Hogshead Brewery | Gilpin Black Gold

Before I moved to Denver, I covered food and drink for local alt-weekly publications like the Houston Press and Houstonia. That was a great experience in that I learned a lot, developed my palate, and also got the opportunity to try lots of unique beers and other offerings.

But at a certain point, I was getting invited out to taste so many rare, incredibly heavy beers — 15 to 20% Barrel-Aged Imperial Stouts, Barleywines, and the like — and at some point, I realized that in my free time, I didn’t want to drink like that. 

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Milieu Fermentation Company | smol.

The Festival of Wood and Barrel-Aged Beer is a legendary beer festival and competition held annually in Chicago. Each year breweries from across the U.S. enter their barrel-aged creations for judging, hoping to earn a coveted medal in one of 13 categories. As expected from a competition highlighting barrel-aged beer, most entries are high ABV bruisers where a couple sips is all the flavor and alcohol a drinker could reasonably handle.

Milieu Fermentation Company of Aurora, Colorado, bucked the trend by entering smol., a 2.7% ABV barrel-aged mixed culture ale made in collaboration with Baere Brewing Company in neighboring Denver. For their effort, they were handsomely rewarded with a gold medal in the Wild Beer Mixed Culture (Acidic) category, a huge honor for a tiny beer. 

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Our Culture Brewing & Creature Comforts | Fonio Lager

The sentiment of collaboration resonates throughout the craft beer industry. From check-in warriors eager to be the first to taste what’s new, to production teams, social media folks and retailers,  everyone loves a solid team effort. It’s especially true when the beer is innovative, tasty and brewed for good. Read More

Pure Project | Otter Romp

When it comes time to select a spirit animal, one might gravitate toward a lion, tiger, or bear… oh my! Solid choices of course, but a little reflection helps reveal the unsung hero of the animal kingdom. Enter, the otter. A sign of peace, a symbol of endless curiosity, and never one to turn down having some fun. With this new spiritual enlightenment, there’s no better beer to reward yourself with than Otter Romp, a recent collaboration between Pure Project and Humble Sea.

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Odell Brewing Co. | Thunder Lizard Hoppy Ale

Few things pair better with a fresh powder day in Colorado’s high country than a mountainside pint. Such moments led to the inception of Copper Mountain and Odell Brewing Co.’s slopeside collaboration—Thunder Lizard hoppy ale. To celebrate the grand opening of Copper Mountain’s upgraded Timberline Express chairlift (known as T-Rex for short), the resort teamed up with its exclusive beer partner, Odell Brewing Co. to create a beer as thrilling as the lift it honors.

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Barrique Brewing | Barleywine Double Feature

Last February, we hit the ground running after Dry January and highlighted a special collab from the Barrique Brewing and Blending team in Nashville, Tennessee. Now, a year later, we’re back with a double dose of barleywine from the Barrique crew.

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Little Fish Brewing & Wandering Monsters Brewing | Vallée Rustique

Vallée Rustique got its start as Rustic Auburn Valley, a 100% Ohio-grown, dry-hopped Pilsner that was a collaboration between Little Fish and Wandering Monsters for Ohio Brew Week 2024.

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Four Leaf Brewing | Healing Hues IPA

Clare, Michigan, may be the small-town gateway to the North, but it’s also home to a hidden gem for beer lovers: Four Leaf Brewing. This local hotspot pairs great food with inventive beers, like the fascinating and purple Healing Hues IPA. 

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Wiley Roots Brewing | Vanilla Pseudonym

Barrel-aged beer often takes inspiration from the spirit it uses, but rarely does that inspiration lead to the name of the beer and subsequent series of releases. Seeking to source barrels for an Imperial Stout back in 2017, Wiley Roots Brewing was drawn to utilizing a local distillery instead of a broker. They landed on Laws Whiskey House. “Knowing the quality of Laws and their products made it an easy choice, especially knowing they have a lot of intentionality about where their barrels go,” says Dave Frediani, head brewer at Wiley Roots. Laws began under a pseudonym, Gargoyle Enterprises, in its initial distilling phase to ensure they were creating a product that would eventually be worthy of the Laws name. This became the inspiration for the release of the original Pseudonym in 2018, which would morph into an entire -nym series (Acronym, Homonym, Autonym, and Anonym so far) and lead to the release of Vanilla Pseudonym 6+ years later. 

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The Virginia Beer Co. and Fauve Craft Bière Celebrate ‘Hero of Two Worlds’

“Oui oui mon ami, je m’appelle Lafayette!

The Lancelot of the Revolutionary set

I came from afar just to say Bonsoir

Tell the king ‘Casse toi!’ Who’s the best?

C’est moi!”

Hamilton fans worldwide have been captivated by the gracefully arch swagger of the inimitable Daveed Diggs as the great French Revolutionary hero, sweeping through the first act of the multiple award-winning, genre-defining show with glamorous panache. While Lafayette’s pivotal role in the American Revolution has been immortalized by Diggs on Broadway, his significance to American history and politics can be seen all around us. There are 36 U.S. towns and cities bearing the name of America’s Favorite Fighting Frenchman, a namesake college dating back to 1826 in Easton, Pennsylvania, and the American Friends of Lafayette society dedicated to the preservation of his memory and legacy, formed in 1932.

