High Season for Beer Nuts

The Mile-High City is a top draw for beer aficionados. More than 30,000 are expected to sip and sample the best that the country’s craft brewers have to offer at the Great American Beer Festival next month: 1,700 brews--lagers, ales, stouts, porters and dozens of seasonal beers--from 450 brewers will be in the Oct. 1-3 competition.

The annual festival has gotten so big, important and crowded with competitors that Denver has started a spinoff, all-Colorado version. It’s not competitive--no medals or awards--but about 40 Colorado craft brewers now present their best every June, along with lots of music, food and festivities, at the LoDo Brew Fest in historic lower downtown Denver.

Festivals can be fun, but you don’t have to fight the crowds or even be in Denver a specific week to try some really good craft beers. As I discovered while on a work assignment there last summer, there are five microbrewery pubs in and around LoDo, with enough variety of ambience, menus and drinks to satisfy the most demanding connoisseur of fine beer (as well as companions who don’t really care for the stuff).

Champion Brewery is part of the rehabbed Larimer Square, which tries to feel like Greenwich Village. The crowds thronging the sidewalks can sometimes get to be a bit much, especially if you’re sitting at one of the outdoor tables on a warm weekend evening, but the beer is excellent and the food goes well with it--lots of grilled specialties and what they call “updated” regional entrees, many of them featuring buffalo.

Champion is known for its stout, a full-bodied, dark bitter beer with a tight head of tiny bubbles, and for its much lighter Norm Clark’s Sports Ale. Its Home Run Brown Ale won a bronze medal at the 1997 Great American festival in the English-style Brown Ale category.

Breckenridge Brewery claims to be Denver’s largest, operating seven pubs. One is in a handsomely restored brick building on Blake Street at the edge of LoDo. Try Breckenridge’s delicious Avalanche Ale, a malty, rich yet clean brew.

Wynkoop Brewing Co., across from Union Station (built in 1881 and still a busy rail hub), is Denver’s most commodious brewpub, but don’t go there because of its size; go for everything else.

Looking as if it’s straight out of Denver’s pioneer days, Wynkoop is in the 1899 J. S. Brown Mercantile Building. Check the stunning engraved glass door just beyond the pub’s front entrance; inside, admire the hardwood floors, pressed metal ceiling tiles, thick timber pillars topped by pilasters of pressed ornate metal, gas light fixtures and the open wooden staircase in the center (more about where this leads later). The booths are formed by wood benches of the type found in the more formal railroad waiting rooms of the late 1800s, picking up on a railroad theme that pervades Wynkoop, but doesn’t overwhelm it.

While the pub can get noisy on busy nights, the food and beer are worth the visit. The kitchen has fun with the brewery connection--creamy Gorgonzola ale soup, honey beer mustard chicken breast, beer bread, even microbrew ice cream featuring house ales (yes, it works, with a lighter taste than you’d expect). Entrees range from staples like a shepherd’s pie of braised Colorado lamb to charbroiled medallions of Rocky Mountain elk and such vegetarian delights as a sandwich of grilled whole Portobello mushroom topped with Provolone cheese.

The standout beer here is Wynkoop’s Railyard Ale, a hearty, deep amber brew that is loaded with flavor and satisfies like a chunk of whole-grain country bread. But don’t pass up a chance to taste the India Pale Ale (hoppy, bright and rich), the St. Charles Extra Special Bitter (very English and very good) or the Sagebrush Stout (unusually light but flavorful). If you like a very mild ale, try Quinns Scottish Ale when it’s available.

Matt McAleer of Wynkoop points out that while their lighter ales are carbonated and served cold (about 40 degrees), their British-style dark ales are served at cellar temperature (around 50 degrees) and are without carbonation. They are hand-drawn, using genuine English pumps too.

But don’t leave the drinks list yet. On the nonalcoholic end, Wynkoop brews its own Tiger Root Beer, and you haven’t tasted real root beer until you’ve tried this. It’s not just for kids.

At the other end of the beverage spectrum, Wynkoop carries the longest list of single malt scotches I’ve come across in one location anywhere, including in Scotland. They range from 12-year-old Glenfiddich (from the Speyside region) to 17-year-old Deanston (from the Highlands) to 20-year-old Ledaig (from the Islands).

