GABF 2009 Road Trip: Estes Park

While making our trek out of Rocky Mountain National Park we stopped in Estes Park for a brief foray into the world of true Rocky Mountain brews at Estes Park Brewing Company. Nestled in the foothills of the Rockies, this two story brewery also boasts a second story scenic deck for panoramic views of the mountains. We sampled several of their delicious beers before purchasing a mix six pack and heading back down from the mountains to Longmont and Boulder. It turned out our timing was impeccable as Estes Park received a healthy dose of snow the following day.


Renegade IPA

This pours out with a nice copper color that is cloudy in appearance boasting an unfiltered IPA offering. The nose is very balanced for an IPA and offers up lots of malty sweetness to balance out the piney hops. Tastes very sessionable for an IPA and doesn't beat the drinker over the head with hop flavor. Clocks in at just 5.8% ABV which for an IPA could make it a "lawnmower beer". I would order this again if looking for a more balanced IPA.

As far as IPAs go, I would put this up against British IPAs instead of American IPAs. The aroma is lightly hopped with a prominent honey and malt sweetness. The bitterness is similar to that of a stronger pale ale. The hop flavor contains both pine and grapefruit and is balanced by a caramel and orange sweetness. This is an incredibly balanced IPA. A nice dry finish encourages successive drinks.


Sampson Stout

First off I think it's really cool that a portion of the proceeds from the Sampson Stout are donated to help apprehend and prosecute poachers in and around the Rockies. There was a lot of press up at the brewery about this program and I think it's really a great cause! If that wasn't enough to get you to try the Sampson, it pours very thick and black. Not a lot of light escapes the beer and it has very little head retention. The nose is filled with dark chocolate and roasted notes. When you take the first sip it's mostly chocolate and then subsequent tastes bring out the oatmeal stout flavors and just a hint of that bourbon sweetness without the alcohol burn. This beer brings you back for more and has a dry finish as to not overload the palate.

From the aroma of this beer, you would expect it to be a coffee stout. Dark chocolate, coffee and roasted malts are all easily found in the nose. This is a very sweet stout with flavors of sweet cream, cocoa, brown sugar, vanilla and a hint of coffee. This beer tastes much richer than you might expect with an ABV of 5%. This is a very nice sweet stout.


Estes Park is home to the famous Stanley Hotel, or as it is known in The Shining, "The Overlook Hotel." While exploring the famous hotel, we took notice of a few beers that were exclusive to the hotel. It turns out that Estes Park Brewing Company brews two special beers specifically for The Stanley. Redrum Ale and 217 Ale. These weren't available in the Brewery for take-out which was too bad!

In Search of a Great Session Beer

It is hard for me to write this because I am part of the problem in craft brewing. I will admit that I love big beers (i.e., Dark Lord, Founders KBS, Kate the Great) and I get caught up in the hype train of those high gravity behemoths that beer geeks love to trade away their first born to just try an ounce of what beer websites deem holy water. Over this summer though I have been having a very difficult time finding a great session beer that I want to come back to over and over again. My progression is steadily moving away from "big" beer and all I want most of the time is a really nice comfort beer.

I read a great website from Lew Bryson called The Session Beer Project. He nicely sums up session beer as this: "4.5% ABV or less, flavorful and balanced, conducive to conversation, and reasonably priced." There is no hard and fast rule to session beer, but I prefer the 4.5% ABV vs. 5.5% that seems to be the mark in American craft brew. It may not sound like much of a difference, but during a session I can personally feel a huge difference between these two ABV marks, and even going from 5.5% and 6.0% (FFF's Alpha King), there is a huge difference in how quickly you will be completely fuddled.

I remember my first great session beer. I was on vacation with my wife in England and I had a pint of Timothy Taylor's Ram Tam. It was a truly religious experience for me. I had never had a beer so low in ABV (4.3%) that packed in so much flavor. The explosion of caramel and chocolate malt and earth laden hops on the tongue with the beer's natural carbonation from the cask was brilliant. I had three that night, and I can still think back about that beer I had over two years ago and think about the complexity of that beer and how much I want another one.

So, this summer I've been trying to find a great lawnmower beer, BBQ beer, and soccer match beer, but I've come up short with most of my attempts. I can find plenty of 6 to 8% ABV IPA's that I love and drink often, but not a great deal under the 5% mark. I've had some truly great beer this summer, but nothing that was able to capture my attention like Ram Tam, and nothing that I could call my session beer that would hold me over during all seasons and most occassions. My current favorite session beer is Three Floyd's GumballHead. It comes in at 4.8% ABV, but since FFF's doesn't use any type of dating system, I only buy from my beer guy (Ben at Crown Liquors) when I know it is a fresh shipment from him, so I can't always get it when I want that beer. (I know it is over the 4.5% ABV we just talked about, but this is as close as I've gotten.) I am also a big fan of Sierra Nevada's Kellerweis. It also clocks in at 4.8% ABV.

