Casks & Camaraderie | Oak & Steel

In an unintended continuation from the last installment, Casks & Camaraderie is again headed to Missouri. Previously exploring Cape Girardeau’s Cask Craft Spirits and Beer Lounge, we focused on their elevation of barrel picks to expand exclusively from whiskey distillers into the realm of private picks with local brewery barrel stocks. This iteration picks up in the same barrel room it left off in, with Cory King and Side Project Brewing. His newest collaboration in the Silent Barrel series was with Kyle Howard, owner of Oak & Steel craft drinkery out of Kansas City. We took a deeper dive into his experience, the barrel, and the impact it’s had on the ever-changing beer scene in northwestern MO.

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Resident Culture Brewing Co. | Riding For The Feeling Italian Pilsner

Founded in 2017, Charlotte, NC-based Resident Culture Brewing Company has a genuine appreciation for assertive, hop-forward styles and strives to accentuate the character and quality of a farmer’s harvest.

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Colorado Beer Beat | Bi-Weekly Beer Release Guide 3/21

Welcome to the Colorado Beer Beat, a bi-weekly roundup of all of the new can releases around the state. From Denver to Grand Junction and everywhere in between, we have you covered. Be sure to check back on Thursdays (usually!) to find out what’s new in the Colorado craft beer scene.

Looking to embrace the warmer weather after last week’s snow? Well get ready, because WestFax Brewing Company is celebrating eight years with an unforgettable weekend of beer releases, live music, a silent disco dance party, and food trucks on Friday, March 22 and Saturday, March 23.

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Jackie O’s Brewery | 18th Anniversary Extravaganza

Athens, OH-based Jackie O’s Brewery will be hosting their 18th Anniversary Extravaganza this weekend, March 22-24. Let’s dive in and take a look at what you can expect at their big bash!

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Event Recap | Duvel Perfect Pour Contest

Last week, industry folks and excited patrons alike gathered around Birmingham’s Hop City bar to participate in a special event hosted by Duvel Moortgat in collaboration with its distributor, AlaBev. Duvel’s Perfect Pour Contest, is one of several recurring events that Duvel hosts throughout the year to drive participation and excitement for the legacy brand. This was the first time the Perfect Pour Contest was held in Birmingham, Alabama. Read More

Lady Justice Moves to Englewood, Continues Brewing for a Better World

In February, Lady Justice Brewing announced it would be moving from its four-year-old home in Aurora and heading west to Englewood. Well, Lady Justice’s last day in Aurora was on Feb. 29. Now, the Lady Justice team is preparing for an official opening on Wednesday, March 20.

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Sacred Vice Brewing | Rubbish NEIPA

Philadelphia, PA-based Sacred Vice Brewing started as a small nanobrewery when they first launched in 2018. The brewery was founded by cousins Matt Brodsky and Justin Steinberg who, as most professional brewers do, started out homebrewing.

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Can’t-Miss Beers to Try at the 2024 Collaboration Fest

It’s almost that time of the year again! The time to celebrate the art of collaboration at the highly anticipated Collaboration Fest. Hosted by the Colorado Brewers Guild, this unique festival features local and national breweries coming together to collaborate on distinctly unique beers made specifically for the festival. As one of the more novel festival concepts in the country has continued to serve as one of the best and brightest beer events in the country where creativity knows no bounds — and this is the largest year yet, with 145 beers from 180 breweries.

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Event Preview | Feast Wilmington

Wilmington, North Carolina is launching a new food and drink festival this month to showcase and celebrate the region’s emergence as a top culinary destination. Feast Wilmington takes place March 22-24 at Live Oak Bank Pavilion.

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Collaborating for a Cause | Strawberry Arabesque

Like many of the other fundraising efforts conducted for Alex Kidd and his family following the announcement of his cancer diagnosis, this benefit from Phase Three Brewing took place during the summer of 2023. On June 22 the brewery announced their newest Ambassador-exclusive release, Strawberry Arabesque. However in an unexpected move, they also stated that they would be donating a portion of all the proceeds from bottle sales, draft pours and an in-person raffle to the GoFundMe set up for the Kidds.

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Guinness Goes Big with First-Ever St. Patrick’s Day Celebration at Chicago Open Gate Brewery

“Bartender – Guinness please?” It’s an actionable phrase that Guinness brewery ambassador Ryan Wagner says will be uttered more than 13 million times on St. Patrick’s Day weekend this year around the globe. And while the spectacle and celebration concentrated at Guinness’ St. James Gate brewery in Dublin, Ireland is the stuff of legends, local Chicago beer drinkers should get ready for a similar celebration fit for a city that treats St. Patrick’s Day with particular fervor.

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AleBlazers | Q&A with Ralph Marion (@beeredblackman)

Our AleBlazers series identifies and spotlights folks throughout the craft beer industry who bring a positive light and inclusion to craft beer as a whole.

