Top Ten Virginia Beers - 2026

I love the end of July...our annual week at the beach in Florida is over, usually the temperature is starting to moderate (and it is a very pleasant mid 80s °F/upper 20s °C at the moment here), and in a couple of weeks Mrs V and the kids will begin their respective school years. It is also, obviously of course, Oktoberfest and pumpkin ale "season", at least for the package breweries that need their bottles in the stores as soon as possible, so yes, soon the leaves will start turning, and the happy dark days of autumn and winter will return.

For most years in recent Fuggled history, that has also meant time to post my annual list of the 10 Virginia brewed beers I have enjoyed the most in the last 12 months. For reasons that escape me right now, I skipped the list last year, but promised myself that I needed to get out more and bring the list back for 2026. I always say this, but it bears pointing out again, this is a purely subjective list, and as such will be heavy on the kind of beers I like drinking, so if you are looking for Virginia's most highly rated double IPA aged in gorilla snot barrels, you won't find that here. Hopefully though, the list will encourage you to go find some of the cracking brews we have in the Commonwealth, and in change from years passim, I will go in reverse order - you know, to heighten the tension and what not.

10. Alpine Goat Brewing: Pilsner

    Earlier this year, I wrote about finally getting back out to Alpine Goat Brewery in the Shenandoah Valley, having previously visited a couple of years back when a brewer transition was in progress. I hadn't expected it to take so long to get back, but when I did I found a brewery that ticks all the boxes for this mad Mitteleuropaphile. For most of that trip I was drinking their German style pilsner, and it hit all the right high notes. Obviously, as I had three or four pints in the course of our couple of hours there. We get over to the Valley pretty regularly these days, so soon I will introduce Mrs V to the delights of Alpine Goat, especially as their house beer is one of her favourite styles, kölsch. A welcome addition to this list!

9. Buffalo Mountain Brewery: Wolf Gang Vienna Lager

   Another new brewery to this list, and one that I stumbled upon by accident. Last autumn, I drove from my home in Central Virginia to the distant marches of Southwest Virginia to interview Diane Flynt for a Pellicle article about her work in orcharding and Virginia's cider scene. Rather than sit on the purgatory that is I-81, I took the Blue Ridge Parkway through Floyd County, and through the eponymous town itself. Having overestimated just how long it would take, myself and Mark (my regular photography collaborator) decided to stop in Floyd for a pint and a feed, thus ended up at Buffalo Mountain. Being a fan of Vienna style lagers in general, that was my choice. Pouring deep red, and being much more in the Mexican tradition of Vienna lager, this was a nice, suitably malty, but not syrupy pint. Not only was it a very decent pint, McDaniel's Tavern, the name for the brewery's taproom, is a delightful space that feels very much like a country pub from either the UK or Ireland.

8. Caboose Brewing: Voda Czech Style Pilsner

   I know you are surprised that it took this long for a Czech style pilsner to make its way onto this list. I can't remember if I have mentioned this before, but although I work remotely (or remotely work, haha!), my employer's main office is in Northern Virginia, in the city of McLean. At least once a quarter then, I have to go up there for team meetings, and an inevitable overnight stop, and invariably, as I am the team lead and get to decide where we have dinner, a visit to Caboose Brewing & Tavern in neighbouring Vienna. Thankfully the rest of the team like Caboose's food, and a couple of them also like good beer, so I am on safe ground. On one of our visits they had Voda on tap, "voda" of course is the Czech word for "water", and I drank it almost as such, even though it was far from watery and insipid, in fact it was lovely and hit the spot, with plenty of Saaz character to satisfy my cravings for hay, lemongrass, and the wonderful aroma of Czech meadows. A cracker, I hope it's around when I am up that way again soon.

7. Patch Brewing: Pylon Pilsner

   Not a new brewery to this list, but oddly a new beer (though a perennial in my annual review of the year in December), given that when I drag the kids off to run around in the field and playground at Patch, it is my go-to beer, usually in my ceramic pot that they graciously fill for me rather than having to deal with the plastic pots they use for the outside space. While this is listed as a German pilsner, the base malt is, I believe, actually Weyermann's Bohemian Pilsner, and so it has a touch more body and heft, coupled with a solid hop bite and floral character, it's really easy, and pleasurable drinking. Which reminds me, the kids need a play date with some of their friends soon.

6. Dynasty Brewing: Yorkshire Bitter

   On my previously mentioned regular trips to Northern Virginia, the only place on earth where the speed limit signs are aspirational, there is a British style pub that I love to get to called The Hawk and Griffin. Conveniently it is just a hop, skip, and a jump from Caboose. My primary reason for going is that they are a pretty fair bet for having some kind of cask ale available. When sitting myself at the bar on one such trip there was a pump clip with magical words "Yorkshire Bitter" on them, and on making sure there was a sparkler attached I knew what I wanted. Apparently it is hopped with just East Kent Goldings, and so there is plenty of that classic orange marmalade character, and without darker crystal malts it is very much a biscuity malt thing that dominates, and I thought it was lovely, served at proper cellar temperature to boot. I was a happy camper that night.

5. Selvedge Brewing: Chain Stitch

   It's pale, it's Germanic, it's damned well made, and when it is on tap at Selvedge then you can almost guarantee that I will have at least one pint of Chain Stitch. It's a beer that many times I have joked about needing to become the equivalent of a full kit wanker but for bike riding, prop my underused bike up next to one of the picnic tables out front, and just spend a sunny afternoon drinking. Hopped with the classic Halletauer Mittelfrüh and lagered until it damned well ready (the best kind of lagering process in my opinion), it is as close to Bavaria as you will get in Virginia. It is difficult to really opine about how much I love Chain Stitch, but often that first mouthful is followed by an exclamation of "echt!", and another Willibecher will soon be on its way...

4. Fine Creek Brewing: Farmhouse Lager

   Very few beers make it onto this list having only been drunk once. Very few beers only drunk once, make this kind of impression. Fine Creek are literally just up the road, a relatively quick and easy 45 minute drive, just round the corner from one of our favourite state parks for camping, and much to my shame we still haven't managed to make it to the brewery itself. However, Josh from Selvedge gave me a bottle of the Farmhouse Lager, and as I said in an Instagram post, it is the "perfect marriage of elegance and rusticity". If you can imagine sitting at a Franconian bierkeller drinking their local brew, I imagine it would have a similar effect on you, this was just a gorgeous beer - and I promise, Brian if you are reading this, we will get out there soon.

3. Superfly Brewing: Private Number (cask)

   It could be recency bias, it could be nostalgia having recently been back in the UK and had something of a revelation about bitters which have darker crystal malts in the grist, it could just be sheer glee at a Charlottesville brewery having an actual cask ale program headed up by brewers who get it. First though, let me tell you a story, the first time I had Private Number, several years ago, I was not a fan. I really wanted to be, because I think what Ed and co are doing at Superfly is fantastic, and best bitter is a style I love. That iteration just didn't work for me. Fast forward to Mrs V's birthday weekend and we headed over with friends to have fish and chips for lunch - SuperFly now has a chip van, and they have quickly become the default place for folks who know about these things to get their fish supper on. They also had Private Number of the beer engine, and I was keen to give it another chance. It took that chance with aplomb, laden with toffee, dark fruit, and rich fruit cake maltiness, balanced with a hefty hop bite to scrape the palate clean. Painfully easy to drink and drink it I did. I am looking forward to more of their cask offerings...

2. Selvedge Brewing: Coat Czech 12°

   That there is a new batch of Selvedge's dvanáctka hitting the taps next week makes my life just a little simpler. Every time I go to there these days, I struggle to decide which of the several superb Central European style lagers I want to drink first. Do I want Batiste, their German Pils? What about Chain Stitch, which I mentioned earlier? Do I fancy Vested Interest, a Franconian kellerbier? Decisions, decisions. Yes, I have got to the point where I just ask Erin to bring me a lager because I trust her judgement and honestly they are all magnificent. Once Coat Czech is back, that indecision will disappear because I know what I want first, not necessarily the only beer I will have, though there is always a strong possibility of that too (yay cans to takeaway for porch drinking). Coat Czech is the epitome of great Czech style lagers, decoction mashing for those subtle Maillard reaction flavours, masses and masses of Saaz hop character, with an almost sherbert like note that reminds me of Unětický Pivovar's superb 12°. I am confident that were you to serve this blind to any well regarded beer writer with extensive knowledge of Czech lager - looking at you guys, Evan and Max - they would not be able to tell it was brewed in far off Virginia.

