The newest addition to their barrel-aged series, Barrel Runner is a Mosaic-hoped Imperial IPA. After the beer was brewed, it was aged in rum barrels to infuse sweet and spicy flavors from the barrel to take the already tropical IPA to the next level. It's set for release this summer and will be available in 750ml bottles and 12oz 4-packs.
Based in San Diego, Pure Project Brewing blends Southern California style with unique flavors and ingredients. Their latest release, Sakura, is an unfiltered west coast IPA that is a collaboration between Pure Project and Pizza Port Brewing — a legendary brewpub with five locations throughout California. It draws its name from the Japanese cherry blossom and adds rice to the recipe along with Mosaic and Waimea hops.
Temescal Brewing's labels already showcase their love for the 1980's, and they're leaning into those influences even more with Push Pop IPA. The "Creamsicle IPA" is made to mimic the familiar flavors of one of the best ice cream truck staples ever and is brewed with lactose, vanilla beans, citrus zest, peach purée, and Southern Passion and Motueka hops.
Inspired by a handwritten recipe in George Washington's personal military journal from 1757, Freedom Reserve Lager was brewed by military vets that work for Budweiser. The beer is made using toasted barley grains and some hops and will be packaged in vintage stubby bottles and one-pint cans. The patriotic lager also continues a tradition of honoring American veterans as a portion of the proceeds sold will benefit a nonprofit organization that provides scholarships to military families.
With the annual Run For The Roses imminent, Florida brewery Funky Buddha has a special release to mark the occasion. The beer is brewed with barley, flaked corn, and rye for an American strong-style ale that mimics the recipe of Bourbon mash. Then fresh mint is added before the beer is aged in barrels that previously held High West whiskey for an extended period of time. The result is a unique 12% ABV beer that brings to mind a classic Kentucky cocktail that finds itself in the winner's circle every Spring.
Future space travel adventures will include beer, but in zero-gravity conditions, our senses are altered — so drinks taste different, and pouring them is another problem entirely. Vostok Space Beer is a collaboration between 4 Pines Brewing and Saber Astronautics in Australia. The beer itself was brewed with a zero-gravity environment in mind using a dry Irish style stout recipe, while a special insert was created in the bottle that wicks the beer from the bottom to the neck, providing enough surface tension so you can drink Vostok directly from the bottle in space.
Located in the small town of Williamston, Michigan, Old Nation Brewing is quietly making one of the best IPAs in the country. Named for the Michigan highway that connects Old Nation with larger cities like Lansing, M-43 is a hazy, New England style IPA packed with the citrus aromas and flavors hopheads love but replaces much of the hop bite with a creamy, smooth mouthfeel that makes it more approachable for drinkers typically overwhelmed by hoppy beer. It features a blend of Calypso, Simcoe, Citra and Amarillo hops and is canned at 6.8% ABV.
Made for everyone that wants a better bath experience, the Super-Plush Complete Towel Set from Brooklinen is the result of testing textiles for two years. To create the strongest, most absorbent plush towels, Brooklinen looked no further than the inventors of the modern towel — Turkish artisans, mills, and materials. Each towel is crafted with a "Z twist" terry weave and is dense, cozy, and will hold its shape without unraveling for years to come. Available in White, Putty, Smoke, and Graphite neutrals.
Presented by Brooklinen.
The result of three years of research and millions of data points, the Casper Wave is a breakthrough in mattress design. Underneath its handsome exterior, you'll find the new, proprietary Natural Geometry System. It uses five layers of foam to mimic the natural contours of your body at 36 specific points, adjusting naturally to your shoulders and hips without sacrificing support, and keeping your spine properly aligned. Like the original, it uses open-cell foams to keep you cool at night. Designed and assembled in the USA.
Presented by Casper.
The brewery that helped kick off a beer renaissance in Cincinnati, Ohio has been experimenting with sour beers for nearly five years. Rhinegeist has learned a lot during that time, and are releasing the fruit of their labor dubbed "Outer Reaches." The first in the series is a sour blonde ale aged for six months called Infinite Dawn. It's packaged in corked and caged 500ml bottles in limited quantities and will be available this month throughout their distribution network.
Inspired by the state flower of California, Red Poppy has been a staple in the Lost Abbey line for years. The Flander's Red Ale style is made using sour cherries and then aged in oak barrels for more than a year. It's tart, full of fruit flavor, and a little bit funky. One of the best sour beers brewed each year; Red Poppy is finished at 6.5% in these 375ml corked and caged bottles.
