Avery is to the holidays what cookies and milk are to Santa

Winter is when brewers let fly with their creative concoctions and resurrect the potent ghosts of years’ past. Take Avery’s Rumpkin Ale aged in rum barrels. Even at $12 for a 12-ounce bottle, this sledgehammer (15.9 percent alcohol by volume) pie in a bottle flew off the shelves at local liquor stores when it was released this fall. But you can get one last glass until it’s gone starting at 5 pm Dec. 21–23 at the Avery Tap Room. The in-laws will be a lot more tolerable with a Rumpkin glow.

Avery is atoning for closing Dec. 9 for its staff holiday party by letting its Meph Addict flow New Year’s Eve. This coffee-infused 15 percent ABV Mephistopheles Imperial Stout pours like a moonless night and sports an espresso-brown head and a dark-roasted aroma that will restore the circulation to any extremity.

It’s beer, it’s wine, it’s Super Kind!

Get your glow on with Mountain Sun’s Super Kind barleywine. Brewed to 10 percent ABV, this malty wonder is dry hopped with Cascade pellets, giving it a piny aroma, not unlike the fresh cut trees for sale down at the church lot. And while it may be gone by the time this hits the streets, check and see if the rare keg of Samichlaus is still going. If it is, don’t delay and get thee to the Vine Street Pub for a glass of this 14 percent ABV dopplebock. One of the strongest lagers made, the honey and pear flavors barely stand up to the heat of the alcohol packed into this Austrian import. Mountain/Southern Sun and Vine Street Pub make prodigious use of Facebook, so friend them and watch for daily updates about what’s on tap.

Celebrate the light at Lefthand

If the Barrel-aged Widdershins Barleywine is blown when you read this, check back at the Lefthand tasting room; they are said to have more and will make it available later in December. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t head there now. ‘Tis the season for the barrel-aged Wake up Dead Russian Imperial Stout. This deadly brew (10.2 percent ABV) is outstanding on its own, but after lying  in an oak barrel for more than a year, it gets downright ethereal. And stay tuned for the 2012 Ambidextrous release in January. This is a mix of Widdershins and Imperial Milk Stout that only the mad brewing scientists at Lefthand can concoct. Though the sound of it is quite atrocious, you know it’ll be delicious.

Find your way to Twisted Pine

Another winning winter release is Twisted Pine’s award-winning Northstar Imperial Porter, on tap now when we need it most. Brewed to 9 percent ABV, this robust porter packs in the roasty chocolate flavors. Grab a growler to share with Santa and he’ll be sure to hook you up with that pair of Liberty Helix skis you wanted so bad.

But if your loved one enjoys a good beer or hand-crafted spirit now and again, there are plenty of easy options throughout Colorado. Wrap, drink and be merry. Oh, and save some for us.

Beer

If he or she likes a specific style of beer—stout or India Pale Ale or pilsner—grab the winners list from this year’s Great America Beer Festival and put together the medalists from a specific category. Granted, some of the winners are from brewpubs that won’t be available in bottles, so another option is to put together a sample of local award-winning beers. The ones in bottles or cans (like Oskar Blues’ silver-medal winner, Mama’s Little Yella Pils, or Odell’s gold medal Friek) are easy. But the tap-only winners, like the bronze medal Graham Cracker Porter from Denver Beer Co. will require a growler. That you took the time to hunt down some winners will warm your honey’s heart.

And speaking of the Great American Beer Festival, there’s nothing like scoring a ticket to the hottest beer event of the year. And given how fast it sold out this year, you’ll want to save the dates (nailed down for Oct. 11–13, 2012) and jump on tickets when they go on sale next summer. Sign up for GABF email news at the below web address so you don’t get left out of next year’s GABF festivities or tickets.

If rare, limited-release and high-quality beer is on your wish list, but you don’t have a specific brewery or style, avail yourself of the beer gurus at various local liquor stores. PJ’s Liquors at Sunset Street, north of the Diagonal Highway in Longmont, has an amazing selection of top shelf beers, as does Total Beverage at 770 E. 104th Ave. in Thornton. And of course there’s Liquor Mart at 15th and Canyon in Boulder. These stores have wise guys who know their suds and will help you assemble a high-octane collage of beer.

