What’s Tapping (10/9)

Welcome to San Diego Beer News‘ weekly list of beers tapping for the first time or returning to beer lists at breweries throughout San Diego County, including links where you can find additional info or purchase the beers online. For more details regarding release/tapping dates, times and locations, consult the official website or social-media accounts of the brewing companies listed.

And keep scrolling for Bottlecraft staff recommendations about beers they are excited about that can be found at their bottle shop locations in North Park, Little Italy and Point Loma!

• AleSmith Brewing (Miramar): Evil Dead Red Ale, 6.7%
• Artifex Brewing (Oceanside): Can We Be Friends? West Coast IPA, 6.5% (collaboration w/ Pure Project Brewing)
• Ballast Point Brewing (Little Italy): Dead Ringer German-style Märzen, 6%
• Ballast Point Brewing (Little Italy): Prost! German-style Kölsch, 5.2%
• Ballast Point Brewing (Little Italy): Schooner Vera Wet Hop Pale Ale, 5.6%
• BattleMage Brewing (Vista): Goblin King 31 Whiskey Barrel-aged Imperial Stout w/ Vanilla, Chocolate, Coffee & Coconut, 13.8%
• BattleMage Brewing (Vista): Goblin King 32 Bourbon & Rum Barrel-aged Imperial Stout-Brown Ale Blend, 13.5%
• Belching Beaver Brewery (Oceanside, Vista, North Park): Farm Fresh Fresh-hop IPA, 7.4%
• BLAH Brewing (Normal Heights): Hasta la Raíz Dark Mexican-style Lager
• BLAH Brewing (Normal Heights): Repeater Simcoe Pale Ale, 5.3%
• BLAH Brewing (Normal Heights): Saazall Dry-hopped Czech-style Pilsner, 5%
• BLAH Brewing (Normal Heights): Ultimate Snowflake German-style Festbier, 5%
• Brewjería Company (Chula Vista): Galactic Defender New England-style IPA, 7.3%
• Brewjería Company (Chula Vista): Hasta la Raíz Light Blonde Ale, 4.5%
• Burgeon Beer Co. (Carlsbad, Vista, Escondido, Downtown): Neural Shift Double Dry-hopped Hazy IPA, 6.6% (collaboration w/ Cerebral Brewing) – PURCHASE ONLINE
• Burgeon Beer Co. (Carlsbad, Vista, Escondido, Downtown): Resin Reaper Double Dry-hopped IPA, 6.5% (collaboration w/ Grains of Wrath) – PURCHASE ONLINE
• Burgeon Beer Co. (Carlsbad, Vista, Escondido, Downtown): Sticky Fingers Fresh Hop Double IPA, 8.2% – PURCHASE ONLINE

• Burning Beard Brewing (El Cajon): Wet-hopped Dankness Visible West Coast IPA, 6.5%
• California Wild Ales (Ocean Beach): Vienna Waits for You Vienna-style Lager, 6%
• Coronado Brewing (Bay Park, Coronado): Costa Azul Grapefruit IPA, 7%
• Culture Brewing (Solana Beach, Encinitas): Apple Cidezer Hard Cider, 5%
• Culture Brewing (Solana Beach, Encinitas): FestCoast Bier German-style Lager, 6%
• Deft Brewing (Bay Park): Deftly Hallows Foreign-style Export Stout, 7.9%
• Duck Foot Brewing (Miramar, Leucadia): Friar Duck Belgian-style Table Beer, 4.5%
• Duck Foot Brewing (Miramar, Leucadia): Poison Apple Beer Slushie, 5%
• Eppig Brewing (Point Loma): Beach Beer Mexican-style Lager, 5.2%
• Eppig Brewing (Point Loma): Paradise Point Tart Ale w/ Guava, Passionfruit & Strawberry, 5%
• Fox Point Brewing (Encinitas): Prickly Pear Anniversary Ale Gose, 4.7%
• Green Cheek Beer Co. (Oceanside): A Bag Full of Yes Fresh-hopped West Coast IPA, 6.8% – PURCHASE ONLINE
• Green Cheek Beer Co. (Oceanside): Better Late Than Deader West Coast IPA, 7% – PURCHASE ONLINE
• Green Cheek Beer Co. (Oceanside): The Five Year Club Sour Ale w/ Mango, 7% – PURCHASE ONLINE
• Harland Brewing (Scripps Ranch, Bay Park, South Park): Fresh Hop West Coast IPA, 6.5%
• Harland Brewing (Scripps Ranch, Bay Park, South Park): Helles Lager, 5.2%
• Home Brew Mart (Morena): Tombstones & Travel Plans Double Dry-hopped West Coast IPA, 7.3%
• Hopnonymous Brewing (Kearny Mesa): Mango clipse Double Hazy Double IPA w/ Mango, 8.1%
• Itza Brewing (Ocean Beach): Mount Laguna American IPA, 5.4%

