Category: LA Craft Beer Events

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RT5

R.T. Rogers Brewing is a delightful little spot tucked up in the foothills.  If you haven’t visited yet, well there is a great opportunity to check it out when they have their 5th Anniversary celebration….

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Review – Bites & Brew at the Ritz Carlton Laguna Beach

I have had great beers in a cold warehouse setting off a freeway off-ramp and I have had bad beers in fully kitted out taprooms but having a selection of curated beers on a bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean is a whole new level.

Yesterday, I attended the Brews & Bites at the extremely fancy Ritz-Carlton in Laguna Niguel (maybe Dana Point). So fancy that empty glasses and empty food plates were whisked away by an attentive wait staff.

I will circle back to the beer later but the food was certainly a co-star. I mean, there was an ice cream bar with beer caramel (and sprinkles amongst other toppings). And two of the ice cream were beer accented.

Myself and my beer buddy Rich sampled all the food from the lamb sliders, to pretzels, quesadilla, curry fish and chips and a Korean corn dog. The borracho taco which was more a quesadilla to me was my favorite with the curry being my least even though the fish was nicely done. All the dishes had a kick to them, nothing plain to be found.

There were a lot of pilsners and lagers on hand which matched the bright sunshine of the day perfectly. Sage has their new LA LA Lager which was almost my favorite of the beers drunk were it not for the Bow & Arrow table where you could have the Easy Cactus Lager or Denim Tux Blue Corn Pilsner. The lager was Vienna malty in style and the pilsner was the perfect start to tge afternoon.

Another good choice was Like, Wow hoppy lager a collaboration between People’s Republic of South Central and The Bruery. It used Vista hops and had an apricot version as well.

I could easily get used to this ritzy beer festival.

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Infinite 2023

Smog City will make wishes come true March 17th through 19th with Infinite Wishes Weekend.  I bring this up now because the pre-sale of bottles starts this month on February 26th.

I will follow up with more Wish Weekend information when those details are made public.

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Cellador 2.0

Here is your Cellador Ales update. Promise that it is great news. Alex Ourieff is taking over the reins of the wild ale producer and they have 1/2 a new home….

“We’re excited to announce that the new home of Cellador Ales’ brewing operation is at Smog City Brewing Co!

The folks at Smog City have welcomed us in to share their dedicated sour beer production space. While our team will continue to handle every step of our own production process, working at Smog City will give us access to a dramatically better workspace as well as tools, equipment and climate control that’ll let us fine tune our process the ways we’ve always wanted to. Through our new relationship, our brewery and our team are about to be better equipped than ever to put some truly exciting beers out into the world.”