I think you should homebrew like a really light lager and call it 15V. Welcome in everybody to the Craft Beer Republic. Thanks for drinking.

Thanks for joining. I am Greg. I'm being joined by old man Flex over there. What's up buddy?

Oh, I pulled my back out lotioning up my meaty quads the other day. Is that a true story?

Yeah, 100% accurate. 34 years old. Pulling my back out, lotioning up meaty quads.

Wow. That is... I tell you, my most embarrassing was I sneezed when I was emptying the dishwasher one time and I was like bent over.

Sneezed. I was done for like a week. I've heard of that one before. I really have.

That was so bad. You're not alone, man. Yeah. Oh, God, I felt like such an old fart. And then joining us to class this place up a little bit.

He is the founder and executive editor of San Diego Beer News. Brandon Hernandez. How's it going, buddy?

It's going great. You know, I'm 46 years old. I ran six miles before I got on with you guys and nothing happened.

What the hell's wrong with you guys? We're not taking our vitamins and saying our prayers. I need to turn 46. That's what I'm saying.

Maybe the 30s are rougher on the back than the 40s are. It's got to be. You're just adjusting.

See, by the time you get to my place, it'll be all good. You can load all the dishes you want. I can't wait for that day. My wife will be so happy.

Oh, that's hilarious. I also forget what it's like to run, but we'll we'll address that another time.

I don't do that. Yeah. You just lift. Yours are all pretty muscles. They're not useful.

Not at all. Yeah. Unless you need like a refrigerator moved, then I'm not a guy. You got a good five minutes in you.

So much to get to today. We're going to talk to Brandon about San Diego beer news and what's going on in San Diego.

We got a voicemail from the homie Chu. We got a lot of brewing recaps to get to and a lot of research.

Some big news. You had a busy weekend, didn't you? Man, I had a very hydrated and busy weekend.

Still can't hear about that. Yeah. And in fact, I pounded some coffee before the show started. That's that's the kind of weekend I had.

Wow. It's seven o'clock, right? Yeah, I know. It's seven o'clock my time. It's going to be a long night.

Some breaking news to get to and so much more. Before we get into anything, though, I'm feeling quite sober

and I need to counteract the effects of the weekend. So if you guys don't mind, I'm going to plunge into the first beer real quick.

Well, in honor of Brandon being from San Diego, I found San Diego beer to drink tonight.

I am drinking Pure Brewing's Pure Project Brewing's Monteverde. This is brewed for their seven year anniversary.

It's six point six percent, has a four point one one on untapped. Very respectable for the angry mob that is untapped from the brewery.

They say Monteverde or Green Mountain was named after the remarkable Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve in Costa Rica.

The canar is donning a scenic green and green and blue hued backdrop of jungle and mountains.

And it's an ode to the wondrous, lush and biodiverse place. We hopped this murky IPA with Nectaron at the front and added in some mosaic

and citra for even more flavor and balance. The result is a murky, pale colored brew with fruity aromas of passionfruit,

orange and dried mango. Sips are filled with tastes of passionfruit, pear and juicy peach over a subtle dankness made to celebrate.

Monteverde is a true pura vida experience. Well, that doesn't sound awful.

I mean, those hops suck. Yeah, that's a bunch of horrible hops in there, right? You know, I really do like seeing Nectaron come up a lot more lately.

I feel like that's going to be the hop of 2023. Interesting. We'll see where that goes.

Yeah, HBC 586. Oh, yeah, that's been around for a few years now. I'm waiting for that one to get its own name.

Yeah, let's start a petition named the hops. I'm trying to run. Yeah.

On the shawls over here, very light, a little bit tropical, but mostly orange picking up the orange on the schnauz.

The flavor really follows behind that with a lot of orange up front. Some like dried tropical fruits, kind of like a like a mango

gummy bear or something kind of coming up behind it. They're real soft mouthfeel, just a delicious and flex for the algorithm.

This can art is, you know, you were describing the can art. And the first thing that crossed my mind is that sounds sexy.

And now that you're showing me, I can confirm that that is definitely some sexy can art. It is quite sexy.

Pure's always knocking it out when they go big on their can art. So very, very delicious.

I just wish either they keep it simple or they just do something. Yeah, not I don't want to say like overly detailed, but it's it's like

there's no spectra. It's like on one side of the spectrum and the other. Maybe I'll rip it off the can and frame it.

Yeah, do that. But yeah, they do a brilliant job with everything all around. Yes. Yeah. Those guys and down here also a virgin beer company,

they're really good at taking not a template, but, you know, something very recognizable and just making each beer look so cool.

And and oftentimes I mean, like, for real sexy. Like, yeah, I don't know what's in there, but I'm in.

Let's do it. Yeah. It's one of those ones where you look at you go, I'm going to need to try that. I don't even care what it is. Yeah. Algorithm aside. Right.

Doesn't matter what the price is that can are so great. Yeah. You got to get into it. Flex has an algorithm.

It's price to ABV to can art, and it's all got to work out. Like it can't be too expensive.

You know, you don't want a four percenter that cost twenty five bucks for a four pack. That's insane. There's there's an algorithm to this thing.

That'd be one hell of a table beer. Yeah, right. Triple dry hopped with nectar on.

Right there is four percent. You can drink it all day. Never feel it.

Yeah. Got to be efficient. Yeah. So, Brandon, if I if I may talk about San Diego beer news for a little bit,

I've been following. Yeah, please. I've been following you guys. Well, mainly you. Right. You're you're the lone ranger.

Yeah, I would say I'm about ninety seven point five percent of it. But we have we do have people who contribute guest columns that are

and they're really good. It's there's they're a little bit few and far between. But yeah, it's mostly a overblown passion project

turned into a full blown business here. So that's that's living the dream. One of these days, Flex and I will make money or at least get enough free beer

to make it one of these years or just somebody send me a hat. Exactly. That's a beggar's can't be choosers, man.