1. Selvedge Brewing: Spoolboy 10°

   Take pretty much everything I just wrote about Coat Czech and add a couple of caveats for Spoolboy: it won't be on tap next week, and when it is on tap I almost exclusively the beer I drink. Desítka, that's a 10° lager (regardless of colour technically speaking) for the non-Czech speakers of the world is just my preferred Czech beer "style" (ugh, I hate that word when it comes to Czech beer). Again with the decoction mashing, again with extensive lagering until it is good and ready to be on tap, Spoolboy hits every spot that a great desítka does. Yes it is ridiculously easy to drink, yes it positively reeks of Czech hop goodness, yes you will never only have one, and yes it has the Mrs V seal of approval. There was a point when it was on tap that Mrs V and I would be lost in a revelry of Czech Ostalgia (not a typo) for our years in the Czech Republic. It was a beer that took us, even after 17 years in Virginia and neither of us being actually Czech, home. It is the beer that we dragged many of our Czech, and Czech adjacent friends to Selvedge to try, and watch as their faces almost instantly go full on Anton Ego. Byla to dokonalost.

So there we are, my (revived) annual list of the beers I have enjoyed most in the last 12 months - as subjective and lager centric as always, anyone would think I had a type...

Some Closing Thoughts

On Friday afternoon, with work concerns disappearing into the rear view mirror, and a little time to go until I had to pick up the twins from school, I was having a very fine pint of lager (but which one?? It was Vested Interest, a Franconian-style kellerbier) at the bar in the Selvedge Brewing taproom. As I reveled in the magnificence of that beer, which is a stunner in an already superb lineup, I heard news that instantly yucked my yum.

Virginia's only craft malting company, my good friends Murphy & Rude, are closing their doors at the end of May.

To be honest, I don't know the ins and outs of why Jeff has decided to shut up shop, so I am not going to speculate on that. From what Murphy & Rude have told customers though, they were looking to scale and it became clear that the challenges of scaling made it unfeasible. What I do want talk about though is the ramifications of their coming demise.

From a very personal, and entirely self-centred, perspective, I am bummed that I am going to have to re-formulate all my homebrew recipes. For several years now, I have committed myself to brewing as much as possible with only their malt. My reasons are pretty simple, they are local, they malted, for the most part, Virginia grown grain, oh and their malt made my beer a lot better. While my best bitter was perfectly good with Maris Otter or Golden Promise, when I switched to using Murphy & Rude English Pale malt, the ante was upped quite significantly. Fresh malt makes a massive difference in terms of flavour. I also have recipes that I have designed specifically for Jeff's malt, my Haus Lagerbier is built on his Virginia Pils malt, which uses the Violetta strain of barley, as has the most recent versions of LimeLight, my lime witbier. As such, I will have to drop some dollars on stocking up on my preferred malts, and some containers to keep rodenty bastards at bay, so I can carry on brewing my favourite recipes for as long as possible.

Taking a broader perspective, there are several local breweries who are now in a similar position, though obviously with far more at stake as they make their living from Murphy & Rude malt. If I remember rightly there were about 12 breweries in Virginia that only used Jeff's malt, but something like 50 outfits using it at some level, including in some wonderful award winning beers. All of these will have to be re-factored for different grains, and in some cases find new suppliers, set-up accounts, contracts, etc, etc.

Taking it slight broader yet, there are farmers with grain in the ground right now who will have to find a new customer for their harvests. Most of those farmers, as I mentioned earlier are in Virginia, with some in Maryland and Pennsylvania, according to the M&R website. Hopefully the malting companies in those states will be able to pick up those harvests.

I don't think it is overstating the case to say that the loss of Murphy & Rude is a tragedy for the craft brewing and allied industries in Virginia. As Josh Chapman commented in my article about Murphy & Rude in Pellicle:

"When you close the distance between supplier and producer, things can only get better".

With that distance inevitably widening again, we are all the poorer for it.

Note: all the pictures here are beers I made exclusively with Murphy & Rude malt.

Get Your Goat

Goodness me, it has been a while.

This last weekend, Mrs V was up in Washington DC for the annual American Montessori Society conference, she being a Montessori teacher and all that. Thus it was that it was just me and the twins from Thursday night through until Sunday afternoon when she got home.

What to do though with a pair of 8 year old boys with sufficient energy to power a small city, especially on Saturday, as they had school on Friday. Thankfully I got a text during the week from a Welsh friend asking if we fancied taking our combined brood of children for a hike or some kind of adventure, followed by chilling out at a brewery given that the weather was supposed to be glorious. Spoiler alert, it was.

We settled on visiting Luray Caverns, a karst system in the Shenandoah Valley, not too far from Harrisonburg, which is one of the most beautiful cave systems we have ever visited. This was the second time the twins and I had been, but the first for our friends.

Having wandered through the caves, taken in the car and caravan museum, which, thrillingly for this nerd, includes a Morgan three wheeler from the 1920s (I think), and then the Shenandoah Valley Heritage museum, with old houses and interesting displays on the German immigrant communities in the valley, it was time to hit a brewery for some lunch. Said brewery was an hour's drive, through some lovely countryside, having eschewed the hell of I-81, to get to Weyer's Cave and Alpine Goat Brewing.

I had been to Alpine Goat just the once before, when out and about in the Valley promoting my book, "Virginia Cider: A Scrumptious History", and I had a grand time. The owner came and joined us, us being Mark and I, and eventually so too did the relatively recently hired brewer, Jared. They were still working through the previous brewer's batches for the most part, and while decent enough, the star of the show had been one of Jared's own creations. I took a mental note to get back when everything on tap was his, not planning that it would take me more than a year.

To get to Alpine Goat there is a little bouncing along a gravel track, but the views from the brewery and its beer garden over to the Shenandoah National Park are more than worth it. Seriously, if there is a more picturesque brewery in Virginia, I haven't been there yet. Having packed the kids off with a ball, frisbee, and boomerang to snag a table with space for them to play, we went to the bar and naturally I ordered the pilsner, described on the website thus:

"Our German Pilsner showcases the delicate noble hop profile from Tettnanger and Mittelfrüh hops, layered over 100% Bohemian Pilsner malt. Expect a well-balanced bitterness and subtle floral notes, characteristic of the style. With a clean, crisp finish, it's a refreshing choice for any beer enthusiast."

Clearly I didn't take any pictures of the beer, oops. However, the beer lived up to the description, and very nice it was too. Having polished that off while waiting on a food truck lunch, my second pint was the Vienna lager, and again it was a very respectable beer. Thus fed and watered, we spent a very chill couple of hours letting the kids run themselves ragged, they would sleep well that night for sure. Spoiler alert, they did.

Mrs V and I really enjoy heading over the mountains to spend time in the Shenandoah Valley, whether going that way for cider or beer, and in Alpine Goat you can safely say that we have added another location to the list of places to visit. So, if you're ever that neck of the woods, head up the gravel road, park on the grass, and enjoy one of the most charming breweries around right now. Next time I will take better note and maybe even a picture or two...of beer.

Top Ten Virginia Beers - 2024

Ah the final few days of July...

Back from the annual beach week in Florida, just a couple of weeks until the kids go back to school (how are they in the second grade already?), and Mrs V heads back to work soon too. All this means a couple of things, autumn is finally on its way, I have already seen plenty of Oktoberfest branded beers in the shops, and it is time to do my annual list of the top ten Virginian beers I have had in the past 12 months.

I say this every year, though I fear repetition has dulled people's ears, but this is a purely subjective list, and certainly not exhaustive. I don't get round to every brewery in Virginia each and every 12 months, and neither would I want to given the price of gas and pints these days. Being a subjective list, it is naturally heavy on bottom fermented beers, for the obvious reason that they are just the kind of beers I like to drink. Anyway, with all of that said, let's dive into the list...

