2nd Shift Brewing | Chateau La Douchebag

We have all seen them lining up outside a brewery as early as 6 a.m. — or sometimes the night before — to ensure they can be the first to claim their coveted release before anyone else and sometimes even flip the bottle on the secondary market. Yes, the rare beer seekers are out there, lurking in almost every brewery and bottle shop just waiting for that whale of a beer to drop.

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Central State Brewing | Table Rustic Blonde Ale

January 2021 is here. Finally.

A time-honored tradition among many craft-beer drinkers every January is Dryanuary or, a month without alcohol. But this January, craft breweries need our help more than ever. And, let’s face it, we all need a beer more than ever. So what’s a good compromise between cutting out drinking altogether for a month and giving craft breweries our support? Let’s go with drinking more low-ABV beers. If you indulged in a lot of high-ABV beers over the holidays like we did, it’s time to cleanse the palate anyway.

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Indulgent Beer Series | Choc Beer Co. Wild Brew Spelt Saison

Sometimes you need a beer, and sometimes you need to treat yourself to something special. This Wild Brew Spelt Saison, the result of a 2013 collab between Oklahoma’s Choc Beer … Read More

Birds Fly South | Virtual Mystery Bag Bottle Share

As we all know, breweries have been affected by the current pandemic that has swept our towns and cities across the country. Many local breweries have had to quickly evolve and adapt to the changing landscape, closing taprooms and offering to-go beer purchases.

A standout during these trying times is Birds Fly South in Greenville, SC. The booming “funk first” brewery’s 2020 plans came to a screeching halt, but that didn’t stop them from finding fun ways to serve up their award-winning beer. In order to evolve, shift and engage their community, the brewery has developed a series of virtual beer events to keep people connected in new ways, pioneering how we can all enjoy beer together. Read More

Birds Fly South Ale Project | Rustic Sunday

What’s better on a Sunday afternoon than kicking back with a craft beer? This rye farmhouse ale by Birds Fly South will make you wish that every day was a “Rustic Sunday.” Read on to discover what makes this beer so approachable, crisp, and tart, and why it calls for soaking in every moment on laid back, lazy afternoons. Read More

Ardent Craft Ales | Brett IPA

Richmond, VA is known to some as a mecca for craft beer in the state for lovers. Ardent Craft Ales was originally started as a cooperative of homebrewers who wanted to get out of their kitchen and brew a little more seriously. To do so, they rented out a garage with a half-barrel system and started brewing every Sunday in said garage located in the Churchill region in the eastern side of the city.

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Troegs Independent Brewing | Apricot Farmette

Hershey, Pennsylvania, is more than just The Sweetest Place on Earth! Beyond the chocolate bars, the town is also home to the 27^th largest craft brewery in the U.S. based on beer sales volume. This brewery, Troegs Independent Brewing, has been around since the late nineties. Throughout the years, they have created a variety of beers including lip-puckering wild ales like Apricot Farmette. Read More

Charleville Brewing Company | Amelie

I’ve declared that my Summer of Beer 2019 will include a return to some styles that have sort of fallen off my beer list, namely Hefeweizens and Witbier.  Witbiers are Belgian-style ales that are usually unfiltered which gives them a pale and cloudy hue on the pour. They are usually spiced with a fruit such as coriander or orange peel, and are both crisp and wheaty on the tongue.

I find them to be refreshing with an orange slice, but some people don’t care for the extra fruit.

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Steel Bender Brewyard | Cinderella Story

Los Ranchos de Albuquerque in New Mexico is a small village that maintains the charm of rural living despite being surrounded by the city of Albuquerque. Steel Bender Brewyard is the first licensed (and only) brewery in the village and it has positioned itself as a community gathering place for a variety of occasions including ordinary after-work happy hours and celebratory milestones from baby showers to retirement. Using seasonal fruits from local orchards for their barrel program and creating “from scratch” pub fare in their full kitchen, there are many reasons why Steel Bender Brewyard should be added to your next beer journey in New Mexico.

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Cellar West Artisan Ales | Sapience

I know, I know. We’re post-Labor Day, school has started and the pumpkin ales and warm toasty porters are hitting the shelves. But as I sit here in my kitchen with the windows thrown wide, trying to tempt the air to somehow drop below 80, I just can’t bring myself to go there yet.