I just need a hat. Take what we can get around here. Yeah. Any time I'm heading down to San Diego, I always make sure to hop on the

website, see if there's anything new that I need to check out, any new breweries or anything like that.

Do you have any favorite up and coming breweries that are popping up in San Diego? It's always hard to say favorites, but I mean, people that are up and coming,

I think that Sikh Beer Company has made a huge name for itself really quickly in a lease to brew sweet down here in North Park or North Park area,

which is completely saturated with breweries, but they're really good. And it's it's always a very fun time spent down there.

But yeah, I came from Houston, Texas and Urban South Brewery and just completely has knocked it out of the park for the first year

and been really impressive like that. Not as new, but open in 2020.

So during the last three years that feel like I don't know, five days of weirdness. Or or 50 years. Who knows? Yeah.

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Craft Coast Beer and Tacos in Oceanside is a rad place from a former

Pete's Port Brewer. He basically set up a place that celebrates the specifically

like the San Diego SoCal style of taco shop. So that kind of food plus beers that are very,

they very much have roots in the Pete's Port, you know, West Coast IPAs. There's hazy IPAs. There's great loggers.

But yeah, it's kind of like an interesting spin on that model. And it's in this part of Oceanside that's just blowing up.

So those are two that I really, really enjoy. But man, you could throw a stick as far as you can throw it,

which wouldn't be too far. OK, wait a second. You can't not find a good brewery in San Diego.

I mean, no matter where you're at, you are within easy driving distance. It's not like you got to want it and go 25 miles or something like that.

It's like you're getting distance. There's something around. So, yeah, like come to our website, San Diego Beer dot News.

And we always have the updated list of all the breweries. So over 200 spots. Yeah.

And to double up on Seek, we were there in June and hadn't even heard of them. One of the guys were with us like, hey, we got to try Seek.

But yeah, OK, whatever that is. And we rolled in and then the brewers that we met, the brewer found out that he was from urban south and super nice.

You heard that draw. Yeah, exactly. That speaking of sexy now, that's a voice.

Got to get him doing some voiceover work. His accent in general. Yeah. Yeah. Except for Midwest. Right.

Can't stand my Midwest accent. A hoser. I guess it's more Canadian. But yeah, met him super nice. Got some pictures with him.

He made us basically drink all of his beers, which was such a shame. Yeah, it was had to choke him down.

So, so good. We stood up there. So I can't wait till his cans start making it up a little north to where I'm hanging, because that is some good beer he's making down there.

I have a feeling I know where he's at. He's in the old epic spot, which is really sort of like a developmental spot

until you can get a real production brewery, you know, bigger production brewery. So I'm hoping that happens sooner than later

so we can really start working on some distro. I have to think that there's got to at least be the beginnings

of some kind of talk towards that happening. But, you know, when the time's right, he'll definitely have a fan base

already built. And speaking of canard, he has really cool canard that he does himself. So he's the artist.

Yeah. Yeah. People see his art and they're like, man, who does your cans? And it's usually him. That's all. That's awesome.

Yeah. See, he takes the San Diego beer news approach to having a business. It's pretty much him doing everything.

Just him and his wife are just knocking everything out, just like me. So it's pretty cool.

I can definitely respect what he's got going. But I haven't seen a brewery take off quite like CKAS in quite some time.

So it's been awesome to see. Yeah, he definitely knows what he's doing. And Flex, just for reference, that was the brewery where we're all just starting to get our buzz on.

And we tried to call you and we were all. Oh, that's the spot. OK. And you wouldn't answer the phone because it was night time for Flex.

Was sleepy by. Oh, that was that was like a time zone thing, right? Yeah. No, if it's any time after eight o'clock here, I'm usually sleeping.

OK. Yeah. You are 34. I mean, I am old man Flex and I'm sticking to it.

He really, really does. Yeah. I'm not even kidding. Yeah. It's like this is the latest I stay up on any given night.

Well, thank you. I feel honored now. Strictly for podcasting.

Yeah. Monday nights are his big night. And as far as like trends going on in San Diego beer wise, any new trends?

I know kind of California wise, cold IPAs have finally started to calm down. And thank God they have because that name is horrible.

But anything going on down there? It's all good. Yeah, that's it's what they are. Their IPLs and IPLs are delicious.

Stop. Stop marketing them to Hayes boys. My favorite was the when they market them as West Coast Pilsner's.

That that's my real favorite. I've had a couple breweries out this way do that. And it's just a nice little chuckle.

Yeah, I had a brewer tell me over the week and we're doing a collaborative. Like, yeah, that's just I fuck up a pills and I dump a bunch of hops in it.

And also it's a West Coast pills. But, yep, save that batch anyway.

So so any any fun trends? A trend wise, I mean, I think that we're kind of like on with all the trends.

The cold IPA thing is is living large here. You know, loggers do so well around here and

seeing all styles of them. And I think it's a little bit of time to get the Australian sparkling ale or whatever you want to call it out here.

But we're starting to see a few more of those around and and tons of just we have tons of dry hops, any kind of lager

you can think of at all times. It's really great. And it goes with the weather. Not not lately. We actually had some weather this year.

Yeah. Before you know it, that sun will be back and it's going to be rad. The good thing about San Diego is that everything's being made at all times.

There's not a there's it's not really so much about the trends. People dabble in them at all. But yeah, for the most part, you can find just about anything.

So it's kind of hard to pick up the trends, which I I really like. But I guess the big trend here is that, you know, for a while

we were known for having a lot of the larger breweries in the state and in the country and places that have gone on to

like the next phase of their lives. And what we've seen here for the past five years, I'd say five to seven years, maybe is just this return to small breweries

opening up the just service their finite community, because we have one of the most expansive counties in all of

all of the country, really. So a lot of people are now really into just being a brewer,

having a brewing company as their livelihood and servicing the people right around them, all of their friends and neighbors.

