Wild Woods Brewery

When brewery owners Jake and Erin Evans first moved to Boulder, the criteria for purchasing their house was simple: they needed a basement large enough to mimic a small (nano) brewery where they could house their 10-gallon Brew Magic homebrew system. Once they dialed in their recipes and officially decided to open a commercial brewery, they wanted to create a space that could reflect the beauty of Colorado’s open spaces. “We have a love of the outdoors,” says Erin, “and we wanted that to shine through in our brewery.”

Housed within an industrial complex, you feel as though you’ve traveled to a friend’s cabin in the mountains—a cabin with eight beers on tap. Within seconds, you start to understand the relationship between Wild Woods and the nature that inspired it. The walls and bar are built of reclaimed beetle kill pine, giving it a bluish hue, and the beers are spiced to reflect the visceral emotions created by Mother Nature. Their Treeline IPA balances its hops against an addition of juniper berries, and the Smores Stout uses milk sugar, cocao nibs, and graham cracker-like biscuit malts in a reinvention of a fireside staple.

Relying on word-of-mouth promotion, Jake and Erin seem to follow a steady theme. “We wanted our growth to be organic, something that happened over time,” Erin says. Another beautiful reflection in a world of mass production; and certainly a reminder that sometimes it’s nice to sit, relax and smell the roses, er, hops.

GREAT FOR: Food trucks. Simply follow their website/Facebook/Twitter to see when the trucks will be stopping by.

3 ABLE ALES: Wildflower Pale Ale, Ponderosa Porter, Berry Patch Wheat

SECRET MENU: Half Treeline IPA, half Berry Patch Wheat. This blend gives  a whole new meaning to “earthy” taste!