Regional Craft Brewery: An independent regional brewery with an annual beer production of between 15,000 and 6,000,000 barrels who has either an all malt flagship or has at least 50% of it's volume in either all malt beers or in beers which use adjuncts to enhance rather than lighten flavor. (Read the last half of that as a brewery that makes beer that they try to make flavorful, not dumbed down.)
New Glarus Brewing - New Glarus, WI
If you're from Wisconsin, you already know about New Glarus. What more could I really say that you don't already know? Probably not a lot, but I'll give it a try anyway.
New Glarus Brewing was founded in 1993 by Deb and Dan Carey. Initially located in an abandoned warehouse, the beer was brewed on used brewpub equipment. In 1997, New Glarus was lucky enough to purchase around $1 million worth of brewing equipment from a retiring brewer in Germany for only $24,000 (the brewer was happy that his equipment wasn't going to scrap).
One of the interesting things about New Glarus is that they only distribute in the state of Wisconsin. (They used to distribute in the Chicago area, but were basically told to go blow themselves by a distributor that bought out their distributor.) In 2011, New Glarus was the 28th largest brewery (19th biggest craft brewery) in the United States. Think about that. They distribute to one state, and not a huge state at that (20th largest population). Sure we've got the German heritage thing, but still!
With their new brewery that was opened in late 2008 (which was made to look like a Bavarian Village - take that Epic!), New Glarus now has the ability to produce up to 100,000 barrels of beer a year, all of which will be sold in Wisconsin. (Quick math, that 100,000 barrels is the equivalent of just over 33,000,000 12 oz bottles.)
- My favorite New Glarus beer: Dancing Man Wheat
The first time I tasted Dancing Man, I completely understood the name. Dancing Man is a Bavarian Hefe-Weizen that is full of flavor with a kick of cloves and cinnamon. This is a summer seasonal that should be available very soon at your local liquor store (in Wisconsin). Please do yourself a favor and pick up a six-pack. If you don't like it, please bring the rest of that six-pack to me. I'll even pay you for it.
Lakefront Brewery - Milwaukee, WI
Lakefront is nowhere near the size of New Glarus, and they may not brew their beer in a "Bavarian" village, but neither of those affects the taste of their beer.
Lakefront traces it's roots back to 1987 and a man deciding that he could do something better than his brother. (Sounds like that start of many stories that end in an emergency room...) Russ and Jim Klisch eventually turned this sibling rivalry into Lakefront. The original brewery was located in an old bakery building on Milwaukee's north side. This building housed the brewery as it grew from 72 barrels in 1988 to almost 3,000 in 1998. At this point, Lakefront decided it needed a new home and found one in an old power plant that the City of Milwaukee was considering tearing down. This building at 1872 Commerce St in Milwaukee is still home to Lakefront as it has grown to produce almost 18,000 barrels of beer in 2010.
Lakefront makes many great beers, but they make a couple that are worth pointing out for their uniqueness. The first is Organic E.S.B. (Extra Special Bitter), which as it's name implies, uses 100% certified organic ingredients. The second is New Grist. New Grist is a pilsner style beer that is completely gluten free. Made with sorghum, hops, rice, water, and gluten free yeast, it was the first beer to be certified gluten-free by the USDA.
- Pumpkin Lager
It's been a while since I've had Pumpkin Lager (maybe that's because it's May, and this is definitely a fall beer...), but it has a very distinct taste to it. Honestly, it's almost like you're drinking Pumpkin Pie. The beer is heavy on cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and of course, pumpkin, but it all works together with the malty body to produce a wonderful beer. I highly recommend this come October.
Today's run: 7 miles - 50:41 - Ran at the Princeton Club. I really needed an easy flat run. I got half of that... I need to learn how to run slower when I'm tired...
Today's beer: Capital Hop Cream
I spent about ten minutes standing in front coolers at Steve's tonight trying to find one that jumped out at me. Well Capital, you caught me with the name. I'm a fan of IPAs and we just brewed a cream ale a couple of weeks ago, so I figured I'd give it a shot. Well, I am thoroughly unimpressed... Cream ales are typically a light beer that doesn't have much hop flavor to it (we added one ounce to our recipe), so the beer in general is a juxtaposition of two opposite styles. The beer is a light copper color and has a herby aroma to it. The initial taste is piney and doesn't mesh well with the cream ale base. Thankfully the taste as it lingers isn't hoppy. (To make the beer they made a cream ale, and while it was in secondary fermentation, they basically boiled some hops in water and added it to the ale.) In the end, it seems like they tried to make something different, but the hop choice just doesn't mesh in my book with the cream ale base.
- Skippy's rating: 3 out of 6
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