And they're really not concerned about getting bigger or opening a satellite tasting room or becoming the next, say, like a stone

or ballast point or something like that and following in those footsteps. They just want to do what they want to do, which kind of harkens back

to how beer started in the first place back in the old world. It was like, OK, well, here's here's the village.

Here's the one guy who makes beer. That's our beer. So it's kind of fun to see. And there's this whole like ultra local Voreanism that happens around it.

But that's a trend that is now just really defined. Nobody's opening up like I'm going to be huge.

It's all I'm going to be really small. And I love that. Yeah. So that's the biggest trend.

Well, I feel like it's easy, like I shouldn't say it's easy to do that in California, but I feel like that's the way to go,

because there are so many breweries all over the place that if you have that mentality to open up like I'm going to be the big shit,

you're probably not going to succeed, because if you have that mentality, but your beer's not good, you know, like that's not going to get you anywhere.

Yeah. Yeah. And then there's so many other places around that people are going to be like, hey, this beer isn't very good.

Let's head over here where I can throw a stick and we'll get beer there instead. Right. Bring back a stick. Yeah.

Yeah. You know, you never let go of the stick. Never. You throw it, you pick it back up and you throw it again.

Well, and speaking of the whole small brewery model that leads in perfectly to sort of what I was going to ask you next, I was going to ask you about what you thought your most underrated brewery is.

And in the area, the one I tell people, whenever people tell me I'm going to San Diego, where should I go?

I always tell them my favorite spot, most underrated brewery. They don't distribute. They don't can.

They hardly even send out any kegs. And that is Helix Brewing. Oh, yeah. Helix is great and doesn't get talked about nearly enough.

I love the I love that campus. You know, you walk in there and you got two buildings. One on the side is like all the fresh beers and the other side,

they have their Sour Works. So you are W.O.R.X. And it's just really a really cool dichotomy.

But yeah, great hoppy beers. I mean, especially if you like hoppy beers, that's the place to go. And it's in La Mesa

out in kind of like the beginnings of our East County. So it's not even in kind of the place. You're not going to stumble upon Helix most likely. Right.

For me, another place that's very much like that. They do. They do can. But they've been around for gosh, must be almost 15 years, if not more.

New English brewing. And that's a brewery out in a place called Sorrento Valley. Kind of on the West, getting close to La Jolla and Del Mar on the coast over there.

But it's this Englishman who came over him and his wife built this brewery and they serve fantastic UK styles, but also great West Coast style IPAs and pale ales.

Fantastic. Just any style that they go for barley wines, imperial stouts, things like that.

They still have a cask engines, which is really cool. And their ESP is just unmatched on that thing.

But, you know, people never talk about it. And they never really have because English styles just don't play here big time. You know, people don't want any kind of lukewarm

thing with malt driven. But that's why it's so cool, because, yes, those are fantastic.

And, you know, benchmarks. But at the same time, their IPAs stand up with all the best IPAs

that are here in San Diego, which is known for its IPAs. So, yeah, I would totally do a two for day and go to Helix and go to New English.

And man, super cool. Great pull on that. I love it. Nice. I've never been to New English.

And now that you've said it, it's going to have to be the top of my next trip. Is New English brewing? Yeah. And there's other things around it, too.

So it's like it's just a starting point. But it's like give a little love to that one and then go find the other cool stuff

around it. Yeah, I love it. I love it down there. I love finding new places every time. So I'll stop gushing about San Diego, at least eventually.

And before I'll pick I'll pick up the slack. Yeah, you stop. I'll pick it up. But oh, yeah. Go to New English and then go to a place called Gravity Heights.

I've heard of Gravity Heights. OK, I will. I will hit that up before I forget. Don't forget to follow SD Beer News on the gram and the socials at SD Beer News.

And like Brandon said, San Diego Beer dot news. All right, Brandon, baseball fan down there.

I love Petco Park. Best beers in the country. Yes. Love the Padres. Can't wait.

So excited. I need the season to start, though, so that like all the preseason injuries

can be over. You know, I don't know. No, it's just, man, I love our team, but it's like made of glass.

Professional sports in a nutshell right there. Right. As a Laker fan, I know all about that glass thing. Oh, yeah, absolutely. OK.

Yeah, it's rough. I can't even watch anymore. But yeah, Padres looking pretty good down there.

They're beating up our team right. Or a week ago, Gavin Lux is out for the season. Thanks to you guys. Yeah, that's rough.

I did see that news. Yeah. Flex, how is your beer selection at your stadium there? It's pretty solid.

So I haven't been there. Well, you know, obviously since last year, but they actually.

Where is this? Where's this place you're talking about? Milwaukee. Oh, is Milwaukee? Yeah.

Oh, my other team that I love. And you got the Brewers cap on now.

That's great. I love it. I like the Brewers a lot. I would say particular reason.

Is it because they have the best name in all of professional sports? They've got the best that they got the best name. No, I've been a Brewers fan since I was eight.

So I love the Padres because their hometown team. But, you know, I think you should get to pick the teams that you like.

So yeah, I agree. I did it. And it's been fun. And I believe I can't remember if it was pedals and pints or if it was not.

I think it was naughty pine. But somebody from naughty pines, dad or uncle used to play for the Brewers.

I don't remember this at all. No, they they post somebody posted something about the Brewers on like their page.

I was like, oh, that's awesome. Like, I love the Brewers from Milwaukee. And they they commented back saying that they have a like

their dad used to play on the Brewers or something like that. Oh, interesting. So we're going to dive into that eventually. But a few years back, I want to say like four or five years ago now,

they opened up this whole craft beer section in the stadium. There's probably like 20 to 30 different local craft beers on tap.

They're all like, you know, 14 to 18 dollars a beer. So it's not that's all.

