• Caldera IPA (Caldera Brewing Company)
• Dale's Pale Ale (Oskar Blues Brewery)
• Marooned on Hog Island (21st Amendment Brewery)
• Morning Glory Espresso Stout (Old Dominion Brewing Company)
• Oatmeal Stout (Mendocino Brewing Company)
• Rampant Imperial India Pale Ale (New Belgium Brewing Company)
• The Immortal IPA (Elysian Brewing Company)
Even within the craft brewing industry, known for its spirit of camaraderie, the bond between Milton's Dogfish Head Craft Brewery and Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. of Chico, Calif., is closer to familial.
The companies collaborated in 2009 and 2011 to brew two iterations of a strong ale they called Life & Limb. Now they have gotten together again to bring out a third beer in the lineage, a double IPA called Rhizing Bines.
Collaborations have been an outgrowth of the craft beer industry's collegial climate for the years. We've seen team-ups between New Belgium and Alpine, Russian River and Avery, and Green Flash and Founders, among many others. Dogfish Head itself has participated in a dozen collabs, notably Saison du BUFF with Stone Brewing Company of Escondido, Calif., and Victory Brewing Company of Downingtown, Pa.
But the Dogfish/Sierra relationship seems to have grown into something special. In a promotional video for the original Life & Limb release, Dogfish founder Sam Calagione (who was just nominated for the third time for a James Beard Award as one of the country's most outstanding brewers) chatted with Ken Grossman, founder of Sierra Nevada and one of the true giants of the American beer renaissance.
Calagione joked about the cellarable brew: "Fifteen years from now my ultimate goal would be if Ken's kids were enjoying it with my kids at a beer festival and complaining about how horribly the first-generation people ran those companies."
Three years later, a video released to promote Rhizing Bines features Calagione chatting with 25-year-old Brian Grossman, now a general manager for his father's company. In it, Calagione says the catalyst for the new collaboration was Sierra Nevada breaking ground in 2012 on a production facility in Asheville, N.C.
"With you guys coming to North Carolina to open a brewery on the East Coast," Calagione said, "we thought it would be a fun time to get back together and welcome you to our coast and do something that again speaks of the terroir of our breweries, but is perhaps more in the wheelhouse of what we're known for as brewers."
Life & Limb contained maple syrup from the family farm where Calagione grew up in Massachusetts and Grossman family estate barley from the Sierra Nevada premises in California.
Rhizing Bines has some of the same estate barley, but other contributions are different.
Sierra Nevada loaned to the project a "torpedo" – a canister-like accessory invented by the elder Grossman for optimizing hop utilization during the fermentation stage.
For Rhizing Bines, the torpedo was packed with two kinds of hops: Bravo, a bold superalpha variety, and #644, an experimental hop Grossman describes as having "big floral notes" and "big fruit notes – almost tropical in essence."
Dogfish Head contributed a specially selected Red Fife winter wheat from Anson Mills, a grower of organic heirloom grains in North Carolina. The beer is being brewed with house yeast from both breweries.
Whether it's because of the familial bonds or just the combined prowess of more than 50 years of brewing experience, Rhizing Bines is an outstanding beer. It pours a warm, clear amber color with an impressively dense white head with lots of staying power. The aroma is earthier than expected, with musty hops, yeast and a hint of its 8 percent alcohol.
There is loads of complexity in the taste, all pulled together with deft craftsmanship. It is sweet, but not ponderous like many double IPAs I've had, and there is a malt grain flavor in the middle that brings it down to earth. I pick up notes of butterscotch and cantaloupe. The smooth, glassy mouthfeel lends the impression of a rich, substantial brew.
Rhizing Bines is one of the most appealing beers I've tasted lately. It will pair with food – the brewers suggest barbecued meats or chevre – or would make a good after-dinner sipper. It's in 22-ounce bottles in stores, for about $13 to $14.50, and on tap regionally.
A fantastic variety in this week's mix-pack!
