craft beers
Taking a self-guided craft beer tour of California Highway 99
This particular self-guided craft beer tour will be a five (5) part series that covers a visit to 22 production breweries and brewpubs between Los Angeles and Santa Rosa. Let there be no mistake, there are far more than 22 craft breweries in that geographical area but we had a set amount of time. It was another of those “so many beers, so little time” situations. When I set out from LA there were three basic routes to take; I could drive Interstate 5 which is definitely the fastest route but the desert is a barren wasteland when it comes to craft beer. Taking US 101 up the coast takes significantly longer than I-5, but there are barrels and barrels of beer all along the way and if time is of any importance, there are far too many distractions. The third option and the one I opted to take was California Highway 99. When I opted to take 99 I knew the drive would take a little longer, but I also know that I would be able to find some craft beer along the way. This particular route was set going northbound, but you can easily reverse the map provided below and plug in your own starting point.
The locations visited on this leg of the self-guided craft beer tour were Lengthwise Brewing in Bakersfield, Full Circle Brewing Company in Fresno and Dust Bowl Brewing Company in Turlock. You can find the photos of the three locations at http://craftbeerguy.com/lengthwise-full-circle-dust-bowl-brewing/.
Photos of the Absolution Brewing Company Ribbon Cutting
On Friday afternoon Torrance’s newest production craft brewery, Absolution Brewing Company (ABC), held their official grand opening with a ribbon cutting ceremony. The ribbon cutting was attended by Mayor Frank Scotto and several members of the Torrance City Council as well as the Torrance Chamber of Commerce and assorted other officials. After the ribbon cutting and presentations the beer flowed with the addition of three new brews to the extensive Absolution Brewing tap list with their Holy Cow milk stout, Wanderin’ Possessed Easter Candy English porter and their Cloistered red ale. The Creative Eats food truck was on-hand with a special menu that was paired with the various ABC brews.
As you can tell from the photos, it was a very well attended event. In fact, I left after an hour or so and came back a couple hours later to what seemed to be an even larger group than before. It is probably safe to say that Absolution Brewing Company is a very welcome addition to the local craft beer scene. Absolution Brewing Company is located at 2878 Columbia Street in Torrance. Cheers! Continue reading
Taking a self-guided craft beer tour of the South Bay
Hi there, thanks for visiting. I just wanted to point out that this article was written in April of 2014, the South Bay only had seven craft breweries then. You can find a more current list of breweries at http://craftbeerguy.com/list-all-south-bay-breweries/ (it was written December 2016).
Cheers!
I am a firm believer that if one person suggests something, there is a good chance that dozens of others are thinking the same thing. Since I have had many people tell me that I should include maps of the craft brewery tours I write about, I have decided to add a new feature, maps of the various breweries and their relationship to each other. I have decided to use MapQuest since they allow you to plug in your starting point; Google Maps seems to eliminated that feature, so we will use MapQuest until something better comes along.
These maps will be set up to show the easiest way to visit each of the breweries visited and will usually form a circular pattern so you are not bouncing around from one end of town to another and back again. I am beginning with the South Bay area of Southern California for a couple reasons. The first, and most logical, is because that is where I live. The second being that there has been such an explosion of microbreweries around here that I know people from other areas would like to know the easiest way to see all that the South Bay offers. Whenever possible, these tours will begin with one freeway close location and end with another freeway close destination. If you are a first time visitor to any of these locations I recommend a purchasing a flight so you can sample what each brewery offers.
Business & Beer returns to Monkish Brewing Company
Thursday evening, April 10, the business networking group Business & Beer returned to Torrance production brewery, Monkish Brewing Company. Monkish Brewing is the South Bay’s source for fresh Belgian-styled ales of which there were 13 available to us last night. There was a nice group of people that at least stopped by for a while to say hello and join the large group of Monkish Brewing fans that were in attendance. Vella Pizza was there with their mobile brick oven; for the first time that I recall, they actually sold out of pizzas.
If you live or do business in the South Bay and enjoy craft beers and networking you might want to consider checking out the Business & Beer networking group. It is an informal networking group that meets at a different craft beer tasting room or brewpub in the South Bay area on the second Thursday of every month. Rapidly approaching their two year anniversary the group has built solid business relationships for some and is constantly putting possible business connections together. There are no dues and no mandatory meetings; just come down and join the group. Everyone is friendly and a fan of good beer so you know you will have at least a couple things in common with everyone there. You can find the schedule of upcoming meetings on the BusinessNBeer.com website or by following them on Facebook. The next gathering will be May 8 at Smog Brewing Company in Torrance. Cheers! Continue reading
A visit to the Alpine Beer Company Brewpub
When we left Arizona and headed back home I programmed a slight detour into my car’s GPS system as we took the long way home and headed to Alpine Beer Company, in Alpine, California. As you will likely notice, the photos in this gallery were taken over the course of two separate visits to the Alpine Beer Company brewpub. The first time I went there was last year when I was returning from a trade show, the experience was fun enough that I made a second 100+ mile detour to return there last week.