Spirits

Ahhh, the holiday spirit! Santa likes nothing better than a stiff White Russian (made with 303 Vodka and Roundhouse Corretto Coffee Liqueur and some raw milk—or cream!—from Rocky Plains dairy in Dacono). The spirits are top shelf and the raw dairy (milk or cream) is exquisite tasting and massively healthy for you. If you’ve never tried it, raw milk is a treat.

If you want something a little more refined that makes for a great after-dinner sipping toddy or a tasty flask filler for the slopes, try out the Peach Street Distillers selection of peach, pear and plum brandies made from fresh Palisade fruit. If you miss that juicy, bursting-with-flavor fruit from the Western Slope, these brandies are exquisite and do a stellar job of capturing the taste and aroma in a bottle. Find them at larger liquor stores.

The recent 9th annual Craft Lager Festival in Manitou Springs the second weekend in August saw more than 4,000 lager enthusiasts in two days enjoy some 30 craft beers. But new this year was the introduction of craft distillers to the mix.

A relatively young bunch—seven years ago there were three craft distillers in the state; today there are 22—the addition was met with some skepticism by the brewers in attendance, said Rob Masters, distiller of Rob’s Mountain Gin, which is created at Boulder Distillery, also home to 303 Vodka and 303 Whiskey.

“They (the brewers) were a bit leary, but when they saw what we were doing, they thought it was great,” Masters said.

Much of the reason is that beer has become the new cocktail mixer. No longer are whiskey and vodka and gin relegated to dancing with cola, lemon-lime soda and tonic. Bartenders are starting to experiment with mixing stouts and whiskey as well as vodka and sour beers.

If you’re curious how this plays out, check out the Fall Harvest Brew Fest at the Drake Centre in Fort Collins Oct. 15. They, too, are welcoming Colorado distillers to serve up cocktails and other unique concoctions. In addition to the 20 regional breweries in attendance there will be a half dozen distilleries, including Boulder’s RoundHouse Spirits, Loveland’s Dancing Pines Distillery and Greeley’s Syntax Spirits, as well as 303 Vodka and Rob’s Mountain Gin.

Winner Winner

The sold out Great American Beer Festival was a boon for Denver (and has garnered enough respect from the managers of the Colorado Convention Center that they’ve booked next year’s festival for Oct. 11–13, so plan to get your tickets early). Several local breweries that had gone winless in years past brought home the hardware this year, and visa versa. Here, a list of area winners.

Blue MoonVintage Blond Ale: Bronze

Upslope, Upslope Pumpkin Ale: Gold

Bull and Bush, Turnip the Beets: Bronze

Copper Kettle, Mexican Chocolate Stout: Gold

Dry Dock, Coffee Milk Stout: Bronze

Denver Beer, Graham Cracker Porter: Bronze

Wynkoop, Belgorado: Bronze

Strange, Gluten-Free Lemon Pale: Gold

New Belgium, LeTerroir Sour Ale: Gold

Odell, Friek: Gold

Bull and Bush, Release the Hounds: Silver

Wynkoop, B3K Schwarzbier: Bronze

C.B. and Potts, Pavlov’s Pils: Gold

Oskar Blues, Mama’s Little Yella Pils: Silver

Del Norte, Orale: Bronze

SandLot Brewery, Move Back Oktoberfest: Gold

Coors Archive, PrePro Bock: Silver

Oskar Blues, Deviant Dale’s: Silver

Grimm Brothers Brewhouse, Little Red Cap: Gold

Crabtree Brewing, Berliner Weisse: Gold

Dry Dock, Hefeweizen: Gold

Funkwerks, Funkwerks Saison: Silver

Dostal Alley Brewpub, Shaft House Stout: Bronze

Crabtree, Oatmeal Stout: Silver

Oskar Blues, Old Chub: Bronze

Mountain Sun Brewery, Colorado Kind: Silver

The Denver Beer Fest itself is a collection of events, tastings, food pairings and shows with beer as a uniting theme. If you want to see what makes a brewery tick, check out a tour of your favorite craft brewer or of the massive Coors facility in Golden. If you’re interested in meeting the minds behind your favorite suds, then the “Meet the Brewer” gatherings from 6–9pm on Thursday nights at the Wazee Supper Club are the place for you.

