The nation’s most decorated large brewery — at least in the eyes of certified judges — has 12 employees.
AC Golden may be small, but under the competition rules it must compete in the category in which its parent company falls.
For anyone who has taken a tour of the not-so-little Coors Brewing operation on the banks of Clear Creek, AC Golden’s win as 2014 Large Brewing Company and Brewer of the Year begins to make sense.
As one of the craft-beer imprints of the even bigger MillerCoors corporate family, AC Golden is — or should be — a valuable asset as sales of craft beer skyrocket and light lager sales limp along.
“Our partnership with MillerCoors gives us the ability to source the best ingredients and brewing equipment in the world — and then they get out of the way to let us experiment with a wide variety of beers, including Colorado Native,” AC Golden president and co-founder Glenn Knippenberg said in a statement. They’ve let us grow our business the right way and, in a world where a lot of folks are focused on immediate returns, they take a long-term view.”
Size matters when it comes to ingredients. Otherwise, AC Golden could not have brewed on any scale Colorado Native Amber Lager and Colorado Native Golden Lager, which won gold and silver, respectively, in the American-style amber lager category.
The Colorado Native brand beers are brewed exclusively with Colorado ingredients. That means local water, malted barley and yeast, which are easy enough to come by. The challenge is procuring enough hops, the flowery green herb that gives beer its bitterness and bite.
AC Golden brewer Ben Knutson said the brewery buys 80 percent of the state’s hops and pays a premium to make it viable for growers.
The Colorado Native brand , a hoppier cousin to the lagers.
There was a cost in flavor. Before bottling the IPL, AC Golden removed from the recipe out-of-state Simcoe hops, which .
Standing on the festival floor with the pair of medals around his neck, Knutson shared another bit of news: The silver medal-winning Colorado Native Golden Lager will be coming to six packs this spring.
Sorry, sour heads: In a blow to the geekiest of beer geeks, Crooked Stave Artisan Beer Project .
The program gave the sour and wild Denver brewery a cash infusion during its start-up phase and provided members benefits including early access to specialty releases and twin bottles of 10 exclusive barrel-aged releases that aren’t available to regular customers.
But Crooked Stave is retooling and decided to cut the program at the end of 2014, in part because its exclusive concoctions took up too much space in its Barrel Cellar on West 46th Avenue.
Also, the processing of membership payments apparently caused some problems. Now is about the time the brewery would have started enlisting members for next year.
So, what’s coming?
The brewery, which opened a taproom inside The Source in Denver’s River North neighborhood last year, aims to increase production of its core barrel-aged sours (L’Brett d’Or, Origins and Nightmare on Brett) and step up releases of one-off “progressive wild beers.”
Also in the works is allowing regular customers to buy the kinds of beers Crooked Stave had limited to members.
Crooked Stave hinted at “major plans” for its barrel room, allowing for more experimentation and more space for Crooked Stave Artisans, the growing distribution affiliate that has brought the likes of Prairie Artisan Ales, Evil Twin Brewing and Perennial Artisan Ales to Colorado.
Dude, where’s my IPA? It became known as the Dankapolypse.
On Dec. 31, 2012, agents with the state Liquor and Tobacco Enforcement Division abruptly shut down production of Dank IPA, the sole packaged offering of little Dad and Dude’s Breweria.
The Aurora-based father-and-son brewpub had been brewing on Denver-based Prost Brewing’s system, and state regulators called foul.
The contract had been written improperly, resulting in unintended problems in how taxes were supposed to be paid, among other things, said Dad and Dude’s co-founder Mason Hembree (the son).
The setback could have crushed a small business. But instead, one of the state’s most modest brewing operations rebounded as it seeks to bolster the profile of suburban Denver breweries.
To can, the brewery entered into an alternating proprietorship with Rockyard Brewing in Castle Rock, which had brewing capacity to spare.
The deal will allow Dad and Dude’s to expand capacity from 730 barrels in 2013 to more than 1,000 barrels this year.
Two of the 16-ounce cans are new to packaging: Leaves of Lemongrass, an unfiltered Belgian-style wit beer, and Riot Red Rye Ale, a malty amber ale.
Lastly, the flagship Dank IPA returns in a new redesigned can, having survived the Dankapolypse.
Staff writer Jon Murray contributed to this report.
Eric Gorski: 303-954-1971, egorski@denverpost.com or twitter.com/egorski