1. Selvedge Brewing: Coat Czech - I will be completely open and transparent here, but I actually hemmed and hawed about making this beer my number one choice because I was worried about there being a very case of recency bias. Coat Czech has been my go to beer for the last couple of months while it has been available at Selvedge, whose new venue is also one of my favourite places to have a drink despite being the other side of Charlottesville. Coat Czech is a 12° světlý ležák, aka pale lager, that my first impression was that it reminded me on the magnificent 12° from Únětický pivovar back in Czechia. When I mentioned that to Josh, he let me know that the Únětický beer was indeed the inspiration, and boy did Selvedge nail it. Poured from the Lukr taps, with the pile of wet foam that entails, Coat Czech is absolutely redolent with Saaz hops, that lemony spicey bitterness is there, a beautiful meadowy hay character too, all backed up with the honeyed biscuits of decocted pilsner malt. I loved this beer and will be at a loss as to what to drink when I next head to Selvedge (actually that's hyperbole because I know what is being released on Wednesday and I am excited for it big time!), oh and one other reason this get's top spot for 2024? Mrs V loved it too and said it reminded her of drinking back in Prague, when she likes a beer, you know it is damned good beer.
2. SuperFly Brewing: Midnight Train - SuperFly Brewing in Charlottesville are a relatively new brewery, but one that is kicking it out of the park. Midnight Train is a London Porter that snuck into the final three for Fuggled Dark Beer of the Year back in December on the strength of a coupl eof pints just a few days before the post went live. It has become one of my go-to choices when I swing by, the taproom is conveniently located right opposite the homebrew store I use, as it hits every high note you would expect of a traditional London style porter, inky black, masses of coffee, unsweetened cocoa, and a biscuity base that makes it painfully moreish. It really was no surprise to me that it won the porter category at this year's Virginia Craft Brewers Cup, and also came in third in the best in show. Cracking beer.
3. Selvedge Brewing: Loden Vienna Lager - Before there was Coat Czech in my affections, there was Loden, which if I remember rightly was Selvedge's first beer brewed on their new system at the new location, and also the first double decocted lager they produced. Loden is a classic Vienna lager, and by classic I mean in the vein of the beers brewed by Anton Dreher in around 1840, using English malting technology to get a paler malt than had previously been regulalry available. Being brewed with 100% Vienna malt and hopped exclusively with Saaz, Loden was a stunning burnished copper, topped with several inches of firm white foam - another thing I love about Selvedge is their commitment to serving beer with plenty of foam, none of your all the way to the top of the glass, vaguest schmeer of scummy foam here thank you very much. Crusty toast and a delightfully spicy hop flavor mingled and merged to make this a beer I drank inordinate amounts of, and look forward to doing so again when it returns.
4. Tabol Brewing/Selvedge Brewing: Tabolcloth - the Franconian style vollbier that walked away with the overall Fuggled Beer of the Year for 2023, and a beer I drank a lot of when it was available late last summer and autumn. This was the first beer I had ever drunk, that I am aware of, that used the old Franconian yeast strain with the oh so sexy moniker, TUM-35. The beer itself was a lovely amber hue, with a distinctly rustic aroma and graininess that I could happily imagine drinking by the maß outside a country Gasthof, watching the world go by.
5. Wheatland Spring Brewing: Found Artifacts - Every January I take the month off the booze, however January 2024 was a little different as I was in the process at the time of researching and writing my upcoming book, "Virginia Cider: A Scrumptious History". One weekend, my photographer collaborator and I were doing the rounds in Loudoun County in northern Virginia and looking at the map I realised that we would be a mile from Wheatland Spring by the time we finished visiting cideries. I knew at that moment that I would be taking an evening hiatus from Dry January to finally visit a brewery whose beers I have been enjoying for a few years now. Their Found Artifacts Pilsner was on tap and I while I had a couple of intermission pints and other beers, it was this that I kept coming back to, it is such a wonderful pale lager. What John and the folks at Wheatland Spring as a farm brewery is fantastic, and all their beers are excellent, but for me this is the best find of the lot.
6. Tabol Brewing: Kelheim - Another trip with Mark for the book, this time to Richmond, and being in the neighbourhood of a brewery I have a lot of time for. It was their collaboration with Selvedge called Tabolcloth, mentioned above, that really put Tabol brewing more on my radar, I'd had a couple of bits and pieces of theirs previously though. When we got to the tasting room, where pints were $3.50 at the time, I instinctively picked up a four pack of Kelheim, their lovely, malt forward märzen to take home and enjoy over the Yuletide holidays. As I described it in an Instagram post, it is simply an "on the button" strong pale lager that has no right to be that easy to drink
7. Devils Backbone Brewing: Morana Tmavé - It's been about 14 years now since I designed the recipe for Morana, back when the hair splitters who love to advocate for the rating of beer wouldn't even accept that Czech style dark lager is a seperate tradition from either Bavarian dunkel or schwarzbier. Given the veritable tsunami of Czech dark lagers in US craft brewing since Jason and I brewed the first batch of Morana, I like to think we won that particular argument. From my own research, Morana was the first authentic Czech dark lager brewed definitely in Virginia, and most likely in the United States at all. You're welcome. Since that first batch, Devils Backbone have been able to invest in open fermentation and horizontal lagering tanks that have taken this 14° beer, styled on Kout na Šumavě's of the same strength, to ever greater heights. Whenever it gets brewed I make sure to stock up and savour every single drop.
8. Caboose Brewing: Slam Dunkel - I work from home, and have done since before the Pandemic. However, every few months I head up to Northern Virginia for some in-person planning meetings with my team, and when I am up there I try to get to a decent brewery or two. Caboose Brewing's Tavern in Vienna is one of my preferred places to go after a day of product planning and schedule horse trading. The chill vibe, excellent beer, and good food just hit the spot for me. At one of my recentish trips up there, they had Slam Dunk, a Munich Dunkel on tap and I think it was the only beer I drank that night. Rich, toasty, and with a delicate chocolate note in the background, it was lovely. I'll be back up in NOVa soon, and while I don't expect it to be on, I do hope their Oktoberfest lives up to Slam Dunk's standard.
9. Iron Tree Brewing: Pepper Street Porter - From the first cider research trip with Mark, we stopped in at Iron Tree en route from the far south west of Virginia to Lexington, as Mark is friends with one of the owners. Now, I love a good dark beer, and that's exactly what Iron Tree have with this American style porter. It is richly malty, with lots of nutty, coffee, and choclately notes - sure that's what you expect with a dark beer, but the layers of flavour here work really nicely together so it actually almost tastes like you have used chocolate milk for your morning coffee, and if you have never done that, give it a whirl. Hopefully promotional events for the book will take us back down to that part of Virginia, and you can guarantee we'll be stopping in for more.
10. Black Narrows Brewing: How Bout It - This was the beer that opened my eyes to the use of corn, in this case malted heirloom Bloody Butcher corn. If you've been following Fuggled for a while, you'll know that I wrote about Black Narrows for Pellicle last year, and then a post earlier this year about Josh taking the decision to close his brewery on Chincoteague Island. Thankfully Josh has a new beer project on the go, Upweller Beer Company, and he posted the other day that he was brewing a fresh batch of the beer once known as How Bout It. This corn lager is a delight, with a wonderful nuttiness, kind of like the very centre of an almond, and completely lacking the slick oiliness I associate with pretty much every other lager made with corn.

Get Your Coat Love

I have said it plenty of times on here as well as my various socials, I am an abysmal beer tourist. You see, I have this tendency to find a place that I like, that does the kind of beer I like, and I am then a happy camper and a loyal customer. Nearly two years ago I got my act together to visit a few local Charlottesville area breweries that I had heard glowing reviews of, including Selvedge Brewing in their old Woolen Mills location.

