Combined with Strange Brewing's excellent Zora Rosemary Pale Ale, and you have two area beers that make a baker jealous of their flavors.
Example B is Copper Kettle's Mexican Chocolate Stout, a time-tested pleaser with a chocolate-cinnamon come-on and back-of-the-tastebud kick that is now available in bottles. Everyone should try this at least once.
3) Dare I say there is a kolsch battle going on in Colorado? Steamworks was serving up its Colorado Kolsch, which is by no means new but continues to set the standard for crisp and refreshing in this state with just enough light hops to give it full flavor.
But I have to hand it to Elevation Beer, whose 8 Second Kolsch was on tap at every bar in Salida. It is sweeter, with just a hint of light fruit to its heavier-than-hops malt taste. And it presents the state with a good problem: Which of two kolsch beers to spend time with this summer.
4) You know who's impressive? Fate Brewing. Yes, one could have picked out almost any brewer at the rendezvous, admittedly, for recognition. But the new Boulder brewer, which kicked convention in the teeth by making a fantastic watermelon kolsch already this summer, debuted its Gose Saturday.
It takes guts to make a German sour to begin with, but this version calms the salty overtones too often prevalent in the style and adds a citrus twang without a peltingly sour body. At the very least, it will be fascinating to watch where this 5-month-old brewery goes.
Sure, there were 73 breweries planted in Salida's Riverside Park - the largest gathering of beer makers at an outdoor festival in Colorado history. But it wasn't the number of brewers so much as the age; at least half of them, by my count, were less than three years old.
And it was that youth, that seeming camaraderie of spirit to define Colorado beer in their own terms, that just imbued this past Saturday's Colorado Brewers Rendezvous with a certain energy, a certain newness. And one couldn't help but walk away with a few trinkets of knowledge from the Colorado Brewers Guild's annual signature event about where the state of the craft brewing industry is going.
1) Tart sours were sooo 2012. Now, even the boundary-pushing beers are having their boundaries pushed in new directions.
Take, for example, Trinity Brewing's Damn It Feels Good to Be a Gangsta, an intriguingly dark and chewy sour that combines the tastes of roasted chocolate, raisin and a tart cherry strain. It's enough to make you stop and think a little longer than usual.
Or, if roasty sour wasn't quite enough, Three Barrel Brewing took it a step further and added ancho chile to the already jarring taste of a chocolate sour and might have made the intriguing beer of the festival with its Melaza. The Del Norte brewery is supposed to have beer in at least one Denver liquor store by the end of the summer, and it couldn't come soon enough.2) The more herbs or spices in the beer, the more fascinating it gets.
Example A is Cannonball Creek's Rosemary Sourdough Saison, whose lighter body allows you to taste not only the floral flavor of the rosemary but just a hint of sour. Combined with Strange Brewing's excellent Zora Rosemary Pale Ale, and you have two area beers that make a baker jealous of their flavors.
Example B is Copper Kettle's Mexican Chocolate Stout, a time-tested pleaser with a chocolate-cinnamon come-on and back-of-the-tastebud kick that is now available in bottles. Everyone should try this at least once.
3) Dare I say there is a kolsch battle going on in Colorado? Steamworks was serving up its Colorado Kolsch, which is by no means new but continues to set the standard for crisp and refreshing in this state with just enough light hops to give it full flavor.
But I have to hand it to Elevation Beer, whose 8 Second Kolsch was on tap at every bar in Salida. It is sweeter, with just a hint of light fruit to its heavier-than-hops malt taste. And it presents the state with a good problem: Which of two kolsch beers to spend time with this summer.
4) You know who's impressive? Fate Brewing. Yes, one could have picked out almost any brewer at the rendezvous, admittedly, for recognition. But the new Boulder brewer, which kicked convention in the teeth by making a fantastic watermelon kolsch already this summer, debuted its Gose Saturday.It takes guts to make a German sour to begin with, but this version calms the salty overtones too often prevalent in the style and adds a citrus twang without a peltingly sour body. At the very least, it will be fascinating to watch where this 5-month-old brewery goes.