My first experience that I recall trying an Alpine Beer Company beer was at a bottle share in 2012 when someone brought a growler of Nelson IPA. I was so impressed that whenever I am anywhere close to Alpine, CA I do what I can to go to the source. As fate would have it, both times that I have gone there it has been a Sunday which means the brewery itself is closed. “Settling” for the brewpub is hardly a bad thing as their food, home-style barbecue, is pretty good if you like barbecue but the beer is what is my draw. While I am always pretty vocal about “Top 10” lists and how they are pretty useless when it comes to beer; I will admit that I do look at them once in a while. In my opinion, a Top 10 IPA list that ignores Alpine Beer Company just confirms that my general opinion of Top 10 lists is dead on.
Since it was getting a little late in the day we did not have the time to sample all 10 beers that they had available that day, but we did order a brisket plate and a small flight consisting of the McIlhenney’s Irish Red, Captain Stout, Pure Hoppiness IPA and an Odin’s Raven Imperial Stout. While the Pure Hoppiness was naturally my favorite, all four were very solid brews and the Odin’s Raven was particularly delicious. The downside of the brewpub is that they do not do growler fills, so we grabbed several bottles to bring home. Continue reading
Walowski retains title at Smog City Battle of the Cask – Part 2
Saturday afternoon, Torrance production brewery Smog City Brewing held their second Battle of the Cask at their tasting room. Initially the competition was to be between the six Smog City employees, with each of them making their own little tweaks to the Amarilla Gorilla IPA that all used as the base for their cask recipes. As sometimes happens during fermentation, a couple of the casks “exploded” so they had to be disqualified. Luckily, they were able to put them on tap so we could at least try them. They were both amazing.
Anyway, we had five casks to sample and I have to say, this was a really tough decision and that was reflected in the final tally which was a mere five votes between the first and second place choices. Assistant brewer Chris Walowski, who won the Battle of the Casks in December, wowed the crowd again Saturday with his recipe consisting of Merlot Concentrate, Mosaic and Simcoe hops; narrowly edging out Smog City Brewing co-owner, Laurie Porter’s Mango and Muscat Oolong Tea, Peach Puree and Simcoe hops recipe. This made Walowski the undefeated holder of the coveted Budweiser Belt. All the entries were very good and I look forward to the third Battle of the Cask.
By the way, Smog City Brewing Company will be holding their first anniversary party on Saturday, May 17 from 12:00 PM – 8:00 PM. They will be releasing another new beer and they will have their first bottle release. You know there will be more surprises as the date draws closer, but you should probably mark it on your calendars. Cheers! Continue reading
Craft beer in the Phoenix, AZ area
When I left off, we had visited Coachella Valley Brewing and La Quinta Brewing in the Inland Empire and began our drive to Arizona. Unfortunately, there were not a lot of options available to us between the Palm Springs area and our final destination, Tempe. Since it was a Wednesday afternoon there were some breweries that were open in the Phoenix area but most would be closed before we arrived; besides, we needed food as well so a brewpub would be the preferred choice or a gastropub if no brewpubs were available.
Tanya got online with her iPhone and discovered that SunUp Brewing, a brewpub in Phoenix, would be open so I set our GPS for Camelback Road. SunUp Brewing has a fairly wide food selection, primarily made up of the kinds of foods you would expect to find in the Southwest like nachos and chili, but also offering several salads, sandwiches and burgers. I left the food choice up to Tanya which resulted in our having a spinach salad, some chili and peach cobbler. The salad and chili were good, but the peaches were a little crunchy. But I was there for the beer. Our server, Emily, provided us with a flight of all nine of the brews they had on tap that night. We started with their Horizon Hefeweizen and Light Rail Cream Ale which were both solid but a little light for me, although the cloves and banana flavor of the hefeweizen were nice. The Stinger Pale Ale, Amber, Trooper IPA, Amber (w/ Cascade), Falcon Red, Vanilla Porter and Coffee Oatmeal Stout were more my style and quite enjoyable. All of their beers could qualify as session beers, so feel free to order a flight or a couple pints; you should be able to walk a straight line later. SunUp Brewing is located at 322 E. Camelback Road in Phoenix. Continue reading
New breweries in the Inland Empire
Last week I made my annual pilgrimage to Tempe, AZ. For the past couple of years we made it a habit to leave the night before my scheduled arrival date and always found myself at Babe’s BBQ & Brewhouse in Rancho Mirage because they were the only place open by the time we got in the area. While they have a nice selection of in-house brewed beers, decent food and amazing peach pie, this year I wanted to try something new; and I just knew that there had to be a couple new production breweries in the Palm Springs area. As I am inclined to do, I asked my Facebook followers if they had any suggestions; once again they did not let me down.
