Octoberfest Cookout and Hamilton’s Tap Takeover!

Hello Nickel Beer Fans!

It is beginning to feel like fall in the mountains and the trees are just beginning to turn color.  We have a lot going on both at the brewery and down in San Diego this weekend.  Our weekend hours have been changed so that the brewery is now open at 11 am on both Saturday and Sunday.  I have updates on our San Diego Beer Week events and upcoming specialty kegs.  Here are all the details…

At the tasting room the Julian Lion’s Club will be doing a fundraiser cookout for Octoberfest featuring bratwurst on both Saturday and Sunday from 11 am to 5 pm on the 1st and the 2nd of October.  All of the money raised goes to charitable projects in Julian.  On Saturday we will tap a keg of our collaboration with Julian Cider Works – Tom and Perry.  It is a blend of pear cider made from the pears growing at the brewery with apple cider and a mead made from local honey.  All 6 of our San Diego fresh hop beers are still on tap and we have a Scorpion Pepper version of the Fresh Mountain Crystal right now.

There are some great match ups in college football this weekend starting Friday night with #7 Stanford taking on #10 Washington at 6 pm.  Saturday we get #4 Michigan v. #8 Wisconsin and #11 Tennessee v. #25 Georgia at 12:30 pm followed by #3 Louisville traveling to #5 Clemson at 5 pm.  #19 San Diego State (can you believe you are reading that?) plays South Alabama also at 5 pm and that game will be on ESPN News.  On Sunday the Chargers play the Saints at 1:25 pm.

Hamilton’s Tap Takeover

Friday night we help kick off the 10th Anniversary celebrations for Hamilton’s Tavern in South Park.  We will have 12 beers on tap plus 2 casks and some great food specials featuring Nickel Pickels and Scorpion Pepper Beer Cheese.  We will be pouring all 6 of our San Diego Fresh Hop beers – Star B Pale, My Way IPA, Fresh Mountain Crystal, Standing Eagle IPA, Buffalo Paw Brown and Green Truck Double IPA.  Owner Scot Blair and I collaborated on the Buffalo Paw Fresh Hop Brown Ale and we will be serving up two different cask conditioned versions of this 4% alcohol brown ale.  One will have local Neo Mexicanus hops in the cask while the other is a play on Mexican Hot Chocolate with Cacao Nibs, Vanilla Beans, Mexican Cinnamon and a Scorpion Pepper (putting the hot in hot chocolate).

In addition to those great beers, Hamilton’s will have a keg of Tom and Perry on tap along with The Crab Apple Pie Ale, Stonewall Stout on nitro, Jalapeno Gold and our massive Triple IPA – Lion’s Blood.  As a special treat, I am rolling out the last of our Barrel Aged Redstonewall Stout.  It is a barrel aged version of Stonewall Stout blended with Redstone’s Vanilla Cinnamon Mead.  The flavor really reminds me of Horchata.

This is going to be a huge event with nearly as much Nickel Beer as we have on tap in Julian.  I plan to be at the pub from roughly 5-8 pm on Friday to enjoy some beer and food and toast to 10 years of Hamilton’s.

San Diego Beer Week

We now have a few events set for San Diego Beer Week.  We will be part of the Back Country Beer Night at O’Brien’s on Friday, November 4th along with Alpine and Cellar 3.  Saturday the 5th we will be pouring at the San Diego Brewers Guild Festival.  And on Thursday the 10th we will be doing an event at West Coast Barbecue and Brew in La Mesa.

The very exciting news for SDBW is that we will be releasing a collaboration IPA brewed with Kern River Brewing.  I am heading up to Kernville in October to brew the beer and it will be available at select accounts during SDBW including O’Brien’s, Toronado and West Coast BBQ.  We will also be serving it up at the tasting room.  We don’t have a name yet, but I can tell you that the beer will use some Tahoma hops.  Speaking of which, we will have Tahoma IPA around during Beer Week as well.

Looking Ahead

Our popular Extra Pale Ale, Take A Hike, will return next week.  Friday the 14th we will be tapping a keg of Chocolate Vanilla Stonewall Stout.  And later this month look for the return of Sour Apple Pie Ale.

Next week I will be brewing an IPA called Pride of Chops.  The beer was first brewed by Beachwood Brewing in Long Beach as part of the 20th Anniversary celebration for O’Brien’s pub.  Beachwood is brewing the beer again right now and I am brewing a version in Julian.  I hope to be able to do some side by side tappings in late October.  It is a hugely hoppy IPA with lots of Amarillo and Nelson hops.

That is your Nickel Beer news for now.  We’ll see you soon for a great Julian brewed beer.  Cheers, Tom

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