craft beers
San Diego Beer Week VIP Preview Party Photos
These photos were taken Thursday evening at Stone Brewing World Bistro and Gardens at Liberty Station, where the San Diego Brewers Guild presented a VIP preview of the 11th Annual San Diego Beer Week which will be held November 1-10.
The event began with a free Happy Hour consisting of appetizers from the Stone Brewing World Bistro kitchen, and beers from Stone Brewing, Amplified Ale Works, Burgeon Beer Company, North Park Beer Company, Second Chance Beer Company, and Thorn Brewing. There was also wine and sodas for those that didn’t want beer.
After an hour and a half of networking, eating and drinking on one of Liberty Station’s multiple patios, we were guided inside for a short presentation explaining why we were all there … other than the opportunity to network, eat, and drink some of San Diego’s craft beers. Continue reading
Cosmic Brewery Enters Soft Open Phase
The long awaited opening of Torrance’s newest production brewery, Cosmic Brewery, home of Cosmic Ales, is now a reality as they opened their tasting room to the public this past weekend. I only had a short window of opportunity to visit on Saturday evening but for making a last minute announcement on Friday that they would be open Saturday, the place was packed.
As you can see by my photos, as I watched the build-out of the brewery I never got any photos of the future tasting room. Owner Christopher Briles always kept that close to the vest and he did not want anyone to see it until it was ready. When it was revealed Saturday one had to admit, the cosmic theme is pretty cool.
The tap system is different than any tasting room I have visited in that you pour your own beer and are charged according to how much you pour. If you recall my article about zpizza a couple months ago, it is the same concept. You purchase a card that you insert on the tap, and you pour your beer. I did not play with it Saturday, but I will probably check it out this weekend. Continue reading
A Visit to zpizza Tap Room at LAX
A couple of weeks ago, while attending the Endless Rant Release Party at King Harbor Brewing I was approached by a young woman that recognized me from this site and various social media platforms. In the course of our conversation she informed me that she and her husband had recently opened a pizza place by Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) and they had a craft beer tap list that they were pretty proud of. She pointed out her husband and mentioned that he was a graduate of El Segundo High School. I figured he had to be in his early 30’s so I mentioned that he probably knew one or both of my kids since they both graduated from there, and El Segundo is a pretty tight-knit community. We decided to find out, and went over to him for introductions.
She introduced me to her husband, Jason Imhoff, and almost immediately after mentioning my son’s name Imhoff began speaking about him with a lot of respect. That is an inside tip; if you want to get on my good side, speak highly of my kids.
Imhoff told me a little about his business, zpizza Tap Room, and invited me to please come by to check them out. My regular readers know that pizza is not exactly a draw for me, but I told them I would stop by the next time I was in the neighborhood. A day or two later I was talking with my son and asked him if he remembered Jason Imhoff. Like Imhoff had done with him, my son had nothing but good things to say about Imhoff; at that point I decided I would not wait until I was in the neighborhood, but would make a special trip out there. This article and the photos are from my visit there last Wednesday afternoon. Continue reading
Smog City & El Segundo Brewing Birthday Bash Photos
These photos were taken Saturday, when Smog City Brewing in Torrance and El Segundo Brewing in El Segundo combined forces to celebrate Smog City’s third and El Segundo’s fifth anniversaries.
I started the morning off at the VIP session of Smog City’s festivities. They had opened up the cellar room that connects directly to the south of the main tasting room where they added two beer stations. One had their sours, like Cuddlebug, Snugglebug and Jason’s now famous Cuddle Paloma; and a citrus station where you would find Bloody Optimist, Mexican Vacation and Kumquat Saison. The main taproom had an additional Brewers Station back in the brewhouse where you would find brews like Bourbon O.E., Infinite Wishes and The Nothing. The Old Fashioned O.E. made its return from last year; I was glad Tanya got one so I could taste it.
The group was limited to 200 people which might sound like a lot for the tasting room, but with the cellar room being opened up, it was quite comfortable and the Smog City staff was keeping up handily with any lines that formed. Continue reading
Bottle List for Chad’s Rare Beer Tasting Released
As I announced last week, local craft beer hoarder Chad Hazen, in conjunction with King Harbor Brewing Company and Steinhaus Restaurant and Beerhall at Alpine Village, will be holding his third in a series of rare craft beer tastings with 90% of the proceeds going to benefit the Richstone Family Center in Hawthorne.