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Big Boss | Oak-Aged “Strange Cargo” Trio

We at PorchDrinking are no strangers to Big Boss. They’re one of Raleigh’s best and brightest breweries. But we are strangers to their new oak-aged “Strange Cargo” trio. At least we were, until now. Read More

Odell Brewing | Elephunk Imperial Wild IPA

ABV: 9.9% | IBU: 33

Funky doesn’t begin to describe Odell Brewing Elephunk Imperial Wild IPA. This delicious boozy palette puncher is indeed a wild ride. It’s weird. It’s complex. It’s funky with a “p-h.” Yep, it’s PHunky.
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Brewery Showcase | Stickman Brews

American craft beer is like the history of the country itself. As a nation of immigrants, our brewers borrow their techniques from many different traditions, tweaking, combining and refining them into something uniquely american. Now, try imagining that we had a centuries old heritage of farmhouse brewing like Belgium. What impact would that have had on modern craft beer? Stickman Brews‘ mission is to find an answer that very question.
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Inside the Tank | Stickman Brews’ Ethan Buckman

How would craft beer have evolved in America if we had a centuries-old farmhouse brewing tradition like Belgium? Head brewer and co-founder of Stickman Brews, Ethan Buckman, focuses his creativity on creating beers that could have existed in this alternate brewing history. He brews hop-forward American-style ales, which he then ferments farmhouse-style with different strains of Brettanomyces and wild yeasts in open-top fermenters. The resulting beers blur style guidelines in exciting new ways. Ethan doesn’t like to assign styles to his brews because he doesn’t feel there are any regularly used styles that accurately describe what he is trying to create.

He is probably right.

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Black Raven Brewing Co. | Raven de Garde

Belgian Style Pale Ale 2014 and 2015 Vintages 7.4% ABV

In spite of, or maybe because of, the number of great beers available in Washington, I usually don’t know until … Read More

Funkwerks | Paisley Belgian-Style Brett Saison

ABV: 7%

Paisley is a beer from Funkwerks’ experimental series, packaged in a bright Paisley-decorated bottle that could have come from Pier 1 Imports rather than the liquor store. We were excited to try our first Funkwerks wild ale and popped it open with some anticipation. The beer poured into the glass a hazy golden orange color with delicate lacing. At first whiff there was a strong barnyard smell that immediately transitioned to tropical flavors including apricot, cherry, and spicy passion fruit aided by the Funkwerks’ house yeast strain. Read More

Evil Twin/Other Half Brewing | Beat It, Nerd!

ABV: 6.66%

While I was taking on Shredder as Donatello, and then later waiting in line for a chance at the original Pac-Man, I found myself accurately dubbed both gaming AND beer nerd in the dark, cavernous room on 24th street known as Barcade. Although positioned as a provider of hard-to-find arcade treasures, its extensive and ever changing craft beer list also brings in the highly obsessed brewery-type-folk looking to get their local fix.

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New Belgium Brewing | Lips of Faith: Wild² Dubbel

ABV: 8%
IBU: 30

As one might expect from the name, New Belgium Brewing has a long-standing reputation built on producing solid Belgian-style beers including their Abbey ale, Trippel, and even Fat Tire, a ubiquitous brew which undoubtedly marked the beginning of many a casual beer drinker’s insobrietous journey to certified beer geek. As such, I was excited to find Wild² Dubbel, a new entry in their Lips of Faith series in a local bottle shop. What makes this dubbel wild? Well, it’s brewed with Schisandra berries, also known as the “five taste fruit” and finished with Brettanomyces. The five flavors promised by the berry are sour, sweet, salty, bitter, and spicy. Brett is something I generally enjoy, but not being familiar with Schisandra, I wasn’t sure what to expect as I opened the bottle.

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TRVE Brewing – Eastern Candle

TRVE Brewing – Eastern Candle (Batch #2)
ABV: 6.5%
Currently listening to: Absu – Never Blow Out the Eastern Candle

“So take thy hand and join me for elixir,
And we shall ride the portentous serpent tonight.”

In honor of the 20th anniversary of their second album, “The Sun Of Tiphareth,” TRVE Brewing has released the first of four ales dedicated to the mythological occult metal act, ABSU.

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Crooked Stave – Wild Wild Brett Violet aged with Passion Fruit

It’s easy to see why Crooked Stave has built such a huge following in such a short amount of time. Their motto “Cultured in Yeast” really tells the story, as they are known for brewing beer almost exclusively with unique and wild yeast strains. Many of their beers are fermented, at least in part, by wild strains of Brettanomyces. Other, more coveted beers, are barrel aged with souring bacteria to produce mouth-watering libations. From coast-to-coast, people are seeking out Crooked Stave’s beers and their specialty bottle release beers may as well be trade gold. Of the specialty releases, the Wild Wild Brett series of beers is the granddaddy of them all. So when the unexpecting passer-by (me) shows up at the taproom on a random Sunday night before picking up a friend from the airport and sees the chalk-board sign that reads “Wild Wild Brett Violet aged with Passion Fruit”, the bartender knew exactly what I wanted when my response to “What will you have to drink?” was “Is that some kind of joke?” Read More