If I don’t see another beer again for awhile, I will be a happy girl and I owe it all to this weekend. The past week was the famous Beer Week in Denver which acts as a prelude to Great American Beer Fest, the biggest, most epic beer festival in America. There was beer event after beer event going on all throughout town with a number of visitors coming into our great city for some hoppy goodness.
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One of those visitors was one of my favorite bloggers, Erin and her boyfriend. Erin is straight up fabulous, we’ve been reading each others blogs for the past two years, have a passion for food, dogs, makeup and keeping it real. When she told me they were coming in for GABF I made it a point to get some time off to hang out and we planned to meet up on Friday afternoon to hit up some local breweries in the area. Can I just say that having a random Friday off is just fabulous? I got to sleep in a bit, go to the gym, hit up Target up for some nonsense then hang out, just about perfect!
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The first stop was CopperKettle Brewery. It’s located in a random little business park that I would never think that a brewery would be located in. My bf was off as well so he came along with us for our little beer-adventure. We grabbed a table and each split a flight of beer, this was a treat since I’ve only tried their Mexican Chocolate Stout before. I really enjoyed their Black IPA, I’m not sure if this is a newer concept but I’m starting to see these more often and love that the rich, hoppy flavor. It’s helping me venture more into the world of stouts which I’m not a total fan of (a little absurd seeing my love for coffee is through the roof!) and I was surprised at how much I liked their Black IPA and more of their Mexican Chocolate Stout.
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We were in need of food and Erin asked about a good place to stop for food, so we stopped at Biker Jim’s afterwards. Biker Jim’s has gourmet hot dogs, has won numerous awards and Anthony Bourdain is a fan so all signs pointed in this direction. They have some funky dogs like elk, buffalo, reindeer and I went for something other than my norm this time-the jackalope–jack rabbit and antelope topped Biker Jim’s style which is a weird, unlikely combination of cream cheese and caramelized onions but it works and it works well. You get some sweet and savory action on top and it’s a perfect meal to coat your stomach if you’re drinking. Perfect for us because the next stop on our brewery tour was my favorite brewery in Denver, Great Divide Brewing Company.
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The line was out the door which is total forgivable seeing that it was Beer Week and all plus they have $1 tasters so we made our way to the bar, found a spot to sit and hunkered down with a few beers.
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Titan IPA, Hercules Double IPA and Yeti. I really wish I could spend more Friday afternoons gallivanting around town drinking beer, it was so delightful. Later that night my liver was happy to take a break from beer and instead, indulge in sushi at Sushi Hai in the Highlands–thank you Living Social.
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Good thing I did that because the main event was Saturday…..the 5:30pm session of Great American Beer Fest. I took the bus up to the convention center where it was being held and it was pure madness–there were people swarming the entire place, even an hour beforehand and if I didn’t know better, would have thought a riot was about to break out. The line was quickly growing around the building and I found Erin, Lauren, Paige along with Erin’s and Lauren’s significant others, posed for a picture (because we have to!) and got ourselves in line.
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They were performing vow renewals and weddings at GABF!
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We came, we saw, we conquered….all under a funky yellow hue (seriously, can someone explain what that’s all about because I kind of love the post-apolyptic feel it was giving off). Since Erin and her man are accustomed to NE beer, they wanted to check out Colorado and west beers and I was mainly on the hunt to try Oregon, Austin and some other random breweries that I’ve come across in my day. Some of my favorite new discoveries of the evening were:
*Saint Patrick’s Brewing Company Englewood, Colorado
*Moonlight Pizza and Brewpub Salida, Colorado
*Base Camp Brewing Company Portland, Oregon (they had a killer S’more Stout)
*Deep Ellum Brewing Company Dallas, Texas
*Uinta Brewing Salt Lake City, Utah
I was especially excited to see that the brewery in my college town, Morgantown Brew Pub, was there and one of my sorority sister was there serving beer. Oddly enough I didn’t take too many pictures and I was surprised at first by how mellow it was. Come four hour later, it wasn’t the shit show I thought it was going to be but you could definitely tell people were having too much fun. Am I happy I went? Hell yes, it’s been on my radar for some time and I’m excited I got to attend. If I had to guestimate I’d say that we tried over 35 different breweries and if someone wasn’t going all delete happy on her phone, could have told you based on the GABF app. They have a tracking and notes section so you can put down thoughts on the beers you tried which I found especially spiffy.
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Would I go again? Probably not since it was too much beer for me to try in a five hour span without getting obliterated. I will rather go to a smaller beer festival instead with fewer breweries and maximize my time more between those plus the ticket price of $77 and the anticipation of will I or will I not get a ticket was annoying (You basically have to have friends who are home brewers to get your tickets, which Lauren and her husband did because they get hooked up with being able to buy tickets a day or two ahead of general public but if I didn’t would have been SOL) then they sold out of tickets within 20 minutes of opening it to the general public. Everyone who I talked to before hand was shocked I actually got a ticket because they sold out so quickly. Volunteering used to be the popular route because if you volunteer, you get into a session for free but those also ran out right away so it kind of sucks that they don’t make more availability or extend the festival to another day or have shorter sessions with more tickets available. That being said, it was an awesome time and an even better weekend being around friends, beer and all around good times. Tiffany 1 GABF 0.