The driving force behind that first visit was that they had recently hired a new brewer, who had previously worked at Champion Brewing (remember them?) and was a fellow fan of central European lagers. Naturally then, Josh and I talked at length that visit about decoction mashing, extended lagering, and the joys of doing things the old school way. Oh, and the beer was good too. That first beer was their Oktoberfest style beer, Tracht, and it became a regular tipple that autumn, as did the first iteration of their Munich Dunkel, Tweed.

About a year ago, I think, Josh mentioned to me that Selvedge would be moving to the other side of Charlottesville, to a venue in Ivy, and that they would be shut over a chunk of the winter and early spring. When they opened the new spot a couple of months ago, I knew I would be getting over there on opening weekend, that had after all put an ordinary bitter on their new beer engine - yes you read that right, a central Virginia brewery with a functioning, and being used, beer engine!! Speaking of dispense methods, the majority of the taps are standard flow control faucets, while they also have a pair of Lukr taps.

Since they re-opened, Selvedge has become a regular haunt of mine, especially as Josh is now able to do decoction mashing on his central European lagers, the first being Loden, his recent Vienna Lager...

Just look at the glorious pint, topped with a veritable fountain of foam! Oh and willibechers are my favourite glass by a country mile. Not only did it 100% look the part of a classic 100% Vienna malt lager, it tasted on the money as well, redolent with toasted malt and a lovely spicy Saaz finish that made it simply moreish, and more and more and more. Simply put, it was delicious, and my go to pint for as long as it was available.

From time to time though I would change things up a little, with their Italian pilsner above, Poplin, or sometimes more of the dunkel, or maybe even the remnants of the ordinary bitter, Houndstooth, served through the Lukr tap - serving top fermented beers through a Lukr tap is becoming something of a thing in Central Virginia, with Decipher Brewing also pouring their 80/- through it now as well.

It was then, with no little excitement that last Friday came around. A few weeks back Josh did a double decoction with Moravian malt, chucked some Bohemian hops into the boil, and even got hands on the lauded H strain of yeast from Pilsner Urquell to make Coat Czech, his version of a 12° světlý ležák (pale lager to you). Josh was recently in Czechia, visiting many of the best pubs and breweries in both Prague and Plzeň - I may have given him several pointers - and this beer was the outcome of drinking in the home of great pale lagers.

Straight from the Lukr tap, in the hladinka style pour - while I have your attention, please, please, please can we stop bastardising the Czech language by asking for multiple hladinkas? Hladinka is singular, hladinky is plural for between 2 and 4, and if I remember my grammar correctly, more than 5 would be hladinek. Facts matter people.

Anyway, what a storming, storming 12° Coat Czech is. 4.8%, 40 IBUs, this is the most on the money Czech style pale lager I have had since getting back from my last trip to Prague. All of that Saaziness is there, lemongrass, a spiciness that initially had me thinking cinnamon, but also perhaps a kind of coriander thing, but maybe that is the lemoniness messing with my head. Oh and it's bitter, proper bitter, like proper beer should be, bracing without being overpowering, I could happily drink this beer all day, every day, and that would stand if I were in Czechia with all the options available there. Yes, it is that good.

I think I was on my third, and chatting to Josh at the bar, when I commented that it reminded me most of the gorgeous 12° at Únětický Pivovar, to which Josh responded with "that's because that was the inspiration". Inspired, for sure.

As long as it is on tap, I know exactly what I will be drinking for the next few weekends, and if it is still on tap when it is time to head for the annual holiday in Florida, then I might just load on crowlers too.

A Loss for Virginia

The Virginia brewing scene is a poorer place today.

Do we still have around 350 breweries in a state with a population of 8.6 million, giving us a brewery for approximately every 24,000 people? Yes we do. Can you go in pretty much any decent sized store and get beer brewed in Virginia? Yes you can.

Still, the Virginia brewing scene is a poorer place today.

"Why?" I hear you ask...

Yesterday, Josh Chapman, owner and brewer at Black Narrows Brewing on Chincoteague Island announced that they have decided to close their doors - their final weekend in operation will be February 16-18th. You may, or may not, know that I wrote a profile of Josh and his brewery for Pellicle just last year.  It was also just last year that their magnificent malted corn lager "How Bout It" was awarded a Good Food Award - the corn in the lager being an heirloom variety, grown on the Eastern Shore, malted by Murphy & Rude in Charlottesville, and fermented with a yeast strain derived from a Chincoteague oyster. Beer does not get much more local than that.

My few hours on Chincoteague with Josh was a shot in the arm for me. Here was someone making beer in ways that deeply resonated with me, on equipment that wasn't state of the art, in a manner that seemed to encapsulate the early pioneers of craft beer. Josh's hops were mostly from the Eastern Shore, he only used Murphy & Rude malt, which is all made from Virginia grown barley, he did interesting things, like using pine needles, oyster liquor, and eelgrass in his beer. He supported his community by taking what they could offer, and returning it to them in the form of insanely tasty beer.

Black Narrows was a local brewery in perhaps the purest sense of the word.

In announcing the closure, Josh noted that "we watched our ingredients, equipment and labor costs increase. It was all too much". In the end, the finances of being a hyper local, community supporting brewery just couldn't sustain the business, when I interviewed Jasper Akerboom noted that "If you start a brewery, you are not going to get very wealthy". Prescient words perhaps.

Thankfully, the beer scene on the broader Delmarva Peninsula is not losing Josh entirely, and there is something new in works, and when it opens you bet your life I'll be trekking up past northern Virginia to get there - and how much I hope the corn lager will be part of this new adventure.

I am not generally a sentimental person when it comes to the business of brewing, but when it came to Black Narrows, I genuinely wanted them to succeed and thrive as their vision of what local, community, brewing means is something I can readily sign up for, where a company is not just a local brewery, but a brewery for locals.

What Price a Pint?

Yesterday, the following image popped up in my various socials:

Said image was accompanied by the following text:

"Starting today all pints will be $3.50. Share, spread the word, and show us some love so we can keep it going for the full month… or forever, should the response be undeniable; either way, this is the price that pilsners should be. Come and take advantage!"

Three things immediately sprang to mind, firstly that is a damned fine looking pint, secondly, I don't think I have ever paid $3.50 for a pint of beer in my 14 years living in Virginia, and thirdly bravo to Tabol Brewing!

Tabol Brewing are based in Richmond, and given that I very rarely go that way I have yet to actually get to their taproom, where all pints are now $3.50. I have, however, had a few of their beers in cans, on tap at Beer Run, or in the case of my favourite beer of late summer/autumn their collaboration Franconia inspired vollbier with Selvedge Brewing. Everything I have had from them has been superb, and the vollbier, Tabolcloth, is very much a contender for the Fuggled beer of the year.

A while back, I wrote a post about what the price of a pint would be if we followed the pricing restrictions of Reinheitsgebot as well as the ingredients, and unless my maths is entirely atrocious (eminently possible), based on the average daily wages of a manual labourer in Virginia and it's purchasing power compared to 16th century equivalents, Tabol's new price point is pretty close.

I reached out to Travis at Tabol to share the post I mention above, and while he admitted that he could "proffer zero opinions with regard to the maths of the various European currencies" he did tell me his reasoning behind the change:

"my cans are sold, to-go, at $3.50 a piece in their 4 packs and more expensive packaging. I figured I could cut my pint prices in half, and still be making as good or better profit than my to-go sales in cans".

I have long muttered under my breath about the price of a pint at a brewery's taproom, especially when you consider the number of markups removed from the brewery to drinker process when you buy a pint in the taproom. To see a brewery actually take action on behalf of the consumer then is both refreshing and in my opinion absolutely fantastic.

Travis continued:

"I'd like the working man's beverage to be affordable. I just want to know it it's enticing enough to drop the price. Instead of seeking hype and notoriety for a brand, maybe my traditional style lagers should be more traditional in price? If we can make it work".

I am pretty sure this move it going to stir the pot in craft brewing circles in Virginia, especially given the number of breweries where they are changing $7 and upwards for a pint at their taproom. I am sure that Travis and the Tabol team have considered all the economic implications around the change, and to be perfectly honest I desperately want them to succeed, even though I am unlikely to get to Richmond any time soon and take advantage of $3.50 pints of superb lagers.