Labels: Cannonball Creek Brewing, Colorado Brewers Guild, Colorado Brewers Rendezvous, Copper Kettle Brewing, Elevation Beer, Fate Brewing, Steamworks Brewing, Strange Brewing, Three Barrel Brewing, Trinity Brewing
Sunday, December 30, 2012
Top 10 Colorado Beers of 2012
In thinking back on the past year that was for Colorado brewing, what stands out is the lack of standouts - but in a good way.
Looking back on last year's list, the top two beers were a 14-brewer collaboration that sold for $40 a champagne bottle and a beer that was introduced at one of the most hyped Great American Beer Festival press events of all time. And that's OK.
This year, however, Colorado's finest beers seemed to happen almost when you weren't looking, sneaking into liquor stores and taprooms and even one-time events with great subtlety. And so, without further ado, here is one man's thoughts on the best that the Centennial State offered in 2012:
10) Black Swan - Twisted Pine Brewing
The most interesting beer of the summer was a saison that oscillated in taste from peat moss to mellow licorice to slightly sweet ester, making you rethink what is happening with each sip. What's more, it represented the maturing of a Boulder brewery that has produced good beers for years but is now pushing itself to create one-offs that are likely to redefine it again.
9) Saison du Tomme - Trinity Brewing
Jason Yester never fails to produce fascinating tastes, but it was where he produced his best beer of 2012 that exemplifies the Colorado Springs brewmaster's willingness to experiment. Saison du Tomme rolled out as part of Focus on the Beer's fantastic Beers Made by Walking series, in which brewers go on hikes and produce something original with ingredients found on the way. This saison included rose hips, lemongrass and grains of paradise, and its pixie-stick goodness should come back in future years.
8) Wild Wild Brett Green - Crooked Stave Artisan Beer Project
The lines that clogged the Crooked Stave booth at the GABF - and if you didn't see them, they were impressive - went there for pure sour concoctions. But the best thing Denver experimenter Chad Yakobson rolled out this year was a daring crossover blending his wild yeast with a traditionally hopped beer. What came out of it was a yet-undefined new style on which Crooked Stave hopefully will continue to push boundaries.
7) NBB Love Felix - New Belgium Brewing
The best sour-beer creators in Colorado pumped out another talk-worthy creation and GABF medal winner this year with their blond sour ale aged in oak foeders. Not as bristling as wonderful creations of theirs such as the Le Terroir, this offering stung the tongue just mildly before letting citrus flavors roll over it. In what was a great year of experimentation for the Fort Collins masters, this was one of their best.
6) Mick Jaggery - Wit's End Brewing
The terms "Top 10 beers" and "ESB" rarely cross. But when you combine a seriously hopped ESB with the Indian cooking sugar Jaggery (hence the name), the result was a bitter and sweet melange of tastes that literally stunned the entire Fearless Drinking Crew one night earlier this month. Scott Witsoe's beers are all a little bit off of any style description, but this one pushed definitions far enough to let the Denver brewery truly stand out.
5) Zora Rosemary Pale Ale - Strange Brewing
Of all the unusual ingredients that have been added to Colorado beers in 2012 - from Hawaiian black lava salt to bull testicles - none of them has made as positive a difference as the rosemary that Strange brewers Tim Myers and John Fletcher decided to drop into a pale ale earlier this year. The woodsy herbal taste combined with the natural floral overtones of a heavily hopped pale was like an awakening in a glass. Frankly, it's surprising that more brewers haven't realized how good this flavor combination is. Until they do, however, Strange should endeavor to keep this on tap constantly.
4) Oud Floris - Avery Brewing
Here's how to push the limits: Combine beer aged in Cabernet, chardonnay, whiskey and rum barrels and produce a tart sour that not only is complex but shockingly has a softer side to it, an almost buttery peach taste. Avery can make beers that scorch the palate; Oud Floris stands out for being a ridiculously approachable effort that is as good as anything that has come out of the Boulder brewery's barrels.
3) Super IPA - New Belgium Brewing
Every year, it seems, one more beer gets added to the repertoire of phenomenal Colorado double IPAs. What is so surprising about this year's addition is that it came from a brewery whose reputation was not for mastering the hop. But in a collaboration offering with San Diego's Alpine Brewing, New Belgium amped up flowery goodness to new levels while keeping the body of this limited release so easy-drinking that you have to rethink the hop presence.
