Drinking on the Last Frontier: Cool festival is hot ticket — Frozen River Festival kicks off Saturday

Photo by Lee Kuepper/courtesy of Frozen River

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

The 2016 Great Alaska Beer and Barley Wine Festival took place Jan. 22 and 23. For the second year in a row, a brewery from here on the Kenai Peninsula took first place in the Barley Wine Competition at the festival.

The panel of judges tasted barley wines from more than 30 breweries from across Alaska and Outside before awarding the gold medal to Kassik’s Brewery’s Buffalo Head Barley Wine. Two barley wines from Outside tied for second place, Old Gnarleywine Barley Wine from Lagunitas Brewing of Petaluma, California, and Old Birdbrain 2012 from Black Raven Brewing of Redmond, Washington. This is a real statement on the excellence of craft brewing here on the peninsula, coming as it does on the heels of St. Elias Brewing’s taking the gold last year with its Moose Juice Barley Wine. Congratulations to Kassik’s Brewery on taking home the prize.

But that was January. Now it’s February, which means it’s time to start getting ready for this year’s Frozen River Fest! The festival will take place from 3 to 6 p.m. Feb. 20 at Soldotna Creek Park. Yes, we are crazy enough to do it again and hold a festival outdoors in February. There will be live music and food vendors, plus activities for the entire family. But this column is about beer, so let’s focus on that part of the festival. The following producers will be in attendance: Arkose Brewery, Palmer; Baranof Island Brewing Co., Sitka; Bear Creek Winery, Homer; Broken Tooth Brewing, Anchorage;; Celestial Meads, Anchorage; Denali Brewing Co., Talkeetna; Homer Brewing Co., Homer; Kassik’s Brewery, Nikiski; Kenai River Brewing Co., Soldotna; King Street Brewing, Anchorage; Midnight Sun Brewing Co., Anchorage; Specialty Imports, Anchorage; and St. Elias Brewing Co., Soldotna

In addition, our two Soldotna breweries, St. Elias Brewing Company and Kenai River Brewing, have created another special beer in honor of the Frozen River Fest. They have each brewed a Wee Heavy Scotch Ale. This style of beer was created as Scotland’s answer to the barley wines of England and has its roots in the strong ales of the 1700s and 1800s. The term “wee heavy” means “small strong” and traces to the beer that made the term famous, Fowler’s Wee Heavy, a 12 Guinea Ale. They have strong malty sweetness, with little or no hop bitterness, and occasional roasted or smoked notes from caramelization during the boiling process. Strength typically falls between 6.5 percent and 10 percent alcohol by volume.

Drinking on the Last Frontier: Brewing news — Snow Goose migrates to new owners, Bearpaw River stomps on the scene

Photo courtesy of Elaine Howell. The Snow Goose and Sleeping Lady Brewery in Anchorage has been purchased by the company that owns 49th State Brewing in Healy.

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

It’s now 2016, but since my last column there have been a couple of big changes in the world of Alaska craft beer. Things are starting to get pretty dynamic, with breweries opening and changing hands. So let’s take a look at these recent developments.

In late December, local beer lovers were startled by the news that Denali Visions 3000, the corporation that owns up-and-coming 49th State Brewing, the seasonal brewpub in Healy near Denali National Park, had purchased the longtime Anchorage brewpub combination Snow Goose Pub/Sleeping Lady Brewery.

Opened in 1996, Snow Goose/Sleeping Lady was from the original wave of brewpub openings in Alaska. Besides several other now-defunct operations, Glacier BrewHouse and the Moose’s Tooth Pizzeria (now Broken Tooth Brewing) date from the same time frame. Owner Gary Klopfer and his wife, Jane, made extensive renovations to the location over the last two decades, including the addition of a popular deck with views overlooking Knik Arm and Mount Susitna. In an interview, Klopfer said he’d considered selling for several years. He has one daughter who he’d hoped might take over, but she works in publishing in New York City and isn’t interested in running the business. He will retain a small ownership stake in the new venture.

The Snow Goose closed Dec. 26. The new owners plan an extensive, three-year renovation of the 28,000-square-foot facility and hope to restart regular food service in the spring or early summer 2016. Some of the more popular beers from Sleeping Lady’s portfolio may continue to be produced, but will be sold under the 49th State Brewing label.

Drinking on the Last Frontier: Sharing holiday cheers

Photo courtesy of Elaine Howell

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

We’ve survived Thanksgiving, and December is here, so now it’s time to get serious about our Christmas shopping. Once again this year, I’d like to try to help you out with some gift ideas for the craft beer lover on your list. You can always fall back on just giving them beer or brewery apparel, but here are some other ideas to consider.

