After breakfast on the Friday of GABF, we had some time, so we joined many other fellow beer travelers, and headed over to the Great Divide Brewery, which had opened it’s doors wide open for visitors during the conference.

Inside, the brewers were freely pouring samples in their brewery, as well as in the tap room. Conference goers mingled on the brewery floor, enjoying the samples.  In the center of the room, a large stack of barrels stood aging, while behind them, Brewer Taylor Rees actively worked on a batch of wort. Even with the crowds and visitors, this is an active brewery making beer. There were also lines of plastic kegs, apparently bound for Europe.

I was particularly smitten with a very special brew that they had brewed just for the conference – and I wasn’t the only one. The Baumer, as explained to me by Taylor, was made with Hades and Samurai worts, both of which had been fermented using Brett yeast, and aged in barrels.  It also had a hint of fresh raspberries, and was specially blended to pour this weekend.  The resulting beer was lightly sour, with a delightful golden hue.  It was perfectly representative of the kind of experimentation and beer exploration I find most exciting at breweries.

I then got a short tour of the brewery from Brian, one of their sales reps. It included an amazing bottling machine, as well as a very active fermentation room, where foam was overflowing from buckets onto the cement floor.

I left Great Divide mightily impressed. Not only with with the beers, but the people.  Taylor and I reconnected on the GABF floor later that day, and we talked pretty extensively about what it’s like to work there, while sampling beers from Jolly Pumpkin. What really impressed me was how he had been brought up, and trained by the brewery.  They were striving to take care of their own, and that sort of care seems to be reflected in the beer.

Tags: brewery tour, Denver, gabf, Great Divide

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