If you’ve ever stopped in Birmingham, Alabama, there’s a good chance you recognize Ralph Marion, also known as @beeredblackman. You’ve probably seen him behind the bar or welcoming you as you came through the door at Hop City. Hell, you might have been around long enough to have seen him at J. Clyde’s. There’s a good chance it could have been at one of the taprooms around town, too. He sat down with PorchDrinking to talk about Birmingham, beer and inclusivity in the industry. Read More

New Ownership Takes Over Resolute Brewing Company

Resolute Brewing Company, a brewery with locations in Centennial and Arvada, is changing ownership. “We are thrilled to embark on this journey as the new owners of Resolute Brewing Company,” said Jacob Wells, a new owner of Resolute. “Resolute has established itself as a cornerstone of the community, and we are committed to upholding its values while infusing fresh energy and creativity into the brewery and taprooms. We’ve been big fans of Resolute for a long time and can’t wait to get started.”

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Colorado’s Best Saisons Blind Tasting Presented by On Tap Credit Union

Back with another edition, in fact, the tenth edition(!), of our Blind Tasting Series. For this iteration, our Blind Tasting focused on trying to find the best Saisons made by Colorado breweries. Altogether, 16 beers from 16 Colorado breweries were submitted. In the end, two took home Honorable Mention awards, two scored Top Marks, and one was crowned Best In Show.

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Ultimate 6er | The 96th Academy Awards

2023 has one of the best rosters of Best Picture nominees in recent memory. From festival favorites to big blockbusters; I’ve been seeing nearly every film in this category appear in every critic’s Top 10. Even after the Academy Awards ceremony, I’m hoping that people remember how these films defined last year through their top tier artisanship.

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Go Big Or Go Home: Can Smaller Producers Recreate 19.2 Ounces of Success?

“Where’s your bomber section?” — said no Millennial or Gen Z craft beer shopper ever in the past four years. So is the once revered 22-ounce craft beer bomber dead? In short, not really. Most consumers can find plenty of high-end, special release large format bottles from a multitude of brewers on shelves nationwide. But the format of choice, and one of the fastest growing package segments in the alcoholic beverage space, is now the 19.2-ounce single serve can, a.k.a. the stovepipe. And growth is not slowing down any time soon. The 19.2-ounce can accounts for more than 92% of craft sales in the convenience channel according to Circana, a leading industry data aggregation firm, which adds up to about $221 million in sales dollars. In a mid-year 2023 report from Bump Williams Consulting, the 19.2-ounce can was the top growth contributor to incremental dollar sales in the single serve category (Brewbound, August 2023).

So how did we get here? The simple beer can — once disregarded as a sign of lower quality has now become the shining star of the craft beer industry. The concept of single serve, once touted as the beverage that you hide in a brown paper bag is now trending in every corner of the Off Premise market. Something in our consumer base has shifted and with that comes questions from smaller producers about whether or not they should jump on the trend wagon.

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Colorado Beer Beat | Bi-Weekly Beer Release Guide 3/7

Welcome to the Colorado Beer Beat, a bi-weekly roundup of all of the new can releases around the state. From Denver to Grand Junction and everywhere in between, we have you covered. Be sure to check back on Thursdays (usually!) to find out what’s new in the Colorado beer scene.

As March gets going and we start approaching the spring season, one thing is for certain: West Coast IPAs are the big thing you’ll be seeing early this year. It seems like every brewery is breaking out a classic West Coast style to add in to their offerings. In an ever changing world of craft beer, the big question is what style are we going to see popping up everywhere next?

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Regulation Rollercoaster: Chasing compromise between small brewers and wholesalers

With almost 10,000 operating craft breweries in the United States vying for customer dollars and craft beer sales down about 2% coming out of 2023 (IWSR, January 2024), the need for regulatory reform for small brewers has become more important than ever. 
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Phase Three Brewing | Arabesque & Minutiae Reserve 2024

A few weeks ago, those who follow Phase Three Brewing were given a heads up to mark their calendars for a huge release to start out the month of March. Reserve Weekend 2024 celebrated a very special release of two of Phase Three’s most highly sought after beers: Arabesque and Minutiae. PorchDrinking is here to give you all some early insight into these exciting new reserve beers, including an exclusive review of each of these high-gravity beasts.

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Eight & Sand Beer Co. | Gabagool Italian Pilsner

“Gabagool? Over here!”

Eight & Sand Beer Co. has risen to become the face of brewing in Woodbury, New Jersey, since its founding in 2016. Named after a common railroad phrase meaning “quick and safe travels,” where Notch 8 was the quickest setting on certain trains and sand was used to prevent track slippages, Eight & Sand has embraced its New Jersey heritage.

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