• G'Knight Imperial Red (Oskar Blues Brewery)
• Toasted Lager (Blue Point Brewing Company)
• Cadillac Mountain Stout (Bar Harbor Brewing Company)
• O’Ryely IPA (Widmer Brothers Brewing)
• Gunpowder Falls German-style Dunkel (Bauernhof Brewing Company)
• Double D Double IPA (Old Dominion Brewing Company)
On this chilly, cloudy Saturday, I journeyed by car, train, and bus to the Philadelphia Navy Yard for the Philly Craft Beer Festival. More than 80 breweries (at least 23 from Pennsylvania) dispensed samples of their brews under the shelter of two gigantic tents.
Below is a list of the most memorable beers I sampled, along with any specific recollections I can conjur.
• Coal Porter - Atlantic Brewing Company (Bar Harbor, ME) This was the first dark beer we tasted that day among an onslaught of IPAs. I was not familiar with Atlantic. They are still quite small, apparently, with distribution only in New England, the mid-Atlantic, and Ohio.
• Obovoid Oak-Aged Oatmeal Stout - Boulder Beer Company (Boulder, CO) This was served on nitro, so it had a dense, creamy head and velvety mouthfeel, even above what you'd already expect from an oatmeal stout. The woody note was nicely integrated with the dark malts. A real treat!
• Rye Stout - Lavery Brewing Company (Erie, PA) Very roasty, with a substantial rye spiciness. I didn't tasting anything else all day that was quite like this. Props to tiny Lavery!
• Rugbrød - The Bruery (Placentia, CA) A Danish-style dark rye ale -- can't claim to have had one of those before. Bread and toffee, with a sudden turn toward Belgian-type sourness at the end. Very unusual.
• Stegmaier Porter - Lion Brewery, Inc. (Wilkes-Barre, PA) The venerable old Stegmaier brand is perpetuated by the Lion Brewery, and this porter is very solid, with deep malt flavor and that faint smokiness I love in porters.
• Chocolate Stout - Appalachian Brewing Company (Gettysburg, PA) This was the last beer I sampled in the first tent, and it was among the best. Super dense and chocolatey. The pour was far more generous than the supposed 2 oz. limit, but I definitely wanted more.
• Hop Karma Brown IPA - Terrapin Beer Company (Athens, GA) To my surprise, one of the best beers I tasted all day. Nice caramel, crème brûlée flavor -- somewhat reminiscent of Tröegs' Flying Mouflan, hands down my favorite beer of the 2012 International Great Beer Expo.
• Ground Break American-style Saison - Ithaca Beer Company (Ithaca, NY) I loved the slightly heavy mouthfeel of this beer, and its apricot fruitiness and lemony but not overstated hop contribution.
• Doppelbock - Cottrell Brewing Company (Pawcatuck, CT) Although their website declares them "the oldest continuously brewed and bottled beer in Connecticut," Cottrell was another new discovery for me. I was impressed that this flavorful doppelbock was able to cut through my palate fatigue so late in the day and make a strong showing.
• Rise Up Stout - Evolution Craft Brewing Company (Salisbury, MD) My very last sample at the end of three hours of tasting. The ex-Delaware brewers delivered a wonderfully rich flavor in their coffee stout. I am told that they are doing remarkable things with their barrel-aged and blended Menagerie series, but, alas, it was too much to hope that they would bring their top-end products to a festival.
Apart from a slightly chaotic situation with the bus queues for returning to the subway terminal, this was a very enjoyable event that offered many new discoveries. Time to consider buying tickets to the International Great Beer Expo in June.
• Genesis Dry Hopped Session Ale (Shmaltz Brewing Company)
• New Albion Ale (Boston Beer Company)
• Righteous Ale (Sixpoint Brewery)
• Bête Blanche Tripel (Elysian Brewing Company)
• Scarlett Red Rye (Speakeasy Ales & Lagers)
• Old Heathen Imperial Stout (Weyerbacher Brewing Company)
