Another successful Coralville Brrr Fest is in the books and it’s amazing how much better the beers and breweries are now then when this started 4? years ago. So many excellent breweries bringing their best beers and adding the Mellow Mushrooms pizza was a nice touch as well. Pizza and beer, tough to beat. I tried many outstanding beers on Saturday but here are the ones that stuck out for me: **515 Brewing – OJ IPA and Mediocre Pale Ale – I’ve had OJ a few times and enjoy it every time. Dave from 515 mentioned something about this batch being messed up but I thought it tasted excellent as always. The mediocre was an excellent surprise. Mosaic hop was showcased making this an awesome pale ale. **Big Grove Brewing – Progeny and Mellow Drama – I’ve had progeny before but for some reason it was tasting extra good on Saturday. I was getting ton of peach flavor and had to go back for seconds. The Mellow Drama is a collab beer with other Iowa breweries. Very smooth and delicious. **Exile Brewing – Beaknik Sour – tons of cherry in this beer and with Exile bottles hitting Eastern Iowa I would love to see a bomber of this brew show up on our shelves. Excellent stuff. **Galena Brewing – Brett Michels Saison – despite the name I really enjoyed this saison. Tons of spice on this saison making it wonderfully refreshing and flavorful. Would love to see this in bottles! **Lion Bridge Brewing – GAZPROM! and Maple Disaster – GAZPROM! is a barrel aged russian imperial stout with maple syrup added. A very smooth RIS and the syrup adds just the perfect amount of sweetness. Would love more of this! The maple disaster is a barrel aged brown porter with maple syrup. This beer was so good I had to the brewery the day after just to get some more. Great things happening at this brewery! **Madhouse Brewing – VIP – although it wasn’t on tap I still need a pour of this brew. My favorite Madhouse offering and thankfully I have a few bottles in the cellar yet. **Third Base Brewing – Another Passe IPA- glad to see this on the tap lines as I had it at the brewery a few weeks ago and really enjoyed it. Third Base flies under the radar a bit but I find myself taking the whole family for some good food and tasty brews. **West O Brewing – Coco Stout – the gold medal winner lived up to that honor pouring a wonderful thick stout that was full of flavor. An excellent stout. **Overall, another terrific experience. The breweries were all very friendly and engaging. This event keeps getting bigger and better so make sure you secure a ticket next year, because if this year is any indication, there will more and more excellent brews to try.
Tag: iabeerbaron
Boulevard Beers Hitting the Canning Line
Boulevard Brewing’s twitter handle @boulevard_beer just announced that some of their beers will start hitting the canning line in 2015. Those pictured are Pop-Up Session IPA, Radler, Heavy Lifting IPA, and their Wheat Beer. Here’s the post from their website:
Boulevard Beer in Cans
It’s often said that brewers brew the beers they’d like to drink and hope that beer drinkers embrace them. We take that approach at Boulevard Brewing Company, but we also depend heavily on the feedback we receive from you, our loyal fans. Lately, the message, “We want Boulevard cans!” has been heard loud and clear. To this end, we’re excited to share with you that we’re currently in the planning stages of bringing canned Boulevard beer to reality in 2015.
Brewery leadership is finalizing details right now, but it’s our goal to release the following beers in six packs of 12 ounce cans:
You’re likely familiar with Unfiltered Wheat Beer, Pop-Up IPA, and Ginger Lemon Radlerand we hope you’re very excited to be able to enjoy these beers in places normally not accessible to glass bottles.New to the lineup is Heavy Lifting IPA. Based on the wildly successful Tasting Room beer, Mid-Coast IPA, Heavy Lifting joins the family as a year-round offering available in both cans and on draft. Think of Heavy Lifting as a close cousin to Mid-Coast IPA. Coming in at 6.2% ABV and 80+ IBUs, Heavy Lifting features massive late and dry-hopping with Centennial, Amarillo, Topaz and Citra hops that leap from a minimal malt base composed of our base pale malt and a touch of Munich malt.
While some details are in the process of being finalized, we were just too excited to keep this news to ourselves any longer. Stay tuned in the coming weeks as we hope to share more specifics with you.
– Jeremy Danner, Ambassador Brewer
Brewery Ommegang Releasing Joemmegang in May
Beer Street Journal just posted a release stating the Brewery Ommegang will be releasing a coffee ale in May of this year. Joemmegang will be released shortly after their next Game of Thrones brew. Here’s more from www.beerstreetjournal.com:
Cold-aged with a custom mixture of cocoa nibs, 1/3 espresso blend, 1/3 sumatra and 1/3 Papua New Guinea beans. Mahogany hue with red hightlights and creamy tan head. Aroma dominated by cold-brewed coffee, milk chocolate and caramel – rounded out with aromatic hints of fruit and figs. Taste is of sweet malts and smooth, rich coffee and chocolate. Pleasantly fruity notes from both the yeast and coffee beans.
Ommegang Joemmegang is on the brewery’s release calendar for May, 2015. To be available in 750ml bottles.
