Category: Beer in the news

Great articles that you should read.

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More Magnolia in LA

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Looks like L.A. will get a little more Haight and Dogpatch as San Francisco’s Magnolia Brewing Company has partnered with Guardian Distribution to get more kegs on draft throughout Los Angeles County.

Be on the look out for flagships brands Blue Bell Bitter (which has shown up at rare times in LA), Proving Ground IPA, Prescription Pale and Kalifornia Kölsch plus seasonals and limited release beers from time to time.

Founder and brewmaster Dave McLean was in L.A. earlier this month to meet and greet to promote the new flow of beer to us. I missed it because of a little election thingy that took my attention that week.

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Modern Time at Leisure

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Leisuretown. Some words just sound like polyester pants and that one certainly does. But the extremely rapidly growing Modern Times is using it for a huge new outlet (31,927 square feet) in downtown Anaheim. And it does sound less obnoxious than the Dankness Dojo moniker for the delayed (and smaller) Modern Times – Los Angeles.

Here are the very verbose details from their press release:
• A gorgeous funky/sour brewing facility chock-full of foeders, amphora, and various experimental fermenting vessels, housed in a jaw-dropping old hoop-style wooden warehouse.
• A showpiece Modern Times café & restaurant set in an utterly charming two-story, historic craftsman home
• Stalls serving food from some of SoCal’s most kickass restaurateurs
• A giant frickin’ swimming pool, complete with poolside bar, movie screen, and sweet floaty toys
• A delightful and convenient Modern Times merch store & bottle pick-up location
•A vast and beautifully landscaped outdoor space primed for group gatherings and luxurious beer drinking

Anaheim is on a roll with the addition of Modern Times and recently Karl Strauss too.

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Change of Venue

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Laguna Beach Beer Company whose beers I have yet to see on shelves or taps made the surprising announcement that they would be taking over Cismontane Brewing Company’s production facility and tasting room in Rancho Santa Margarita, CA.

The transition includes plans for Laguna Beach Beer Company plans to expand the existing sorta-industrial park location to add a kitchen and more seating.

Cismontane will focus its attention on the brewing & distilling facility and tasting room in Santa Ana.

People and places are on the move in the SoCal scene. And it is probably not the last announcement we will see.

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Today is International Stout Day

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Whether you like collecting badges on Untappd or you just need an excuse to drink something other than an IPA, International Stout Day (aka TODAY) is here to help. And, of course celebrate the classic beer style, Stout.

Learn more about Stout Day and then head to a craft beer shoppe and try one.

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Yanow 2.0

Looks like the next chapter for former Golden Road and current Mohawk Bend and Tony’s Darts Away owner Tony Yanow will be craft beer brewpub space in the Valley.

The latest intel is that Yanow is considering a spot way out in Sherman Oaks on Ventura Boulevard. It is projected as a brewpub. Restaurant focused with a small brewery.

For sure, there will be IPA’s on the menu. Past that things get hazy like the NE.

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Verdugo West

A cryptic Facebook post from Chris Walowski, formerly of a bumblebee costume at Smog City hinted at a late 2016 opening for a brewery in Burbank.

Verdugo West doesn’t pop-up in Google searches yet but as the opening draws closer, that will probably change and we will learn more about this latest addition to the brewing scene.

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Bitter Chaser

I don’t know and really don’t want to know if you pour the espresso in the beer OR you chase the IPA with it.
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I still don’t understand this Starbucks at “night” campaign either. Who wants to hang around a bunch of people huddled around glowing screens after they do that at work all day?

Hopefully this is something that is only being tested in a single market.

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Bill is Wild

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A second large departure from Stone Brewing will leave an ambassador sized hole as “Dr.” Bill Sysak has left to prepare a new brewery in San Marcos, California.

2017 will see the debut of the Wild Barrel Brewing Company The 15 barrel brewhouse “will be known for its “San Diego Weisse” sours implementing a variety of fruit additions, along with a constantly rotating selection of San Diego style IPA’s to satisfy the most extreme lupo-maniacs. Rounding out the core lineup is an American stout with coffee additions changing seasonally from local roasters, and a “crushable” Belgian Wit.”

A couple of points ring weird to me from that paragraph. One would think with the years at Stone that more marketing panache would have gone into the name and logo. Wild Barrel is a rather pedestrian name in my book. And the certainty in which they declare that they “will be known for” their San Diego Weisse and that their Wit will be “crushable” is a little cart ahead of the horse. Flagships aren’t declared. The people buying will make it so.

Time will tell how Wild Barrel fares in a tough San Diego market.

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Homebrew Lime-A-Rita

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I have zero idea what a “disruptive growth organization” is or how it relates to making beer but the DGO of SABInBevNoMiller, ZX Ventures is disrupting by purchasing Northern Brewer Homebrew Supply and its sibling Midwest Supplies.

The usual cut-n-paste explanation of the sale offered no clarity as to the future since it was written with enough vagueness to please a lawyer but whereas a beer BUYING community will certainly have members who either don’t know who owns the brewery or don’t care, the people in the home BREWING community are much more likely to know that using Northern Brewer is using the foreign owned company.
Other acquisitions by ZX were much more niche and under the radar.

This ownership change will affect a lot more people who have used products from Northern Brewer for their malt bills and hop torpedoing and I do think many will simply decide to go elsewhere even though it is easier to buy online which is the strong suit of the Midwestern company.

And perhaps that is what the goal is? To irreparably harm a growing company or at least shackle it and deprive home brewers of certain hops or malts or to just make it harder on them.

If the Behemoth from Belgium were truly altruistic, they could make hay with this acquisition but I doubt that is the case.

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A Brewing Expedition from Venice to Paso Robles

Would you consider VIP access to next year’s Firestone Walker Invitational Beer Fest on June 3, 2017 enough of a prize to get excited about?

What if you add in the opportunity to brew at the R&D kettles in Venice? And then add more, blending beer at the Barrelworks in Buellton?
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To reiterate, you get to….

Prize 1
“The Firestone Walker Expedition begins at the Propagator pilot brewhouse in Venice, California for a crash course in brewing the types of experimental and R&D beers that will set the pace for what’s next from Firestone Walker. The day concludes with a celebratory meal at the Propagator restaurant.”

Prize 2
“Next up is a visit to Barrelworks in the town of Buellton in Santa Barbara County. Here, Barrelmeister Jeffers Richardson and Master Blender “Sour” Jim Crooks will show the participants how to blend their own unruly brew from a variety of eccentric Barrelworks creations.”

Prize 3
“The journey concludes in Paso Robles in the heart of the Central Coast wine country, where participants will enjoy a private tour of Firestone Walker’s main brewery with Brewmaster Matt Brynildson. On June 3, the group will head out for VIP early-entry to the Firestone Walker Invitational Beer Fest, which has been hailed as one of the nation’s top beer festivals”.

All you have to do is :to nominate their favorite Firestone Walker fanatic by producing and uploading a video explaining what makes that individual worthy of joining the Expedition. Three winners will be selected. The prize for each winner is two all-expenses-paid spots on the Expedition.”

All the rules and FAQ’s can be found HERE. You have until December 11th to create a compelling video.