Day Fifty, Denver, CO: Water, Hops, Yeast, and Barley

AWESOME Day Fifty, which was Saturday, the 8th of August.

Boulder, CO has a lot of microbreweries, for some reason or another. It started with the clean, mountain-run-off water supply, and then it became a chicken and the egg scenario; as the beer culture became more and more prevalent, more microbreweries popped up.

So, on Saturday I visited three breweries; Avery, Oskar Blues, and Left Hand.

I really enjoyed the Avery brew tour. As the tour guide – who doubled as the tap room manager as well as one of the brewers – said, each of the brewers are “handpicked”. They’re smart, loud, and competitive people. Their beers reflect this personality. Like most of the Colorado-brewed beers, they’re very hoppy and bold. Very loud beers.

Next was the Oskar Blues Brewery. They can their beer there, and it’s kind of funny. They are great people, and they do have a full batting cage in the brewery. I tried to trade the two free beers that I had won by answering trivia questions for a few pitches in the cage, but they were not interested in this exchange. (For the record, the only reason I was trying to ditch the free beers is because, having to drive on my own, and on top of other samples… otherwise, you should never turn down a free beer, kids.) Oskar Blues cans their beers mainly because it is cheaper, the beer stays fresh longer (light and dissolved O2 stay out of the can,) and, as modern cans do not impart any taste to the beer, it tastes the same. Everybody wins. Oskar Blues was the first microbrewery to can their beer (Dale’s Pale Ale being the flagship,) seven years ago. According to the brewery, 50 other microbreweries have now picked up the trend.

Unfortunately by the time I got to Left Hand it was well beyond brew tour time, (after 5pm at least.) But I picked up a pint glass for the bar back home for my troubles and headed back to my uncle’s. (I end the trip with 7 new pint glasses to add to the collection).

Beer!