• To start with, growler technology continues to improve. I’ve written in the past about stainless, double-walled growlers, but how about a growler that you can pressurize and turn into a minikeg? The DrinkTanks insulated growler with pressurized Keg Cap dispenser gives you the convenience of a party tap for sharing beer with friends without dragging around that full-sized keg. The blow-off valve keeps you safe from over-pressurizing, and the CO2 port protects your precious beer from harmful oxidation. The growler alone will run you about $70, with the Keg Cap dispenser going for another $45, so it’s not a cheap gift, but the beer lover in your life will thank you. You can order it at www.drinktanks.com.
• If the beer lover you’re shopping for is like me and already hip deep in growlers, how about something in the personal hygiene realm? Beer and hop-infused products are all the rage this year. Beards are omnipresent in the craft beer world, so why not give Lesher’s Beerd Balm? With seven different hop varieties available, a beard can smell like everything from old-school Saaz to new-school Citra (www.beerdedbeard.com). You can find soaps made from beer at Home Brewed Soaps, including Porter, Coffee Stout and IPA scents (www.homebrewedsoaps.com). Another option is a set of hop-infused beard oil and beer soap from the Craftsman Soap Company (www.craftsmansoap.com). Whichever company you choose, beer and/or hop-infused products are a great gift option.
• I’ve never been a big advocate of gifting glassware. Most beer drinkers are usually very well-stocked in that department. However, there is a very nice, 16-ounce, stainless steel pint available from Hydroflask for $22. It’s stainless on the interior surface and has a powder-coated exterior that’s easy to grip. It’s also double-walled, so the beer stays at the proper temperature and the pint doesn’t sweat on warm days. It feels comfortable in your hand and has something called an Enhanced Lip to better fit your mouth. It’s a great choice for camping or boating, allowing you to pour your beer out of a can into something equally sturdy. You can choose from a variety of colors at www.hydroflask.com.

Drinking on the Last Frontier: Where there’s smoke, there’s buyers — Tradition of smoked beers finding renewed popularity

Photo courtesy of Elaine Howell

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

For most of us who live in Alaska, the flavor of smoke is quite familiar, given the amount of smoked foods available for us to enjoy. In the past, when almost every kind of food would have been cooked over wood, the flavor of smoke would have been even more ubiquitous. This is also true of beer, since its main ingredient — malted barley — would have been dried over wood fires. Smoke flavor in historical beers typically wasn’t mentioned, not because it was absent, but because it was omnipresent. It was only mentioned when it became so excessive as to detract from the taste of the finished product.

All this began to change three centuries ago, as new smokeless fuels became available. First coke and then more recently steam, natural gas and electricity made possible the production of unsmoked malt. Beers with smoke flavors hung around longer in some backwaters, like gold rush-era Alaska, but by the early 20th century, smoked beers were essentially extinct, with one notable exception.

In the town of Bamberg, in the Franconia region of Germany, smoked beers (rauchbier in German) have continued to be produced to the present day, most famously by the Schlenkerla Brewery. It produces three smoked styles, an urbock, a märzen and a weizen, all from malt that has been dried over beechwood fires. Its smoked märzen is considered by many to be the gold standard of smoked beers and represents a direct link to the taste of beers from centuries ago.

While Bamberg may be the home of these wonderfully anachronistic beers, Alaska can rightly claim the honors for inspiring the modern American smoked beer.

In 1988, Alaskan Brewing Co. (then known as Chinook Alaskan Brewing) had been in business for all of two years. Just across the street from the brewery was Taku Smokeries, owned by Sandro Lane, a business that smoked salmon using local alder wood. Alaskan owner/founder Geoff Larson recounted what those days were like in a March 2012 interview for All About Beer magazine:

Drinking on the Last Frontier: Expansion a’brewin’ — New craft breweries opening all over Alaska

Photo courtesy of Elaine Howell. Construction progresses at the new home of Kenai River Brewing Co. in Soldotna.

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

There has been a lot of excitement in the beer scene in Alaska over the last month. New breweries have been popping up and opening around the state like mushrooms after a good rain. I thought I’d use this month’s column to let you know about the breweries that have opened and the ones that are likely to be opening soon.

Icy Straits Brewing opened Aug. 15 in Hoonah in Southeast. In such an isolated location, it’s a small operation, with owners Todd Thingvall and Dan Kane hoping to produce 500 barrels a year, distributed strictly locally. The brewery and taproom are in a renovated, 100-year-old house built on pilings over the water.

The Gakona Brewing and Supply Co. received its final license from the state Sept. 15, and is currently fermenting its first two beers. Owner Ed Miner has been working for years to get approval to operate his half-barrel nanobrewery, and now he will finally be able to produce craft beers in Gakona. Initially, his brews will only be available at the Trapper’s Den Tavern in the historic Gakona Lodge. The tavern is open year-round, so if you are passing through Gakona, stop and have a beer. The first two offerings will be Berry Wheat Ale, made with raspberries, blueberries and black berries, and Killer Rabbit IPA.

