This past weekend Eric and I had the good fortune of attending the Great American Beer Festival. Big thanks to Lindsay for getting us a second ticket! We attended the 5:30-9:30 session on Saturday evening, the final session of the festival. Some quick facts about the festival:
- 3 Day festival
- 49,000 attendees
- Annual event held in Denver each year
- 2,700 different beer samples
- More than 580 US Breweries
It was something else. Picture Grand Central Station but everyone is happy and drunk. Being our first beer festival we didn't know what to expect but our enthusiasm for beer and pretzels helped us fit right in. After getting our wristbands and free sample glasses we were off and running. Well it was more of a jog but it was a marathon for sure. Too many beers, too little time. Some notable quotes were, "Ok, on to the next one", "That was pretty good, can I try that one now", "No time lets go!", "Only an hour left, time to get serious" and "We JUST went to the bathroom man!"
The Exhibit Hall in the Colorado Convention Center, 584,000 square feet, was filled with tables and tables of breweries who had at least two beer samples each, usually more. The breweries were split up by sections of the country (Midwest, Southeast, Northwest, Southwest etc.) and Eric and I made our best efforts to visit each section. You know your festival is serious when you have your own smartphone app, something that came in handy as we wandered the floor and tried to decide where to go next. The sample glasses had a 1oz line on them signifying how much beer you would get per sample. Some gave you more and some were a bit stingy and gave you less. My first impression was "this isn't going to be nearly enough" but it was plenty.
I began the festival with the intentions of keeping track of how many samples I tried and rating each sample. This did not happen. After reading the scamatics of the different beers a brewery offered I would point at a pitcher, the person behind the table would poor, I'd give a one-word rating to Eric and repeat. Most of the time I would try multiple beers from the same brewery, take a side step to the next brewery, point, drink, rate. This went on for the whole night. I lost track of how many I tried after 3. At first I tried to write down the beers I liked the best but this became too time consuming and tedious so we just took photos of the beer descriptions that we found noteworthy. Its funny how we took more pictures near the end of the festival than at the beginning.
Some favorites included the Hazlenut Brown Nectar (Gold Medal Winner in the Specialty Beer category) of the Rogue Brewery which Eric met one of the owners of the night prior, Mountain Mama Helles of the Lone Tree Brewery and the Spicy Blonde Holiday Ale of the Morgantown Brewing Company. Looking to get me some Spicy Blonde around Christmas, smooth and delicious with a ginger bread after taste. Also was fortunate to have gotten a few free samples of the Sam Adams Utopias, a beer aged for up to 16 years with an ABV of 27% and priced at over $150 a bottle.
Next time we are definitely making our own pretzel necklaces. A good pretzel necklace separates the beer festival vets from the rookies. We saw them all around the festival and were immediately jealous. Like the lion's mane in the jungle, the bigger and brighter your pretzel chain the more respect given. And don't think that pretzel necklaces are limited to just pretzels. We are talking string cheese, bagels, Funions, whatever you want. I think I'm going to start wearing pretzel necklaces more in my life. Just seems practical.
- 3 Day festival
- 49,000 attendees
- Annual event held in Denver each year
- 2,700 different beer samples
- More than 580 US Breweries
It was something else. Picture Grand Central Station but everyone is happy and drunk. Being our first beer festival we didn't know what to expect but our enthusiasm for beer and pretzels helped us fit right in. After getting our wristbands and free sample glasses we were off and running. Well it was more of a jog but it was a marathon for sure. Too many beers, too little time. Some notable quotes were, "Ok, on to the next one", "That was pretty good, can I try that one now", "No time lets go!", "Only an hour left, time to get serious" and "We JUST went to the bathroom man!"
The Exhibit Hall in the Colorado Convention Center, 584,000 square feet, was filled with tables and tables of breweries who had at least two beer samples each, usually more. The breweries were split up by sections of the country (Midwest, Southeast, Northwest, Southwest etc.) and Eric and I made our best efforts to visit each section. You know your festival is serious when you have your own smartphone app, something that came in handy as we wandered the floor and tried to decide where to go next. The sample glasses had a 1oz line on them signifying how much beer you would get per sample. Some gave you more and some were a bit stingy and gave you less. My first impression was "this isn't going to be nearly enough" but it was plenty.
I began the festival with the intentions of keeping track of how many samples I tried and rating each sample. This did not happen. After reading the scamatics of the different beers a brewery offered I would point at a pitcher, the person behind the table would poor, I'd give a one-word rating to Eric and repeat. Most of the time I would try multiple beers from the same brewery, take a side step to the next brewery, point, drink, rate. This went on for the whole night. I lost track of how many I tried after 3. At first I tried to write down the beers I liked the best but this became too time consuming and tedious so we just took photos of the beer descriptions that we found noteworthy. Its funny how we took more pictures near the end of the festival than at the beginning.
Some favorites included the Hazlenut Brown Nectar (Gold Medal Winner in the Specialty Beer category) of the Rogue Brewery which Eric met one of the owners of the night prior, Mountain Mama Helles of the Lone Tree Brewery and the Spicy Blonde Holiday Ale of the Morgantown Brewing Company. Looking to get me some Spicy Blonde around Christmas, smooth and delicious with a ginger bread after taste. Also was fortunate to have gotten a few free samples of the Sam Adams Utopias, a beer aged for up to 16 years with an ABV of 27% and priced at over $150 a bottle.
Next time we are definitely making our own pretzel necklaces. A good pretzel necklace separates the beer festival vets from the rookies. We saw them all around the festival and were immediately jealous. Like the lion's mane in the jungle, the bigger and brighter your pretzel chain the more respect given. And don't think that pretzel necklaces are limited to just pretzels. We are talking string cheese, bagels, Funions, whatever you want. I think I'm going to start wearing pretzel necklaces more in my life. Just seems practical.
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