New Releases
North Coast Brewing is releasing Scrimshaw & Old Rasputin in 19.2oz
North Coast Scrimshaw Pilsner and Old Rasputin Imperial Stout will be available in large format cans this month.
Fort Bragg, California based North Coast Brewing is taking two of their famed beers to large format- namely Scrimshaw Pilsner and Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout.
Both are easily some of the longest running (and perhaps best) craft beers of their style in America today – especially Old Rasputin. (Should you ever have the chance to have Old Raspy on Nitro, do it. It’s life changing.
Per North Coast (still rocking since 1988), the big cans will in mid to late January 2024. Scrimshaw Pilsner clocks in at 5% ABV and Old Rasputin is a smooth 9%.
Sierra Nevada Celebration IPA returns in cans this month
It’s always nice to see a venerable beer like Sierra Nevada Celebration IPA still able to stir up some excitement. The brewery posted a picture of Celebration cans ready waiting to be filled, and fans re-professed their love for this seasonal beer all over again. Celebration IPA is an absolute seasonal classic, akin to Bell’s Two Hearted, or Russian River’s Pliny the Elder. Only, you can only get it as the year wind’s down.
Celebration Ale has hit shelves once again.
Sierra Nevada has been brewing this fresh-hopped India pale ale since 1981, just one year after opening in 1980. While craft beer’s #1 selling style [IPA] has seen a lot of trends, Celebration Ale has remained steadfast in simply staying as-is. Perhaps that mix of quality and reliability is what makes it so popular – a fact proven by the overwhelming reactions from Celebration fans after the brewery posted the above photo this week.
Celebration Ale follows Oktoberfest in the brewery’s seasonal series of releases.
Style: IPA
Availability: 12oz Cans, Draft.
First Release: 1981
Latest Return: November 2023
6.8% ABV
PIC: Beer Street Journal
New Realm releases a new collaboration with Zillicoah Beer
New Realm Sound of Our Own Wheels has hit shelves, a collaboration with North Carolina’s Zillicoah Beer Company.
This double IPA is actually a family collaboration, a first for New Realm. Jon Chassner founded Zillicoah in Woodfin, North Carolina in 2017, and Jeff Chassner is the Chief Sales Officer of New Realm. As the name suggests, these Chassners are cousins. Family ties make a beer collab pretty self-evident.
New Realm’s brewmaster and co-founder Mitch Steele, Jeff, and Beer Street Journal traveled to Zillicoah’s home of Woodfin for the first of what would be two brew days. We’re pretty sure Zillicoah’s Jon and John (Chassner and Parks) wanted to brew an India Pale Ale with the man who literally wrote the book on IPA, so an Imperial IPA had to be on the brew sheet.
Sound of Your Own Wheels is a big tropical flavor bomb, brewed with Azacca, El Dorado, and Strata hops. This douple IPA pours golden and clear like a west coaster (Mitch Steele has entered the chat) and 9% alcohol by volume. It is prudent to note that Wheels doesn’t drink at all like a 9% beer. Finish the 4-pack one sitting and see what we mean.
We asked Steele what he thought of the finished beer this week at the launch in Atlanta. “It’s probably the best double IPA we’ve made yet,” he says with a smile. While New Realm’s beer styles have been all over the map, the brewing of imperial IPAs have been reserved for special occasions like anniversaries or friends. You honor the special occasion with high alcohol and hops, naturally.
Sound of Your Own Wheels is bright and sunny like late summer in the South and strong enough to make you forget how drenched in sweat you are as if you’ve been pushed into the deep end of a pool. The Sound of Your Own Wheels might just be you telling yourself to “drink more.”
Available in 16-ounce cans and draft for a limited time.
Style: Imperial IPA
Hops: Azacca, El Dorado, Strata
Availability: 16oz Cans, Draft.
Debut: Mid-July, 2023
9% ABV
Sierra Nevada adds Crisp & Tropical Little Thing
Sierra Nevada’s “Little Things” Series expands with the addition of Crisp Little Thing a summer approaches.
The series started with Hazy Little Thing, which is the first nationally distributed hazy IPA in the U.S. For summer 2023, the brewery is releasing a lager- Crisp Little Thing, as well as Tropical Little Thing, the second in their limited rotating IPA series.
Crisp Little Thing is described as “crushable” as most lagers tend to be, 4.7% alcohol by volume and a smooth 18 IBUs. Only found the the “Little Things Party Pack” – 12 pack variety pack.
Tropical Hazy Little Thing is available in 12oz/6 packs, now through August 2023. The IPA features Cascade, Sabro, Sultana, El Dorado, and Amarillo hops, built on the back of oats, Two-Row malt and wheat.
Crisp Little Thing (4.7% ABV)
Style: Lager
Availability: 12oz Cans, Mixed Pack Exclusive
Tropical Little Thing (7% ABV)
Style: IPA
Hops: Sabro, Sultana, El Dorado, Cascade, Amarillo
Availability: 12oz Cans, Draft. May-August.