2) Ambassador Barrel-Aged Sour Ale - Dry Dock Brewing
A personal story: It was the day after GABF, and the last thing that the Beer Geekette and I planned was to drink beer. But when we stumbled across this in a Highlands buffalo-wing restaurant, we had to try it. And even the shattered liver could appreciate something so tart that it lit up the sides of the tongue while being so peach-cherry-citrus-forward that every sip was an adventure in discovering what wild yeast could add to a medium-bodied masterpiece. As Dry Dock goes big-time with its expansion next year, it would do well to think about making more of this sour that adds to its constantly growing resume of world-class beers.
1) Hoppenberg Uncertainty Principle - River North Brewery
When you define a year in beers, the question must be asked: What beer did you go back to over and over again? The answer here is: A Belgian-style double IPA made by a brewery that is now just 11 months old but has crafted such daring products (featured in picture above) that it must be mentioned in the same breath as Denver's finest breweries. The beer formerly known as Hypothesis (a name apparently bogarted by a California winery) pushed styles in two ways, taking the brewery's signature ester-ful yeast and mixing it with a hop-laden beer that swirled over the taste buds like a one-two punch of grass and citrus-clove. The beer may help to redefine the Belgo-IPA style. And the crew is looking forward to drinking much more of it in 2013.
Looking back on last year's list, the top two beers were a 14-brewer collaboration that sold for $40 a champagne bottle and a beer that was introduced at one of the most hyped Great American Beer Festival press events of all time. And that's OK.
This year, however, Colorado's finest beers seemed to happen almost when you weren't looking, sneaking into liquor stores and taprooms and even one-time events with great subtlety. And so, without further ado, here is one man's thoughts on the best that the Centennial State offered in 2012:
10) Black Swan - Twisted Pine Brewing
The most interesting beer of the summer was a saison that oscillated in taste from peat moss to mellow licorice to slightly sweet ester, making you rethink what is happening with each sip. What's more, it represented the maturing of a Boulder brewery that has produced good beers for years but is now pushing itself to create one-offs that are likely to redefine it again.
9) Saison du Tomme - Trinity Brewing
Jason Yester never fails to produce fascinating tastes, but it was where he produced his best beer of 2012 that exemplifies the Colorado Springs brewmaster's willingness to experiment. Saison du Tomme rolled out as part of Focus on the Beer's fantastic Beers Made by Walking series, in which brewers go on hikes and produce something original with ingredients found on the way. This saison included rose hips, lemongrass and grains of paradise, and its pixie-stick goodness should come back in future years.
8) Wild Wild Brett Green - Crooked Stave Artisan Beer Project
The lines that clogged the Crooked Stave booth at the GABF - and if you didn't see them, they were impressive - went there for pure sour concoctions. But the best thing Denver experimenter Chad Yakobson rolled out this year was a daring crossover blending his wild yeast with a traditionally hopped beer. What came out of it was a yet-undefined new style on which Crooked Stave hopefully will continue to push boundaries.
7) NBB Love Felix - New Belgium Brewing
The best sour-beer creators in Colorado pumped out another talk-worthy creation and GABF medal winner this year with their blond sour ale aged in oak foeders. Not as bristling as wonderful creations of theirs such as the Le Terroir, this offering stung the tongue just mildly before letting citrus flavors roll over it. In what was a great year of experimentation for the Fort Collins masters, this was one of their best.
6) Mick Jaggery - Wit's End Brewing
The terms "Top 10 beers" and "ESB" rarely cross. But when you combine a seriously hopped ESB with the Indian cooking sugar Jaggery (hence the name), the result was a bitter and sweet melange of tastes that literally stunned the entire Fearless Drinking Crew one night earlier this month. Scott Witsoe's beers are all a little bit off of any style description, but this one pushed definitions far enough to let the Denver brewery truly stand out.
5) Zora Rosemary Pale Ale - Strange Brewing
Of all the unusual ingredients that have been added to Colorado beers in 2012 - from Hawaiian black lava salt to bull testicles - none of them has made as positive a difference as the rosemary that Strange brewers Tim Myers and John Fletcher decided to drop into a pale ale earlier this year. The woodsy herbal taste combined with the natural floral overtones of a heavily hopped pale was like an awakening in a glass. Frankly, it's surprising that more brewers haven't realized how good this flavor combination is. Until they do, however, Strange should endeavor to keep this on tap constantly.