Most recently, Odd Man Rush Brewing opened at 10930 Mausel St. in Eagle River on Sept. 25. Brian Swanson and his business partners, Reid McDonald and Ross Johnson, grew up playing hockey in Eagle River, so they decided to open a hockey-themed craft brewery. The brewery boasts the original scoreboard from the Harry J. McDonald Memorial Center, the Eagle River sports complex that was recently remodeled, and its walls are made out of reclaimed wood from the Mac and old hockey sticks. There’s even the front end of a Zamboni and a sign from the historic Regal Eagle Brewing, the first brewpub in Alaska that operated out of the North Slope Restaurant in Eagle River from 1995 to 2003.

That’s three new craft breweries open for business in the last six weeks, bringing the total in the state to 27.

That number does not look to be accurate for long. Two breweries in the Mat-Su area are working hard to open soon — Bearpaw River Brewing in Wasilla and Bleeding Heart Brewery in Palmer. In Anchorage, Quake Brewing is looking to open on Tudor Road, while Cynosure Brewing on Potter Drive just took delivery of its brewhouse. Girdwood Brewing is coming to its namesake town, and Baleen Brewing will bring local beer back to Ketchikan. There are likely others out there on the drawing board that I just haven’t heard about yet. As I said, breweries and brewpubs are springing up like mushrooms all across our great state.

Here on the Kenai Peninsula, I’m not aware of any new breweries opening, but that doesn’t mean that exciting things aren’t happening. All you have to do is drive behind the new Walgreens in Soldotna to see what I mean. The foundation and floor are going in for the new home of Kenai River Brewing Co. The building is going to house an expanded brewery and a much larger taproom. With an opening scheduled for May, we should all be able to be enjoying beers from Kenai River on the covered patio next summer.

It truly is an exciting time for craft brewing in Alaska.

Drinking on the Last Frontier: Historic hullabrew — ‘Mythic’ old beer style sees revival

Photo by Jenny Neyman, Redoubt Reporter. An East India Porter is dark in color with perhaps some garnet highlights. The style was nearly lost to history, but will be available at St. Elias later this year.

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

I’ve been a history buff for as long as I can remember. I’ve always loved learning about the deeds of those who came before us and I agree with the quote from the movie “Gladiator,” “What we do in life echoes in eternity.”

Since I began researching and writing about beer, I have learned how important brewing has been in the long-running saga of human civilization. Look at almost any historical event in the last 5,000 years and you’ll probably find that beer or wine or both played a part in it.

Unfortunately, when it comes to much of what passes for beer history these days, another quote comes to mind, this one from Henry Ford, “History is more or less bunk.”

Books have been written debunking popular historical beer myths, yet you continue to see the same wrong history repeated again and again. I don’t know whether this is due to laziness or ignorance on the part of writers, but neither cause reflects well on them.

One of the most often repeated of these beer myths deals with the origin of India Pale Ale. The gist of the story is that the dark brown porters, brewed in London from the early days of the 18th Century, couldn’t survive the four- to six-month sea voyage from Britain to its newly acquired imperial gains in India.

So a new beer style had to be created, a pale ale rather than a dark porter, brewed with more alcohol and more hops to act as preservatives. The new style was an immense hit in India and was named India Pale Ale. The end.

A great tale, with only one flaw — it’s not true.

Drinking on the Last Frontier: Cheers to beer culture — Kenai Peninsula Beer Festival toasts growth in craft brewing

Photos courtesy of Elaine Howell. The crowd enjoys last year’s Kenai Peninsula Beer Festival.

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

When beer writers like myself talk about a region’s beer culture, they are referring to the totality of the relationship between the people of a particular locale and beer. Not just how many beers are brewed there or how many bars have them on tap, but how craft beer is viewed and valued by folks.

In the past 11 years that I have lived on the Kenai Peninsula, I’ve watched our beer culture grow from almost nonexistent to one of the best in the state. Let’s take a look back at how we got from then to now.

In 2004, the only craft brewery on the peninsula was the Homer Brewing Co. While well established, it did not distribute its beers outside of its local area. This made getting growlers filled during a visit to Homer a ritual for beer lovers from anywhere else on the peninsula. Most local bars carried Alaskan Brewing Co.’s beers, and a few might occasionally have a beer from Midnight Sun or Silver Gulch on tap, but that was about it.

All that began to change in May 2006, with the opening of Kassik’s Brewery and Kenai River Brewing Co. Suddenly, fresh, handcrafted beer was no longer an 80-mile drive away — it was right here. People’s interest in and experience with craft beer began to grow. The process accelerated again with the opening of St. Elias Brewing Co. in May 2008.

I will humbly claim a small bit of the credit for some of this growth on behalf of my annual beer course at Kenai Peninsula College (started January 2007) and this monthly beer column (first written November 2009). Craft beers, both from local breweries and around the state, are now fixtures in our bars and on our liquor store shelves. Even Seward finally got some craft beer love with the opening of the Seward Brewing Co. in 2012.

