WILK Friday BeerBuzz–22 June 2012 Otter Creek Copper Ale, Black IPA & Wolavers IPA w/Mike Gerhart

A few weeks ago we featured Long Trail brewing and some of their great Vermont brews….so we decided to go one better.  Todays show featured not one, not two but THREE great Vermont brews. 

Coming to us from Middlebury Vermont, Otter Creek Brewing just celebrated their 20th anniversary last year.  Relatively new to our markets, Otter Creek is a really underrated brewery and one we have been looking forward to featuring on the Friday BeerBuzz.  As a bonus Otter Creek also shares resources and facilities with Wolavers Organic Ales so today we featured BOTH!

Brewmaster Mike Gerhart came to Otter Creek from Dogfish Head so his background is solid and his new brews at Otter Creek have proven that.  Mike also is brewmaster for Wolavers so he was the perfect guest to help us sample today.

We first sampled Otter Creek Copper Ale.  First off, the new packaging design looks great.  Otter Creek just invested close to $1 Million on quality & energy efficiencies, so creating a package that matches the quality of the beer is really important.  Copper Ale is a traditional German-Style Alt.  Historically Altbiers came from the days when brewing with lager yeasts in summer was not practical.  As such Altbiers were developed as a style that uses Ale or top-fermenting yeast and this brewing method creates a crisper and cleaner finishing beer…and Copper Ale is no exception.

Mike next talked us through Otter Creek’s new Black IPA.  This beer was wonderful…it maintained the citrus nose of an IPA with the dark roasted flavors and caramel flavors you’d expect in a darker beer.  A very tasty and drinkable beer and one I know I’ll seek out again.

Finally Mike put on his Wolaver’s hat and helped us sample Wolavers IPA.  We had very few details on this beer going into the show and we were pleasantly surprised to taste what I believe may be our first 100% Organic IPA.  It was a really hoppy treat and a surprisingly flavorful & citrusy IPA.  Clearly Mike knows hoppy beers and it was a treat tasting with him today.

Thank you to Mike Gerhart from Otter Creek & Wolavers

, Nancy, John, & Joe for yet another fun Friday.

The Friday BeerBuzz…bringing good beers and good people together.

As always you can check out the video on-line at the WILK Friday BeerBuzz page by clicking HERE.