Tag: Craft Beer & Brewing magazine

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Best of Brewery # 2 – Cohesion Brewing Company

To Colorado and Czech beers at third Cohesion Brewing Company.

Let’s have some lagers, shall we?

Cohesion 10º: Světlé Výčepní Pivo (Pale Draft Beer) “Single decocted lager with a light hop flavor and touch of malt sweetness. The most commonly consumed style in the Czech Republic. Honey, refreshing, smooth.”

Cohesion Polotmavý: Ležák 12º (Half Dark Lager) “Our amber lager with a name that translates to “half dark”. Rich notes of caramel malty goodness are balanced by herbal hop flavors, and a touch of bitterness. Malty, nutty, balanced.”

Cohesion 12º: Světlý Ležák (Pale Lager) “Our version of the most famous Czech lager – the original pilsner from Pilsner Urquell falling in this style. A full bodied malty lager with a rounded bitterness. Sweet hay, herbal, pleasant bitterness.”

Cohesion Tmavý: 14º Tmavý Speciální Pivo (Special Dark Beer) “Dark brown with rich malt flavors, this double decocted lager has flavors of toffee and a touch dark chocolate, with a light finish. Rich, toasted malt, full-bodied.”

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Best of Brewery # 1 – Roaring Table

I read through the 2021 Best Of… issue of Craft Beer & Brewing magazine to select three that grabbed my attention. Let’s start with Roaring Table Brewing Co. from Lake Zurich, Illinois.

12 Degree Czech Dark Lager – “Coming in at 4.4 abv this tmavé pivo features pilsen, caramel, roasted and toasted malts. Smooth, crisp and perfect for this time in the Midwest. Na Zdravi!!! And before you ask.. no we are no fluent..”

Ex Libris Wild Ale – “This blonde mixed-fermentation beer comes Solera-style from our Foeder Crafters oak foeder, which we first filled in July 2017.”

Frequency # 2 Pineapple Soursop – “Our tart and funky foeder base aged 14 months on fruit purée in a second-use Chardonnay barrel. Big sweet-tart pineapple and subtle coconut on a dry and zesty body. “

Supergigantic Metafantastic Hazy DIPA – “Get your haze, your hazy days, your metagaze on those metaplays, the one where the one is the one. Get a turtle, get a tortoise, here we are now, thus comport us.”

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and the Best of’s Start

November is not even finished but in beer punditry world, the year is done and dusted and it is time to rank the beers!

Here are some notables (in my view) from Craft Beer & Brewing magazine and their 20 Best of 2021

Maplewood Barrel Aged Cuppa Vanilla Rye  (Chicago) That sounds like a breakfast beer.

Vitamin Sea Tropical Envy (Collaboration with Civil Society Brewing (East Weymouth, Massachusetts) Usually TIPAs don’t make the list.

Green Bench Postcard Pils (St. Petersburg, Florida) Always a pils on the list

Oxbow Crossfade (Newcastle, Maine) Oxbow is one of those who almost always make the list.

Wild Provisions Metes & Bounds: Red Globe Peach (Boulder, Colorado) Now I am interested to try a red globe peach.

Resident Culture Static God (Charlotte, North Carolina) Always a lager on the list.

Breakside True Gold (Portland, Oregon) Go Oregon!

Triple Crossing One and the Same (Richmond, Virginia) 

WeldWerks Starry Noche (Greeley, Colorado) Perennially added brewery

Green Cheek It Just Works (Orange, California)  I have had this one! Wasn’t super impressed by it.

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Second of Best of 2020 – Craft Beer & Brewing Magazine

There is a nice mix of lists from Crafts Beer & Brewing magazine. Bordering on too many almost. You have a main Best of featuring twenty beers of which I had three. Then there are readers choice categories in top 50, favorite brewery by category and a who brews it best by style. Then there are five more Best of’s from different contributors.

From an LA perspective Monkish gets their hazy (and stout) love but Highland Park is making some serious inroads and could almost be considered 1B from our area. Speaking of, the excellent Glendale Tap in my adopted town made the best beer list which s quite the commendation.

The sheer amount of beers can lead to overload but you can see patterns emerge as you see breweries show up on multiple lists. You may have to make notes in the margins but this is a lot of helpful leads.

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Best of # 3 – New Anthem

Our final virtual brewery tour for 2019 takes us to North Carolina for something new, New Anthem Beer Project.

New Anthem has (2) locations in Wilmington and a long list of past beers of which there are a few that I want to highlight from their Belge section…

Nothing in My Brain – Tripel

Quiet Corners – Red Ale

Finger Pistols – Saison

Doing Mischief – Saison

They also have beer sections labeled Hoppy, Dark, Lager and Mixed Ferm.

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Best of # 1 – Hop Butcher for the World

I looked through the Best of listed from Craft Beer & Brewing magazines lists (organized by barrel size) and plucked out three breweries to highlight this month, starting us off is Hop Butcher for the World.

Hailing from Darien, Illinois and taking their name from poet Carl Sandburg this brewery which is lauded in the less than 15K barrels category has very distinctive branding.

Here are the beers that I would try first and the hops in each beer for this hop-centric brewery…

Supreme Being Pilsner – Saaz, Select & Monroe

New Oklahoma Pale Ale – Barbe Rouge & Mosaic

Lush Terrain IPA – Mosaic, Wai-iti, Motueka, Waimea & Moutere

Blazed Orange DIPA – Citra & Strata

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Let the Best(s) Begin

I ran across the first Best of 2019 list a week ago…

Craft Beer & Brewing, one of the few remaining beer magazines around now published their Top 19. I was heartened to see Beachwood Blendery on the list, Russian River nabbed a spot and one of my favorites from the year, the Crooked Stave Sour Rose was there which validated my taste buds. I just can’t believe that with 2 months left in an industry tilted towards spur of the moment tap room only releases that you can leave 2+ months of the year un-examined.