What We’re Drinking | June 3rd, 2016

Many a thing pair beautifully with our beloved beverage, beer. Cheese, pie, porch swings, macaroons, bacon, campfires, you name it — there’s probably been a beer pairing for it. Personally, my favorite thing to pair with beer has always been dessert… but what about when the beer is so wonderfully decadent that it is, in fact, a dessert? Yes please. This can easily be said about Westbrook Brewing’s recently released Mexican Cake — a highly sought-after imperial stout aged on cocoa nibs, vanilla beans, habanero peppers, and cinnamon sticks. This is one you don’t want to miss, folks.

The PorchDrinking team has been busy researching (drinking) all week long to make sure you have the beer-iest, most beautiful weekend possible. See what else we’re excited about below. Cheers to liquid dessert. *clink*

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Beerstagram 5/26 – 6/2

We hope your Memorial Day weekend was well spent! From the looks of Instagram it seems like a lot of beer was consumed, as you would assume with the kick off … Read More

Event Recap | CCBW: Nevin’s Brewing Company 21 Beer Salute

Few beer events can simultaneously appease both beer geeks and beer novices, but Plainfield, Illinois’ Nevin’s Brewing Company 21 Beer Salute did just that. As part of Chicago Craft Beer … Read More

Yards Brewing Co. | Brawler Ale

Photo courtesy of cornerpubsports.com

ABV: 4.2% | IBU: 20

With the NBA finals and Stanley Cup playoffs owning serious air time this week, I’d like to introduce a companion craft beer to keep up your competitive spirit and take you through those clock-stopping, breathtaking moments.

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Ultimate 6er | Blizzard Entertainment

Blizzard Entertainment Inc. is one of the finest video game studios on American soil, mounted in the halls of pop culture for creating some of the most significant video game franchises in the world. From their humble beginning creating Super Nintendo titles such as Blackthorne, The Lost Vikings and Rock & Roll Racing, Blizzard is a name loved by gamers for their legacy of rich stories and diverse content. When this crew makes a new game, the video game landscape changes.

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SAVOR Event Preview | Adroit Theory Beer & Cheese Pairing Salon

If you’re in the DC area or headed into town this weekend, you are in luck. There are a plethora of craft beer drinking options at your fingertips courtesy of … Read More

Denver Rare Beer Tasting VIII Brewery List Released by Pints for Prostates

Tickets for Pints for Prostates Awareness Event on Sale Father’s Day

The list of 54 craft brewers committed to serve beer at the Denver Rare Beer Tasting VIII has been released by Pints for Prostates.

The prostate cancer awareness event will be held on Oct. 7 in Colorado during the same weekend as the Great American Beer Festival. The Denver Rare Beer Tasting VIII features the chance to sample rare, exotic and vintage beers from 54 of America’s top craft breweries and the opportunity to meet the men and women who made them.

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Inside the Tank | WeldWerks Brewing Co.

Video Created by PorchDrinking.com Videographer Travis Weger

Voted Best New Brewery in America via a USA Today reader poll,  WeldWerks Brewing Company has quickly become one of the hottest new breweries not just … Read More

Dry County Brewing | Namesake Blonde Ale

Pick your cliché: Rock. Dart. Dead Cat… throw any one of those items around Atlanta and chances are good you’ll hit an up-and-coming brewery. After all, nearly 30 have popped up around the state since 2010. Now you can add Dry County Brewing Company, based in Kennesaw, Georgia, to that list. Although they went online in November of 2015 with a five barrel system, expansion plans are in the works. Their future is bright. They’re all wearing sunglasses.

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Ultimate 6er | Parks & Recreation Part 2

NBC’s Parks & Recreation is one of my favorite TV shows. Like any devoted Parks & Rec fan, season seven was a dark time for me, as I knew it meant that this hilarious show was coming to its unimaginable end. However, once Hannah Carlson debuted her wildly-popular Parks & Rec Ultimate 6er article in April [Ludgate], I finally felt ready to move on from my despair and celebrate my love for this show. Since there are so many great characters, I decided to feature six additional Pawnee favorites, and have this Ultimate 6er post pick up right where Hannah left off. Read More

PorchDrinking’s Weekly Denver Beer Beat | June 1st, 2016

I must opine that each and every week, the Denver Metro is blessed AF with the number of beer’y events that are going down. Seriously folks. Just look at all … Read More

“Hamilton” Beer & “Hamilton” Trivia with Gun Hill Brewing’s Dave Lopez

Every sentient being on the planet says it: If you’re in New York, you just HAVE to go see “Hamilton,” the musical currently taking Broadway by storm. (And it’s ridiculously difficult to see if you don’t purchase tickets way in advance.) It’s life-changing, they claim. It manages to make Americans talk enthusiastically about two things that have NEVER been so universally beloved: history and musical theater.

