The Rare Barrel

Photos from the Juicy Brews Beach Party at Brouwerij West

These photos were taken Saturday afternoon at Brouwerij West in San Pedro, where they hosted the Hop Culture Juicy Brews Beach Party Craft Beer Festival. The festival, which was also a fundraiser for the Palos Verdes Land Conservancy, featured craft beer from more than 25 of the top breweries in the country. In addition to copious quantities of really good beer, there were food trucks, including The Highroller Lobster Company and Love Hour, as well as music provided by DJ Thom Lessner.

While I am not sure it was actually “beach party” weather, it was a very pleasant day without being too cold or too hot. As Hop Culture is out of Pittsburgh, I am sure our weather was more beach-worthy than a January afternoon in Pittsburgh.

The sold out event featured a who’s who of craft breweries, such as Arizona Wilderness, Bottle Logic, Creature Comforts, Great Notion Brewing, J Wakefield, The Rare Barrel, Russian River, and Homage Brewing. There were fewer than 1,000 tickets sold, so the Brouwerij West beer garden area was more than large enough. I only noticed two lines the entire day; one was for Homage Brewing and another for the J Wakefield booth which featured several collaboration brews they have done. As one participant noted, it was one of the few craft beer festivals where Russian River did not have the longest line. Continue reading

Chad’s Beer Cellar IV Photos

These photos were taken Saturday at the Chad’s Beer Cellar IV bottle share which was held at King Harbor Brewing Company in Redondo Beach. This event was the fourth and possibly final bottle share put on by local beer hoarder and King Harbor Brewing investor, Chad Hazen. All the funds from the event went to benefit the Richstone Family Center which is located in Hawthorne. The Richstone Family Center is dedicated to preventing and treating child abuse.

First off, I would like to personally thank everyone that showed up. While my involvement with the event was limited to getting the word out, the previous events never sold out, which I found incredulous considering the quality of the beers that were made available. I made it a personal goal to see that they did sell all 100 tickets this year, and it happened. While all the monies have not been tabulated yet, with ticket sales, raffles and the silent auction, over $8,000 was raised for Richstone. Of course, none of this would have been possible without Chad.

The first of these bottle shares was held in December of 2014 when Hazen decided he wanted to quit drinking beer for a year while he trained for a marathon as he felt his collection of beer was just a little too much temptation. He got together with King Harbor Brewing Company and they decided they would have a bottle share benefiting Richstone Family Center. Continue reading

Photos from the 2nd Annual Summit Beer Festival

These photos were taken Saturday at Matsuyama Japanese Fusion in Roseville, and the 2nd Annual Summit Beer Festival which was held at the Capitol Mall in Sacramento.

While I knew I would be attending the Craft Beer Summit, I was undecided as to whether or not I would be attending the Summit Beer Festival because I have friends that are a lot closer to Sacramento than I am and I really wanted to visit them. On Friday I discovered that the Summit Beer Festival was just a few blocks from my motel; when I realized that the festival did not start until 3:00 PM I figured I could drive 20 minutes to Roseville and visit my friend Song Kim, the owner of Matsuyama Japanese Fusion. I have mentioned Matsuyama once before here; suffice it to say, if you enjoy sushi and are anywhere in the Roseville area, you owe it to yourself to visit Matsuyama Japanese Fusion. You will not regret it; be sure to tell Song I sent you. Continue reading

Photos from the 4th Annual Firestone Walker Invitational Beer Festival

These photos are from Saturday at the 4th Annual Firestone Walker Invitational Beer Festival (FWIBF15) which was held at the Paso Robles Event Center. The festival included craft beer of 53 breweries from all over the United States, Europe and beyond. This was my first opportunity to attend and I did not attend as any type of “official media” so my experience was probably similar to that of any other first time attendee; except I probably waited in line longer to get in. On Friday night I had heard stories of lines just to get in reaching down the street and around the block, so I walked over to the event center and was there before 9:00 AM. If you are taking notes, the event did not start until noon and there was nothing to be gained by being among the first 20 to be there. If you get there at noon you will be fine.

To be honest, I was not aware that this was only the fourth Invitational and it is definitely run like they have been doing it a lot longer. I had the opportunity to speak with individuals that had attended multiple times before and the one thing that became obvious is that Firestone Walker listened to the feedback they received after each event. For example, in the beginning, attendees had to buy food and water. As the event evolved it now has free food from 26 restaurants and multiple free water stations with enough filtered water to hydrate the 3,000 plus attendees. Now, I have to say, I am not really sure how many tickets were sold but between comments I heard, articles I read and a personal guess, I would guess between 3,000 and 4,000. The thing is, the location can hold a lot more than that and when you divide them between 80 booths there was not much in the way of lines. Naturally, there were some breweries like Three Floyds and Alchemist that had long lines all day; and when breweries like Beachwood or The Bruery had their special pours people started waiting; but most of the lines that I experienced moved rather quickly. Continue reading

