Finally had a chance to stop by the newest brewery in St. Louis, Six Row Brewing Company, so I thought that I’d share some of my thoughts and also some photos.  First, I really liked the feel of the place.  It’s very warm and very inviting.  It seems like agreat place to stop in a grab a pint or two before heading home or heading to an event downtown.

For only being open for two months, I thought the beers were very solid.  I enjoyed the Extra Pale Ale quite a bit, the Honey Weizen has some great banana notes,  and I thought that Porter was very good.  I’m happy to see a local St. Louis brewery offering up a porter.   Wasn’t a big fan of the Whale, but that could just be my own palate.

It also looks like these guys may be looking into doing a little bit of distribution in the future, so it will be nice to see some of their beers available around town.  This is a brewery first and foremost.  Look at the menu below and you’ll see there isn’t much in the way of food.  But I think this gives them the opportunity to concentrate solely on making beer.

I’m curious to see where these guys go and I’m looking forward to the future.

This was our last full day in Denver, so we headed to Fort Collins, CO to check out New Belgium Brewing.  I was lucky and was able to visit New Belgium last year during GABF.   While my tour last year was a lot of fun, this year we got a tour from New Belgium’s Sensory Specialist, Lauren Salazar.

Notes from Day 3, New Belgium Brewing:

• It shouldn’t surprise you that this place is huge.  Just enormous.
• Which is why they’re on schedule to do 500,000bbls this year.
• This first photo below is the original brewing system that New Belgium started with.
• Check out Sponge Bob eating a pizza!
• Yes, this is the second day in a row I got to visit the top of a brewery’s fermentation tanks.
• As you may know, this company is very green.  You can see the new solar panels they’re installing.
• Drinking beer right off of the large wooden barrels is really cool.
• I asked Lauren about the change in La Folie, she told me that she realized that she was making the beer more for her palette and not for the consumers.  Which is why the sourness has been scaled back a bit to make for a more balanced beer.
• While we saw the bottling line, we didn’t actually get to see it in action.
• But I did get to see it last year and I’ve included a video below.
• Yes, that really is a slide and yes you really can slide down it.

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Sunday morning in Denver. Irene had to attend conferences and talks all day, which means I was free to roam.  I decided to hit up Avery Brewing and Oskar Blues.

Since starting this blog, one of the most frequent questions is, “How much free beer do you get?”  The answer surprises a lot of people, because I don’t get that much.  I didn’t start this blog to get free beer, though it’s always appreciated when I get it.

What I do get is the opportunity to do a lot of stuff that many people don’t get to do.  Like for instance, stand on top of one of the fermentation tanks at Avery.  Make sure to check out the panoramic photo below.

Notes from Day 2, Avery Brewing and Oskar Blues:

• GPS is a godsend.
• Avery is tucked back in a little industrial park, if you didn’t know where to look you wouldn’t find it.
• If I’m not mistaken, Avery is on schedule to do 15,000bbls this year.
• Alex from Avery is a cool chick.  Thanks to Adam Avery for hooking me up with an awesome tour.
• Oskar Blues is huge.  Way, way bigger than I was expecting.
• OB is on schedule to do 30,000bbls this year.  Just to put that into perspective, Schlafly is on schedule to do the same amount.
• Sometimes it pays to be in the right place at the right time.  Just as I was leaving Avery I met one of the brewers from OB and he hooked me up.  They basically let me roam the Oskar Blues production facility all by myself.
• Oskar, come to St. Louis soon!

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Let me say, while being unemployed sucks, there are a few decent things about it.  One of them being that you can have a bit too much to drink on a Monday night and not need to get up the next morning.  So it’s safe to say I had a great time last night at the Avery Experience at iTAP.

First, let me just say that Adam Avery is an awesome guy.  About the nicest guy I’ve met in brewing.  Second, I’m going to steal directly from EricSTL6’s Twitter feed to give you some of the details Adam laid on us about upcoming Avery beers:

• Adam Avery says the 3rd barrel-aged brew won’t be brewery release only like the Sui-Generis. We should expect 20 cases in MO.
• Adam Avery was excited about 3rd Barrel-aged series beer. Black Tot, a Goslings Rum barrel-aged Impy Oat Stout to be bottled in late Nov.

Neat stuff.  Here are some photos from the event:

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I said something similar last year, but I’ll say it again. If beer drinking was a sport, than to me Schlafly’s Hop in the City always feels like the beginning of a new season. It feels like the kick-off to a new year of beer and beer festivals and this kick-off never seems to disappoint.

I’m sure we can all see how much I loved the festival beer.  A few suggestions for next year are that I would look at different pouring configuration in the large tent.  As we all know, too many people congregate near the pouring areas and there wasn’t a lot of room on the east side of the large tent.  Also, maybe some signage about, “Get you beer, then move your rear.”

If you were unable to attend, here are a few photos of the festival which will hopefully tide you over until next year:

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Had a chance to visit the new Hill Brewing Company yesterday and thought I would share some photos with you all.  The good news is everything is progressing well and Ray is expecting to be open by December.  The bad news is that you’ll have to wait until December!

Here are some of the key points Ray laid out for me in my visit yesterday:

• The Classic American Pilsner is currently being contract brewed by Lion Brewery in Pennsylvania and will be hitting the shelves with new packaging in the next few weeks.
• Ray purchased not only a 15bbl brewing system, but 15 bbl fermenters and 15bbl temperature controlled serving tanks which will insure a optimal serving temperature when the beer hits your glass.
• This new facility will allow for seating of 150 people upstairs and 150 downstairs.
• Ray will be using the basement for bottling and kegging his beer in the near future.

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International Tap House hosted the launch party of homebrewer Jim Yeager and O’Fallon Brewery’s collaborative effort Alright Already Amber Ale.  This beer was produced for the Great American Beer Festival’s Pro-Am competition.  If you didn’t attend, you really missed out on one of the best cask beers I’ve had this year. 

Here’s some photos from the event:

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