Beer & BBQ Fest at Brenner's On The Bayou

It's going to be a beautiful weekend and I suggest spending Saturday afternoon outside on the grounds of Brenner's On The Bayou for their annual Beer & BBQ Fest this Saturday, October 3rd from 3pm ~ 6pm.

They'll be featuring craft beer from local, Texas and out of state breweries along side barbeque from four different regions (Texas, Memphis, Kansas City and the Carolinas). Tickets are $55 before Saturday and $70 the day of. There is also a VIP option for $110 which provides early access to the festival and a VIP room with premium selections, on-site brewery representatives and additional food options.  Valet parking is $10 or you can take the shuttle service for $5 (see Parking & Info for more details).

• Karbach Brewing Co. – Houston, TX
• Saint Arnold Brewing Company – Houston, TX
• Independence Brewing Company – Austin, TX 
• Cedar Creek Brewery – Seven Points, TX
• Bayou Teche LA 31 Brewing – Arnaudville, LA
• SweetWater Brewing Company – Atlanta, GA
• Ballast Point Brewing Company – San Diego, CA
• Boulevard Brewing Company – Kansas City, MO
• Boston Beer Company – Boston, MA

Texas Breweries at the 2015 Great American Beer Festival

The 2015 Great American Beer Festival begins in less than a month, so it's a good time to take a look at the Texas breweries that will be attending this year.

Last year there was 47 Texas breweries with booths on the festival floor which was the largest turnout ever. It's down slightly to 45 this year, but that probably has more to do with the space limitations in the convention hall and how the booth space is assigned due to the record number of craft breweries now operating. According to the GABF website, the following breweries will be representing Texas this year:

Brewery	City	Booth
(512) Brewing Co	Austin	Y2
903 Brewers	Sherman	K2
Austin Beerworks	Austin	K3
Bitter Sisters Brewing Company *	Addison	K5
Black Star Co-op	Austin	K6
Blue Owl Brewing *	Austin	K8
Bluebonnet Beer Co *	Round Rock	K9
Buffalo Bayou Brewing Co	Houston	K12
Circle Brewing Company	Austin	K13
Community Beer Co	Dallas	K14
Deep Ellum Brewing Co	Dallas	W10
Flix Brewhouse - Round Rock	Round Rock	K16
Fredericksburg Brewing Co	Fredericksburg	K23
Freetail Brewing Co	San Antonio	K24
Freetail Brewing Co - Brewpub *	San Antonio	K25
Hops & Grain Brewing	Austin	K27
Humperdinks Restaurant & Brewery	Dallas	K28
Independence Brewing	Austin	K30
Lakewood Brewing Co	Garland	K32
Live Oak Brewing Co	Austin	L3
Martin House Brewing Company	Fort Worth	L5
Middleton Brewing Co	San Marcos	Z2
No Label Brewing Co	Katy	L7
North By Northwest Restaurant and Brewery	Austin	L8
Oasis Texas Brewing Company	Austin	L9
Panther Island Brewing Company *	Fort Worth	L10
Pedernales Brewing Co	Fredericksburg	L11
Peticolas Brewing Co	Dallas	Z11
Pinthouse Pizza	Austin	Z12
Rahr and Sons Brewing Co	Fort Worth	X3
Real Ale Brewing Co	Blanco	K1
Revolver Brewing	Granbury	L13
Saint Arnold Brewing Co	Houston	J17
South Austin Brewery	Austin	BP17
Southerleigh Brewing *	San Antonio	L15
Spoetzl Brewery	Shiner	L20
Texas Beer Refinery	Dickinson	L23
Texian Brewing Co	Richmond	L24
The Austin Beer Garden Brewing Co	Austin	L25
The Collective Brewing Project *	Ft Worth	L26
Tupps Brewery *	McKinney	L30
Twin Peaks Brewery	Irving	K34
Twisted X Brewing Co	Dripping Springs	L31
Uncle Billy's Brew & Que	Austin	Z21
Zilker Brewing Co*	Austin	L33

* Denotes first time attending GABF

 

This is another great turnout from Texas and includes quite a few new breweries. Hopefully this will result in another great medal showing after Texas breweries took home 16 medals last year and 10 the previous year. 

Good luck to all the breweries who have beer entered in the competition this year and I look forward to sampling your beers on the convention floor.

Celebrate National Bourbon Day with a Beer Dinner at BRC

In celebration of National Bourbon Day this Sunday, June 14th, BRC Gastropub is hosting a special beer dinner featuring bourbon barrel aged beers from Karbach, Firestone Walker, Oskar Blues and Saint Arnold. The cost is $70 per persons and reservations are required which can be made by calling 713-861-2233 or sending an email to brcgastropub.@feedtcc.com.

4th Annual Houston Press BrewFest

The 4th Annual Houston Press BrewFest takes place on Saturday, May 16th from 3pm ~ 7pm at Silver Street Station (the same location as previous ones).  Over 100 beers will be available (beer list available soon) as well as food trucks and live music. It's a great festival for trying a variety of beer styles in one place as well as an opportunity to try some of the new craft breweries that are not widely available. If you want to see what it's all about, check out the video from last year's BrewFest.