This got me thinking about the American craft beer movement and what is happening (at least as I see it) in the beer industry. Bigger is better right now, and rarity breeds overly inflated demand for the beer. Some of the lower ABV beers I've had this summer have been from brewers that do tremendous business based on their "big beers," but many of their lower ABV beers have fallen flat on their face in my opinion (and we all know what opinions are like, right?). But I am really curious about something: Can some of these brewers even make a great session beer that falls below 5% abv and do it consistently? If a brewer makes a great session beer, I will continue to drink anything from them at least once and will put more of my beer dollars into them over the year vs. spending money buying a four pack or a bomber of their special release beer only one time a year.

Don't get me wrong here. I am not saying that I want big beer to go away or make this some competition of high gravity beer vs. session beer. There is plenty of room in the marketplace for both. I just want to see more of a focus from brewers on flavor-packed, low-ABV session beer. I would also like to see beer geeks get excited about a new session beer coming out from a brewer. The suggestions I get here from people I want to then review later with the Hoosier Beer Geeks.

So, after that long rambling message about nothing really, what are you thoughts? What is your favorite session beer? What would you like to see reviewed?

GABF 2009 Road Trip: Avery, Twisted Pine and Left Hand

These beer diaries are going to be out of chronological order, but not that anyone really cares. On Monday we decided to stop by Avery's tap room to check out what they had in store for the week of GABF. Holy crap, were we in store for a treat! Present upon each table was a list of 30-40 aged, barrel-aged, or otherwise super-rare beers that they will be tapping throughout the week. It turns out that in the tap room they love to display their "one and done" ideology that they use when experimenting with barrel aging. You could stay here instead of going to GABF and get a similarly great beer geek experience. For a fun example, one of the beers they will be tapping this week is called Voltron, and it is a blend of 5 barrel aged beers.






Here are a couple of the beers we tried:

Eagle Rare Reverend 2008
This aged variation of Avery's Reverend was placed in Eagle Trace bourbon barrels, and the finished product presented itself as a wonderfully sour beer. The nose was very lambic-like with brett, vanilla, oak, and hints of strawberry and banana. The sour flavors were pleasingly balanced without too much of an acidic bite. Vanilla, caramel, pear, and Riesling grapes all came in to play. This was a really impressive hybrid of lambic and bourbon.


Samael 2006
If you've had Samael, you know how hot this beer is fresh. Avery recommends aging it up to 10 years. This three-year-old rendition had a mellow bourbon nose with oak, vanilla, caramel, and a hint of coconut. It came across super creamy with strong flavors of toffee, butter, vanilla, oak, bourbon, cinnamon, spiced apples, dried figs, and just a touch of pineapple. All prominent players in the complex profile of a bourbon, but with only a touch of the alcohol burn. Aging really makes this beer stand out.


Dry Hopped IPA
This is just their standard IPA offering except dry hopped and thusly kicking the flavor up a notch. There's lots of grassy florals in the nose that give you a nice green flavor to look forward to when you finally take a sip. This starts out with big hops and a lot of sticky pine flavors that devolve into an easy-drinking IPA. It's amazingly smooth and not overpowering for a dry hopped option.

We decided to swing by Twisted Pine, as they are the creators of our gateway chile beer - Billy's Chilies. Their tap room is quite cozy, dog-friendly, and a great place to hang out on a cold Colorado afternoon.



Reilly's Oak Whiskey Red
Named after the resident brewery dog, Reilly's recently won a gold at GABF. This bourbon-aged red doesn't carry any of the alcohol flavors you might expect. The nose is very sweet and rich in toffee, molasses, honey, and vanilla. The flavors follow the sweet precedent with cherries, vanilla, maple syrup, and caramel. Kind of like a whiskey flavor profile spiked with honey.


Billy's Chilies
This beer was my introduction into the world of delicious chili beer a few years back and is still every bit as good as I remember it being in 2006! With five different kinds of chiles and not a huge malt profile, this beer is nicely balanced and reminds me of cheesy nachos topped with jalapenos. It's crisp, refreshing, and finishes with a kick of delicious green chile spice. This is perfectly balanced and warming - great for a fall day!

Last on our list of stops was the Left Hand Tap Room. We popped in just before last call to grab a pint.


Bard's Tale English Dark Mild
It pours a dark brown with nice ruby edges. Balanced malt nose is indicative of what is to come in the beer. It's slightly sweet with a nice hit of hops on the finish to dry out the palate. I would recommend this to someone looking for a lighter, more sessionable beer that isn't going to overwhelm the palate.

400 lb. Monkey IPA
Consider this the IPA you always wondered if Left Hand made. Lots of lemongrass, orange, and citrus in the nose and notes of grapefruit and citrus in the palette, balanced with caramel and a hint of ginger. A really solid APA all around.