First of all, my brother in law thought “Saturday Morning Glory” would be the perfect name for a tailgating beer, so any brewers that want to jump on to that go for it!

Big Grove’s Richard the Whale bottle release was the perfect way to start off your Saturday morning if you’re a beer lover. For this release, if you bought a ticket you received 2 bottles of Richard the Whale, 1 bottle of Richard Coffee, 1 Richard glass, and also the opportunity to drink many fantastic beers on tap. Even if you didn’t get a ticket, the beers on tap were still an option.

So, to start off the morning I went with some Coffee Richard on tap, waiting patiently until that 10:00 tapping of Jean Luc Richard. What seemed like a simple bottle release was just a bit more at Big Grove. Along with all the tremendous beer on tap, the real treat was to be able to shoot the shit with the guys and girls who bring us this terrific beer. The opportunity to talk with the folks responsible for putting on an event, knowing there hasn’t been much sleep and some long ass days and they greet, smile and talk to everyone they can; so thanks to Chad, Danny, Rabbit, Doug, Matt, and Chef Smart..a terrific event and I’m looking forward to the next!

So many great conversations with the fellas from 7G, who are great beer conversationalists all the time, so cheers to Collin, Clint and Garrett from 7G! Also, Bob and Dave from Need and as always, the guy who should be in the Dos Equis most interesting man in the world commercials, Jeremy from Club 76.

Richard and the variants tasted amazing, although I didn’t eat the buffet I’m kind of kicking myself as it looked terrific. Bellied up at the bar with a some great stouts I was offered a glass of Big Grove’s Easy Eddy from Mr. Swift. He told me they switched the yeast strain and what he poured came back as a hazy, juicy, hop bomb. It was delicious! Easy Eddy is tasting great right now folks! They also had a double dry hopped IPA on tap that was very tasty.

Overall, the new space in Iowa City was perfect for hosting this event and the folks who run the show really knocked it out of the park. Beer, food, conversation, (not to mention the sweet ass swag BG has going right now), all made for a fantastic event. When Big Grove has their next release, there’s no question I’ll be there and there’s no question they will try to top how great Saturday’s Richard release was! Check out those sweet as Richard labels as well!  Cheers BG!