The Brew Tasting Extravaganza

So, I did tell you that my weekend was really productive.  I honestly can’t begin to tell you how incredibly productive it was!

I had an interview for a new job, and I got it.  So I now work in a bakery in addition to my department store working.  I’m pretty excited and wish me luck.  The bakery is delicious, so I may end up eating a lot of food.  We’ll see.  And I think the manager already likes me a great deal, so I am so so excited.  I’ll let you all know how it goes once I start.

I also spent a lot of this weekend working on number fifteen on my twenty-four before twenty-four list.  I didn’t actually get to go on the tours because I only know my schedule two weeks in advance and at least one of these breweries books months in advance for their weekend tours.  The others, we just didn’t get an early enough start to be there in time for the tours.  But, we’ll for sure be going back some time in the summer before I leave for my summer job, so I should be able to give you a full report then.

However, the point of going on the brewery tours is less to tour the breweries and more to taste the beer.  So even though it’s not as exciting as doing the tour too, we did go to a few brewery tastings.  So while it’s not the full-fledged tour/tasting, I think just doing the tastings counts in the spirit of number fifteen on the list, which is to learn to appreciate beer, even if I don’t like it.

Anyway, let me tell you about my weekend.  My friends Seth and Vinny accompanied me, along with two of Seth’s friends in the area.

We started off at New Belgium.  You only get four tasting tokens if you’re just stopping by (you get six for the tour), but four was great, because if you’re not a beer aficionado, like me, then you’ll be able to get your feet wet without trying one too many you don’t like.

The tasting room here was so crowded.  It’s one of the more popular (and larger) breweries, in my understanding.  We did find a pocket in which we could chat, Seth and Vinny could recommend me beers, and I could write postcards.

That was pretty awesome.  They have postcards you can write on there and then they’ll send them for you.  I wrote one to Shawn because I thought he would appreciate it and I also wrote one to Steph because we do things like that all the time.  I don’t think I’ve told you all about our postcard collection.  I’ll have to do that at some point.

So, on to the beers!

The first beer that Seth and Vinny recommended to me was Mothership Wit, an organic wheat beer.  It was really tasty.  It had a hint of orange.  It reminded me a lot of Avery’s White Rascal (which Shawn loves), only less yeasty.

Next, the boys recommended Trippel, a Belgian style ale.  It wasn’t as good as the Mothership, but definitely something I would drink again over other beers I tried that day.

After that, it was getting close to the time we wanted to leave and head to the next brewery, so I double fisted my next two beers, which were Sunshine Wheat and Sahti Ale.  Sunshine was pretty good, not as good as the Mothership, but something I would get again.  The Sahti was interesting.  Almost pomegranate tasting.

All things considered, the beers at New Belgium were great recommendations and I enjoyed them a great deal.  Here are some pictures.

Mothership Wit

Trippel

Sunshine Wheat and Sahti Ale

 

So the next brewery was ODell.  We missed the tours here simply due to timing.  The tasting room was pretty busy and we had to sit outside.  It had been a pretty nice day up until this point, but it was getting a bit chilly.  We did get to enjoy a Classic Pilot flight and a Co-Pilot flight (so punny), so there were beers to be had.  I forget how much each flight and the pint cost, but it was $17 total, so not as free as New Belgium.  I don’t remember the names of all of them, but I can tell you my opinion.  Here’s a photo.

 

Classic Pilot and Co-Pilot

 

From left to right on pilots: (Classic)  Pretty good, pretty good, okay, gross, eh, gross and (Co) gross, gross, pretty good, gross, gross, gross.  And the big glass was interesting.  Not great, but not bad, but not quite okay.  I don’t know what to tell you about it.

 

And the last brewery of the day was the Fort Collins Brewery.  This was probably the most spacious tasting area of the three and only $5 per flight, so that was nice.  We got both flights they had here and I don’t remember the names again, because I suck at that, apparently, but I am still happy to tell you my opinion.  Here’s a photo.

 

Fort Collins Brewery

 

The back flight is the seasonal brews (left to right):  gross, eh, pretty good, gross, okay

The front flight is full-time brews (left to right):  okay, pretty good, okay, okay, tasted like BBQ (what?), eh, gross

And yup, that’s pretty much my brew tasting experience.  I had a lot of fun, other than being the only girl in the group, but that’s neither here nor there for the actual tastings.

Let’s see where our next brew tours take us.  And, like I said, I know we’ll definitely be back for these ones some time in early summer, so there’s at least that.