The first location I was directed to was Coachella Valley Brewing Company in Thousand Palms, a production brewery that has been in business about six months. To be honest, I had planned to leave town a little earlier than I did so I could spend more time at my destinations, but fate was not on my side. Add to that an extreme dust storm that literally brought traffic to a dead stop on I-10 and I was definitely running behind. When we arrived at Coachella Valley Brewing the sand in the air was so bad that I had concerns taking my camera out of the car; it was pretty nasty.
Once we got in I was pretty impressed; the place is massive. When I heard they were only six months old I was even more impressed. They advertise that free tours come with every pint purchased but the beertender appeared to be the only one on duty so I settled for taking a few photos of their brew house and sampling a flight. They had about 12 different options available on the day we were there. Our flight consisted of their Desert Swarm, a witbier featuring locally produced honey; a Sessions IPA that I guess is a session beer because of the 4% ABV and the poor flavor. We continued with a Harvester IPA which was quite enjoyable and ended with another enjoyable beer, their Whopper Imperial Chocolate Milk Stout that reminded me that my son has a Whopper Stout fermenting as I write this. As I only tried four of at least 20 options I don’t know that I can really judge them, but I am positive I will be back when I have more time so I can try some of their other options. Coachella Valley Brewing Company is located at 30640 Gunther Street in Thousand Palms. They are open six days a week (closed Mondays) so if you find yourself stranded in a dust storm, head over as they are likely open. Continue reading
King Harbor Brewing Company: From the beginning
I remember the day well; it was the 4th of July 2013 and Tanya and I were taking the dogs on their morning walk. We were walking through the strip mall that we walked through virtually every morning. Something caught Tanya’s eye on the window of one of vacant units, I glanced over and immediately recognized the ABC’s Public Notice of Application to Sell Alcoholic Beverages. I knew the neighborhood demographics well enough to know it wasn’t going to be a bar so I stopped to take a closer look. Could my eyes be deceiving me? Will there be a microbrewery a block from my house? Apparently Coastline Brewing was going to become my neighbor.
As soon as we got home from the walk I started doing some research and was soon in contact with the new microbrewery owners Tom Dunbabin and Will Daines. We set up a meeting for the upcoming week where we discovered we had met a couple weeks earlier at The Brewery at Abigaile. After some beer and discussion I offered to come speak at the CUP hearing they had scheduled in a couple weeks. The Redondo Beach Planning Commission approved the Conditional Use Permit and almost immediately Dunbabin and Daines started tearing apart their unit in preparation of building a production brewery and tasting room.
Within a couple months a decision was made to change the name to King Harbor Brewing Company (KHBC) because there is a winery up north in Santa Rosa, Coastline Cellars, and they did not want their beer brand confused with Coastline Cellar’s wine brand. While building King Harbor Brewing, Dunbabin and Daines also sought out a head brewer and came up with Phil McDaniel, a former brewer at Stone Brewing Company and Lead Brewer at The Bruery. It was all a matter of time; which was extended a little due to the government shutdown which caused all kinds of delays in the brewing world. Anyway, as you can tell by the photos, eventually all the permits were approved, i’s were dotted and t’s were crossed and KHBC was brewing. King Harbor Brewing now has a couple of soft opens under their belt, kegs distributed all over the South Bay and they are ready to have their Grand Opening! Continue reading
Strand Brewing brings March Madness to Naja’s Place
It is that time of year again for collegiate basketball fans; March Madness is upon us. Now I have to admit, I do not really have the time to follow basketball of any type so “March Madness” really has little bearing on my life but when I heard that Strand Brewing Company and Naja’s Place were teaming up for a March Madness tap-takeover it did not take much convincing to get me over to the International Boardwalk to attend their event.
Now, I guess “tap-takeover” might be a little exaggerated since Naja’s Place has 88 beers on tap, but Strand Brewing Company brought eight beers on tap; Musashi Black IPA, White Sand DIPA, 24th Street Pale Ale, Atticus IPA, Batch 100 Stout, Harvest Ball Orange Wheat, Beach House Amber Ale and Black Sand DIPA as well as their White Sand DIPA with Chinook hops on cask. There was a large contingency of Strand Brewing Company fans on hand that made short work of the cask, but there were plenty of other Strand Brewing Company beers for them to enjoy.
Strand Brewing Company is located at 23520 Telo Avenue in Torrance and Naja’s Place is located at 154 International Boardwalk in Redondo Beach. Cheers! Continue reading