You can start your beer drinking day during the Denver Beer Fest at the historic Capitol Hill Mansion Bed and Breakfast Inn at 1207 Pennsylvania, where they will serve Wynkoop’s Railyard Ale from 7:30–9:30am every morning from Sept. 23–Oct. 1.

Get your hop on Sept. 26 at the Wazee Supper Club with the Attack of the India Pale Ales. Versions of this highly hopped style of ale from Ska, Mad River, Great Divide, Grand Teton, Wynkoop and more will be on tap through the evening. Side-by-side tastings of this popular beer style are a great way to get an accurate take on who does it best.

An excellent way to learn your way around the Denver beer scene is to book a seat on the Denver Brews Cruise. There’s nothing like being driven to the city’s best breweries to taste and tour. Breckenridge Brewery as well as the two newest players in the Denver beer scene, Strange and Renegade breweries. Tours can be booked at brewscruise.com/denver.

But probably the best place to be if you didn’t get a ticket for the GABF is at the Summit Music Hall at 1902 Blake St. in Denver. On Sept. 29–Oct. 1 from 4pm–2am there will be hundreds of beers on tap and in bottles. Put on in conjunction with Boulder’s Reuben’s Burger Bistro—a local mecca for Belgian beers—there will be tappings of one-off kegs from local breweries, specialty brews and Belgian beers never before available in kegs in Denver. Food offerings will also include five kinds of German sausages, soft pretzels and more. Check out summitbeergarden.com for details on what’s on tap and special offerings.

One thing is certain: The Denver Beer Fest makes getting shut out of the GABF much less painful.

Beer for Boobs

Left Hand Brewing is raising money for Breast Cancer research with the inaugural Polestar Pole Dance Competition at 9pm Sept. 28 at Platinum 84, 8485 Umatilla St., Denver.

That’s understandable. Or maybe you’re a “wine” person. OK. But if you’ve ever considered giving barley pop a try again, now is the time.

Belgian beers inhabit a relatively mellow neighborhood in the community that is craft beer and are a great place to rekindle an affair with the suds. The majority are ales and, except for a few examples, they are judiciously hopped and are therefore not painfully bitter. Belgian yeasts, too, impart a somewhat sweet, fruity—often citrusy (think orange or lemon)—flavor and aroma.

A wide variety of styles, flavors and strengths are represented by Belgian beers, meaning there’s a beer here for everyone.

“Belgium is to beer what France is to wine,” said Reuben Verplank, an unabashed fan of the region and proprietor of Reuben’s Burger Bistro—a bodacious Belgian beer rathskeller on Broadway in Boulder that carries 11 varieties on tap and another 54 in bottles. “There is so much variety in the beers there.”

On the light side of Belgians are the pils beers made with lager yeast. These are lighter in color, body and hops—not unlike a Hamm’s or Rolling Rock. Not particularly flavorful or high in alcohol, these are passable summer beers that can be pounded as needed to assuage the blistering heat of the dog days. Blond ales, of which Duvel is a popular example, are more flavorful still.

And then there’s saison (French for “season”). The hempen homespun heritage of the saison has largely been lost in today’s controlled brewing process. Born in winter for summer drinking, this farmhouse ale was typically light in body and low (3.5 percent) in alcohol and as varied in flavor as the farmers who brewed it as a summer thirst quencher. Today they have crept up in potency, but have lost the funky flavors that came from widely varying temperatures during fermentation.

Getting heavier and much more flavorful are the amber, dubbel, strong ale, trippel and quadruppel. These are the heavy hitters in the Belgian lineup and pack a bunch of flavor—from rich malts to banana to currant to cloves and beyond—to go with the higher gravities. With Belgian beers, it’s all about the yeast, which imparts those fruity flavors and a slight tartness.

In addition to Reuben’s, you can get your Belgian fix in a big way starting in September at the Vine Street Pub on 17th and Vine in Denver when those good folks (who also own the Mountain and Southern Sun pubs in Boulder) will turn 16 taps over to Belgian beers for the month.

And Sept. 17, the pub will shut down Vine Street for a block party and beer Olympics featuring competition between other brewers in events such as tricycle races, keg tossing and the like. Friend them on Facebook to keep up with special Belgians that rotate in on the taps and to find out which special band’s playing at the block party.

