New Nashville Favorites: Craft Beer Proliferation

I don’t write about the local beer scene as much as I could. The local media and alternative press tend to gush about it, acting as though it’s the first town in America to undergo a craft beer renaissance. It might not be the 71st. Not every beer needs deification.

But the new beer is rising. I come not to bury those I don’t fancy or those not interested in canning or bottling. I can only praise those that snared my taste buds lately.

 For many years I have quickly anointed Jackelope Brewing's Love Birds as Nashville’s best fruit/wheat beer. The strawberry-raspberry a great beer, easily the best seasonal to come from Jackelope. My only gripe is that it’s a year-round lineup.

This summer, Love Birds got some fruit beer competition. Blackstone began bottling Strawberry Picnic, a fruit-rich variation of its Picnic summer ale. The ants on the label won’t be the only creatures clamoring for Strawberry Picnic. It’s cloudy because Blackstone used actual strawberries, the beer an additional touch of earthy character to the fruit.

Innovation isn't restricted to the city itself.  Because of its location in suburban Williamson County, Cool Springs Brewery often gets overlooked on the Nashville brewery spectrum. They have been bottling such delights as a Mosaic-hopped saison, a mango-infused IPA and several other big IPAs.

None of its IPAs can exceed the high mark set by Hoppy Balboa, a quad IPA brewed for CSB’s fifth anniversary. This IPA crosses strength (18.4 percent ABV) and flavor frontiers. Thanks to heaps of Citra, Amarillo, Centennial and Columbus hops, Balboa radiates some serious citrus, especially tangerine and apricot, in addition to the expected pine needle and resin notes. It drinks way lighter than anything this strong should, and the black pepper backdrop never grows obnoxious.

CSB is helping to pin Nashville on the IPA map (it has a many miles to go, It City people - deal with it). We’ve also been enjoying the fruits of Yazoo’s sour imprint, Embrace the Funk. This typically involves getting an e-mail about a bottle release, standing in line for an hour and leaving with a lot of wild and sour beer. There are few Yazoo releases for which I won’t brave those lines.

The latest batch included Delicieux, a hopped wild ale that runs very close to the venerable Trappist ale Orval, a blueberry wild ale (Funky Blue Persuasion) and Lignage a Trois. While trying to uncap Funky Blue through its unnecessary wax seal, the neck broke on the bottle. I still drank it, but that dampened the experience, especially on a $25 beer.

 Released in  late 2014,  Lignage a Trois had no such problems ( I chipped away all the wax I could before uncapping).  proved to be a revelation. The 100 percent brettanomyces red ales grows more complex through a number of flourishes. Aged on raspberries in barrels that at different times held Tennessee whiskey and red wine, Lignage a Trois is a force, pushing the limits of what red ale can be. An assertive barrel influence opens some new flavor horizons. Like Russian River Brewing before it, Yazoo pairs the beer style and barrel with an appropriate fruit that amplified the best qualities of the malts and wild yeast.

There are plenty of other fine brewers around Nashville. No matter what you like, craft beer has reached a point where you cannot possibly taste everything. Nashville’s booming beer market requires a little more selectivity but every brewery I encounter will get a few chances before I disregard them completely. With the brewers above, you should never hesitate.