You know, I know you always say that. And that blows my mind. Yeah, but stadium is the worst. See, that's crazy.

I'd like to 18 dollars for a Golden Road. Oh, but this craft section you're talking about.

I haven't been I haven't been there since like 2012, I think. OK, yeah, so it was definitely after.

So it's real deal like legit like local craft, all local. Wow. So it's super nice.

And like I said, it was at least when I went, whenever they opened it up, it was like 20 to 30 beers.

And on the menu, they have them all listed by like the, you know, beer categories that they are.

So like, you know, your IPAs, your stouts, your just all that stuff. It was all separated.

So it's super neat. Nice. Yeah. And I would way rather pay that money, though, than for like an 11 dollar summer shanty.

No offense, lining kugels. But, you know, if I'm going to get good beer, I will pay the price.

Yeah. Yeah. Or you want if you're at a stadium, this is where ABV matters. Like if you're going to pay 18 dollars for a beer,

you want the most out of that 18 dollars you can get. I'm taking a 10 percent triple IPA over the pale ale

because I need that 18 dollars to stretch a little bit. Do they do Long Island's at Dodger Stadium?

Long Island Ice T's? Yeah. God, I hope not. Oh, my gosh. See all the all the hooligan fans just act like they've had four Long Island

Ice T's. Dodger fans can't be trusted. So that is the most popular beverage in Milwaukee at Brewers games.

That's awesome. And oh, really? Because the yeah, the beers run like 10 to 11 dollars like per 16 ounce.

And the Long Islands are like 12 bucks. All right. Well, it makes sense. I see. I don't even need an algorithm for that.

That's just easy. Yeah. So there's like there's one bar outside, you know, connected to the stadium, but you have to walk outside to get there.

And I think there's one other spot inside that does it. But yeah, my buddies got thrown out of the park so many times

that he actually got the Brewers logo tattooed on the back of his arm. And underneath it, it says no more Long Islands.

Wow. He regrets it. You know, I see that other people would have learned their lesson, but I love that he just embraces it.

Yeah, doubles. Oh, yeah. This is lifestyle, baby. That's exact. That's exactly his

mentality in life. Dominic Toretto of the Brewers lives his life one Long Island at a time. What can I say?

All right, Flex, before we find out what you're drinking, a couple of things discuss Brandon Hangout Crackwise with us.

Yeah. Quick shout out to Chu. Happy birthday to your beer. Happy birthday to how awesome.

Yeah. He should have known quite the birthday week. And I was following along in the stories and happy birthday to Val,

who I have to say that to. It's my sister. Oh, well, hey, happy birthday, Val. Congrats on the engagement.

Oh, yeah, that's it. Over the weekend, went to Petals and Pints Brewing for their Pink Boots collab.

I was invited to that as long as as well as the wife and a bunch of other fun people. That's what two or three years in a row now for you.

Yeah, I think that was a second year for Petals. This was such a blast. We had obviously Monica had Brewer Petals was there.

Her husband, James, who works at Enneagrin, the new Bright Spark, Tim and Lindsey showed up.

Chaz from Malibu Brewing was there. Some people from Tarantula Hill were there.

Oh, Brittany from Naughty Pine was there. I mean, it was a who's who of like the area breweries. And I don't know why I was invited, but it was a blast.

We we hung out all day, drink some great beer and and drink some great beer.

Oh, it's cool to your friends with all of them. Like, how great is that? Yeah, it's fun. Just a big, big group of beer lovers getting high.

That's outstanding. Yeah, those good to hear people are the best people like that, though. It's like, yeah, we're all interested in the same thing.

You can hang out. I mean, shoot, I don't pass like most people's litmus test for should he be invited?

It's like, no, I'm like, you must you must be this tall to ride this ride.

And the people, it's much lower. And it really is. And really, whether or not it's true, like me, like I don't know a lot about beer,

but I tell you what, I like drinking it and I like talking to other people who like drinking it. So and the nice thing is when you're with a bunch of people like that,

the brewer is a lot more open with her taps and like they have a barrel aged out coming out there.

They're at three year anniversaries coming up this Saturday. So if you guys are in there, you go check it out. They're releasing their barrel aged out 12 percent.

It's the first time they've barrel aged something. It's a blend of sherry barrels and whiskey.

Oh, shit. Now I forget a sherry and something. Oh, poor sherry and port barrels. They blended it afterwards.

It was drinking really nice. It was like 99 percent finish. She just wanted to add a little more carbonation to it.

We tried it. But 12 percent, that bad boy was dangerously easy to drink. Can they can they call it?

Oh, sherry. And then the night they release it, just play that Steve Perry song on loop. I think that would make everybody want to hang.

I'm already sure it's going to sell out. That's what I meant to say. Yes, yes, that's I'm not great. I'm not great at marketing, but I'm pretty sure that's a winner.

I like that. It's not just the standard whiskey combination. That sounds pretty good. I mean, like sherry and port, that's got to be pretty

like really get this like grapey, fruity type thing happening. And how California is that?

Yeah, it was really fun because like you pick up some of like, I'd say like a little bit more like acidity from the sherry bottles.

You really get like that deep written richness that port brings to the game. Like it wasn't just like you said, wasn't just like,

it tastes like whiskey, like all the other barrel aged out. So it was really fun. You could actually taste the two different barrels a little bit in there.

And it was delicious. And I plan on having a lot of it this coming Saturday. Nice and Ubering and hope.

Hopefully I can Uber and I don't do the whole thing where my wife has to take my. I don't I don't think you should do. I don't think you should do your Uber driving that day.

Who wants a ride, baby? And then finally, I just I have to mention this over the week.

Last weekend, Nick and Nicole Coley came over and I had this problem. We have two wine fridges.

In fact, you guys might be able to see if I turn this and I beat up my microphone a little bit.