I also love the fact that Tabol don't shy away from the fact that beer is the everyman drink rather than a niche product for the upper middle classes. I realise every brewery is different, and for many where their primary outlet is a brewpub, dropping prices so dramatically might not be possible given the added overheads of being a restaurant. But where a brewery's taproom is exactly that, a place to drink a brewery's beer, in situ, as fresh as fresh could possibly be, without the additional logistical steps that drive up the price, then cheaper than draft or packaged retail should be the norm. If this move drives down the cost of a beer, that is a good thing in my world. After all, isn't that one of the supposed benefits of increased competition? 

We have shit loads of breweries now, so why are prices not coming down in line with the alleged economic orthodoxy that increased competition is good for consumers?

Top Ten Virginia Beers - 2023

It's been quite the jet-set month has July. At the beginning of the month, plus a couple of days at the end of June, my family and I traipsed our way up to and around Iceland for 10 days (quite possibly the best holiday I have ever had) and now we are down in central Florida. While my wife and kids have fun on the beach, I am working so as not to completely use up all my holiday time, still I can't complain as the view from the window is one of a couple of palm trees and the Atlantic ocean.

As usual at this time of year, I like to take a pause and decide on what have been the ten best beers from Virginia that I have drunk in the last 12 months. The list is entirely subjective, and likely doesn't feature hype breweries making hazies, bastardised sours with fake fruit flavor syrups, or pastry stouts simply because I don't enjoy that shit. This is, after all, the Fuggled Top Ten Virginia Beers, purely subjective, entirely my opinion, and I make no apologies for that. 

With that said, let's dive into my Virginian drinking highlights...

1. Port City Brewing - Franconian Kellerbier (5.0%). - for the fourth year in a row, Franconian Kellerbier is either top of the list or second, though for 2023 it returns to the number 1 slot. Each spring I look forward to its release, and as ever I bought a couple of cases once it was available. The beer itself has a delightful rusticity that I find delightful, especially when I am sat on my deck dealing with the first harvests from my gardens, often shelling peas. If I had a single complaint about Franconian Kellerbier it would be that it isn't part of the permanent lineup, but I guess we all need things to look forward to in life.
2. Wheatland Spring Brewing - Found Artifacts (4.8%). - the number 1 beer in my 2022 list, I have enjoyed Found Artifacts several times in the last 12 months and it would have taken top spot again this year but for Port City. I love the work that John and the folks at Wheatland Spring are doing up in Northern Virginia, especially as a brewery growing the vast majority of the ingredients they use. Despite being an unfiltered beer, Found Artifacts showcases the very real benefits of extended lagering to produce a pale lager of such poise and balance that I would defy any central European friend of mine not to think it superb.
3. Devils Backbone Brewing - Yourn 10°. - I have said this many times, but Devils Backbone are still one of the best breweries in Virginia, full stop, end of story, I don't give a shit about your big beer business bogeyman arguments. Jason makes incredible beer, and his recent Czech inspired 10° pale lager was right up there with the very best beers that he has put out in 15 years on the brewing deck behind the bar at Basecamp. Decocted, fermented in an open fermenter, and then given extensive lagering in their horizontal lager tanks, Yourn is brewed with so much fidelity to its Czech inspiration that drinking it is like being transported back to rural Czechia, drinking in the villages, in the heartland of Czech beer culture, and there is not an ounce of hyperbole in that statement.
4. Port City Brewing - Porter (7.2%). - let me be honest with you, I probably only drink Port City Porter a couple of times a year, usually in the depths of winter, and if the weather is being favourably unfavourable, next to a roaring log fire, yet most years it makes my list of the 10 best Virginia brewed beers. Port City Porter is, in my unhumble opinion, one of the best porters being brewed in the world today, let alonge just Virginia or even the US. A complex beast dripping with unsweetened cocoa, espresso, and even an umaminess that reminds me of traditionally made soy sauce (forget your mass produced sachets from your local Chinese restaurant), all in a beguiling package that makes it too easy to forget that it is pretty hefty at 7.2%, not a session beer, but certainly a delight.
5. Black Narrows Brewing - How Bout It (4.2%). - A new brewery to the list, and a new kind of beer in some ways. I have never been a big fan of corn in my beer, I find it lends an oily, slick, sweetness that I just find disagreeable, the same could be said about bourbon. But, malt the corn and you get a very different beast, the sweetness dissipates and what is left in it's wake is a very subtle nuttiness, kind of like an almond. Now, put that malted corn in the hands of a true artisanal brewer like Josh Chapman up on Chincoteague Island and what you get is an American Light Lager that is quite frankly, fecking awesome. I love the story behind the beer, so much so I wrote an article about it for Pellicle, and I love the beer too
6. Decipher Brewing - 80/-. - Unhumble opinion time again. Most American brewed "Scottish" ales are shit, a riotous mess of crystal, chocolate, and black malts that would never see the light of the mash tun actually in Scotland, and we haven't even got around to talking about the use of peat malt (we don't, so feck off with your "traditional peated flavor" bullshit). Decipher though get it right, and get it right with aplomb. The star here is drinkability, a Scottish export is not supposed to be sweet, it is supposed to have balance, be something that lubricates the social setting, that looks glorious in the glass, and the Burtons get it. Now, I have to admit to a touch of bias, because anyone that is willing to do something daft like put an 80/- on a Lukr tap to try and replicate the old Scottish Aitken font because some loony Scotsman in Virginia suggests it must be a top bloke. It helps that they make such cracking beer too.
7. Reason Beer - Barrel Aged Inexorable Stout. - assuming that you have cleaned up the spillage from you choking on your drink at the presence of barrel aged stout weighing in at 10.5% making it onto this list, let me tell you story. Mrs V plays the fiddle, and once a month or so, her teacher invites her to take part in an Irish music session at a local restaurant/pub. If we can find a babysitter to look after the twins, I will tag along and allow myself a couple of hours of reading with a pint. Usually I drink whatever the best lager they have available is, but on this particular Sunday I fancied the porter on the menu. The barmaid told me that they were out of the porter, but that they had a stout, so in the absence of strength denoting adjectives I agreed. Along came this beast, and I thought to myself, why not, just the one. Just the one is all it took to remind me that done well, barrel aging an imperial stout can lead to a great drinking experience. A definite slow sipper rather than my regular chugging session beers, I sat with my book, a brew that unlocked more dimensions than a dungeon master as it warmed, revealing cocoa, chocolate, coffee, vanilla, and a whole melange of tastes, all to the soundtrack of excellent folk tunes.
8. Devils Backbone - Alt Bier (5.8%). - I've been a fan of the altbier style of beer since having a half litre of Schumacher Alt at an arts festival in Berlin. Dry, bitter, intensely hoppy, and with all the sweetness you expect of central European malts (i.e. not the fecking syrupy mess of crystal malt), bundled into a very pintable package, it is a woefully undervalued style in the US. Thank goodness then for Jason and his love of central European beers, and his commitment to making them as authentically as possible, with open fermentation and horizontal lagering. Also thank goodness for Jason sending me texts to let me know when Alt Bier is on tap - come on marketing people of breweries everywhere, keep your websites and social media up to date with what is on tap. A couple of time this year we've made the 60 minute drive to Basecamp purely on the basis that Alt Bier was on tap, and both times I have sat there drinking great beer and being immensely happy that Devils Backbone is one of my local breweries.
9. Selvedge Brewing - Tweed (5.3%). - once upon a time there was a Munich dunkel style lager brewed in Charlottesville that I absolutely adored, then the brewery making it changed brewer, and the dunkel was no more. A good dunkel is a rare beast, a cracking one with a fascinating yeast strain that elevates the malts is worth chasing. Selvedge are a new brewery to this list, and I have really only started going there in the last 12 months, since they hired a former Champion Brewing brewer who started making the kind of beers I love - you know the drill, bottom fermented, extensively lagered, no silly shit. Tweed is very much a classic Munich dunkel, but with the added wrinkle of using the TUM-35 yeast strain, which originated in Franconia and was thought lost until re-discovered in a yeast bank archive. Perhaps it is purely a figment of my imagination but used in a dunkel, TUM-35 adds a character somewhat like rustic country style rye bread that you find in Central Europe, a basket of which accompanies practically every meal, add to that the crusty bread of Munich malts, and the subtle Nutella of something like Carafa, Tweed is a glass full of comfort and cheer, and I am already looking forward to its return.
10. Patch Brewing - CU Later Copper Ale (4.4%). - every now and again you have to disagree with the brewer of a beer. If you look at Patch's Untappd page for this beer, it is listed as an Extra Special Bitter, though purely on strength I would argue it is closer to a Best Bitter, but that is not my quibble. My quibble, which is purely semantic I am sure, is that CU Later is an excellent example of a mild ale - though of course if there is one beer style likely to cause more confusion among many than the notion of "bitter" being a good thing (bollocks to Keystone Light and their anti-bitterness marketing) is the very existence of Mild. While CU Later does tread a fine line between a mild and the kind of best bitter you find in London and the South East, it is definitely in the excellent, moreish, I need another pint of this camp. During December, I found several excuses to wander by the brewery, it's only 7 miles up the road, and have a few pints with mates, it's what beer is really all about after all.