• Julian Beer Co. (Julian): Wild Card Dragon Fruit & Lemon Hard Seltzer, 5.8%
• Karl Strauss Brewing (Downtown, Sorrento Mesa, Rancho Bernardo, Carlsbad): Iron Star American Porter
• Ketch Brewing (Kearny Mesa, Downtown, Point Loma): Knots & Hops New Zealand-hopped IPA, 7%
• North Park Beer Co. (North Park, Bankers Hill, Pacific Beach): Bird Park Bohemian-style Pilsner, 4.7% – PURCHASE ONLINE
• North Park Beer Co. (North Park, Bankers Hill, Pacific Beach): Hop-Fu! Double Dry-hopped West Coast IPA, 7.5% – PURCHASE ONLINE
• North Park Beer Co. (North Park, Bankers Hill, Pacific Beach): Jazz Is Harder Triple Dry-hopped Hazy IPA, 6.6% – PURCHASE ONLINE
• North Park Beer Co. (North Park, Bankers Hill, Pacific Beach): Mysterious Mystery Triple Dry-hopped Hazy Double IPA, 8.4% – PURCHASE ONLINE
• Pizza Port (Solana Beach): Arctic Hammer Cold IPA 
• Pizza Port (Solana Beach): Save Bandit! West Coast IPA, 6.8%
• Quantum Brewing (Kearny Mesa): pH 3.4 Belgian-style Brown Sour Ale, 7.9%
• South O Brewing (Oceanside): Thin Crust West Coast Pilsner, 5.6% (collaboration w/ Pizza Port Brewing)
• TapRoom Beer Co. (North Park, Pacific Beach): Jagged Hedge Fresh Hop West Coast Double IPA, 8%
• Viewpoint Brewing (Del Mar): Hell’s Dubbel Belgian-style Dubbel, 7.3%
• Viewpoint Brewing (Del Mar): Lavender Fields Forever Saison, 6.4%
• Weir Beer Co. (Vista): Spice Up Your Life Pumpkin-spice Porter, 7.4%

Gene Fielden | Bottlecraft North Park Manager

We are absolutely flooded with fresh hops this year ‒ so much so that we are doing an unprecedented second column in a row dedicated to them!

Burgeon / June Lake High Key | Fresh-hop Extra Pale Ale (5.5%): Held each January, Burgeon Beer Co.’s anniversary celebrations are a highlight of the new year for hopheads, for they invite all their brewery friends to pour their finest IPAs in the winter sunlight. June Lake Brewing was one of the surprise newcomers a few years back, from the “Switzerland of California” east of Yosemite ‒ their beers were phenomenal. Now they have returned for a collaborative beer with hosts Burgeon once again, and it is similarly outstanding. High Key is brewed with a smattering of hops ‒ Citra, Krush, Mosaic, Simcoe and Strata ‒ but it is the fresh-hop Chinook that receives top billing on the can. Piney, resinous and complex, yet also only 5% ABV (alcohol-by-volume), this one calls for a four-pack.

Crux Straight Outta Harvest | Fresh-hop West Coast IPA (6.5%): Back in August 2017, I traveled to Bend in northeastern Oregon for the first time so as to witness the total solar eclipse that was passing through. To say it was extraordinary is not to do it justice. Imagine an eerie purple twilight falling upon the earth in the late morning, as if sunset were in all directions at once. Later that day, still stunned by the experience, I went to the Crux Fermentation Project headquarters in town and had a bevy of delicious beers. Straight Outta Harvest is the first fresh-hopped beer we have received from these fine folks, just loaded with Strata from the esteemed Crosby Hop Farm in the northern Willamette Valley. And that’s the crux of the matter!

Fremont Cowiche Canyon | Fresh-hop Pale Ale (6%): Depending on whom one asks, Cowiche Canyon may be the most anticipated release among Fremont Brewing’s incredible lineup of fresh-hopped beers. A rare example of terroir in beer, this West Coast pale is brewed with fresh unkilned hop-cones derived from a single eponymous canyon in the Yakima Valley. Adding to the mystique is the sterling quality of these hops ‒ Simcoe and Citra, all of them organically grown. To my knowledge this is the only fresh-hopped beer packaged with all organic hops. Enjoy now, as these beers are inordinately fragile and fleeting!

Click here to explore the quality beers at Bottlecraft’s three San Diego locations