Here are two wine fridges. I do. And the DeLorean and the DeLorean for Back to the Future, of course. They have been overtaken by beer by a little bit.

By a lot of barrel aged, like mostly Firestone barrel aged stuff just that we've collected over the years.

And we got some really nice wine. The wife is a wine lover. And we went to load up the fridge and was like, there is no room left.

So we we can fix that problem. So we invited Coley. It's a great problem.

Yeah. Coley and Nick, because we have a ton of like duplicates and even a couple of triples. And we just said, look, we're going to make dinner

and we're going to go through as many fucking bottles as we can. And we accomplished like we went through well over 10 bottles

and nothing was under 10 percent. It was all double digits. We drank so much beer and then Nick found his way to my kegerator

where I've got my homebrew brown, these nuts brown on tap as well. As well as the Goza, the Goza collab is on tap as well.

So he he definitely had some of that. And then we had a ton of barrel aged stuff. And there's actually room in the fridges now.

So we were ham skewed. More room for these nuts. Exactly. These nuts always needs more room.

Oh, it's a good time. So was it a Dr. Pepper morning the next day? No. You know what?

You know, it fixes that is if you throw up the night of, you don't you don't get hung over the next morning.

So I solved my hangover. Respect, man. Respect.

Nipped it right in the butt there. All right. Before we get to choose voicemail,

let's answer the most important question of the night in a world where craft beer is king,

a world where muscles are bigger than growlers. Only one tongue can guide us.

One man, one tongue, one tongue jobber. In this world, we must find out

what is Flax drinking. Well, let me send out a big thank you to Brian and Deb again.

Oh, yeah. Finally came through Casa Agria. I didn't have any San Diego beer and I was trying to drink something,

you know, the West Coast since, you know, Brandon's on. And this is this is the best I could come up with.

You went a really good route. They make. Yeah. Not too shabby for the best.

Yeah. You know what I'm saying? I'm not going to lie. I'm not going to lie. I'm not going to lie. Yeah, I do. You know what I'm saying?

Yeah. So I'm drinking Westwise from Casa Agria and the can and the old untapped.

They don't agree on the ABV. OK, I'd go with the can. The can. Yeah, agreed. The can six point eight.

They got to update the old untapped. It says seven point one, not too far off. But I mean, legally, they can be half a percent off.

Well, then the can are. This is illegal. But yeah, we'll see what happens. But the description is much, much shorter than the last.

It says Westwise is a modern West Coast IPA that features everyone's favorite combination of hops, citra and mosaic.

And without remembering that the word modern was in the description, I thought to myself, wow, this is a real modern West Coast

because of those hops, right? It doesn't have the classic centennials, your Chinooks, your

who dags and woe bobs. Yeah. Yes.

Start now with the can. Right on this one. Yeah, those popularity years ago. It's super simple, but very modern.

Brilliant. Bright, colorful. Absolutely love it. Totally fits the algorithm.

I'm sure the West Coast price doesn't. But that's what happens when you lose for you. A bat. Sorry, intern.

So on the schnaz, right? Super early. Definitely tell it's a West Coast.

A little bit pine on the back end. Great color. It's clear. It's not hazy, right?

It is a West Coast. A real West Coast. A little more yellow than that classic like copper.

Then we warm up the tongue jobber. Dive right in.

Now that it's warmed up, we can officially get in there. OK, so the description on untapped, it says it's creamy.

I wouldn't describe this as creamy at all. I'm glad to hear it. As most West Coast.

Yeah. Yeah. West Coast, I wouldn't really describe it. We're a West Coast. Yeah, it is crisp.

It is super light. Carbonation is real low on it. It's not real citrus forward.

It's light flavored. The herbaceousness comes out a little bit on the palate.

Real low end bitterness to this. This is like a super duper easy drinking West Coast.

Super duper. 100 percent. Honey approved. And especially at a 6.8.

Like that's just a little bit under my wheelhouse. But to me, this is like an all day drinking beer.

And it's it's fabulous. Nice. You like to hover around like seven and a half, right? Big fan of the seven and a half.

Yeah, that's a nice sweet spot for you. Even start creeping into the eights. OK, I'm a big fan of that.

You know, and then once it's like the nines and the tens, that's when we're partying. Well, at this old age, though, you got to be careful with those.

Well, yeah, you never know. You're going to crack a can and crack your back. I don't write. You never know. You got to wait till you hit your forties and you're safe.

I don't know. I've been a really big fan of things moving towards like the six point five to seven range.

OK, I mean, it just kind of works for me. Like, you know, I'm a littler dude. Not I mean, like, never mind.

It's going to get me in trouble. But but but yeah, I don't know, because like you were saying, it's like I could

you know, like this could be an all day type drinker for me. Yeah, instead of having to go all the way to like session IPA territory,

where usually it's not all that great, you know, like the body is missing or something like that. Yeah, I love that. Now they just brought it down so you could just drink like two or three and it's fine.

It's not like you're going to lose it. That's my biggest harp about session IPAs. Yeah, is that like they're all like the whole idea is like so many people

ideas like still bring the flavor through with a lower ABV. But what you what you said, you completely lose all body.

And it's just kind of like some people have managed to do it. I don't want to say like all of them are that way, because for a while I worked at a brewery

that had won twice, they got two gold medals at JBS for their session IPA. Wow.

And it was a society brewing. I love society. Hard to say. Great. Amazing. So that was called the Coachman, and it was just fantastic as far as just hot presence

on the aroma and the palate. But you didn't feel like you were drinking some kind of little bitty beer.

It was like a regular beer. And yeah, if you find that one, check it out. It's one of their core beers now, and it makes it around a little bit more.

So it'd be really easy for someone to probably send you some. Oh, crap. Was that a hint? Whoever.