The Festival 2014 at CRAFTED: Promo Code

Warehouse No. 9

The Festival 2014: Los Angeles Edition

There are beer fests and then there are beer festivals and my regular readers know that I attend quite a few beer festivals of various sizes and styles. Around the Los Angeles area we primarily see beer fests that concentrate on American craft beers with an emphasis on the burgeoning local craft beer scene; and why not, there are some amazing beers being brewed in Southern California lately. Back in July The Alpine Village in Torrance held their first ever Euro Bierfest 2014, featuring more than 50 beers from France, Belgium, Italy, Germany, Iceland, England, Czech Republic and Sweden. It was one of those events that any true craft beer lover should not miss; but we have a new [to Los Angeles] beer festival that will be held November 8 and 9 that looks to be a festival for the ages; The Festival 2014: Los Angeles Edition.

Presented by Shelton Brothers and Sharefest in collaboration with Brouwerij West at CRAFTED at the Port of Los Angeles in San Pedro, The Festival 2014 will be bringing you craft beer from all four corners of the globe with almost 100 breweries being represented. Not only are there more than 90 breweries in attendance, you will have the opportunity to meet more than 70 of the best beer, cider, and mead makers in the world!

If you think this is an exaggeration, take a look at the breweries scheduled to attend. International breweries include 8 Wired (New Zealand), Amager Bryghus (Denmark), Au Baron (France), Baird (Japan), Be.Er Brewery (Belgium), Birra Toccalmatto (Italy), Blaugies (Belgium), Brasserie Dunham (Quebec, Canada), Brekeriet (Sweden), Brew By Numbers (England), Brewfist (Italy), Burning Sky (England), Nøgne Ø (Norway), Oersoep (Netherlands), Oliver’s Cider and Perry (United Kingdom), Partizan (England), Pays Flamand (France), Peckham’s Cider (New Zealand), Rappi Bier Factory (Switzerland), Ribela (Spain). Ritterguts (Germany), Rooie Dop (The Netherlands), Shiga Kogen (Japan) and many more.

Just so you do not think that the American breweries have been left out, you will also find such breweries as AEppelTreow Winery (Wisconsin), Arizona Wilderness (Arizona), Cambridge Brewing Company (Massachusetts), Celestial Meads (MA), Crooked Stave (Colorado), Hair of the Dog (Oregon) Jolly Pumpkin (Michigan), Mystic Brewery (Massachusetts), Oxbow Brewing (Maine), Prairie Artisan Ales (Oklahoma), Pretty Things (Massachusetts) and Saint Somewhere (Florida) will also be pouring. California craft breweries Bagby Beer, Beachwood BBQ, Bottle Logic, Brouwerij West, Cellarmaker, Faction, Firestone Walker, Monkish, Rare Barrel, San Pedro Brewing Company, Tahoe Mountain, Telegraph and The Bruery will also be among those in attendance. Continue reading

Photos of The Bruery’s 6th Anniversary – Sucréversary

On Saturday afternoon, members of The Bruery’s Reserve and Hoarders Society and their guests gathered at The Phoenix Club in Anaheim to join The Bruery and many of the best local craft breweries to celebrate The Bruery’s Sucréversary, or 6th Anniversary. The proceeds from the event were to benefit the Boys & Girls Club of Santa Ana.

Since this was a private event I was a little surprised at how many attendees there were; this beer festival easily rivaled any of the local beer festivals I have attended in recent memory both in the number of people attending and the breweries represented. I got there a little early and even though they were not yet pouring beers, there were four very long lines as The Bruery had scattered three booths and a beer truck around the venue and their fans took advantage of the beer map to get in line for their favorite Bruery offering. To say there was a lot to choose from would be a definite understatement as The Bruery brought such ales as their Griffon Bruxellois, Oui Oui, Premiere, Batch #50, Confession, Sucré – Tawny Port, Grey Monday, Hottenroth, ORB, Grey Monday and many others. They even brought out some special beers such as Three Floyd’s 2013 Dark Lord.

Joining in the celebration were guest breweries Almanac Beer Company, Ballast Point, Beachwood Brewing, Bootleggers, Bottle Logic, Cismontane, Eagle Rock, Firestone Walker, Golden Road, Hangar 24, Kern River Brewing, King Harbor, Lost Abbey, Modern Times, Monkish, Noble Ale Works, Pizza Port – San Clemente, Smog City, Societe, St. Archer, Stone Brewing Co., TAPS, The Rare Barrel, Tustin Brewing and Valiant Brewing. The price of admission included a lunch catered by Beachwood BBQ; Chunk-n-Chip Cookies provided dessert. Continue reading

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