Plenty of craft breweries make a coffee-infused beer. Not many use coffee beans they've roasted themselves. Modern Time in San Diego just happens to brew beer and make coffee, and Bedrock is the perfect combination of those passions. The beer is a brown ale brewed with their Black House Blend coffee and drinks more like a boozy cold brew than a beer. Available on-tap now and soon in these colorful, nitrogenated 16-ounce cans.
For the first time in 17 years, Yuengling is adding a new beer to its core lineup. America's oldest brewery developed this new Pilsner over the course of 18 months before landing on a recipe that combines pale and specialty malts with Hallertau and Saaz hops. Light and crisp at 4.7% ABV, Golden Pilsner will be available in cans and bottles starting in April.
A classic style, amber ales rarely get their due these days. To help shed a brighter light on the style, Creature Comforts brewed a full-flavored amber ale aged on French Oak that quickly became a favorite in their taproom. It took three years, but they're now canning Reclaimed Rye, whose name is also a nod to the wood used to make the bars, picnic tables, and walls in the Creature Comforts brewery, all designed and built from local woodworkers.
Goose Island is one of the pioneers of boozy, barrel-aged stouts with more than 25 years of experience. Their latest success — aged in the same barrelhouse where the legendary Bourbon County Stout matures — is Brasserie Noir: an imperial stout aged in Cabernet barrels for up to 12 months. The Cab barrels infuse some sweetness, acidity, and dark fruit flavors into the beer, which weighs in at 11.3% ABV in 765ml bottles.
There are several reasons you don't see many craft lagers on store shelves. One is that while easy to drink, lagers are harder to make, with flaws that are tougher to hide behind a mountain of hops. In 2000, Firestone Walker released a lager, only to see it drowned out unceremoniously by the hop craze. Now, 18 years later, this new all-malt lager is ready for its debut, brewed in the classic Munich Helles style using German pilsner and North American pale malts.
A classic West Coast IPA with a modern twist. That's the latest creation from Sierra Nevada, named Hop Bullet after a new brewing technique. The technique involves adding a double-barrel blast of Magnum hops and lupulin dust to the beer. The dust is the yellow powder that contains all the resin and oils responsible for the flavor and aroma, and it balances out the bitterness. It's 8% ABV, very approachable, and another victory from a craft brewing legend.
Combining vintage design and modern materials, Hamilton celebrates 100 years of aviation timepieces with the Khaki Pilot Watch. The dial is modeled after the flight instruments inside classic aircrafts, featuring a day display at the 12 o'clock and sand-colored Super-LumiNova numerals. It's housed in a 42 mm stainless steel case which has been coated in dark brown PVD. The watch is finished with a rugged leather strap. Inspired by U.S. military jackets, it sports a signature hot stamp and an authentic cockpit patina.
Presented by Hamilton.
All of Leica's cameras are somewhat rugged, but only the Leica X-U was built to thrive in the elements — including underwater. This is evidenced by the dedicated "UW" mode that adjusts the white balance and activates distortion correction for the conditions, and the flash that's placed as close as possible to the subject. Overall, the body is waterproof to 50 feet, in part thanks to a fixed lens, sealed aluminum top plate, and grippy TPE coating. Otherwise, the camera is still recognizable as a Leica, with all the manual controls you'd expect, a reassuring heft, and a slight influence from Audi Design, who collaborated on the project.
Sensor: 16.5-megapixel APS-C / Lens: Summilux 23mm f/1.7 (35mm equivalent) / Focus: Contrast-based AF / Burst: 5fps / Monitor: 3" LCD with 920,000 pixels / Video: 1080p / ISO: 100-12,500 / Body: Aluminum and Plastic with TPE reinforcement
Width: 5.51" / Height: 3.11" / Depth: 3.46" / Weight: 1.4 lbs.
An annual late winter release from Elysian Brewing, Split Shot Milk Stout pairs two of Seattle's flagship beverages. The 5.6% ABV beer is brewed with Elysian's neighbor Stumptown Coffee Roasters using a pound per barrel of cold-infused espresso. The mixture gives the stout plenty of coffee flavors, balanced with a hint of sweetness from the added milk sugar for a smooth sessionable brew that's warming enough for winter but light enough to welcome in spring.