Well, whoever did Casa could get you that. Yeah. I mean, I see Coachman at Trader Joe's fairly often, so maybe I'll have to slip some to

Frank. Really? Yeah. There you go. There you go. Love TJ's around here, man. They got some good beers on tap.

Yeah. Get that tiramisu stuff. I've had it years ago, but I had it.

Banger. Yeah. Banger for the price. $3.98. Are you kidding me? For a bomber.

Brandon, are you a fan of Pawlenty the Younger? Yeah. I mean, I like the adventure of it all, and I like that it changes a little bit each year,

but generally it's just a really well done triple IPA and very enjoyable. Yeah.

I love it. I've gotten to that old age where I don't love standing in line for it.

I don't do the whole line thing, but if I can get my hands on it, I do like it. But the Homie Chug Your Beer has never had it before, and so he called Midline for Piney

the Younger. Of course he did. Midline? Midline. Excellent.

Excellent. This is going to be a choice. He'd already had a few other Russian River offerings at this point.

So here's the Homie Chug Your Beer. Hello. No one is available to take your call. Please leave a message after the tone.

Hey, yo, what's up, Fat Beer Republic? Chug Your Beer here. I'm at the Shirley Dope in Encino.

It's Wednesday. I got my tickets for my Piney the Youngster, Homie.

This would actually be my first time ever having youngsters. I've been chasing it for about 14 years of my craft beer career, Homie.

So yeah, homies, I got my three tickets, chilling with my boy Marvin, eating some fucking cheese fries, they're giving me bubble guts already, so let's hope it doesn't come out the other end,

homies. So yeah, I'm drinking my STS pills. I just had their new border.

I'm waiting for 7 o'clock, homies, until they tap this Younger keg, homies. Other than that, homie, this is Chug Your Beer.

You're listening to Craft Beer Republic. And this is Piney Watch 2023, homies.

Looking for Piney the Youngster. I can watch, homies. Peace out, eh?

He's fucking wild. I don't know if he could handle a triple IPA after all he's had to drink at that point.

I wonder how that went for him. Yeah, strictly from a biological sense, I hope it does come out the other end. There's a preferred end.

Oh dear. I just hope they come out with a Piney the Youngster now. They should.

The double dry hopped version is Piney the Youngster. Or maybe make it like a session. There you go.

Oh, I'd forgotten all about that guy. He is so cool. I know that guy. Oh, you do know Chew?

Yeah, I do. It's been a while. Yeah. As soon as I heard that voice, I'm like, oh yeah, Holmes.

Dude, that's a metal Holmes. Yeah, no, he's red.

He's the best. Choose the best. 805-538-BEER is the number to call if you guys want to leave a voicemail.

The first news story I have here, I pulled purposely to talk about on this show because Brandon, you kind of got very intimately familiar with this one.

In fact, you talked to Tommy, but the Lost Abbey downscaling and their plans are beginning to unfold and Pizza Port, ironically, is going to take over the old Lost Abbey port spot.

There's a lot of moving parts with this. Lost Abbey and Port Brewing will become separate business entities.

Lost Abbey will shut down the tap room on May 1st, and then they're going to basically contract brew or looking to contract brew after that.

They're going to continue operating their other facilities. In addition to the brewing assets, Pizza Port will take over the intellectual property for

Port Brewing and the THC brands, which I was surprised that he didn't hang on to Port. And then afterwards, the Lost Abbey's three satellite tap rooms and the IP of Lost Abbey

and any other ongoing businesses concerned will be part of Tommy's business. So I saw you got to talk to him about this.

Correct. Seems like, I don't know, is this a good thing? Or at first it seemed kind of weird, then it seemed like, oh, this is bigger than it started as.

Yeah, because at first they were just looking to, you know, downsize their operations that they're at the place that you've been for 17 years.

Right. Which is in San Marcos in our north county. The original stone brewing facility.

Exactly. Yeah. So over in Matawe. And that place, when they took it over, it was rather small.

And they continued to grow it and grow it and grow it to where they took over most of one building and spots in the building across from them in this little industrial part.

But things were going well. And back then, you know, if things were going well for your business and you were a brewery,

it wasn't like now it's like, let's charge ahead and we're going to move this thing forward. We're going to be like the next stone or something like that.

Right. So they had a 30 barrel brew house and they had capacity to go to what I forget what it was,

like maybe like 25,000, 30,000 barrels a year. But they never got anywhere close to that.

Yeah. And so they're like, OK, look, Belgian beers, not as popular as they once were,

which for me is like the worst. I love Belgian beers. I love Saison's in particular, Bret Saison's.

I mean, like everything the Last Abbey does, I really, really, really, really appreciate a lot.

And that even goes for their hoppy beers that are becoming part of the portfolio. At any rate, they want to just go ahead and say, OK, let's sell the stainless off,

sell the corresponding cellar, and we'll get something in here smaller that really fits our needs, get it down to like, you know, 15,000, 10 to 15,000 barrels a year type range

and renegotiate our lease and give back some of the building to the landlord. And so they were able to kind of do that to some degree on the square footage with the

landlord, but they didn't get exactly what they wanted. And then it came to the point where, you know, their number one beer, best selling beer is

called Mongo. It's their double IPA. Yeah. And that production of that had already moved over to Pete's production facility over in

Carlsbad. Oh, well, they're making all that. So they really just like, we don't need this 30 barrels of that.

And then Pete's port eventually said, you know, the owners of Pete's port are co-owners of the Lost Abbey brand, which was the Lost Abbey and Port Brewing.

Right. Because Tommy worked for Pete's port first, right? Right. And then they got in together to open up this new venture back in 2006.

It was new then anyway, but it was their, you know, it was their first packaged beer. They had back then you couldn't even get like, they didn't have the whole production facility

for Pete's port. So they had things like, you know, their red and their IPAs wiped out and some other cool

things. But it was basically had every style you could want under one roof. And it was the quality of Pete's port and quite frankly, like the mastery of Tommy when

it comes to things like barrel aged beers and Belgian beers. I mean, he knocks it out of the park consistently. He wrote the book.