General Admission and VIP ticket options are available and both include eight 3oz sample cards (additional cards will be available for purchase). VIP tickets include early admission at 2pm to begin your sampling one hour before the General Admission ticket holders as well as in-and-out access to a VIP area with additional specialty beers and complimentary appetizers. Tickets officially go on sale to the public at noon on March 21st with early bird pricing (GA $30, VIP $55) before increasing to regular prices (GA $35, VIP $60) on April 28th. If you're a procrastinator, there may be some remaining tickets at the door (no guarantee), but for a much higher prices (GA $45, VIP $70), so you may as well go ahead and grab a couple tickets now for cheap. And if you're really excited about it, you can get in on a special pre-sale starting today by going to this link and entering promo code ALLGOOD15 to unlock the purchasing options.

Craft Brewing Industry Reaches New Levels in 2014

The Brewers Association has released the 2014 data on craft brewing growth and for the first-time ever, craft brewers reached double-digit (11%) volume share of the marketplace.

In 2014, craft brewers produced 22.2 million barrels, and saw an 18 percent rise in volume and a 22 percent increase in retail dollar value. Additionally, the number of operating breweries in the U.S. in 2014 grew 19 percent, totaling 3,464 breweries, with 3,418 considered craft broken down as follows: 1,871 microbreweries, 1,412 brewpubs and 135 regional craft breweries. Throughout the year, there were 615 new brewery openings and only 46 closings.

Note: Numbers are preliminary and the Brewers Association will release the list of Top 50 craft brewing companies and overall brewing companies by volume sales on March 31. Additionally, a more extensive analysis will be released during the Craft Brewers Conference & BrewExpo America® in Portland, Oregon from April 14-17.

Texas Debut of Alpine Beer Company

Another week, another out of state brewery makes its debut in Texas. This time it's Alpine Beer Company from Alpine, California (sort of).

Alpine was founded in 1999, but initially had their beers contract brewed at AleSmith Brewing Co until they opened their own brewery in 2002. Alpine's beers have been highly regarded, particularly their IPA's, but were difficult to find as they had a maximum production of around 1500 bbls a year and distribution didn't reach far from home. But that started to change in November 2013 when Green Flash Brewing Co. began brewing some of Alpine's beers (Nelson, Hoppy Birthday and Duet) at their facility in San Diego.  The increase in production and sales of Alpine beers would help raise capital that Alpine desperately needed in order to expand. Apparently that relationship worked out pretty well because in November 2014, Green Flash bought the Alpine Beer Company. And with the production capabilities and resources of Green Flash, beers from Alpine are now finding their way to Texas.  The Flying Saucer in Downtown Houston is tapping a different Alpine beer every night from March 9th to the 13th, including the highly sought after Nelson (apparently the Flying Saucer is the only location in Houston to receive a keg). The following is the tapping schedule:

Mon, March 9: Duet
Tues, March 10: Hoppy Birthday
Wed, March 11: Alpine Ale
Thur, March 12: Nelson
Fri, March 13: Irish Red

I'm happy to see that Alpine was able to find help from within the craft brewing industry.  I'm sure we'll be seeing more mergers and takeovers in the future as the older craft breweries continue to expand and seek new markets and revenue streams.  And this is definitely preferred over a takeover by ABImBev.

Beers From Sweetwater Begin Flowing in Houston

Sweetwater Brewing, named for a tributary of the Chattahoochee River, was founded in Atlanta, GA in 1997 by two former college roommates. It has since grown to be the 19th largest craft brewery thanks to their most popular beer, 420 Extra Pale Ale, and the rest of their regular lineup which includes the Sweetwater IPA, Georgia Brown Ale and Take Two Pils along with Blue (a light bodied ale with a hint of blueberry) and Hop Hash Double IPA (made with the hop resin scraped out of the hop pelletizer).

There are various events around town this week to celebrate their launch and it shouldn't be too difficult to find it on tap, but here's a few that I know about:

In addition to those, I also found events at Hay Merchant today and Ladybirds on Thursday.

8th Wonder Celebrating 2nd Anniversary

8th Wonder is celebrating two years of brewing beer in the shadow of the Houston skyline with a party on Saturday, March 21st at 3:00pm. Tickets are available online and priced at $100 for VIP or $25 for General Admission. Only 200 of the VIP tickets are available and prices will increase after March 1st. Further details about what the VIP level gets you hasn't been released yet, but a post on their Facebook page indicated "rare tappings, private bathroom, merch, light bites, pint glasses and more". The event also includes musical performances by: The Suffers, Earphunk, Stooges Brass Band, Wild Moccasins, DJ Sun and Fox & Cats.

Hay Merchant's 3rd Anniversary

The Hay Merchant is celebrating their 3rd anniversary on Thursday, February 12th. The doors open at 3:00pm, but there undoubtedly be a line forming way before then. Their Facebook page indicates Kevin has dug deep in their cellar and come up with a bunch of special beers to mark the occasion. The same post also includes a great parody of the recent Budweiser commercial:

Post by The Hay Merchant.