This made for excellent beer that wasn’t polluted with cheap adjuncts like corn (sugar) or rice (used prodigiously by Budweiser USA, among others). But what I found odd was the somewhat common practice of using beer as a cocktail mixer and even adding other sodas to a brew. My sister-in-law likes a diesel, a mix of pilsner (or any beer) and cola. A Radler—German for “cyclist” (or a Shandy, as they say in England) is a beer mixed with either Sprite, cider or lemonade (hard or not). A Russ’n is a wheat beer with lemonade; it’s damn good and can be slammed en masse on a hot day without fear of becoming staggeringly hammered. Truth. Another strange concoction I tried was a Susi Sonnenschein, a wheat beer mixed with Havana Club rum and banana juice. It’s actually not bad, with the effervescent citrus notes of the wheat beer and the banana juice helping to push that flavor up front, but they can ambush your sobriety.

I have nothing against using beer as a mixer. There is room for experimentation. But seeing the zeal for it in Germany—the land of beer purity—was funny. You’d think there would be some law about fouling a perfectly good brew with Coke, but you’d be wrong. Don’t be surprised to see these zymurgic concoctions hit menus as the trend takes off.

Colterra beer dinners

Chef Bradford Heap has jumped aboard the beer pairing dinner bandwagon with a monthly offering at his acclaimed Niwot restaurant. The first Wednesday of each month, Heap will prepare four courses and pair them with specific beers from local breweries. He started off with Great Divide and is hooking up with Avery for the July 6 dinner. Cost: $45 per person.

Fooooore!

Upslope Brewery has a fourth beer out in cans: the Upslope Craft Lager. It’s somewhat light (4.8 percent alcohol by volume) and rather crisp and bright with a mild hop bite, as compared with other craft pilsners available in Boulder County. In addition to expanding and renovating the tiny tap room, Upslope has also expanded its hours to 2–8pm Tuesday through Thursday and 2–9pm on Friday and Saturday; closed Sunday. Gotta check out the new roomy digs.

Saison is French for Summer

Twisted Pine’s popular Le Petit Saison is back on tap for summer at the taproom on Walnut Street just east of 30th Street or in 22 ounce bottles at your favorite liquor store. This citrusy and lightly fruity beer owes its flavor profile to the yeast, and brewer Jeff Brumley says he keeps the malt and hops somewhat subdued in order to let the yeasty flavors remain front and center. At 5.5 percent AVB, this is a nice summer session beer, but only after you’ve put the weed whacker away for the day.

Swing north on Hwy. 550 and stop in Silverton at the brewery there. Then drop down the road to Ouray and grab a pint of whatever is on tap at the Ourayle House on 7th Avenue. They only brew a barrel of beer at a time and who knows how that will turn out. But you gotta love the spirit and spontaneity of the enterprise. For a more traditional pint, and a menu full of good eats, head to the Ouray Brewery at 607 Main St. for a refreshing kolsch or crisp, dry Cascade Creek Rye Ale.

Then head down to the award-winning Colorado Boy Pub and Brewery in “downtown” Ridgeway. Not only will they teach you how to build your own brewery (as they did for Ouray Brewing), but they make stellar beer. The last stop is at the Smuggler’s Brewpub and Grille on Pine Street. The award-winning beers and solid pub fare are a treat after a long day. But take a break from the fermented beverages and sink a sweet tooth into Smuggler’s divine root beer or cream soda. The lineup for this year’s festival is off the charts: Willie Nelson, The Flaming Lips, moe., Dweezle Zappa plays Zappa and Louisville’s Lionel Young Band. If you don’t have your tickets by June, you’ll be missing the festival of the year.

Anything that’s on its fifth iteration (except movie sequels) should be showing marked improvement over past versions. Mike Laur’s stellar fifth edition of the Beer Drinker’s Guide to Colorado—which includes some $150 in free or buy-one-get-one-free coupons—goes there in spades.

Laur’s love of maps is immediately evident in the beautifully rendered image of the state and the extensive information it contains.

The guide is completely updated, listing (as of the printing) all 142 breweries and brewpubs in Colorado. And while the glove compartment version takes up backside real estate with an illustrated guide to the brewing process and beer styles in pictures, the real compliment to the map is online.