He's continuing to write the book. And now he's still writing the book. Yeah. But at any rate, it became advantageous for Pete's port and kind of like one of the only

ways to go for Pete's port to go ahead and just say, you know what, we're just going to buy that stainless. We're going to take over the facility.

We'll close down the tasting room. They might open another tasting room for a smaller one for Pete's port at some point.

Take over the port brewing brand, the hop concept brand THC, because those are hoppy beers and they excel at selling hoppy beers.

I mean, their whole sales force, that's what they do all day long. So it's like, great, just give them more weapons.

And then that allows Lost Abbey to move out, operate their three tasting rooms that they have and find another place to brew, go into an alternative proprietorship, go into a contract

brewing with somebody if that should be the case. They're seeking investors. So they want to like get to a point where they can be self-sufficient.

But yeah, like you said, a lot of moving pieces. And it wasn't exactly what people thought were going to happen, including Tommy and

probably, you know, the Marsaglia is from Pete's port. But I think it's a good example of kind of like where this industry is going, the challenges

people face on multiple levels. And it's just, wow, we have this award-winning, amazingly, amazing, esteemed brewing operation

that is having trouble putting all the pieces together, making it work for the current marketplace. And yeah, it's something to watch for sure.

But it's better than watching a brewery go out of business or just be completely helpless and have no options at all.

I look forward to seeing what happens. They are going to be introducing new beers from the Lost to into the Lost Abbey portfolio.

So while they'll be taking out IPAs from Port and Hop Concept, I'm sure they'll brew their own new IPAs that are, you know, Tommy and his crew's recipe and introduce those

to the taproom. So it's not like, oh man, I only like going there for the port brewing beers.

Because I like IPAs. Well, something else will be there and it'll be right along the same vein because they

came up with those recipes as well. So it'll be interesting to see what they do. And I think that it'll be fun, quite frankly, to watch an introduction of new beers to Lost

Abbey. All under Lost Abbey because I don't know, as much as I love that company, I always thought

it was really strange to have all these sub brands. It was kind of weird. So hard for anybody to understand, especially with Pizza Port and Port Brewing.

Well, which is which and so many people like the layman is just completely confused if they like either one, they don't know what's happening.

And it's probably good from a clarification of just what the business is and what it produces. It'll be nice to see that.

That said, Lost Abbey will continue to make their tiny bubbles line of Brett beers and they'll continue to make the charisma line of hard sparkling teas.

So there'll still be two sub brands. If you're really into sub brands, you can get those. He loves those sub brands.

You know, a similar thing happened up here in the L.A. area. Cellador Ales, they lost their lease on their brew facility.

They found a contract brew and at the same time they transferred ownership. So now they are contract brewing elsewhere.

I don't even know where. They won't say, but I'm sure someone knows. But it's interesting with that, right?

How people get so weird about contract brewing. Yeah, like it's so bad. I mean, it's your recipe.

So what's it matter? Yeah, as long as the degree of oversight is such that you're seeing it or you're doing

your own QA, I would assume. But it's just not a bad thing anymore. I think, in fact, I think it's how a lot of brands are going to stay alive either by doing

it. Like these large brewing companies that have all this capacity and nothing to do with it.

Yeah. You know, well, let's contract brew for somebody or vice versa. It's like, well, things are getting expensive, but I can still afford to contract brew over

there and run a small tasting room, you know? Well, and I don't want to out any smaller breweries, but I know of at least a couple

smaller breweries that were contract brewing at Alesmith just so they could package. Right, right.

So it's still the recipe. They still have oversight. Yeah. And the crew over at Alesmith, where I also used to work.

Just worked all of San Diego. Oh, I worked at Stone too. But, but, you know, the crew at Alesmith definitely know what they're doing and they have a state

of the art. Awesome. Yeah. Incredible brew house. So I don't see that as a negative, but for the longest time, it was just like, well,

your contract brewing, you must suck. I'm like, well, why? Why must they suck? Did they have help from people who know what they're doing?

They've been nothing else. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. So in a weird turn of events, BrewDog, everyone's favorite.

Everyone's favorite. Oh, God. Those assholes. Damn dog. Great people. Yeah. Great people.

Great company to work for. BrewDog, the most punk brewery in all of breweries has partnered with Budweiser in China to quote,

spur major expansion in the world's biggest beer market. So not only are they already terrible people.

Now they just get even worse. Yeah. Well, and how punk of them to team up with Budweiser.

Budweiser. Yeah. Super punk. Thanks, guys. Man, now there's an operation that just keeps getting overextended as hell.

And I don't understand how that how it keeps working out. Like, oh, man, we'll just yeah, we'll pick that up. We'll pick that up.

We'll go international, do all these kinds of things. Like, how is this working out for y'all? There must be so much behind the scenes.

But yeah, this one's that's stay classy. And honestly, I don't know anybody that drinks BrewDog,

yet they keep going to other countries and expanding. Well, that's because there's only people who haven't had it who might have it.

That's true. Yeah, I was going to say, I think I saw one thing of theirs. I went to a total wine a couple weeks ago, which I hate total wine, by the way.

I can't stress enough how much I hate. It's like going to a beer rummage sale because.

Mine's not that bad. Really, every four pack pick up, you got to look for like the can on date.

Because. Yeah, that's a good one, though. Yeah. But it's like the fact that you have to do it there.

It yeah, yeah, it turns like a seven minute trip to like your local bottle shop or, you know, little beer store.

It turns like a seven minute trip and like a 45 minute trip because everything you look at, you're like, all right, like when was oh, this was six months ago.

Oh, I don't want a hazy that's been on the shelf for six months. Like, oh, you're putting fruited sours, you know, on the shelf outside of refrigeration.