Local or for Locals?

It is a mere 7.2 miles, via the back roads of Virginia, from my house to my local brewery, Patch Brewing, by far the quickest and easiest place for me to get to for a pint. I took advantage of this fact several times this holiday season, whether it was afternoon drinkies with my neighbour on Christmas Eve, getting my boys out of the house to run around in the kids play area on Boxing Day, or just having an afternoon drink with Mrs V and the boys whilst playing ludo in the main bar.

Patch has been open for a little over a year now, housed in a former VFW hall on something like 15 acres of land just outside Gordonsville. Their plans include things such as pick you own berries and walking trails in the woods to complement the existing pair of bars, I am a big fan of the outside space though it is sadly closed for winter right now. The brewery itself, and the main tap room area, are housed in the actual VFW hall, an open space with dartboards, a juke box, and trestle tables that remind me of central European beer halls.

When it comes to the beer itself, Erik is really starting to come into his own now that he has his brewhouse set up and has been brewing on it for about 6 months. Erik's previous job was working at the Devils Backbone Brewing Basecamp, and before that at Three Notch'd Brewing in Charlottesville. As such, he has worked under two of the best brewers I know in Jason Oliver and Dave Warwick respectively. An example of this would be his porter that I recently tried again over the holidays having not been wildly impressed when I had it on opening, it was excellent. Testament to the fact that it pays to give a brewer time to work out how to make his system work for him before passing judgement.

It was on my Christmas Eve trip to Patch that I was stood at the bar, there was basically no one there other than myself, my neighbour, and the general manager, who was tending the bar that day. I've know the GM for quite some time now, initially through the local homebrew club, but also as he has been in the beer industry for the best part of a decade I think at this point. The rest of the bar staff know me as a pilsner drinker, and Erik's Pylon Pilsner is definitely my most regular tipple at Patch, but the GM knew what I was there for, their "copper ale", which in my mind treads a fine line between dark mild and the kind of darker best bitter you get in the south of England.

As we chatted, I asked what the brewery's top sellers are. Pylon comes second to Lempicky Light Lager, an American light lager brewed with Murphy & Rude malted corn. When I tried it in the early days of autumn, having stumbled over the name several times (it is lem-piky, not the lem-pitz-ky my Czech brain reads it as), I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it, nicely refreshing, not wildly bitter, but also not bland in the slightest. In discussing the Lempicky, the GM noted that part of Patch's ethos is to make beer "for local people" rather than just being "local" by virtue of proximity.

I have to admit I really like that approach, as well as the fact that the malted corn used in Lempicky is grown and malted locally too, with Murphy & Rude being less than 20 miles from the brewery. Outside of bigger urban areas, Gordonsville proper has a population of about 1500, and away from major tourist haunts, breweries need to cater more closely to the tastes of the local populace, and as such have a broad selection of styles rather than going deep into a particular style. In Charlottesville you can afford to have your taps dominated by IPAs because you are always going to have transient business by virtue of it being the local major hub and a tourist destination.

This also got me thinking about how so many of the beer styles we love and take for granted are a combination of location in a physical sense and locale in a population sense. Take Pilsner Urquell, its location has insanely soft water, which extracts less colour from malt than the hard water of London, for example, and is a key element in what made it such a revolutionary beer. Yet, from my understanding of the history, the brewery was started because the people of Plzeň were drinking more and more imported lager type beer from Bavaria. The good burghers of the city basically decided they wanted a slice of the action, and thus gave the people something they wanted, and the world a new beer style into the bargain.

When I was a student, back in the dim and distant past of the 20th century, one of the things that came up in homiletics classes - yes, I studied to be a preacher - was the importance of understanding your audience, which is basically analogous to understanding your customer. When the majority of your customers come from your locale, presenting them with something they understand and like is key. Sure they may never become a dedicated craft drinker with a penchant for hazy IPAs, but if they become a loyal drinker of your light lager then you have gained both a customer and an advocate, and that can only be a good thing.

Being "local" is all good and well, but I feel as though being "for locals" is better.

Places New...to Me

I am sure I have mentioned this several times, but I am an abysmal beer tourist. I do have a rule that I like to give a new brewery at least 6 months before visiting so they can get the hang of their equipment and start churning out the best beers they are able to. If brewing systems were just plug and play, we wouldn't need brewers now would we? The problem with my 6 month rule is that I am not strict about getting to places once that 6 months is up, and so there are a handful of breweries in central Virginia that I haven't visited because, well, like I said, I am an abysmal beer tourist.

Recently though, I have resolved to try and be better at getting to some of the newer breweries within easy reach of my house, as a result of which I have found a few places that have become, or are very likely to become, fairly regular hangouts.

Patch Brewing is just on the outskirts of Gordonsville, basically a large village that for some reason gets to call itself a town. It is not the first brewery in Gordonsville, that honour goes to Champion Icehouse, but it is the one that I go to with way more regularity. Housed in a former Veterans of Foreign Wars building, they have, I think, 14 acres of land, and plans to basically become a beer hall, beer garden, pick your own berry farm, and several other things all rolled into one. The brewer, Erik, spent several years working under the tutelage of Jason Oliver at Devils Backbone Basecamp, and so you know he knows what he is doing.

Despite being open since October 2021, they have only recently got their own brewing equipment installed (yay COVID!), and so have been brewing at Devils Backbone. Erik has clearly brought some of the Devils Backbone influence to his equipment with him, with horizontal lagering tanks being part of the setup - maybe I am crazy but horizontal tanks are just nicer to look at that endless rows of CCVs. My first trip to Patch was actually last November, when they had only been open for about 6 weeks, as my best mate was in town and we'd been hiking in the Shenandoah National Park, along with my neighbour, stop 1 was so horrific that I will never grace the place with my presence again. It was our second stop of the day before heading home for continued boozing around the fire pit. Being something like a 7 minute drive from my house to the brewery, it is supremely convenient, and I have several friends who work there, so it is always good to get along for a pint, or three.

On the beer front, their Pylon Pilsner is a good, solid German style pilsner, replete with the requisite, at least in my world, noble hop bitterness that so many other pilsners seem to shy away from. I also have a soft spot for their brown ale, A Stone in the Woods. Hopefully this weekend I will find some time to venture out into the remnants of Hurricane Ian as it impacts central Virginia and try their new märzen, Germanna, and a dunkelweizen (a rarity in the US) called 1714 for the year the first German colonists came to Orange County.

Heading into Charlottesville, one new name on the Fuggled Top Ten Virginian Beers this year was Decipher Brewing, and I can tell you now that they will be featuring quite a bit for the annual Fuggled Review of the Year in December. But first a story. As you may recall, I made a batch of my homebrew best bitter with Murphy & Rude Malting Company back in the late spring, using just their malts - which have now become the standard for that recipe as they improved it so much. On the day that I was due to go and try the beer with Jeff and co at the malthouse, Mrs V and I arrived early, so wandered up to Decipher Brewing for a quick pint whilst waiting for Jeff. There were still 10 minutes to opening time, but the bar staff that day welcomed us in and soon enough a pint of their 80/- Scottish ale was sitting in front of me, and I loved it. When I saw that they had a Czech style pale lager coming soon, I naturally inquired as to dates, and resolved that the following Friday I would get along to give it a bash, and I loved it.

