All the lowdown on GABF 2017 for New Mexico breweries

The Great American Beer Festival returns this Thursday through Saturday at the Denver Convention Center, and once again New Mexico breweries will be well represented. This year the Crew is dispatching yours truly, plus Franz Solo, via the magic of press passes (Luke will also be there, but as a civilian, and we just want…

The time to honor the Norse god of winter is nearly upon us

The days are getting shorter, and there’s a bit of a nip in the air here in the higher elevations. Fall will be here soon, officially, and with it the prospect of snow. To many people, snow means skiing, but, only if there’s enough of it! To please Ullr, the Norse god of snow and…

A murder of hops: Diving deep into all the IPA variants

As this is the season of the zenith in hop dominance in our fair land, Brandon and I, Franz Solo, took it upon ourselves to seek out new hops and new hopilizations. We boldly went … (cue Beastie Boys’ Sabotage while tooling along in a fire apple red Trans Am circa 1970 with T-Tops) to…

Delving into the development of the hop-tastic 7K IPA from Santa Fe

It has been quite a while since Santa Fe Brewing, the largest brewery in the state by production, has introduced a new year-round beer. In fact, it was when Black IPA went from seasonal to regular, though in that case it was a long-standing beer loved by many. This time around, SFBC went with something…

Tapping Party set to raise money for children’s music programs

A small beer festival, called simply the Tapping Party, is popping up this Saturday at The Rail Yards south of downtown, with a good cause behind the entire event. Craft for Causes, a non-profit, is teaming up with breweries nationwide to create special beers and raise money for charities. There is no entry charge, patrons…

Get your BearFest beer lists here

As most of you should know by now, BearFest returns this Saturday, now at the Albuquerque Convention Center downtown. VIP entry is at 12:30 p.m., general admission is at 2 p.m., and it all runs until 6 p.m. General admission tickets are still available online and VIP tickets are still available at Boxing Bear. Much…

BearFest roars back with new indoor location

BearFest, the annual local-only craft beer festival hosted by Boxing Bear, returns for a third go-around this Saturday. The big change this year, besides pushing it back and away from ABQ Beer Week and Blues & Brews, is moving the fest out of the brewery parking lot to the Albuquerque Convention Center. Unless you are…

ABQ Beer Week: The 505 flows free on Day Three

After Friday’s events, we can understand if some of you want to take it easy today. Beer Week, though, has no concept of mercy, because it’s gonna be a big one. The 505 Collaboration beer is releasing all over town, O’Niell’s is throwing a Beer Olympics, Santa Fe is having a party, Rio Bravo is…

ABQ Beer Week: Pucker up for Day Two brews

Did you survive? Did you make it through all of it? No, not Day One of ABQ Beer Week, but the Penguins’ double-overtime victory over Ottawa in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals. Just ask anyone at Quarter Celtic last night, half the Crew almost died several times over. But, we digress, for it…