Now check out that central wooden staircase. It takes you down to the basement Impulse Theater comedy club. The same good beer and food are available, but with improv comedy to brighten the evening. I wasn’t able to catch a show, but I’m told they’ve been packing locals in for some time.

Take the staircase up to the second floor, and you’ll find a billiards hall with 22 pool tables (there also are two private pool rooms), several dart lanes and a bar serving all the same beers.

The atmosphere is more youthful here--it’s obviously a popular singles meeting place--but don’t be put off if you’re not (young or single). I’ve seen folks of every age enjoying the place.

The same could be said for the Rock Bottom Brewery, in a more central part of LoDo on the 16th Street pedestrian mall. Rock bands frequently perform at this very popular brewpub--too loudly sometimes for my taste--but there are sections of this very large place where it’s not so bad, and I’d go back despite the volume; both the beer and the food are worth it. The menu is eclectic and long, with a wonderful range of local innovations, such as grilled buffalo fajitas and brown-ale chicken.

*

Rock Bottom offers two versions of its brews--the standard American craft, and some exquisite “cask-conditioned” ales, the champagne of the beer world. With cask ales--known as “real ales” in England--there is no blanket of gas filling the top of the cask to artificially keep the beer fresh, so it must be drunk within four days or so. Such a short shelf life means that the list of cask-conditioned ales is not always as long as one would like. But if any are available, don’t pass up the chance to at least taste a real ale.

Rock Bottom has six beers on its regular board, ranging from a very light Rockies Premier Draft, to a more amber Falcon Pale Ale, to the dark Molly’s Titanic Brown Ale, and an unusually light but rich Black Diamond Stout.

Every brewpub in Denver offers samplers--4-ounce tasters--and at the Rock Bottom the glasses are placed atop a paper place mat that gives the name of each beer, its description and an explanation of the ingredients and processes involved in making fine craft beers.

Denver also offers one truly unique brewpub experience: the world’s first brewery in a ballpark, combining two great American traditions. The Sandlot Brewery inside Coors Field, while owned and operated by the giant popular brewer, produces true craft beers, from ales to stouts. Sandlot even won a bronze medal at the 1997 Great American festival for its Scottish-style Rightfield Red Ale. (People may tell you the Sandlot is open only during games; not true.)

Two other Denver microbreweries were big winners at the ’97 beer fest: The Great Divide Brewing Co. earned a gold medal for its strong Hibernation Ale and a bronze for its Classic English Denver Pale Ale. The Tabernash Brewing Co., the only one dedicated to re-creating German lagers and weiss beers, won a gold for its Munich Dark Lager and a bronze for its Oktoberfest beer.

Beer is one of the oldest beverages around, with recipes for it showing up on Sumerian tablets 5,000 years ago. It even figures in American history: Ale was a staple of the 17th century English diet, and the scarcity of “victuals . . . especially our beer” is what drove the Mayflower Pilgrims ashore at Plymouth Rock.

If you visit Denver, you may find yourself giving thanks that the best of the brew master’s art is so abundantly available.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

GUIDEBOOK

Tapping Into ‘LoDo’ Denver

Getting there: United and Frontier fly nonstop from LAX to Denver International Airport; restricted round-trip fares start at $276.

Where to stay: The Denver Metro Convention and Visitors Bureau offers hotel information and a reservation service at (800) 393-8559. The bureau’s office is at 1555 California St., No. 300, Denver, CO 80202; telephone (303) 892-1505.

‘LoDo’ (downtown) beer sampling: The following brewpubs are open 11 a.m.-midnight weekdays, later Friday and Saturday. All serve lunch and dinner.

Breckenridge Brewery, 2220 Blake St.; tel. (303) 297-3644.

Champion Brewery, 1442 Larimer St.; tel. (303) 534-5444.

Rock Bottom Brewery, 1001 16th St.; tel. (303) 534-7616.

Wynkoop, 1634 18th St.; tel. (303) 297-2700.

Sandlot, tel. (303) 298-1587, is in Coors Field at 2145 Blake St.

For more information: The Assn. of Brewers, tel. (303) 447-0816, sponsors the Great American Beer Festival. It will be Oct. 1-3, 5:30-10 p.m., Currigan Hall, 14th and Champas Streets, downtown Denver. Admission, $30.

Colorado Travel and Tourism Authority, P.O. Box 22005, Denver, CO 80222; tel. (800) 433-2656.