Saaz, lots of Saaz, that's how I would describe Krypto, in the case of the picture above poured from a Lukr tap. This is a very, very respectable Czech style pale lager, if I were to quibble (what? Beer bloggers quibbling? Never!) then I would say that it would be even better with a decoction, or two, chucked into the mash schedule for some Maillard reactions to fill out the malt profile a little. Sitting in their little garden area with a pint after work on a Friday afternoon has become something of a thing for me in recent months. The beer is very good, as evidenced by their taking the Virginia Craft Brewers' crown this year, the ambience is chilled out, laid back, and decidedly unsceney (Mrs V and I have a shared aversion to places that become scenes). Oh, and they did a grodziskie, and I loved it.

Oh, and they did a smoked bock, and I loved it.

Decipher are one of only 4 Virginia breweries that are pouring at the Great American Beer Festival next week, so if you are there, check them out - I believe they will be pouring Krypto and the smoked bock.

Last week I got a message on Instagram from the brewer at Selvedge Brewing, also in Charlottlesville, just round the corner from Decipher actually. The message, accompanied by a picture of a fine looking glass of beer, was to tell me that they were releasing a German style festbier and that he knows I do a big Oktoberfest (märzen and festbiers) tasting around this time year, come on down and try the wares...

A couple of days later I tested positive for COVID, so that had to go on hold until the 10 days of quarantine were over. With that suitably out of the way, I finally made it to Selvedge, which is located in a renovated wool mill, in the Woolen Mills area of the city. Think repurposed 19th century brick and glass built factory and you'll get a sense of how it looks, as a fan of industrial architecture, I loved the high ceilings and light streaming in through the windows. There was an outdoor event going on when I was there, thankfully the inside bar was empty, so I pulled up a seat and ordered a pint of Tracht...

What a lovely beer it is. The crackeriness of pilsner malt, the sweet bready malt of Munich, and hops, a good amount of hops for a clean bitterness, if I remember rightly from Perle, and dollops of Hallertau Mittelfrüh for a slightly spicy finish. While I was sat at the bar, Josh, the brewer, came and sat for a chat and we discussed his plans for the brewery, having only taken the reins in the summer. From what I understand there will be a new larger location in the near future, and he plans to make authentic lagers a central theme of the brewery - any guesses how excited I am at that?

Naturally I tried a couple of the other beers on tap. Poplin is an Italian Pilsner - admittedly a style that seems a little contrived to me, if dry hopping a German pilsner a la Tipopils makes it Italian, does that mean Port City's dry hopping of their Czech style pale lager, Downright Pilsner, makes it a Virginia Pilsner? Either way, Poplin is a veritable carousel of noble hop flavour and aroma that I rather enjoyed, though I have to admit to following it up with another Tracht. 

One of the beer styles that I often find annoying in the US is Kölsch, I just find that they don't live up to the bright, sparkling, refreshing beer that the breweries of Cologne churn out, Selvedge's Linen bucks that trend, and is glorious into the bargain. Mrs V is a fan of the Kölsch style, so I look forward to getting a baby sitter to deal with the twins, so we can have a date afternoon/evening. As we sat discussing the merits of decoction mashing, open fermentation, and the like, Josh mentioned that it took being in Cologne for 16 hours to really get a sense of what Kölsch should be, and how important authentic yeast is to the style, pointing out that many a US brewery just uses good old neutral Chico...and thus it made sense why I found it disappointing over here. For fear of being type cast, I followed it up with another Tracht, did I mention yet that it is a lovely festbier, and hopefully there will be some still knocking around this weekend.

Each of the three breweries here have been open since at least last November, and in Decipher's case for a few years now, but as I said, I am an abysmal beer tourist, even on my own front door. I am glad though that we have them, and when I talk to folks working in them about their plans, I feel like times are going to be good ahead for this unbashed lager boy.

Top Ten Virginian Beers - 2022

This is the tenth iteration of my annual list of the top ten Virginia brewed beers that I have drunk in the last 12 months. I say this every year, but it is worth repeating, this is a purely subjective list of the beers I have enjoyed most. I have not tried every single beer in Virginia in the last 12 months. Neither is there some arcane, near gnostic, scoring system in place, just the beers I enjoyed drinking most, after all that's what this whole beer malarky is about surely, finding stuff you enjoy drinking. Anyway, let's dive in:

1. Wheatland Spring Farm and Brewery - Found Artifacts Unfiltered Pilsner (4.8%). A new brewery to grace the list, and to take away the coveted top spot into the bargain. I had tried a couple of other Wheatland Spring lagers earlier in the year, so when I saw the words "Unfiltered Pilsner" on the label in Beer Run I just picked up a couple of 4 packs. While it may be unfiltered it is far from being some hazy mess, indeed it was an clear as you would expect from many a "filtered" beer. Found Artifacts is as good a German style pilsner as I have ever had, and sitting under our awning in the boiling Virginia heat it went down an absolute treat. I will be buying plenty of this whenever I see it in the store.
2. Port City Brewing - Franconian Kellerbier (5.0%). For the third year in a row, Port City's delicious Franconian Kellerbier is in the top 2 beers of the year for me. This year was a little bit special though as I was up in Northern Virginia for work and had the chance to try it on tap at the brewery itself. What a treat that was, and as usual it has been a regular in the fridge while it has been available. The only downer was that it came out a little earlier than previous years and so I had to find something else to drink while shelling peas in early summer. It's a hard life.
3. Starr Hill Brewing - Dark Starr Stout (4.2%). Something of a comeback kid here as Dark Starr is no longer a regular part of the Starr Hill constellation of brews, but this year they made a special batch, and even canned some. Fair to say that I got my arse to the new Starr Hill tasting room in Charlottesville and caned several. It was everything I remembered, roasty, smooth, and thankfully not adulterated with nitro. I would be thrilled if it were to complete the comeback by being a permanent again.
4. Devils Backbone Brewing - Alt Bier (5.8%). I can't remember the exact reason for heading down to Roseland to visit Devils Backbone, might have been because it was a Sunday or something equally meaningful. I don't need an excuse to go to the original Devils Backbone brewpub and grab a seat at the bar, but when Alt Bier is on tap you can guarantee I will be there. Not only is altbier a style that I love, but Jason knows how to do it properly and makes a moreish delight.
5. Port City Brewing - Downright Pilsner (4.8%). Another common visitor to my fridge that I have raved and written about many times before. There is a reason I spent 18 months bugging the beer buyers at my local Wegman's to stock this, it is just a great Czech style pale lager. The thing that keeps me coming back is that it is properly bitter and hoppy, without being over 5% abv. I don't know what it is about Czech style pale lagers that terrifies American brewers, but 44 IBUs at 4.8% is the right ballpark rather than 25 IBU at 5.5% that seems to be the norm.
6. Decipher Brewing - Krypto Pilsner (5.5%). The second new brewery on this list, Decipher is based on an industrial estate in Charlottesville, which is overlooked by Monticello. On my first visit to Decipher I noticed they had Krypto on their "coming soon" list, and they have a Lukr tap, so I wanted to make sure I had some when it was available. What came out of the tap was a lovely 14° pale lager, that went down with inordinate ease. I had several, and it cemented in my mind that Decipher's tasting room and beer garden will be a place I visit plenty. Have to admit though that this would be higher up the list if there were a decoction or two in the mix as the Maillard reactions involved would elevate an already good beer.
7. Basic City Brewing - Our Daily Pils (4.7%). We seem to have a slew of good pale lagers in Virginia these days, and I am most certainly not complaining! Our Daily Pils shares a trait with many of my favourite pale lagers, it is actually bitter, not shying away from the almost pithy  character that I just love. It also has a fuller, more pillowy body that makes it a delightful drink - and makes me wonder if they are using a different yeast strain than many of the other local breweries who use the Augustiner strain. Whatever yeast they are using, it makes a very nice beer.
8. Beltway Brewing - Fest! (5.8%). In my annual mass Oktoberfest tasting, Beltway's Fest! was kind of a surprise winner. I had it on tap one Friday afternoon at Kardinal Hall, when note taking is most definitely not on the agenda, and so enamored was I of it, I ordered a second to put some thoughts on my phone. Usually I prefer the paler modern interpretations of Oktoberfest beers, but when a darker märzen is not a syrupy crystal malt mess then I enjoy them too. Such was Fest!, not as dark as many US brewed Oktoberfest lagers, but with plenty of malt heft and a clean finish to make more than a couple a distinct possibility.
9. Decipher Brewing - 80/- (4.3%). Not only are Decipher a new brewery on the list, but Scottish Export as a style is making its debut too. Mrs V and I popped into Decipher for the first time, and given the place was empty just grabbed a couple of seats at the bar while we killed half an hour. Scottish Export ales are not something you see very often in Virginia, but served up in a nice dimpled mug it was a deep crimson reminder of home. In my experience many American brewers overload their Scottish ales with crystal malts and so you end up with intensely sweet swill that you just don't actually get in Scotland (hint, most of the colour comes of roasted barley). Decipher avoided that pitfall and produced a lovely session beer into the bargain.
10. Port City Brewing - Rauch Märzen (5.5%). Holding steady in 10th place this year, Port City's rauchbier reminds me so much of Brauerei Spezial's rauchbier that was such a delight when I visited Bamberg in 2019. I really don't like rauchbiers where the brewery waffles on about the beer having a "hint of smoke", and Port City has way more than a hint, smoke is the soul of the Rauch Märzen. Once the nights really start to draw in and the brewery release this again, my fridge will be well stocked.