I have mentioned numerous times that Hazen’s prior events have been better than any beer festival I have attended to date; now I have obtained a list of the beers that will be there so you can see for yourself. Just take a look at Chad’s Beer Cellar Bottle List Continue reading
Chad’s Beer Cellar Fundraiser May 7, 2016
Hundreds of rare beers at Chad’s Beer Cellar Fundraiser
Ever since last December, I have been telling anyone that would listen that this event was coming up and it is not one to be missed. Actually, what I have been telling people is that this bottle share is better than the Firestone Invitational when it comes to the number of available beers and there are no lines since ticket sales are limited to 100 attendees!
The first of the bottle shares was in December of 2014 when local craft beer aficionado and beer hoarder Chad Hazen decided he wanted to quit drinking beer for a year while he trained for a marathon. As he travels a lot for work he had built up quite a collection of craft beer and he felt it would be too much temptation to have all that beer around while he trained. He got together with King Harbor Brewing Company, he is one of the investors, and they decided they would have a bottle share benefiting Richstone Family Center. Instead of attendees bringing their own bottles, Hazen provided about 80 from his collection to be shared with the 50 attendees that purchased tickets. As you can see from the list of beers, it was an amazing time. Continue reading
Photos from Laughs By Volume III
These photos are from Laughs By Volume III, which was held Saturday afternoon at Honeypot LA (HNYPT) in downtown Los Angeles. There were probably 50 or 60 people in attendance that were treated to various beers from such breweries as Stone Brewing, Absolution Brewing, Four Sons, Mission Brewery, Smog City, Refuge Brewery, Anaheim Brewery, Telegraph Brewing, Pizza Port, Julian Hard Cider, 21st Amendment, The Lost Abbey, Victory Brewing, Oskar Blues, Ska Brewing, Brewery Ommegang, Boulevard Brewing, Maui Brewing, Double Mountain, Gentse Gruut and a host of others.
As Laughs By Volume is about the comedy as much as it is the beer, we were treated to about an hour of standup provided by Martin Montana, Daniel Storrow, Jeff Capri, Lance Paullin, Melissa Shoshahi, and Chad Shapiro. It was pretty obvious that the audience enjoyed the show as much as they did the craft beer. Continue reading
Photos of the 2nd Annual L.A. Local Craft Beer & Artisanal Food Fest
These photos were taken at the 2nd Annual L.A. Local Craft Beer & Artisanal Food Fest which was held at the Steinhaus at Alpine Village in Torrance on Saturday afternoon. The event featured 31 Los Angeles area craft breweries and maybe a dozen artisanal food vendors from the LA area.
L.A. Local provided the first opportunity for most of the attendees to try brews from several breweries that have opened within the last year like Scholb Premium Ales, Dry River Brewing, Brouwerij West, HopSaint, Iron Triangle, Mumford Brewing, State Brewing and Honest Abe. Other breweries in attendance included Three Weavers, Port Town, Smog City, Monkish, Phantom Carriage, The Dudes’, Claremont Craft Ales, Ohana, Enegren, California 101 Cider House, King Harbor, Strand, Absolution, MacLeod Ale Brewing and several others. Continue reading
Photos from the Scholb Premium Ales Ribbon Cutting
These photos were taken at the ribbon cutting for Torrance’s latest craft brewery, Scholb Premium Ales; which was held at the production brewery’s tasting room in Torrance on Friday afternoon. The Torrance Area Chamber of Commerce (TACC) ribbon cutting was attended by friends and family of the Schulz’s and Kolb’s as well as the City of Torrance Mayor Pat Furey and city council members Kurt Weideman, Heidi Ashcraft and Mike Griffiths along with many TACC representatives.
For their grand opening, Scholb introduced a couple new beers to their taps, bringing the number of brews currently available to eight. Today they offered their SoCal Blonde, Roll With It Brown, Cherry Wood Smoked Brown, Columbia Street Pale, Havanuther Session IPA, Dad’s IPA, Not Lyin’ Rye IPA and my current favorite, Bat Ray Red IPA. Continue reading
2nd Annual LA Local Craft Beer & Artisanal Food Fest Discount Code
Good beer, good, food, good people at LA Local Craft Beer Fest
This event will be pretty similar to their inaugural event in that all the beer and food will come from the Los Angeles area and you will get unlimited pours of beer and unlimited samplings. Just so there are no surprises, many of the food vendors make jams or sauces, so you get a spoonful. You are probably not going to fill up on the food, but there were some tasty items there. Continue reading
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