Speaking of Beer Camp... I haven't been able to try these beers due to the screwy TN beer laws. Though the laws are better now, with wine/liquor stores being able to sell low and high grav as of July 1, and groceries and such in line to be able to do the same in the coming years, the weirdness of the laws do not allow beer packs to be sold that are a mix of low and high grav (which the Beer Camp is). Sucks, but them's the breaks.
In the meantime, the
Beer Camp Across America has been on tour this summer, featuring festivals in seven cities pouring beers from over 700 breweries. Unfortunately, Nashville was not on the list for the tour. Somewhere along the way, however, someone convinced Sierra Nevada that Nashville would be a spiffy place to host one of the festivals. Fast forward to tonight, and lookie at what I stumbled into...
Shazam! That there's a free Beer Camp ticket!
Sierra Nevada decided to have a mini-Beer Camp fest of sorts in Nashville in addition to the main tour, primarily for industry folks here in Music City. Though 90% or so of the invitees were industry people (brewers, distributors, beer store folk, bar folk), of course I still managed a ticket. Come on... would you expect anything less?!?
The differences in the main seven tour stops and ours were that the main tour invites every brewery in the area to serve, and have thousands of attendees. Our mini-fest had only the core beer camp beers, as well as Rain Check and SNPA. But, we were a much more intimate affair, with only maybe 100 or so in attendance, so it was a much more casual affair, which made it a fun hang. We also miss out on the brewers and reps from the 12 breweries in the collaboration, who are present at the big events. But... Free beer, free food... what more could one ask for?
Sweet!
The event was held at the former Yazoo Brewery, now Corsair Distillery
Menu and tasting glass in hand for the first pour
As I said, an intimate affair
As for my impressions of the beers...
All fourteen beers I sampled were good. Far and away the best for me, and many around me, was the There and Back collab with New Glarius. I also was a fan of the Torpedo Pils (Firestone Walker). Electric Ray IPL (Ballast Point),the rye (Oskar Blues) and the alt (Victory). I was so-so on the Cigar City collab... too much pineapple for me, but that's a personal preference. The FFF collab was OK, but a little disappointing. I wasn't in the mood for the darker beers, so the Bell's and Ninkasi beers kinda were a miss for me (though I could see me really liking the latte during the winter), as was the Rain Check, though I liked it much better than I thought I would after reading the description. The other beers (scottish, belgian pale, white) were fine as well. Of course, SNPA is rock solid, and is one of the beers that got me into American craft beer, so much love for it.
Free t-shirt!
All in all, a great little intimate fest with a bunch of friends from the beer community. Really glad I stumbled into a ticket for this event....