Breckenridge<\/a>, the festival has a variety of different seminars that are relevant for different levels of beer aficionados. Though seminars aren\u2019t included in Saturday\u2019s grand tasting ticket, the presentations are reasonably priced.<\/p>\nFor free, one can attend a workshop on how to become a Cicerone, \u2014 the beer equivalent of a sommelier \u2014 enjoy an evening of paired beers and cigars or wake up for a rejuvenating morning session of yoga.<\/p>\n
The schedule also includes a technical track that has Inland Island Yeast Laboratories along with Avery Brewing Company, Call To Arms Brewing Co. and Crooked Stave discussing the properties of yeasts in high gravity and sour beers. For those wanting a more random selection of panels, The Colorado Farm Brewery, Our Mutual Friend Brewing and Three Barrel Brewing Company will be talking about ancient Scandinavian beers.<\/p>\n
New this year is a seminar that describes how water quality affects beer.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been wanting to feature water for a long time,\u201d Laura said. \u201cWe\u2019ve done hops, we\u2019ve done sours, we\u2019ve done all sorts of different yeast features, but we\u2019ve never focused on water. \u2026 It\u2019s so critical. It\u2019s like what, 80 or 90 percent of your beer? So let\u2019s talk about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Additionally, there affiliated tap takeovers and dining events hosted by local breweries and restaurants.<\/p>\n
While it\u2019s fun and games for most attendees, the weekend will also be an opportunity for one lucky homebrewer to compete at GABF. Two different sessions will judge a maximum of 300 beers entered from across the globe. The winner, announced on Saturday, will brew their beer at a commercial scale with Aurora\u2019s Dry Dock Brewing, will be entered into GABF\u2019s Pro-Am Competition and have the beer featured at Denver\u2019s Falling Rock Taphouse.<\/p>\n
\u2018SH*T-KICKING ALES\u2019<\/p>\n
Ska Brewing has been making beer in Durango for 23 years and 2019 marks their first time at the festival since its move to Breckenridge and the first time being named featured brewmaster.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt really is a big honor,\u201d said Thibodeau. \u201cWe\u2019re fortunate in Colorado that not only do we have the Great American Beer Festival but this festival. Because Laura Lodge did a great job early on bringing international brewers and people like Sam from Dogfish Head that garnered a lot of respect for this festival. \u2026 It\u2019s just well known as a high-end festival with a lot going on for the pretty serious beer geek.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s always fun to go to even if you\u2019re not a featured brewmaster. So this is humbling and very exciting at the same time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thibodeau got into craft beer almost by accident growing up in Denver. In high school during the mid-\u201980s he and his business partner Bill Graham discovered the homebrewing notebook of Thibodeau\u2019s father. The two started to mess around with the recipes, realizing they then didn\u2019t need to buy beer, while simultaneously inspiring his father to get back into brewing. Ingredients like malt were bought at grocery stores because homebrew shops weren\u2019t common and the two continued to brew through college to the founding of Ska.<\/p>\n
Since craft brewing was still in its infancy, no one style was a particular influence. Thibodeau recalls going to Applejack Wine & Spirits with his father and finding a small wooden crate of Boulder Beer and stumbling upon Pete\u2019s Wicked Ale.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was a little tag on the neck that explained why there was sediment in the bottom,\u201d said Thibodeau. \u201d I went home and drank it \u2026 and that was it for me. I don\u2019t know if it was really good or not at the time, but I thought it was fantastic.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe didn\u2019t have a good palette or anything, we just liked beer. We grew up in the shadow of Coors.\u201d<\/p>\n
The one rule of their homebrewing adventure was that ska music had to be played during the process and their previous batch had to be finished before starting a new one.<\/p>\n
\u201cDurango is pretty much a cowboy town, other than the college, so we told everyone it was an acronym for sh*t-kicking ales because we knew no one knew what the music was back then.\u201d<\/p>\n
