Friday Night Pints

Saturday Afternoon at a Beer Fest Edition

Beer festivals are a great way to taste some new, different, and sometimes even unique beers offered just for that one day. They can also be a great opportunity to talk with brewers and learn more about some of the smaller breweries that maybe don’t make it to the supermarket or even our local bottle shops. For me, at least over the last decade or so, beer festivals were, frankly, a pain in the ass. Each vendor has their own set of rules and regulations, each distributor takes ownership of different aspects of the event and people usually just get hammered. Wasted. Blatto’d. On at least one occasion (that I can think of) a guy pee’d himself, covered his pee pants with his weird Peter Pan hat and then walked back to our tent for another round. You could say I have a checkered past with these things.

All that is to say that last weekend’s Shade City Brew Fest, put on by our good friends at Lost Grove and the Idaho Botanical Gardens, was an absolute delight! For starters, I didn’t have to buy an overpriced cup. This has been a fest trend for about six or seven years now that I absolutely loathe. Shade City was like “bring your own cup,” and we did! I had my trusty Yeti tumbler. My friend, Michael, had an old Alefort metal mug, I noticed a great variety of coffee cups and tumblers and it was quite charming. Saw some friends in the business, some friends not in the business, and was able to sample about fifteen beers from a variety of breweries. It didn’t hurt that the day was perfect, 70 degrees, no wind, and everybody was dressed in polyester. Shout out to Michael Teeter for the invite and Stein for the passes … much appreciated. Let’s get to some of the highlights from that fest and some other beers that came out this week. Apologies for the lack of pictures, I’ll do better next time. Without further ado, this week’s Friday Night Pints.

Bear Island Cucum-Bear Kolsch

I was about six steps into the fest when none other than Bear Island Beth (literally) grabbed me and asked if I had been to her booth yet. It turned out that we had not, but were heading in that direction. She tells me that I must (hard eye contact) try this year’s Cucum-Bear Kolsch and that I would love it. I told her that cucumber is not my favorite flavor, but she insisted and here we are.

Pours sort of a straw color with a thin white head. Cucumber on the nose with a little bit of German yeast phenols (banana being the main component there) and a touch of malty sweetness. I will say that I quite enjoyed this beer! You get the cucumber up front with a smooth malty finish. The cucumber did not overpower the beer and it turned out to be a very refreshing start to our day. 5% and 15’ish IBU. On tap at Bear Island and around town.

Mother Earth Spice Cabinet Belgian-Style Ale

Is it spicy Belgian-style beer season? Spring is typically when you see your Saisons, Dubbels, and such but I was pleasantly surprised to find not one, but two locally made spiced saisons out there this week. The first comes from Mother Earth, who emptied out the whole spice cabinet for this one. Brewed with pink peppercorns, chamomile, and just about every other spice you can think of (coriander, black pepper, and possibly curry leaves), the sweetness of the base saison beer really mellows this spice bomb out. In the end you get a tasty and refreshing ode to spring and a beer I would happily go back and revisit. 7% 15 IBU. Found on tap at Mother Earth and possibly around town.

Sockeye Cairo Saison

Oooh, looks like somebody made a trip out to The Namptons! It is always a pleasure to visit my buddies Heather and Ryan at Prefunk and if you haven’t been, make up an excuse to go out there (I was “picking up internet stuff”) and hit up the center of The Namptons in beautiful downtown.

I asked Ryan for the new stuff and he pointed me towards Sockeye’s own spice bomb, Cairo Saison. This Belgian-style saison was brewed with ancient grains and saffron. Ancient grains hopefully being the name commonly used to represent farro, barley, couscous, and whatever else and not just some really old bags of Rahr 2-Row malt left in the corner somewhere. Cairo pours toffee colored with a thin white head. Subtly spiced. Good amount of pepper, saffron comes off as kind of smoky. The flavor is dynamic with notes of smoky saffron, black pepper, coriander, and a good amount of sweetness from the beer to balance things out. The ancient grains bring a good depth of body to this beer, which carries the saffron nicely. This is a spring sipper for sure. 5.6% 20 IBU. On tap at Prefunk and all over town.

Melvin She Lime Pie Pale Ale

When in The Namptons, one simply does not have one beer and split. It’s a pretty long drive, so (safely, of course), plan for two. My second comes from Melvin, recently purchased by our friends at Road House, and this beer tells me that the brewers at Road House are going to continue to brew Melvin beers at Melvin, which is a good thing! This funky pale pours hazy yellow with a thin white head that sticks nicely to the glass. Bubbly. Lime, coconut, and graham cracker on the nose with a little sweetness. Possibly lacto. Key lime pie comes through nicely on the palate with lingering lime zest. Very refreshing, kind of weird and oddly reminiscent of Shades Key Lime Pie sour. It’s nice to try a new Melvin and this one did not dissapoint. 5% 20 IBU. Found on tap at Prefunk.

Highpoint Cider Alpenglow

While in The Namptons, one must take advantage of wary travellers that might come in for a chat and a pint. One such traveller, let’s call him Alex Perez from Highpoint Ciders, came in off the dusty trail (there was construction) and offered us his wares. He sat on down and treated us to four of his tasty ciders and this one caught not only my eye (look at that natural color), but my taste buds as well. One day, when I start doing interviews in this space, I’ll sit down with Alex because the Highpoint story is really interesting and they make some awesome ciders. But, I digress.

Alpenglow pours this really pretty pinkish color with a thin white head that quickly dissipates back into the cider. “Brewed” with raspberry, mint, and lime, you get the raspberry and mint on the nose right away, but it doesn’t overwhelm your senses. The flavors on the tongue are very complementary with the lime taming the sweetness of the raspberry and apple cider. The mint sort of acts as a bittering hop here and rounds it all back up. A great tasting cider! 6%. In 12oz cans and on tap all over town.

Bert’s Brewing 16oz Cans

For those that haven’t tried Bert’s Brewing yet, good news, you won’t have to trek all the away to Garden City to sample them because they are coming to you in these bright and handsome 16oz cans. They are currently offering four “cores,” that include their amazing Pacific Coast Hopway IPA, Vaquero Mexican Lager, Bert’s Pils, and Sailor Dry-Hopped Lager. I reviewed these beers back in, I want to say January, so check out that column for full reviews and pick these bad boys up at bottle shops around town.