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NoDa Brewing Co. | Cheerwine Holiday Ale

NoDa Brewing Company, based in Charlotte, North Carolina, has partnered with iconic Southern soda brand Cheerwine for a delicious take on Cheerwine’s classic soft drink.

Cheerwine, a beloved cherry soda, has been enticing the palates of fans for over a century. Recently, Cheerwine announced the return of its Cheerwine Holiday punch—just in time to “punch” up your holiday season!

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Celebrating World Pear Day with Mortalis Brewing

The team at Mortalis is always down for a creative new showcase idea. For those unfamiliar with the dedicated fruit holidays, the first weekend in December is celebrated as World Pear Day. When it comes to relating this peculiar fruit to the world of craft beer, one specific name comes to mind above all else. We’ve collaborated with Paul Grenier and Mortalis yet again to feature the most monstrous version to date of their famous Pear Brandy Leto in celebration of one of the most-consumed fruits in the world.

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Forager Brewery | 9th Anniversary Showcase

It’s been about two and a half months since Forager Brewing’s 9th Anniversary Foragerfest celebration, and people are still buzzing about the bottles released for the occasion. Free to attend and open to all ages, Foragerfest has become hugely popular over the years, and people have traveled from near and far to Rochester, Minnesota to get a taste of the one-off barrel-aged offerings, live music, and artisan markets that have become so popular at the event. Austin Jevne and the team were generous enough to send us the full lineup from this year to review and share on PorchDrinking, and we can’t thank them enough for allowing us the chance to share the experience with our readers.

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Greenport Harbor Brewing Co. | Leaf Pile Ale

Thanks for Thinking and Drinking Locally Made and Well-Crafted New York Beer! That’s the motto of Peconic, NY-based Greenport Harbor Brewing Company. However, we should be thanking them for brewing up some of the best craft beer New York has to offer!

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Tri City Brewing | Ruckinator Doppelbock

The Michigan Tri-Cities have some killer breweries in Midland, Bay City and Saginaw. Today, we’ll look at one of the oldest and most established in the area, Tri City Brewing Company, and one of its flagship brews, the Ruckinator Doppelbock. The beer won Gold at the World Expo of Beer in 2022 in the Strong European Style category, so let’s take a look at what makes it special.  

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WhereT App & Lonerider Beer | Busy Brew Lager

Odds are that sometimes you just want a quiet place for a few beers or to grab some food. Maybe you tried to call a few spots, or Googled the venue to try and gather some intel about how busy it was at that time. Enter the WhereT app. Developed around the foundation of venue transparency, Brandon Lewis created the app as a remedy for the time lost and potential revenue lost for businesses. Lewis, who currently resides in Raleigh, NC, also partnered with Lonerider Brewery to create Busy Brew Lager. This beer was created exclusively for the WhereT app and is the only beer that truly works for you.

We took time to chat with Lewis, discussing his vision for WhereT and his successes with the social app. We even got to crack open a Busy Brew and taste the beer helping people KNOW before they GO.
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Amorphic Beer | They’re Here Aren’t They Imperial Pilsner

Are you ready to be introduced to your new favorite unofficial beer style? We say “unofficial” because it’s not technically a Beer Judge Certification Program style. Thankfully, the fine folks at  Amorphic Beer don’t care about those kind of rules and categories.

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Collaborating for a Cause | New Image Brewing

It’s honestly baffling to come to the realization that it has been 17 and a half months since Alex Kidd’s shocking announcement that he had been diagnosed with Stage IV metastatic colon cancer. The beer community immediately rose to the occasion, raising over $400,000 for Alex and his family to help with his medical bills. Even after all this time, PorchDrinking still has yet to feature all of the breweries and their beers and/or releases dedicated to the man behind Don’t Drink Beer. That said, we started this journey back in June of last year with Horus Aged Ales’ Stay Strong Alex, and this is now the 23rd installment of Collaborating for a Cause. For this spotlight we zoom northwest of Denver, CO, and set our sights to New Image Brewing.

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Firestone Walker’s 805 Brand Launches 8ZERO5 as its First N/A Beer

The inability to embrace change typically results in extinction, and the craft beverage community’s recent embrace of nonalcoholic options signals the industry’s maturation and ability to evolve amid rapidly changing taste preferences.

Among those diving head first into the N/A movement is Firestone Walker Brewing Company’s 805 brand, which recently launched 8ZERO5, the brand’s first nonalcoholic Blonde Ale. As one of the industry’s most dominant lifestyle beer brands, it felt only natural to embrace recent shifts toward low- and nonalcoholic options. 

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Odell Brewing | Lincolns Lager

It’s no surprise that craft beer is expensive. Perhaps it has always been this way, especially compared to macro beer. The strain of high price points to consumers is more acutely felt these days. To be sure, prices are high at every point in the supply chain, from raw materials to reliable labor to taproom space, and breweries themselves are struggling to balance all of these factors while still providing quality product at a palatable cost. It is because of all these elements that it is all-too-refreshing to find a good and affordable beer—or any drink for that matter. That is where Lincolns Denver steps into the picture, offering all drinks for only $5 cash. 

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