Ft Collins, CO - a microbeer community

My husband and I are here in Colorado to celebrate our 5 year wedding anniversary.

We landed in Denver around 10 am, and drove up to Ft. Collins. We drank beer at the New Belgium Brewery first. I liked their 1554 beer the most out of the free samplers they gave out. I also really liked the Harvest beer. They seem to be quite an incredible company. They own a windfarm in Wyoming to provide 80% of their energy. The last 20% is from the methane gas, collected from a pool, where they treat their own water, to ease the load on the city. Additionally, they have coaster postcards that they give out to people to send out. If you fill out a postcard, they will send it out for you free of charge. The tour was very entertaining, and it was a pleasure to see how seriously they take being green.

Thursday evening we went to Cooper Smith Brew Pub. We asked if they had schooner's, but the waitress didn' t know what a schooner is. I guess schooner's are known as bullets over here. Jeremy had 5 different samples. I liked the stout the best. I only had a few sips of his beer. I tried their homemade rootbeer with my chicken pot pie. I found the rootbeer overly sweet. I ordered the rootbeer on a whim. Why? I have no idea, because I don't like rootbeer. LOL.

Today is Friday. The weather has been beautiful. Its been 80 degrees during the day, but it is starting to cloud up. This morning, we started out with an appointment with MouCo Cheeserie. They create one of my favorite cheeses, the ColoRouge cheese. We met with the owner Robert, who once brewed at New Belgium. They also make a camembert, and are getting ready to release their Blue Cheese. The tour was very informative, and I enjoyed it quite a bit. We were the first tour in over 2 months. They aren't really set up for tours, and are trying to keep them down, to keep contamination down. It sounds like they do just about everything by hand. It also looks like he took some of the green company culture from New Belgium, as they have the vendors they sell to ship boxes back to them, or losing a $15 deposit. I have to remember to send a thank you card for the samples (huzzah for cheese!). I look forward to them being able to sell directly to Top Foods, so I can see the price of the cheese to drop.

Then we went to the Ft. Collins brewery. Their Kidd beer, a dark lager was incredible, and their Chocolate Stout was smooth and tasty. I wish we could take some home, but we're not really prepared to take bottles home with us. Especially with the new laws about liquids on planes.

After Ft Collins we drove over to Odells. Jeremy liked their 90 Shilling the best. I like their Cut Throat Porter the best. I started recognizing people from the other breweries we'd been to.

We then went back to New Belgium, where Jer drank another sampler from them. I stuck to their seltzer water which was fantastic. Slighlty fruity, and just a hint of sweetness. I wish I could find something like that on the market. Seltzer waters are usually way too yucky and sweet.

I'm hoping to get a chance to browse through downtown before the shops close. Its a nifty little town. The trees leaves are turning red and yellow. I think there is some sort of Greek festival going on. I could kick myself for not bringing my LCA. I over cleaned last weekend for the party and now I cant find it.

Still thinking about ideas on how to use the coasters and stickers in some sort of beer or travel journal. New Belgium had an altered 3d box book, like Jonathan Carroll's work. Need to think about that somemore. And this print that is in our room at the Hilton is very cool. Can't tell if they did some kind of printmaking with watercolor prints, or some kind of crayons or pastels. I need to take some art classes.

Will have more after the Great American Beer Festival tomorrow, I'm sure.