Each year Lagunitas brews their imperial coffee stout and hunts down the right barrels to take the beer up a notch. For the latest release, the brewery was able to snag some sought-after barrels from Willett Distillery that once held their rye whiskey. After some time mingling in the wood, "Willettized" is bottled at 12.6% with tasting notes that include chocolate, coffee, oak, and a dash of sweetness from the wood influence. Available in six packs, it might be the best value for a barrel-aged stout you'll ever find.
Founded in 2014 by three like-minded beer lovers, Other Half Brewing in Brooklyn, New York has quickly made a name for themselves. Other Half likes to travel and collaborate with lots of different brewers but always returns home to New York to cater to the locals. All Green Everything is one of their staples, brewed with Amarillo, Citra, Mosaic, and Motueka hops. It's a hop lovers dream and packs a punch at 10.5% ABV.
Located in Chester County, Pennsylvania, north of Philadelphia, Iron Hill has been serving award-winning craft beer since 1996. Rising Sun IPA is one of their flagship brews, named for the Japanese Sorachi Ace hops that are the backbone of its recipe. The IPA is light and well-balanced, highlighted by spicy citrus hops and a fresh new 16oz can design.
After a three year absence, Cascade Brewing is bringing back Sang Rouge to kick off 2018. The beer is a blend of sour red ales aged in red wine barrels and oak puncheons for up to 24 months with some barrels exceeding 30 months. The foundation of their Sang Series, this sour's return features notes of roasted malts, toasted oak, and plenty of tart fruit.
Lambic brewing is a tradition that dates back to the times of the Roman Empire. And the blending of young and old lambics results in what is called geuze. Drie Fonteinen is one of the only traditional geuze blenders left in Belgium, using 100% spontaneously fermented lambic beer, aged in oak casks, with no artificial sweeteners or other additives. Their Oude Geuze is one of their standouts and is a blend of lambic from three Belgian breweries expertly blended by the proprietor Armand Debelder.
Fieldwork Brewing in Berkeley, California is always experimenting with hoppy beers. And Broken Clouds might be one of their best. The double IPA is cloudy, creamy, easy on your palette with minimal bitterness. It's a Northeast style IPA with enough West Coast influence to make it different than anything within the category.
To finish off 2017, Stone Brewing is releasing five barrel aged beers. Among them is this 2016 Xocoveza Charred, a mocha stout Stone releases during the holidays, but aged in bourbon barrels. Time in the barrel gives the already flavorful Xocoveza extra caramel and vanilla flavors that play nice with the spices that help the regular version stand out. Corked and caged 500ml bottles are available in small batches.
The latest barrel-aged imperial stout from Side Project Beer gets back to basics. The beer focuses on the three most essential elements in the process; the beer that is brewed, the barrels the beer is aged in, and the amount of time spent in those barrels. The brewers tasted more than 50 beers in their aging warehouse to come up with this blend, choosing Willett and Heaven Hill barrels and bottling at a hefty 15% ABV.
With so many barrel-aged options available, sometimes it's best to reach for a classic. Built off the back of their legendary Yeti Imperial Stout, Great Divide also crafts this barrel-aged version as an exclusive release annually. It's aged for at least 12 months in whiskey barrels and recently became available in 12-ounce bottles. If it's one of your favorites, you might not get another chance to drink it as Great Divide is shelving it for the foreseeable future after the 2017 release.
As we celebrate the holidays and look forward to another year, Goose Island has released Noel. The beer is inspired by the Belgian tradition where a holiday Noel beer is brewed to thank loyal customers. The Goose thank you is an un-spiced Belgian-style Dark Ale bottled at 9.5%, and is a limited seasonal release that is unlikely to last past the start of the new year.
Since 2007, And Union has worked with brewmasters from small, Bavarian family-run breweries to create unfiltered craft beers. Neu Black Lager is one of their best, made using barley, yeast, hops, water, and plenty of roasted malt. It's easy to drink at 5% ABV and packaged in these black, minimalist cans.
Brewed using only four organic raw materials, this Norwegian Pilsner is a light, balanced option. The simplicity of the beer's recipe is reflected in the can design, opting for clean, bold packaging that stands out. The cans feature a matte finish with gold tops to emphasize the beer's quality and the brand name — Krone, which is Norwegian for 'Crown.'
AleSmith Brewing has released many variants of their flagship Speedway Stout. But this double barrel expression might be the best of the bunch. It's brewed with locally roasted coffee before maturing in freshly used bourbon barrels. It's then transferred to Portuguese port barrels to impart notes of raisin and plum. Released at AleSmith only, it's unlike any Speedway Stout you've tasted.