So there we have it, my top ten beers from Virginian breweries in the last 12 months. It is great to see new breweries on the list, as well as the return of an old favourite. I say this every year, but this is a purely subjective exercise and I make no claims to having tried every VA beer out there. I am always open to recommendations of good beers to try, so leave them in the comments...

Top Ten Virginian Beers - 2021

The end is nigh.

The end of July that is, which means several things. Schools will soon be back in session, already there are sightings of pumpkin ales in the aisles of the supermarket, and it is time for the annual list of beers that constitutes my top 10 Virginian beers of the last 12 months.

Not wanted ado further, let's leap into the list.

1. Devils Backbone - Czech Pale Lager (5.5%). The beer formerly known as Trukker Ur-Pils was relabeled as Czech Pale Lager. This batch also featured a couple of other changes from previous versions as the brewpub now has an open fermentor and horizontal lagering tanks. Jason also swapped out the usual Augustiner yeast for Weihenstephaner, and it made a difference, being softer, less crackery, but just as delightful a beer. Here was a beer that in my world would more than stand up to the very best pale lagers being brewed in Czechia, including Pivovar Hostomice and Únětický Pivovar, yes it really was that good.
2. Port City - Franconion Kellerbier (5.0%). Last year's top beer has been just as good this year and would have retained top dog status had Devils Backbone not brough out Czech Pale Lager. This year's version is wonderfully balanced, drinkable, and the perfect accompliment to sitting at the kitchen table working through the garden harvest, shelling peas and drinking Kellerbier makes for a very zen hour or so.
3. Port City - Helles (5.2%). Every summer I look forward to the release of Port City's superb Helles. This year I actually managed to find it on tap before seeing it on bottles in the shop. I sat at Kardinal Hall on a sunny afternoon and every mouthful was sheer bliss. As you would expect from a Port City beer, the Helles is excellently executed, the sweetness of the malt and the bitterness of the hops working in a delicate balance that makes it so damned drinkable. If I were to have a gripe it's that it doesn't comes in half litre cans and thus on a recent tubing trip we took a different brewery's helles...
4. Devils Backbone - Alt Bier (5.8%). For a few glorious weeks in early spring, this was my go to beer during several trips down to the original Devils Backbone brewpub. Again this is a beer that has gone up a level since the introduction of open fermentation and horizontal lagering at Devils Backbone. There is a deeper richness to the malt, a fuller mouthfeel as a result of less stressed yeast in the open fermentor, and the clean snappy finish just makes it a beer that needs only 4 or 5 mouthfuls before another is in order. I realise my beer tastes are in the minority, but goodness me I wish this were either a regular part of the lineup, or at least a seasonal that could be reliably on every spring.
5. Port City - German Pilsner (4.6%). Admit it, you're shocked it took this long to get a German style pilsner on the list. This is as close to a classic German style pilsner being brewed in Virginia as you can get, though only in August when it comes out as part of Port City's frankly superb Lager Series program. This particular pilsner is unfiltered and carbonately naturally so is a bit softer than some other versions, which I really enjoy, especially as the heat of Virginia's summer finally starts to break and the back deck becomes vaguely habitable again.
6. New Realm - Bavarian Prince Oktoberfest (6.3%). A new brewery on the list. New Realm are the brain child of legendary master of all things IPA, Mitch Steele. In Bavarian Prince they also boast the winner of last year's Fuggled Oktoberfest Champions League, which will likely make a return in a few weeks as the shelves fill up with festbier and märzen for the season. Bavarian Prince, while stronger than most beers I drink, is made with all German ingredients (always a good sign as caramel malts in German beer styles just taste wrong) and insanely easy to pour litre after litre down my throat. I am sure it will take quite some beer to knock it off it's perch this year.
7. Alewerks Brewing Company - Tavern Brown Ale (5.7%). There are a few weeks in this part of Virginia, usually around the September Equinox when it is overcast, the temperatures are dropping to a pleasant autumnal range, and it rains pretty often. Those few weeks, as reliably as Pavlov's dogs on hearing the ringing of a bell, are when I get the urge to drink brown ale, at cellar temperature, in my Sam Smith's pint glasses. When when urge comes, into the shopping trolley goes Alewerk's outstanding brown ale. If there is a break in the rain, I might even don the old tweed cap and sit outside and just watch the back yard get ever greener. Sweet toffee and subtle bitter chocolate notes, married to a distinct nuttiness, just seem to work perfectly on such days, this is brown ale as it should be in my world.
8. Devils Backbone - Schwartz Bier (5.1%). I love a good schwarzbier, and there are few on the planet, never mind just in Virginia, that can top the glories of Devils Backbone Schwartz Bier. There are very very good reasons this has won a gold medal at the World Beer Cup, it is a spanking combination of fresh toast with nutella and beautifully floral noble hops, finishing clean, clean, clean. It is simply a delight.
9. New Realm - Euphonia Pilsner (5.0%). Firstly, I have a confession to make. I was surprised to see this win the Virginia Beer Cup in 2019, and I wasn't wildly impressed when I first tried it, but I came back to it, and liked it more. So I came back to it and liked it even more. Now I like it quite a bit to be honest as it showcases the fact that you don't need to use the latest, greatest trendy New World hops to have a beer loaded with wonderful hop flavour and aroma.
10. Port City - Rauch Märzen (5.5%). Ah rauchbier, a beer style I love, though preferably when we are talking walloping great doses of rauch rather than weedy "hints of bacon". When I first poured Port City's autumnal offering in my glass I was reminded of the gorgeous Märzen at Spezial in Bamberg, and what a lovely drop of beer it is too. The smoke is very much the heart and soul of the beer, but this is no fire pit. Clean, medium bodied, and with a lingering dryness in the finish that makes me want more, I am sure it will take up plenty of fridge space again this year.

For the first time this year I have decided to hand out a few honorable mentions too:

• Basic City Brewing - Our Daily Pils (4.7%)
• Alewerks Brewing Company - Protocol Porter (5.6%)
• Champion Brewing - Gordonsville Lager (3.8%)

I say this every year, and there is no need to change, this is an entirely subjective list based on my own drinking since the beginning of August 2020, which explains why is it so bottom fermented heavy, I am a lager drinker more than anything else. If you have a Virginia brewed beer that you think is so existentially magnificent I should hunt it out, let me know in the comments.