4) Oud Floris - Avery Brewing
Here's how to push the limits: Combine beer aged in Cabernet, chardonnay, whiskey and rum barrels and produce a tart sour that not only is complex but shockingly has a softer side to it, an almost buttery peach taste. Avery can make beers that scorch the palate; Oud Floris stands out for being a ridiculously approachable effort that is as good as anything that has come out of the Boulder brewery's barrels.
3) Super IPA - New Belgium Brewing
Every year, it seems, one more beer gets added to the repertoire of phenomenal Colorado double IPAs. What is so surprising about this year's addition is that it came from a brewery whose reputation was not for mastering the hop. But in a collaboration offering with San Diego's Alpine Brewing, New Belgium amped up flowery goodness to new levels while keeping the body of this limited release so easy-drinking that you have to rethink the hop presence.
2) Ambassador Barrel-Aged Sour Ale - Dry Dock Brewing
A personal story: It was the day after GABF, and the last thing that the Beer Geekette and I planned was to drink beer. But when we stumbled across this in a Highlands buffalo-wing restaurant, we had to try it. And even the shattered liver could appreciate something so tart that it lit up the sides of the tongue while being so peach-cherry-citrus-forward that every sip was an adventure in discovering what wild yeast could add to a medium-bodied masterpiece. As Dry Dock goes big-time with its expansion next year, it would do well to think about making more of this sour that adds to its constantly growing resume of world-class beers.
1) Hoppenberg Uncertainty Principle - River North Brewery
When you define a year in beers, the question must be asked: What beer did you go back to over and over again? The answer here is: A Belgian-style double IPA made by a brewery that is now just 11 months old but has crafted such daring products (featured in picture above) that it must be mentioned in the same breath as Denver's finest breweries. The beer formerly known as Hypothesis (a name apparently bogarted by a California winery) pushed styles in two ways, taking the brewery's signature ester-ful yeast and mixing it with a hop-laden beer that swirled over the taste buds like a one-two punch of grass and citrus-clove. The beer may help to redefine the Belgo-IPA style. And the crew is looking forward to drinking much more of it in 2013.
Labels: Avery Brewing, Beers of the Year, Crooked Stave, Dry Dock Brewing, Focus on the Beer, New Belgium Brewing, River North Brewery, Strange Brewing, Trinity Brewing, Twisted Pine Brewing, Wit's End Brewery
Wednesday, July 04, 2012
Make Summer 2012 the Season of the Beer Dinner
Beer festivals are great collections of many breweries, but if I learned one thing at the Colorado Brewers' Festival a week-and-a-half ago, it was that 100-degree weather and voluminous drinking don't always pair well. So, how's a sweaty beer drinker supposed to spend the summer?
The answer: It's beer dinner time. Think about it. You're indoors, in air conditioning, with people serving you great food and great beer, while you don't have to move. The crowds are much smaller. And I've never seen a brewer say, "Sorry, we ran out of our specialty" in the middle of dinner.
With the Beer Geekette, I recently attended one of the finest beer/food pairings in memory - the Colorado Brewers Guild's monthly Colorado Beer Tour event at the Bridgewater Grill in Golden, this one with Ska Brewing. And through it, attendees can see all the elements that make beer dinners such worthy events.
First, a knowledgeable brewery representative - we'll call him Eric Kaizer, for the sake of this article - was there to explain the history of each beer, both the traditional history of its style and how it came to be in Ska. Eric threw in stories about the brewery leaders' antics (no surprise, if you've met Dave Thibodeau), had trivia contests with prizes (love the shirt) and just made you feel like you were part of the brewing team for one night.
Second, the fine chefs at the Bridgewater incorporated beer into many of the dishes, giving you something you couldn't find if you'd just gone to a restaurant and ordered a good beer. A ginger and beer syrup for the blackened scallop (pictured above, with more emphasis on the scallops than in the opening shot), beer mixed into the chicken jalapeno poppers and - the piece de resistance - beer salt made from several Ska brews on appetizer popcorn was quite the mix.
