With one day’s rest from SF Beer Week, we left the disappointed pups on Wednesday morning and headed to Denver to meet up with our friends Matt and Michelle. The plans included beer touring of Denver and Boulder as well as attending the Beerdrinker of the Year contest. As last year’s winner, Matt is a judge this year. We are also friends with two of the three finalists, so it should be a good fun.
We had some time on Thursday morning before we picked them up at the airport, so we scheduled a 10am tour of Boulder Beer Company, Colorado’s oldest microbrewery. Celebrating their 30th anniversary this year, Boulder can also claim to be the oldest post-Prohibition brewery.
Boulder Beer Company was somewhat of a milestone for us because we think it might be our earliest brewery tour. I say ‘think’ because we sampled beer in the morning at Indian Wells Brewing Company years ago but are unsure of the exact time. This was certainly our earliest tour.
Since our time was limited, we got a quick tour of the 50 barrel brewhouse, cellar and bottling line. Though we rarely do brewery tours these days, Boulder’s was interesting because it was built in a time when breweries still got cobbled together. My favorite among the eccentricities was a pvc pipe that ran through the floor. It’s how the brewers communicate between the two levels. Very high tech.
And of course we sampled Boulder’s beer. While we were familiar with a few of them, like Hazed and Infused and Mojo IPA, this was our first opportunity to taste their full range of almost a dozen beers.
The standouts for me were the Double IPA and the Mojo Risin, which I tried on both cask and draught. Merideth liked Planet Porter, which she tried two ways, nitro and draught. We bought some beer and headed to the airport. Thanks to Dan for taking time out of his day to show us around.
Together with Matt and Michelle, we headed to the opposite side of Denver to visit Ironworks Brewery & Pub. I was a little worried because I had seen reports online that Ironworks was closed and the 45 minute drive across Denver would be waste. It didn’t look good when we drove up, the pub was dark. Wanting to double check, we got out of the car and peered into an empty pub. Before the disappointment could set in, we heard someone say “Do you want to taste some beer?” It was the owner Mike who had just pulled up. We were a few hours early for opening but Mike was willing to open up to pour us some beers.
Over a taster set, we learned that Mike bought Ironworks a year ago and was busily trying to upgrade the pub, including a new brewer to improve the house beers. The beers were pretty good, especially the Stout and IPA.
Next it was time to try some Mexican-style beers at Del Norte Brewery. Yes, Mexican-style beers. I wasn’t really sure what to expect; chili beers, lime beers, chelada or some other odd concoction from south of the border. But it was nothing like that. Del Norte has two award-winning beers, Orale and Manana, brewed with traditional ingredients. Orale, the lighter of the two, was a bit too tame for me. Manana, on the other hand, was a darker lager in the Dos Equis mold. Drinking a sample of the malty goodness, I could easily see myself ordering a few of these at a Mexican restaurant. You have to admire people for thinking outside the box.
Finally, it was time to head into downtown Denver. After a short rest at the hotel, we headed to my favorite place in Colorado, Falling Rock Tap House. Over a few beers, we finally had time to catch our breath and catch up with Matt and Michelle. Pliny, Damnation, Titan IPA cask were my beers of choice.
We ended the evening at the Cheeky Monk, Denver’s entry into the Belgian beer bar scene that’s growing around the country. It was mentioned a lot during GABF and even though it was right around the corner from our hotel, we never made it there. Over our last pints at Falling Rock, Matt mentioned Cheeky Monk and a bell dinged in my head. Yes, we need to go there.
Cheeky Monk had an excellent beer selection though I thought Carlsberg and Lindemans looked oddly out of place next to names such as Orval, Rochefort, Malheur, and Saint Bernardus.
The food was typical Belgian, including many things we ate when we were there two months ago. Cheese Croquettes, Croque Monsieur, and Croque Madame. Overall, a nice place to end the evening.
It has been a good start to our Denver trip and it’s not over yet.
After months of anticipation, SF Beer Week has come and gone. The last day had a mellower feeling to it since the previous day’s revelry seemed to be our apex of the 10-day celebration.
Still being in a sour phase, the highlight for me was a Norwegian Sour Red from HaandBryggeriet. Aged in oak barrels, this Sour Red rivals anything produced in Belgium. A close second was an American Strong Ale called Batch One from Amager in Denmark.
The culminating event for SF Beer Week was the Celebrator party at the Oakland Convention Center. We always look forward to this event because we are pretty much assured that a lot our friends will be there.
After the New Albion beer, it was open season. Triple Rock’s Ipax and Imax, Russian River’s Consecration, Firehouse’s Otis, 21A’s Double Tripel, Bear Republic’s Apex IPA, Firestone Walker’s Velvet Merken and Saucerful o’ Secrets were a few of the beers I can remember trying.
With the nursing of beers over, it was time to confront the beast, the Toronado Barleywine Festival. Arriving around 2pm, the tasting was in full swing. The Barleywine fest is a challenge as Toronado is the not the largest pub in the world. Negotiating the crowd and finding a spot is almost as much of a challenge as actually getting beers. Oddly enough, we ended up in the exact sample place as last year, right by the door.
Having experienced enough of Barleywine, the crew split up and we, with our friend Dave, headed to the Upper Haight and Magnolia. February is Strong Beer Month at Magnolia and 21A and this was the opportunity to try Magnolia’s powerful offerings.
Maybe it was the baby sips of Barleywine, but I finally hit my stride. Beginning with Promised Land Imperial IPA, I tried four of the six strong beers. The Imperial IPA was followed by a Tripel, a Quad and finally, my favorite, Smokestack Lightning Imperial Stout.
They turned us on to a place I never heard of before, the Church Key. Down the street from La Trappe, the Church Key is a new beer bar on the SF scene… and wow. My first beer was cult beer classic 90 Minute from Dogfish Head. But what sealed the deal on my thinking the Church Key was a great place was the fact they had one of my all time favorite beers, Aventinus, on draft. So, the day might have started slow, but finishing it with an Aventinus was the exclamation point on a great SF Beer Week day.
We last visited Speakeasy 15 years ago and it had been about half that number of years since I actually had one of their beers. With the weather being a bit iffy, we braved the big downpour and headed to Hunter’s Point.
We were joined by several friends including Chris Devlin, the Beer Retard, which was a good thing because we were being interviewed by a reporter from the San Francisco Chronicle. Being surrounded by friends helped our image as fun loving beer drinkers and not loners.
The Beer and Chocolate dinner at the Cathedral Hill Hotel was our big event for the day. Chef Bruce’s Valentine’s dinner always draws a large and enthusiastic crowd. This year was no exception especially with the featured beer, Malheur. We were particularly excited as Malhuer Brut was one of the exceptional beers that we tasted on our trip to Belgium. We were eager to try more of their beers.
Bruce’s dinners are always a good place to catch up with old friends. Ken Pajak and Jim “Dr. Fermento” Roberts were down from Alaska. It was great catching up with them and learning what was new in their neck of the woods.
We probably should have called it a night at that point but being SF Beer Week, we were ready for more. We met back up with our friends Dave, Chris The Beer Retard and his friend Phillipe at Tommy’s Joynt. With our Alaskan friends, the party started anew. We ended up at another bar whose name escapes me eventually making it back to our hotel in the early hours of the morning.
“Philly Beer Week” is the latest Year in Beer episode of One Pint at a Time.