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Saturday, October 11, 2008

GABF

Great American Beer Festival 2008
Colorado Convention Center
Denver, Colorado









The biggest beer festival in American brought a line of people that wrapped around the whole convention center 6-8 people wide. We arrived 45 minutes before the start and walked and walked to find the end of the line. Once the doors opened though, the line moved fast--we were inside in about 45 minutes.











Inside it was 400 breweries and 1,800 beers to taste and a ton of people. The largest lines appeared at Lost Abbey, Dogfish Head, Russian River, New Glarius, Oskar Blues, Three Floyds and Stone. Very limited beers and not available in Missouri at this time.









A picture of super brewer, Garrett Oliver, of Brooklyn Brewery pouring some of his fantastic beers and a picture of the Dogfish Head booth. I concentrated on trying the many sought after beers that we cannot get in St. Louis. Beers we eventually hope to bring in to our stores in the future. There was also a lot of people in line to try the Boulevard Smokestack Saison-Brett.








Friday we went to visit to a few breweries in the area. We had a great tour at Left Hand Brewery and saw the whole operation. They were in the process of smoking the malted barley (great aroma) for their Smoke Jumper Porter to be released this November. They only make this beer every other year and you will be able to get it this year at TWCP stores.
We also took a tour of the revolutionary brewery Oskar Blues and met the owner Dale, yes of Dale's Pale. Oskar Blues is the first craft beer to produce their beer in cans. They just installed a state of the art canning system which many other breweries are checking out. Watch for many other craft breweries following their lead and canning their beer. We just started receiving New Belgium Fattire in cans a few weeks ago. Oskar Blues is the place to work, they have a basketball court and batting cage inside the brewery for the employees. It was an amazing place. Check out the palates of empty cans waiting to be filled.












Wynkoop Brewery
We also had a great lunch at Wynkoop Brewery and a tour with Charlie Berger who used to be at Missouri's own O'Fallon brewery and is now brewing at Wynkoop. We tasted many of their great beers including the Obamanator -- which they brewed for the Democratic Convention.



You can check out all of the winners on

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Paul, Any word on Dogfish Head coming to Missouri? Also, Do you or have you got any Kentucky Breakfast Stout from Founders? I dont even know if they come to Mizzou. Excited for this weeks beer specials!

Paul Hayden said...

I have emailed them a few times and they said eventually DFH will make it, no ETA yet.

Founders is not available in Missouri yet either.
Paul