I don't want any of that. Why would I want any of that? Congratulations for them not exploding. Yeah, right. It's like it's crazy.

Yeah, can't stand it. Ours isn't too bad, but you do have to read the labels or read the dates a little bit.

Yeah, I found that out when I was I saw Evil Twin was on a shelf once and I was like, oh, that's pretty sweet.

Evil Twin's pretty legit. And then I found out that the beer was on the shelf for two years.

And I said, hey, that's not pretty legit. Yeah, that's unlegit. Well, I don't know, was it like a like some kind of massive imperial stout?

No, this is aging for you. Some weird four pack or whatever they did, you know, probably had like Jesus in the title.

Even more Jesus. But yeah, it is either even more Jesus or the world's longest name, one of the other.

Yeah, correct. Yeah, so. But yeah, it was it was very undaddy. I would say. Yes.

In a weird turned event, it turns out Bill Gates hates good beer and has acquired a 3.8 stake in Heineken that is worth about 902 million dollars, makes inferior computers,

buys inferior beer. It's just horrible here. You know, this is really funny. So I got to talk about this Heineken thing for a second.

OK. Because I can't remember who I was with the other day, but the Heineken for some reason.

Yeah. And this guy goes, you know, I've never had a good Heineken. And I said, yeah, that's because there's no such thing.

True. Like you can't have a good Heineken because you're just all shitty.

Well, they hit the shelves already skunked unless that's your thing, you know. It's so bad. Yeah, pretty bad.

We'll finish things off with this one. A drunk student was busted for urinating on an American Airlines business class passenger.

I'm going to need some context. He may need some water. Oh, God, names.

Aryan Vohra. Sorry, but a 21 year old Indian national student in the US was arrested in Delhi late Saturday

as he stepped off American Airlines flight AA292 from JFK. The pilot radioed ahead to warn of a disruptive customer who was heavily intoxicated.

Officials said he was repeatedly arguing with the operating crew, was not willing to be seated and continuously endangering the safety of crew and aircraft.

After disturbing the safety of fellow passengers, he finally urinated on a passenger, the airline said.

The passenger just sat there and took it. What do you do at that point?

Yeah, I mean, like you don't have so much room to move. Right. It's because they've taken away all the leg room.

The damage is done. Yeah. Vohra, who was traveling home for his sister's wedding, later told cops that he tried to

go to the bathroom, but the door was locked. And I shit you not, this is what they wrote.

The peed on passenger was not identified beyond the fact that it was a man in seat 15G. That's not real.

That's some great alliteration. Yeah, right. Vohra apologized and begged him not to file a complaint, which he appears to have gone

along with, noting that the arrest followed a complaint filed by the airline and not the alleged soaked victim.

Still, Vohra continued to misbehave after being led from the police by security officials. Mal...

Oh, God. Devesh Kumar Mala, the airport's deputy head of police, was arrested for the crime.

Mala, the airport's deputy head of police, said he vowed to take the strongest possible action.

American Airlines also canceled his return flight to the Big Apple and banned him from all future flights.

Wow. I just don't understand how you just sit there and let somebody pee on you. Still on that one, huh?

I mean, there'd be like a couple of seconds of being peed on as I took off my seatbelt and sprung into action.

I'm pretty sure I can take anybody who's urinating at any point. It doesn't even matter. It's true.

They're kind of incapacitating themselves. So... It's like, what are the odds the one guy in like 15 G, is that what it said?

Yeah. His dream has just been to be pissed on in an airplane, you know?

Dear penthouse, I never thought I'd be writing this letter. Right? He's just like undoing his pants and in his mind he's just like, oh my God, please do

it. And then the guy like does the zipper down and he's like, oh, I'm sorry. He's like, oh my God, it's really going to happen.

And then like flow occurs and he's just like on cloud nine. Sir, sir, it's okay.

It's okay. Like it's okay. Just let it happen. He's already peeing.

It's not really going to get that much worse. It's all right. And you know what? I bet it was Heineken.

I bet he had too many Heineken's on the flight. That's probably what it was. That pee is gonna stink.

And say, if that's the case, though, he probably wouldn't have been that drunk. Maybe you should have had some Heineken's. Maybe, maybe he was drinking Heineken zeros, but he didn't know it was not alcoholic.

Sure. We've all know. So he just like, he was a zero drinking Heineken's. Yeah. Oh, there we go.

There we go. So anyways, uh, zip it up on American Airlines, would you? Yeah.

Zip it up. If somebody's peeing on you, are you really just going to take it? That's come on.

Only if you're in 15g. Otherwise, no, don't sit in 15g. Oh boy.

All right. That is the last of the day. I think that's quite the high note to go on.

And Brandon is now so glad he hung out. You know what I am? That was really, really, really something.

I'm gonna hit some music over here. Brandon, thanks for hanging out with us tonight. That was a lot of fun. Yeah. Nice hanging out with you, man. Thanks for having me.

It was great. Absolutely. Uh, don't forget, follow San Diego Beer News at SDBeerNews.

And of course, SanDiegoBeer.News for the news. Go check it out, especially if you're heading down there.

Any other, uh, socials or anything I've, I missed? No, you nailed it. But, um, I would go ahead and, uh, sign up for our free newsletter because it comes once a week.

And there's all sorts of interesting stuff there, even if you're not from San Diego. You just dream of being in San Diego.

Yeah. Just like Flex. Just dreaming of San Diego over there. It's all I do. Yeah. Go brew crew. Yeah.

One day I'll make my way out there. Nice. You better, you better, you son of a bitch. Uh, follow us at Craft Beer Republic.

And of course, Flex at FlexMeABeer, underscores inbetween, CraftBeerRepublic.com. And if you want to leave a voicemail, 805-53-BEER, 2337.

I believe that is everything. Thank you all for listening. I hope you're staying very well hydrated.