Style: American Strong Ale (w/ Coffee, Cocoa Nibs)
Availability: 750ml bottles, Corked & Caged
Release: May, 2015 (Estimated)7.5% ABV
On Tap @RedsAlehouse for Brrr Fest this Saturday
This Saturday marks another year for Coralville BrrrFest and Reds Alehouse along with Big Grove Brewery and 30hop are providing shuttle service to and from the festival. This will be my first time I will be using the shuttle service and after receiving the following email with the tap list for Saturday at Reds, I’m picking the perfect time to use this service. It’s going to hard to find a better selection of beers on tap at one time as Reds will have 18 of Beeradvocate’s top 250 beers on tap at one lovely, wonderful, tasty time! Here’s the list courtesy of Reds Alehouse:
Update: Dates for Oskar Blues and Hopslam in Eastern Iowa
iaWell, it looks like we may be waiting a tad longer for Oskar Blues and Hopslam to hit our shelves in Eastern Iowa. I just saw a tweet from Johncy’s Liquor Store in North Liberty:
Hopslam February 2nd. Oscar blue January 27th
If you hear of any other places with different release dates please let me know. I’ve heard rumors of Oskar Blues cans at certain locations but haven’t confirmed. Cheers!
Cityview Winter Brewfest 2015 set for Feb. 22 and Keg Stand in Des Moines, IA
Received this link from Facebook. If you are in the Des Moines area Feb. 22nd Cityview Brewfest at the Keg Stand in Des Moines. Below is the official release:
Sunday, February 22, 2015 from 1:00 PM to 3:00 PM (CST)West Des Moines, IA
If you’ve been to Brewfest, then you know you don’t want to miss our all new Winter Brewfest!
$15 gets you umlimited samples of over 150 beers from 1-3 p.m.
There will be a chili bar available for an additional $5.
Get your TICKETS now, only 300 available!
Have questions about Cityview’s Winter Brewfest 2015? Contact CityviewVisit http://brewfest.dmcityview.com/ for more information.
Founders KBS to be Distributed starting March 30th
I just received the following tweet courtesy of Founders Brewing Company:
Announcing KBS Week 2015, March 9-14: http://kbsweek.com/ . Distribution release = 3/30.
One of the most highly anticipated releases of the year is only a few months away. It will be interesting to see how liquor stores handle sales. Will it be similar to BCS releases or will they simply put it on the shelves and have first come first serve? Either way, can’t wait to get my hands on this once again! Cheers!
Funkwerks Brewing is Coming to Iowa!
Prairie Trail Hy-Vee out of Des Moines just tweeted and confirmed that Funkwerks Brewing out of Fort Collins, CO will be hitting the Iowa market hopefully in the next 60 days. Here’s the tweet from Prairie Trail:
Well…
@Funkwerks is the BIG NEWS!!@IowaCraftBeer is hoping to have inventory in the next 60 days. Super excited for this!!!!!
Being a Saison fan I’m very excited for this news. To learn more about Funkwerks check out their website: http://www.funkwerks.com/content/OurBeer/Saison.aspx
Stone Baird/Ishii Japanese Green Tea IPA Collab Hitting Shleves
Just came across the following news on thefullpint.com that another Stone Collab will be hitting our shelves in the coming weeks. It is a Green Tea IPA that I’ve heard great things about. Very excited to try this brew. Here’s more from thefullpint.com:
Hops Bill: Warrior, Crystal, Helga, Aramis & Sorachi Ace
Distribution: AK, AL, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DC, DE, FL, GA, IA, ID, IL, IN, KS, KY, LA, MA, MD, ME, MI, MN, MO, MT, NC, NE, NH, NJ, NM, NV, NY, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, VA, VT, WA and Puerto Rico
And more info from Stone:
A wonderful spirit of camaraderie, cooperation and mutual support exists in the world of craft brewing. We have harnessed this spirit fully in the crafting of this special collaborative brew dedicated to the resilient people of Japan who are bravely endeavoring to overcome the tragedy of the March 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami. We tip our brewing hats to the quiet elegance and humble sophistication of Japanese culture through the judicious addition of Japanese whole leaf green tea to this big, bold, spicy and herbal IPA. Cheers, Japan!
List of 2015 Coralville Brrr Fest Breweries
This should be another great event, and by looking at this list there should be some absolutely phenomenal beers to try. Hope to see you there! Here’s the list from Backpocket Brewing’s Facebook page:
Brrrfest Brewery list is located below. Going to be a great event. List is subject to change… but we doubt it will at this point.
Backpocket
Broad Street
Lost Duck
515
Racoon River
Confluence
Kalona Brewing
Mason City
West O
Court Ave
Boone Valley Brewing
Keg Creek
Buck Creek Brewing
Third Base
Big Grove
Madhouse
Single Speed
Exile
Worth
Millstream
Peace Tree
CIB
Great River
Toppling Goliath
Cedar Ridge
Twisted Vine
Lion Bridge
Another Road Brewing
New American
Firetrucker
Bent River
Blue Cat
Granite City
Potosi
Founders
Empyrean
Schell
New Belgium
Goose Island
Tallgrass
Bell’s
Schlafly
Baraboo
Boulevard
Summit
Lagunitas
Left Hand
Two Brothers
Oskar Blues
Zip Line
Galena Brewing Co.
