Welcome back again beer lovers, sippers, fanatics, dabblers, and dynamos. This past weekend saw one of six Beer Camp festivals come to Seattle. Complete with 100+ breweries from across the country, hundreds of beers. Good times were had. The culmination of this has been made available to nearly everyone through the Beer Camp 12 Pack that has been out for a few weeks now.
This iteration features six different beers from six different regions — Southeast, Pacific Northwest & Rockies, Midwest, NorCal, Northeast & Mid-Atlantic, Southwest. Some rather large, but diverse and inclusive selections. We could go into great length about each brewery involved, but I’d rather us focus on the beers at hand and provide some simple tasting notes for each one. The price tag for the 12 pack is a bit high, $29.99 at multiple retail outlets, but that does break down to be just $2.49 / each, which isn’t all that bad, considering that Narwhal, Bigfoot, and Hoptimum are all $2.49 each, just never sold in a 12 pack form. All that aside, lets just jump into these delicious beers.
Beer #1 — Sweet Sunny South — Southern Table Beer — 4.9% / 23 IBU
Collaborators — Austin Beerworks, Bayou Teche, Creature Comforts, Funky Buddha, Wicked Weed, Sierra Nevada
Notes — A brilliant bright pale yellow pour. Aromas of sweet tea and tropical fruits, peaches, papaya, lemony, bright, sweet. Refreshing, tingly, easy going. This as an awesome start and may be the best of the bunch. Overall — 40 / 50.
Beer #2 — Moxee Moron — Imperial Session IPA — 7.5% / 70 IBU
Collaborators — Bale Breaker, Barley Brown’s, Black Raven, Melvin, Odell, Sierra Nevada
Notes — A peachy orange hue with a nice level head and great lace. A pungent piney herbaceous tropical and berries, stone fruit, this is intense and balance, a true gem and an absolutely incredible showcase of hops and Northwest IPA. Overall — 43 / 50.
Beer #3 — Family Values — Imperial Brown Ale w/ Cocoa — 8.5% / 35 IBU
Collaborators — Schells, Dark Horse, Half Acre, Perennial, Sun King, Sierra Nevada
Notes — Dark and rich, creamy head. Aroma brings subtly rich malt notes, with a bit of a dry cocoa powder note. Not overly sweet or syrupy as the name might suggest. This one is a nice showcase of restraint and balance, everything in harmony. Overall 38 / 50.
Beer #4 — West Latitude — Session Rye w/ Hibiscus — 5.5% / 55 IBU
Collaborators — Bear Republic, Faction, Mad River, Magnolia, Maui, Sierra Nevada
Notes — Intense and peppery rye notes balanced with a caramel sweetness and a fruity berry hop note. Really well done, floral and light, crisp, sessionable. Overall 41 / 50.
Beer #5 — Pat-Rye-Ot — Revolutionary Pale Ale w/ Apples — 5.6% / 55 IBU
Collaborators — Devil’s Backbone, Dogfish Head, Lawson’s, Trillium, Stoudts, Sierra Nevada
Notes — A brilliant amber color with a puffy white head. A nice easy going pale with notes of clover honey and fresh cut grass, some subtle green apple. Overall 34 / 50.
Beer #6 — Stout of the Union — Robust Stout — 7.3% / 64 IBU
Collaborators — Bagby, Beachwood, Lost Abbey, Smog City, Societe, Sierra Nevada
Notes — Dark and rich, big notes of chocolate and coffee, somehow striking a balance with fruity hops and a subtle peppery spice. This is very very well done. Overall 40 / 50.
All in all, a great culmination of beers, all very well made and put together harmoniously. I will be having a hankering for the Session Rye and the Moxee Moron for some time. These recipes all need to be hung onto and hopefully one makes the cut to be rebrewed, just like the Hoppy Lager from 2015. I always love when brewers come together and can manage to create something greater than the sum of its parts. This is one 12 pack worth the price of admission.