At the website beerdrinkersguidetocolorado.com, the interactive map puts all sorts of information—as well as brewery websites—just a click away. Even better is the Scenic Drives link under “Beer and Nature,” where more than two dozen routes are featured, including a map, mileage and, most importantly, breweries along the way.

But don’t think putting brewpubs and taprooms on the map is an encouragement to drink and drive.

“Be careful and pace yourself,” Laur said. “If you’re going to be hitting several brewpubs, be sure to eat some food, or better yet, bring along a designated driver.”

My credo of “too much is always better than not enough” has usually stood me in good stead. Whether dealing with money, snowfall, romance—vowels in Scrabble, not so much—dealing with excess is often preferable. And so it is with beer, especially when it comes to selection.

When confronted with a prodigious variety of quality beers, as we are here on the Front Range, the sane answer to the question of how to deal with this glorious bounty is to make as much of it available as possible. On tap, of course.

Back Country Pizza and Tap House (2319 Arapahoe, Boulder; formerly Dolan’s) has 54 taps and some outstanding offerings, both foreign and domestic.

Another rider on the tap-wagon is Oskar Blues Home Made Liquids and Solids in Longmont with 42 handles. Keen on American beers—“no imports, no bottles,” as they say—they are magnanimous with their selection and offer brews from local competitors such as Asher, Great Divide and Breckenridge breweries.

Yes, the Safeways of the world say they look out for you by twisting arms and throwing money at elected officials to get them to allow full-strength beer, wine and booze sales in their stores. And on the surface it may sound great; you can grab a bottle of Sutter Home merlot to go with your frozen dinner and be on your way. But if you think you’ll get to choose from more than mainstream brands—let alone craft-brewed, fermented or distilled gems made locally—you would be wrong.

“I carry almost 1,000 beers in my store; how many do you think Safeway or 7-Eleven will carry?” said Jim Dean, managing partner of Total Beverage at 92nd and Sheridan in Westminster.

It’s not just quality and selection that get kicked in the shins. Jobs would be incinerated and many say we can expect underage drinking to rise.

“States that have beer, wine and liquor in grocery and convenience stores have higher incidence(s) of underage drinking,” Dean said. “The grocery stores don’t just want to sell it, they want 18-year-olds to sell it and 16- and 17-year-olds to handle it. When you put (alcohol) out there next to the Cheerios, there’s no control.”

Probably the biggest hit would be jobs. There are roughly 1,700 liquor stores in the state of Colorado and about the same number of grocery and convenience stores. In nearly every shopping center where there’s a grocery store, there’s a liquor store, too. Once booze goes in the big chains, the independent retailer selling wine and beer next door is toast.

The impact is felt up the line. Independent brewers and distillers don’t have the national distribution systems Target and Safeway rely on for stock. So the big boys won’t be carrying the local craft beer and spirits that used to get sold at the mom and pop liquor stores. So local producers’ sales go down and they’ll look at shrinking their workforce as a result.

The fight hasn’t started yet, but it’s still early in the legislative session. As of this writing, our elected officials were working on Senate Bill 60, which would allow low-alcohol beer and wine (less than 4 percent) to be sold in restaurants and bars. It is expected to pass.

As for the war on alcohol sales in grocery and convenience stores, that battle has been waged every year for the past four years, and each time the measure gets closer to passing. Those of us who value our local brewers, distillers and vintners can only hope that the Democrat-controlled Senate, along with former craft-brewer-turned-Governor John Hickenlooper, will keep the money grubbing greed heads at bay.

“Sometimes you’re better off just leaving things alone,” Dean said. “For the guy who buys Bud Light or Yellow Tail wine, he isn’t going to care. But for people who buy craft brews, which are 52 percent of my sales, that’s the guy who’s going to lose out.”

Six days a week

Boulder Beer’s tap room (pictured) at 2880 Wilderness Place, just off Valmont, will be open from noon to 8pm Saturdays starting in April. They’ll have their full pub menu, $3 pints for the 3–7pm happy hour and look for a smothered breakfast burrito on Saturday’s menu to help soothe your aching Friday night head. For their first Saturday, April 2, they’ll have live music on the patio.