With winter in full swing, the combination of subzero temperatures and lack of sunlight has cast a spell of cabin fever over the brewery. We're not doctors, but we're comfortable pretending we are, and that makes us confident that our prescription of new beers will lead us to the cure.
COLLABORATION WITH GREAT LAKES
We've long admired
Great Lakes Brewing Company. Since they were established in 1988, they've brewed exceptional beers and done it while emphasizing the importance of operating in an environmentally and socially conscious manner. Needless to say, when the opportunity arose to travel to Cleveland to collaborate on an all-new beer, we jumped at the chance. Brian and Mikey got to work with the Great Lakes brewers and their 7 bbl pub system to brew a truly unique Baltic Porter recipe that incorporates molasses and Great Lakes' proprietary lager yeast. Want to know what it tastes like? We were only able to produce a couple dozen kegs, and only about half made it here to Minnesota. Our taproom doesn't even get one, so you'll have to join us at one of our release events if you want to try it. If you were quick enough to get tickets for tonight's
Happy Gnome Beer Dinner or Saturday's
Beer Dabbler, you'll get a chance at it this week. Next week, we'll be at
Bryant Lake Bowl to tap a keg on Tuesday, January 29th. We'll have a few more release events in the upcoming weeks, so be sure to check for updates on Facebook and Twitter.
WORTHY ADVERSARY FIRKINS -- WITH SOME UNIQUE TWISTS
The Great Lakes collaboration didn't quench our thirst for experimentation; in fact, it only fueled it. Back at our Minneapolis brewery, we turned to filling firkins with some exotic combinations. First, the aformentioned 1/29 event at
Bryant Lake Bowl will also feature a cask of War & Peace - a cult favorite that you'll be seeing more of soon (more on that in a minute). Next up,
Buster's on 28th will be tapping a cask of "Mole" Worthy Adversary this Thursday, January 24th at 6:00. That's Mole as in "inspired by the Mexican sauce," by the way; we added cinnamon, ancho chiles, and cocoa nibs to the cask, not a small, marmot-esque mammal. The following week, we'll be celebrating Firkin Friday on February 1st at
Grumpy's Nordeast with a cask of Worthy Adversary aged with macamia nuts and coconut. We've done a Worthy cask with macadamia nuts once before, and it was truly one of the best we've ever had. The addition of coconut will only make it that much better.
THE ANSWERS TO SOME QUESTIONS WE'VE BEEN HEARING A LOT LATELY (HINT: THEY ALSO HAVE TO DO WITH NEW BEERS)
The questions: "When is the War & Peace coming back?" And: "What's in those barrels?" Then: "So, when are you going to tap those barrels?" The answers, respectively, are: soon, Libertine, and very soon. If you'd like just a bit more information: War & Peace, our Imperial Coffee Stout infused with whole bean Guatemalan Organic Dark Roast from
Peace Coffee, will be available in late February, both on draft and for the first time ever in 750 mL bottles. We'll be announcing an exact date shortly. As for the barrel question: Our friends over at
2 Gingers Whiskey loaned us the barrels, and we've been allowing The Libertine to age in them for several months now. We got to sample it yesterday, and we think it's ready and quite nice. By the way, we don't "tap" the barrels; after aging, we transfer the beer to a stainless steel tank for blending, carbonation, and packaging. We're now blending it and will be announcing a taproom release date very soon.
