And the future of beer is...
The curious case of seltzers
Seltzers and spirits are only the beginning
by Michael J. Casey
w
ith the releases of Red, Many figured the future of beer lay in Rosé, Rosé with Bubbles wild flavors, ancient and undiscovered and White on June 10, Odell styles and IPA by the barrel. But 2016 Brewing Co.’s latest venture, was also the year Mark Anthony Brands The OBC Wine Project, is unleashed White Claw Hard Seltzer on ready for its close-up. After 30 years in an unsuspecting market. Its previous the brewing world, Odell is getting into venture in the flavored-malt beverage the wine game. (FMBs) sector, Mike’s Hard Lemonade, Not that Odell is ODELL BREWING CO. closing up shop and taking its iconic 90 Shilling and IPA with it — there will be plenty of malt, hops and yeast coming out of its Fort Collins brewery — but when the brewery announced in August 2019 it would start packaging a line of wine, the signal was clear: To stay afloat in the brewing world, you had to diversify. Packaged in 12-ounce cans, The OBC Wine Project retails for about $8 a can, which is a did well, but nothing like White Claw. pretty good deal for two glasses of Popularity grew slowly, and then quickquality wine. Red is fruit-forward and ly, even out-pacing Budweiser sales in jammy, White is citrusy with refreshing July 2019. minerality, and Rosé plays it subtle with Budweiser punched back earlier this nuances of strawberry and rhubarb. year, releasing Bud Light Seltzer. They They pair nicely with dinner at home, are not alone; five Boulder County but better with a picnic. breweries package a line of hard seltzer Four years ago, a brewery making with a sixth, Left Hand Brewing, packwine was preposterous. Hazy IPAs were aging a non-alcoholic line of seltzer marching toward ubiquity, pastry stouts water infused with CBD. were catching fire, and sours were conAnd that’s just the beginning. Ska verting wine drinkers into beer drinkers. Brewing’s Ska Street outpost on
Arapahoe Avenue also incorporates a distillery, Peach Street Distillers, coowned by Bill Graham and Dave Thibodeau of Ska, and Rory Donovan. Hailing from Palisade, Peach Street has never shared a facility with Ska (headquartered in Durango), but when the former FATE Brewing Company facility came available, Boulder proved to be ideal for a joint location. FATE had planned to expand the brewery and incorporate distilling when the company went belly up in 2019. The jump from brewing to distilling isn’t unprecedented. Spirit Hound Distilleries’ co-founder and head distiller Craig Englehorn used to brew, too — he helped design the original Dale Pale’s Ale for Oskar Blues Brewery back in the late-’90s. Now Oskar Blues has a line of seltzer (see page 23), and Englehorn has a line of spirits. Regardless, there are still more than 50 breweries in the county that have neither. And, as long as you’re small, another beer on the menu is diversification enough. But in a world where the bigger breweries are fighting for shelf space in the absence of tap handles and packed tasting rooms, breweries exploring non-beer products appear to be the next frontier.
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hough they aren’t all made the same way, they all aim for similar results: 100-ish calories, one-ish grams of carbs, one-ish grams of sugar, 5% ABV and gluten-free. How they get there is their own business, but usually follows this trajectory: Sugar (cane) water is fermented with yeast and then dosed with water-soluble flavors: Yumberry, juniper and lime, grapefruit, etc. That’s where the story ends. When we talk about beer, we talk about what’s in the glass: The ingredients used and where they may or may not come from. The style of beer and what it may or may not say about the origins of the beverage. The brewer and what they may or may not have wanted to bring to the beer. Techniques involved, food pairings and so on. Seltzer is the exact opposite. Seltzer is about what’s not in the glass: Calories and carbs, gluten and aggressive flavors. Whereas hop-saturated IPAs and heavily roasted stouts smack you in the mouth with flavor, seltzers are specifically designed not to. They’re meant to taste crisp when it’s hot outside, refreshing in the club and light enough not to blow out your palate with bitter, sweet or sour. For some, they’re a pre-charged mixer, for others, Le Croix with an edge. And any way you slice it, they’re the key component to growth in the beer market these days.
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