A bit of an abbreviated version of the newsletter this week, on account of a Certain Air Line stranding me in California for two extra days after I visited my 30th Major League Baseball ballpark (Dodger Stadium, where the beer prices make Yankee Stadium and Citi Field look downright affordable), 300th California brewery (more on that in a second), and an airport where all the concessions have Guy Fieri’s name on them and charge $21 for a cold, pre-made sandwich… err, “sammich.”
It’s Citra Week at Other Half
In New York news, your favorite hop* is cause for celebration at Other Half this week, as they mark Citra Week, a week full of beers with the “cheater hop” from the Pacific Northwest.
Among the beers released today at all Other Half locations, including Gowanus, Domino Park, and Rockefeller Center:
HDHC Oyster IPA (6.0%), with Citra and Centennial cryo hops plus T-90s and Incognito
TDH All Citra Everything (8.5%)
TDH Big Citra Vibes IPA (6.5%)
TDH Double Citra Daydream (8.5%)
All Fresh Citra Everything (8.5%), with Citra cryo hops
Citra Snaps Lager (4.5%)
Frozen Citra Ice Bucket Pale Ale (5.5%), with Citra cryo
HDHC Solo Exhibition Citra (10.2%), with a Citra High Density Hop Charge
In a video posted to Instagram this week, OH founder Sam Richardson discusses how Citra revolutionized hops — indeed, it’s one of the hops that helped define the rise of American IPAs.
*Side note: I once met someone who loves IPAs and said their least favorite hop was Citra. Like, to the point that they refused to drink anything with Citra in it. I learned this because their favorite hop was Idaho-7, which is honestly my least favorite hop. I snapped back that “saying that Citra is your least favorite hop is like saying chocolate chip cookies are your least favorite cookies.” Am I in the wrong here?
Brewery Tracker
Total brewery count: 3,470
Total breweries visited in 2024: 186
Total breweries visited in California: 302
Side note: see that link on the “total brewery count” line? That links to a map of every brewery I’ve visited. I discovered last week that few people have noticed this, particularly when a good friend of mine said, “you should have a map of the breweries you’ve visited.” Well, I do! Enjoy.
Brewery Visit of the Week
Brewery #3468, Metabolic Brewing Co., Ontario, California (Visited 21-Jul-2024)
Planning a day-long brewery crawl in California’s Inland Empire with a friend has its pitfalls. It started on Sunday with our first planned stop being closed for the day for a funeral. I’m certainly not going to fault them there. Another planned stop on the crawl decided to close early — something that wouldn’t have been an issue if we had stuck to a schedule instead of sticking around to talk and drink with some very kind brewery owners at another stop along the way. So with the goal on Sunday of visiting my 300th brewery in California and being one away at the end of the day, it was a happy accident when we discovered there was a brewery 10 minutes away that wasn’t even on our radar… mainly because it had just opened on the Fourth of July. That’s how we came across Metabolic Brewing Co.
Metabolic was founded by a husband-and-wife team, David and Kathryn Fresquez, who both work in healthcare. So the taproom has a couple reminders of that background, like x-rays on a wall behind the bar, and beer names like Hospital Gown, their West Coast IPA, and Lobotomia, their Mexican Lager. Elsewhere in the taproom, TVs played a loop of episodes of Saved By The Bell. The color scheme involves a lot of purple and bright green, giving off a 90s vibe. It was a fun spot that was surprisingly busy for a brewery in soft opening on a Sunday night. David’s barside manner kept us around right up until last call.
In an era when more breweries are closing than ever in the U.S., it’s good to see an opening… especially when it’s a place I’d like to visit again.
The Doom and Gloom Tracker
At least 6 breweries I’ve visited closed or announced their closure this week:
Brewery #1079, Exhibit ‘A’ Brewing Company*, Framingham, Massachusetts (Visited 3-Mar-2018)
Brewery #1477, LineSider Brewing Company, East Greenwich, Rhode Island (Visited 17-Mar-2019)
Brewery #1872, Elst Brewing Company, Knoxville, Tennessee (Visited 1-Feb-2020)
Brewery #2151, Unbranded Brewing Company, Hialeah, Florida (Visited 25-Apr-2021)
Brewery #2986, Pretentious Barrel House, Columbus, Ohio (Visited 19-Mar-2023)
Brewery #3262, Devil’s Logic Brewing, Charlotte, North Carolina (Visited 9-Dec-2023)
* brewery relocating
The Weekly Reader
Golf and craft beer are intertwined [Kristen Kuchar, CraftBeer.com]
Micro beer, meet macro lager [Jeff Alworth, Beervana]
Matthew Curtis’ farewell to Good Beer Hunting [Pellicle]
A deep dive on the use of “hipster” as it relates to beer [Maggie Hennessy, VinePair]
One Last Thing
I’m going to dig into the numbers next week, but the Brewers Association released their Midyear State of the Industry report this week. Independent beer sales volume is down another 2% year over year, and glimmers of hope that the post-Covid flatlining of the industry was a blip have all but vanished. In spite of this, the BA reports that there were still more brewery openings than closings in the past 12 months, with a net gain of 19 to a total of 9,358. So, to those worried I’m going to run out of new breweies to visit anytime soon… rest assured, I’m not.
Cheers,
Chris
I just went to Unbranded for the first time 2 weeks ago. It was a cool space! Completely empty, though, during the Euro final, which wasn't a great sign I guess.