Category: breweries

Indeed Burr Grinder Coffee Ale Release

By on February 28, 2013in breweries, MN
burr grinder

burr grinder

As a coffee nerd and a beer nerd, this is one I’ve been waiting for for a bit. It’s no surprise that I like Indeed’s beer and when I heard that they were collaborating with Dogwood Coffee I knew I had to try this beer. If you’re not familiar, Dogwood is extremely well-received by local coffee geeks. You’ll have your chance to check out this brew next week at  Victory 44 on  Tuesday, March 5th starting at 5pm. According to indeed, they steeped 90-pounds of Guatemalan Finca Rosma coffee in the brew kettle before topping off the finished beer with 54-gallons of cold press.

I’ve consumed my fair share of Guatemalan coffee as of late and my mouth waters thinking about this one. Can’t wait to try it.

 

Summit Unchained No. 12, 100% Organic Ale

By on February 27, 2013in breweries
Summit 100% Organic Ale
Summit 100% Organic AleYesterday Summit Brewing Company formally announced the launch of the twelfth beer in their Unchained series, 100% Organic Ale. We first brought you news of this beer at the end of December when  the label was approved. What we missed, of course is that not only is this beer to be an organic beer, it’ll be Minnesota’s first 100% certified organic beer. This beer is brewer Gabe Smoley’s first Unchained creation and it will be available in draught and bottles the week of March 5.
Though organic beers hardly saturate the market, finding one or two isn’t difficult. In fact as far as we know, Flat Earth’s Angry Planet was (to our memory) Minnesota’s first packaged organic beer. As Gabe points out, though, “Most USDA certified organic beers on the market are about 95-99.9% organic because it is extremely difficult to find ingredients like organic yeast. This beer is made with 100% organic ingredients including malts, hops and yeast. I created my own certified organic yeast strain to do this, as there are virtually no organic strains available from laboratories.”

“This has been a challenge, but we enjoy those at Summit. Our company is full of innovators and I am excited to continue that tradition,” added Smoley. “The organic segment of the brewing industry is slowly growing and building steam. My hope is that by working with organic ingredients, we’ll learn some new, sustainable approaches to brewing and promote organic ingredients as a whole to the industry.”

Schell’s Noble Star Collection

By on February 26, 2013in breweries

Here’s the news that Jace at Schell’s has been threatening to share for the past couple of days. TL:DR – Schell’s is launching a line of specialty beers called the Noble Star Collection based on the Berliner Weiss style. What’s more, they’ll be using their remaining 30s era cypress wood aging tanks. I visited the brewery in 2006 or 2007 with the Minnesota Craft Brewers Guild and remember checking out these huge wood tanks and always thought they’d be a nice home for beer again someday.  Read on for the complete press release from Schell’s.

Here’s our 2008 article on the tank restoration.

More photos and complete details after the jump.

Schell’s Stag Series #7 Barleywine

By on February 21, 2013in breweries
Schell's Stag Series #7

Schell's Stag Series #7August Schell Brewing Co.releases the 7th beer in their Stag Series, an American Barleywine, next week. They brewed about 200bbl of the beer and each of the 100 bbl brews  required two separate mashes of over 6,000 pounds of malt.  They added 150 pounds of hop, fermented it with American Ale yeast and aged it for three+ months. Now it’s your turn. Schell’s says to expect “an amped up malt flavor, high alcohol (9.5% ABV) and heaping amounts of citrusy American hops.” Look for this beer starting February 28th.