Debut: Summer 2023
New Year Round: Hi-Wire Mountain Wheat
Hi-Wire Mountain Wheat Ale launches this month, a new year-round beer by the Asheville, North Carolina-based brewery.
Wheat beers had a strong 2022 in sales across the industry, so Hi-Wire figures it’s time through one of their own out there to kick off spring. Mountain Wheat is brewed with lemon peel and coriander, and per the brewery is “bright and refreshing,” with hints of lemon shandy and citrus.
with few options brewed in the Carolinas, we feel this is the perfect time to throw our hat in the ring for this extremely approachable style.”
Hi-Wire co-owner Chris Frosaker
Hi-Wire Mountain Wheat Ale is available in 6-packs of 16-ounce cans and across the brewery’s 9-state distribution area.
Style: Wheat Ale (w/ Lemon Peel. Coriander.)
Availability: 16oz Cans, Draft. Year-Round.
Debut: Late March 2023
5.3% ABV
New Realm Psychedelic Rabbit jumps in on the thiol craze
Let’s talk about thiols. If you crave tropical flavors in your beer or IPA, listen up. This bit of fermentation science is for you.
Thiols are aroma compounds and they come in two forms – free form and precursor. The free form are volatile and pungent thiols found in tropical fruits, grapes, and hops. Those thoils boast flavors of passion fruit and guava and fresh grapefruit. When a beer is more “thiol expressive” it is far bolder and big-time tropical.
Sounds good right? Eventually, but some fermentation science has to happen first.
Chicago-based Omega Yeast Labs introduced “Cosmic Punch,” a thiolized version of their British Ale yeast in 2021. This engineered yeast strain biotransforms the massive amount of thiol precursors in malt and hops to free form (expressive) thiols. Ultimately, the thiol output is far greater using this yeast than found in the traditional brewing process.
How? Omega’s goal was to make freeing these thiols more efficient. It’s about the IRC7, a gene in yeast that creates an enzyme that frees thiols from their precursor form. The challenge was that many brewing strains have mutations in the IRC7 gene that disable the enzyme, resulting in low thoil output.
Extremely simplified – Omega developed a yeast that keeps the gene active, and thus the enzyme. The final beer – which so many are IPAs or hoppy lagers are bright, snappy, and quite expressive.
It’s that bit of science behind New Realm Brewing’s new Psychedelic Rabbit Transcendent IPA. While the brewing team had created a few test batches of an IPA with Cosmic Punch, Kane Wille, brewer at New Realm says it was Omega’s Star Party yeast that really made a difference. “We did a 20-barrel batch in Atlanta and loved it, so it became Psyche Rabbit,” Wille says.
Azacca, Cashmere, Citra, and Mosaic hops headline this beer, and with the help of Star Party, you really find out what thiols are all about. The result is truly a burst of passionfruit, pineapple, and citrus flavors, in a beer that looks so much more of a west coast IPA, with a lighter mouthfeel, without having to be overly dry-hopped. “We wanted to bring something innovative to the market this year, and have been overwhemed by the success of this IPA already,” Jeff Chassner, Chief Sales Officer tells Beer Street Journal. “We are very fortunate to have such a talented brewmaster in Mitch Steele and an amazing team of brewers”
The India pale ale has always dominated craft beer, always going through a plethora of identities as the years pass. By the taste of it, the days of quadruple dry-hopping an IPA might be fading, with the rise of these yeasts.
Style: IPA
Hops: Azacca, Cashmere, Citra, Mosaic
Availability: 12oz Cans, Draft. Year-Round.
6.5%
White Claw Vodka hits select markets
White Claw, the leader in the hard seltzer category, wants to make sure your summer is a boozy blur. White Claw Vodka is officially headed to shelves.
White Claw boasts this launch as “ushering in a new era in America Vodka,” with a secret creative process. So what makes this vodka special? Something White Claw calls “triple wave filtering” which applies the pressure of a 30-foot ocean wave to the vodka. Apparently, this has a smoothing effect on the liquid, as the waves would to rocks or shells found on the beach. Before bottling, the vodka is filtered through activated carbon from charred coconut shells. The spirits range from 30% to 40% alcohol by volume.
The result is a minimal yet complex combination of aromas and sensations in the mouth and nose — subtle notes of citrus at first, then grain, then a velvety finish. Along with the creation of a new process, White Claw also came up with a new way to describe the premium vodka: it’s the “smooovest.”
Like the company’s hard seltzers, White Claw Vodka will be available in a variety of flavors – including Mango, Black Cherry, and Pineapple.
White Claw Vodka + Soda
Alongside this spirits addition, the company is launching White Claw Vodka + Soda in ready-to-drink cans. Each 100-calorie 12-ounce can is made with the namesake spirit, available in Pineapple, Peach, Wild Cherry and Watermelon flavors.
White Claw Vodka and Vodka + Soda will be available in select North American markets starting in March 2023.