And third, there was the food, which was not only intricately cooked but very well paired with the beer. Let's face it, the hot dogs sold at outdoor festivals don't really bring out the character of your IPA. But when the citrus on the macadamia-crusted tuna blends wonderfully with the sharp candy taste of True Blonde Dubbel and the Modus Hoperandi compliments the hint of sweetness in the glaze on the bone-in beef ribeye (pictured above), you can truly appreciate why beer pairs better than wine with excellent food.
The Colorado Beer Tour continues at the Bridgewater Grill with a July 11 Left Hand dinner and an Aug. 1 dinner with Oskar Blues. Yes, both of those dates conflict with book signings I'm doing at Vine Street Pub and Twisted Pine Brewing, respectively. So, I can only recommend that you come visit me on one of those nights and hit the restaurant on the other. (Because it's not like you've got anything else to do this summer, right?)
Also, Freschcraft has a July 18 dinner featuring beers from Dry Dock, Funkwerks and Great Divide, among other breweries. And in Colorado Springs, Trinity Brewing just announced a six-course dinner on Aug. 19 featuring its sour and saison beers.
And there will be many more pairings throughout the next two months as well. So, vow to beat the heat, eat some meat and find ways to support local breweries that won't leave you panting with exhaustion.
Oh, and happy Fourth of July, everyone. Let's celebrate by drinking some American beer.
Beer festivals are great collections of many breweries, but if I learned one thing at the Colorado Brewers' Festival a week-and-a-half ago, it was that 100-degree weather and voluminous drinking don't always pair well. So, how's a sweaty beer drinker supposed to spend the summer?
The answer: It's beer dinner time. Think about it. You're indoors, in air conditioning, with people serving you great food and great beer, while you don't have to move. The crowds are much smaller. And I've never seen a brewer say, "Sorry, we ran out of our specialty" in the middle of dinner.
With the Beer Geekette, I recently attended one of the finest beer/food pairings in memory - the Colorado Brewers Guild's monthly Colorado Beer Tour event at the Bridgewater Grill in Golden, this one with Ska Brewing. And through it, attendees can see all the elements that make beer dinners such worthy events.
First, a knowledgeable brewery representative - we'll call him Eric Kaizer, for the sake of this article - was there to explain the history of each beer, both the traditional history of its style and how it came to be in Ska. Eric threw in stories about the brewery leaders' antics (no surprise, if you've met Dave Thibodeau), had trivia contests with prizes (love the shirt) and just made you feel like you were part of the brewing team for one night.
Second, the fine chefs at the Bridgewater incorporated beer into many of the dishes, giving you something you couldn't find if you'd just gone to a restaurant and ordered a good beer. A ginger and beer syrup for the blackened scallop (pictured above, with more emphasis on the scallops than in the opening shot), beer mixed into the chicken jalapeno poppers and - the piece de resistance - beer salt made from several Ska brews on appetizer popcorn was quite the mix.
And third, there was the food, which was not only intricately cooked but very well paired with the beer. Let's face it, the hot dogs sold at outdoor festivals don't really bring out the character of your IPA. But when the citrus on the macadamia-crusted tuna blends wonderfully with the sharp candy taste of True Blonde Dubbel and the Modus Hoperandi compliments the hint of sweetness in the glaze on the bone-in beef ribeye (pictured above), you can truly appreciate why beer pairs better than wine with excellent food.
The Colorado Beer Tour continues at the Bridgewater Grill with a July 11 Left Hand dinner and an Aug. 1 dinner with Oskar Blues. Yes, both of those dates conflict with book signings I'm doing at Vine Street Pub and Twisted Pine Brewing, respectively. So, I can only recommend that you come visit me on one of those nights and hit the restaurant on the other. (Because it's not like you've got anything else to do this summer, right?)
Also, Freschcraft has a July 18 dinner featuring beers from Dry Dock, Funkwerks and Great Divide, among other breweries. And in Colorado Springs, Trinity Brewing just announced a six-course dinner on Aug. 19 featuring its sour and saison beers.
And there will be many more pairings throughout the next two months as well. So, vow to beat the heat, eat some meat and find ways to support local breweries that won't leave you panting with exhaustion.
Oh, and happy Fourth of July, everyone. Let's celebrate by drinking some American beer.
Labels: Beer dinners, Colorado Brewers Guild, Freshcraft, Ska Brewing, Trinity Brewing