I did see “Hamilton” last month in New York, and all the hype is true. It’s fantastic. Lin-Manuel Miranda (the star/writer/composer) and the cast are extraordinary performers, and the way the show is staged tells a story worth hearing in a bold way unlike anything I’d seen before. I’m one of those people now. “Hamilton” is like veganism – you’ll know a friend of yours has seen it because they insist on telling you all about it. After seeing the show, I immediately followed some of the cast on Twitter, including Miranda’s alternate Javier Muñoz, who played Alexander Hamilton on the night on which I saw the show. And I was intrigued to see Muñoz talk about his involvement in a group creating a craft brew based on the show.

That’s right. There’s “Hamilton” beer.

Gun Hill Brewing in The Bronx has created “Rise Up Rye,” a limited rye beer (4.8% ABV) inspired by “Hamilton.” And just like I immediately went on the hunt for “Hamilton” tickets when I first heard the soundtrack, the revelation that a “Hamilton” beer existed sent me on a quest. And while “Rise Up Rye” isn’t available to me in LA (yet), I wanted to know more. This is where Dave Lopez enters.

Lopez is a co-managing partner at Gun Hill Brewing Co, which has had a Colonial-America look and feel about it since it opened in February 2014. Everything from the website layout to the labeling on their bottles looks like what you would’ve seen in the 1700s. And when you consider that the biggest thing in pop culture right now is the story of young, scrappy, and hungry New York revolutionaries with a vision, it’s easy to see how Rise Up Rye was a natural fit for Gun Hill.

Lopez generously agreed to talk to me about how Rise Up Rye came to be. And then… I put him to the test with a pop (culture) quiz to find out just how well he knows “Hamilton.”

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Modern Brewery & StilL 630 Collaborate on New Beer

Local distiller StilL 630 is once again partnering with good folks at the Modern Brewery.

The two have collaborated in the past with Modern Brewery using StilL 630’s RallyPoint barrels to produce … Read More

Oskar Blues Brewery | Chubna Imperial Scotch IPA

ABV 12.6%

With a new “it” brewery seemingly opening every week, it’s easy to overlook the quintessential breweries whose tap handles already dominate Colorado’s ever-growing craft beer scene. But it’s not just small, nimble breweries canning and bottling experimental beers that cross style and ingredient guidelines. Read More

Event Recap | Orpheus Brewing’s 2nd Anniversary

From inception, Orpheus Brewing, and head brewer Jason Pellett, have brewed under the philosophy “don’t look back.” This, as Jason has stated, is because the goals are always ahead of you, and as mythology’s Orpheus learned, looking back can lead you astray (or more specifically, lose your wife Eurydice back to Hades when abandoning your faith and looking back to ensure she was still following you out).

And obviously, brewing forward-reaching beers, while staying laser focused on future goals has worked extraordinarily well at Orpheus, as the brewery continues to fill any and all gaps in beer styles available in Atlanta. Read More

Brewery Preview | Dovetail Brewery

Days before the craziness of Chicago Craft Beer Week (CCBW), I was offered the opportunity to tour soon-to-open Dovetail Brewery, which is co-owned, operated and run by Bill Wesselink and Hagen Dost. What better way to begin the beer week, than with a preview of the next chapter of Chicago’s burgeoning beer scene.

Dovetail is a reference to the carpenter’s joint of interlocking boards, it is famed for its resistance to being pulled apart. As Bill so elegantly expressed, “It’s coming together to make a stronger brewery. A mix of old and new, American and European to create what we feel is our interpretation.”
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STL Brewers Heritage Festival to Debute Exclusive Beers

We’re counting down the days till St. Louis’ biggest local beer festival. With as many as 100 styles of beer from over 40+ STL-based breweries, the event seems like it couldn’t get any … Read More

Pollyanna Brewing | Summerly Raspberry Wheat

Pollyanna Brewing’s rapid success is almost unfathomable until you try the beer — and then it makes perfect sense. Just shy of two years old, Pollyanna Brewing is already expanding its production, selling its beer at Cellular Field (home of the White Sox), and the taproom is frequently packed. It took Pollyanna only a year to create a beer that exceeded the popularity of its original, and already popular, creations — Summerly, a raspberry wheat beer. The refreshing summer treat is not only delicious, it speaks volumes about Pollyanna.
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Weekly Growler Fill | National Beer News Roundup

The Bruery launches distribution to Kentucky, Goose Island identifies their infection problem, and AB InBev may be in trouble for hurting craft sales. You want the beer news, we’ve got the best stories of the week. Keep reading to catch all of the details in this edition of the Weekly Growler Fill.

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Melvin Brewing | Hubert MPA

ABV: 6% | IBU: 66.6

So, you know when a Magician does a magic trick and you have no idea how it happened? Well, that’s the kind of hocus-pocus that goes into each and every one of Melvin Brewing’s exceptional beers. With over 50+ years of experience in all corners of the Melvin Clan, there’s some true mad science behind it all. Like most good beers, the magic is in the hops. Melvin Brewing breaks the rules in all hop-science. Now you see it, now you don’t. And to think that some of the best IPA’s in the world are being churned out of Wyoming may be quite a surprise to most; our Colorado PorchDrinkers have recently become the believers in all things Melvin and all that they are doing up in the North as they have increased distribution through our friends over at Crooked Stave Artisans!

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