To celebrate the journey from then to now, at the festival Ska will be pouring their barrel-aged MonumentAle from their 20th anniversary, whisky sour aged with orange peel and cherries, Bumpier And Grindier imperial coffee milk stout and Cru D\u2019\u00e9tat, an ale made with wild, spontaneous yeast that was aged in large oak barrels called foeders for two years and weighs in at 11.5 percent ABV.<\/p>\n
Steve Breezley, the chief operating officer of Ska, will host a Saturday morning seminar on how the glucoamylase enzyme is used in brewing to create high ABV beers along with the Champagne-like brut beers. Tickets are $15 and seating is limited to 60 people.<\/p>\n
ACROSS THE POND<\/p>\n
Sharing the headlines with Durango\u2019s brewery is Nyn\u00e4shamns \u00c5ngbryggeri, a 21-year-old brewery from the coastal town of Nyn\u00e4shamns, Sweden, that\u2019s also honored to be featured. For many in the industry this weekend is an opportunity for peers to reconnect and that\u2019s no different here since the two breweries have collaborated on a pair of beers in the past. However, this is the first time Nyn\u00e4shamns has been to a festival in America.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are from a small country in Europe doing our own thing and mostly to our own market,\u201d said spokesperson Marcus W\u00e4rme in an email. \u201cSo, to be selected as a brewmaster for a U.S. festival like this is really humbling.\u201d<\/p>\n
The brewery doesn\u2019t focus on any particular beer style and is influenced by British, Belgian and German beers. Due to a lack of a large brewing culture back when they started, and inspired by author Michael Jackson\u2019s comprehensive beer books, they would travel to other European countries to acquire more diverse brews before brewing their own.<\/p>\n
\u201cTrappist breweries like Chimay, the Westvleteren and Westmalle impressed us back then and still do,\u201d said co-founder Lasse Ericsson in an email. \u201cA few breweries in Bamberg inspired many of the lager beers that we produce today. But even real ale from the Sheffield area was something special for us then and has inspired us over the years.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Saturday afternoon Ericsson and head brewer Andrew Colley will present a seminar about making simple beers true to their style. Tickets are $15 and seating is limited to 60 people.<\/p>\n
DINNER IS SERVED<\/p>\n
Both Ska and Nyn\u00e4shamns will be featured at Friday\u2019s five-course Traditional Brewmasters\u2019 Dinner. Instead of a traditional pairing dinner, \u2014 one beer with each course \u2014 the executive chef for the Brewers Association, Adam Duyle, and the association\u2019s craft beer program director Julia Herz worked with Quandary Grille to develop a menu where each dish works with a beer from both breweries simultaneously.<\/p>\n
For instance, the first course is a seared scallop and crispy potato with a saffron beurre blanc served alongside Ska\u2019s whiskey sour and Nyn\u00e4shamns\u2019 Valsviken Vinterporter. Meanwhile the fourth course of duck \u201ccassoulet\u201d pasta, Portuguese sausage and candied bacon is paired with Nyn\u00e4shamns B\u00f6tet Barleywine and Ska\u2019s Cru D\u2019\u00e9tat.<\/p>\n
Additionally, the festival will feature a Thursday dinner at Beaver Run Resort hosted by Avery Brewing Company and Dogfish Head Brewing as Friday will see a small plates pairing crafted by Aurum Food & Wine, Blackberry Farm Brewery and Verboten Brewing.<\/p>\n
Throughout the weekend, there\u2019s always a bite of food to pair with a glass of beer, and vice versa.<\/p>\n
via:: Vail Daily<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thirsty people are invited to the 19th annual Big Beers, Belgians and Barleywines festival happening this weekend in Breckenridge. Roughly 150 breweries from around the world will be pouring more than 450 beers. As the name of the festival implies, to be served the beer has to be higher than 7 percent alcohol by volume […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[160],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1302317","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-12 11:00:18","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1302317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1302317"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1302317\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1302317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1302317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1302317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}