In addition to all the advances enumerated above, perhaps the biggest single indicator that the craft beer culture of the central peninsula has come of age is the growth of our beer festivals. With the establishment of the Frozen River Fest in February this year, we now have two annual beer festivals in Soldotna. The biggest and oldest of them — the fifth annual Kenai Peninsula Beer Festival — is happening this weekend.

Beer foments history in Alaska — Prohibition didn’t stop brewing predilection

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

In my last two columns, I’ve made passing reference to my newest book, “Alaska Beer: Liquid Gold in the Land of the Midnight Sun,” which was released in mid-May and is finally on the bookshelves here in Alaska. It’s a history of beer and brewing in our great state, from the period of Russian rule to current day. It represents a year’s worth of research and writing on my part, during which I came across some fascinating stories regarding the role alcohol, in general, and beer, in particular, has played in Alaska history.

During the Gold Rush period in Alaska, breweries were key businesses in the establishment of towns. What typically “put a town on the map” was the establishment of three key businesses — a bakery, a brewery and a brothel. Given the poor sanitation of many mining towns, beer was often a much healthier choice than water, plus it contained vitamin C, which helped prevent scurvy, one of the most common ailments. From 1874 until the coming of territorial prohibition, some 34 different breweries operated in 15 different towns in Alaska. Their main competition, then as still today, was not other Alaska brewers, but larger breweries from Outside, such as Rainier, Olympia and others on the West Coast. These breweries were eager to capture the Alaska market and did everything in their power to undercut the local brewers. Despite this fierce competition, Alaska brewers more than held their own until they were put out of business when the citizens of the territory voted to ban alcohol.

Why prohibition? Scholars continue to ask that question to this day. The idea of outlawing a substance which had been enjoyed by a large segment of the population since time immemorial seems a strange one to be adopted by popular vote in a country as freedom-loving as the United States.

It seems even more so in a territory as fiercely individualistic as Alaska. Nevertheless, in November 1916, Alaskan voters chose prohibition by a 2-to-1 margin. After approval by Congress and President Woodrow Wilson in 1917, territorial prohibition went into effect Jan. 1, 1918. As of that date, the Territory of Alaska was, at least in theory, bone dry with regard to alcohol.

As anyone with a basic grasp of human nature could predict, territorial prohibition was a colossal failure. With its large size and small population, Alaska was a bootleggers’ paradise. Here are a few examples that I came across in my research:

Drinking on the Last Frontier: Alaska breweries reopen for summer season

Photo courtesy of Elaine Howell. Seward Brewing Co. is open for the summer season.

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

In many ways, Alaska is a crazy place to try to operate a brewery. The logistics involved in just obtaining the necessary ingredients are challenging, since the only raw material for beer that Alaska has available locally is water.

The same logistics increase the cost of buying equipment and packaging, as well. Distributing the finished product any distance at all is equally expensive, given the distances involved and lack of infrastructure. Just to make things even more fun, Alaska has the second highest state beer excise tax in the country, at a whopping $1.07 per gallon of beer sold. Finally, the extreme seasonal nature of many of our communities drives extreme swings in beer demand for those locales.

To deal with the challenge of seasonality, different breweries have adopted different strategies. Some, like Soldotna’s St. Elias Brewing Co., are lucky enough to have sufficient local population to make operating year-round profitable. Others, like Skagway Brewing Company, significantly reduce their off-season hours in order to balance the books. Sometimes, even that doesn’t work. Denali Brewing Co. keeps its beer garden in downtown Talkeetna open all winter despite operating at a loss in order to both serve the community and retain its core staff. Then there is the final option — hibernation, i.e., close the brewery until the snow melts and the tourists return with the sun.

Currently, three breweries in Alaska follow this model. Each is relatively isolated and heavily dependent on the summer tourist trade. The 49th State Brewing Company in Healy caters to the hundreds of thousands of visitors who come to Denali National Park each year. A couple of weeks after the park closes for the winter, so does 49th State, to reopen at the end of April the following year. Gold Rush Brewing, located a couple of miles north of Skagway, follows the same pattern. It comes to life each year just before the tourist-laden cruise ships begin arriving and goes to sleep shortly after the last one departs. Here on the Kenai Peninsula, we have the Seward Brewing Co., which just reopened for 2015 on May 1.

Drinking on the Last Frontier: Cheers to new home — Kenai River Co. building brewery

Photo courtesy of Elaine Howell. Doug Houge, one of the owners of Kenai River Brewing Co., kicks back at what will be the site of the new brewery near the “Y” in Soldotna. The expanded facility should open next May.

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

The growth of craft brewing, both in Alaska and across the U.S., continues to amaze. The Brewers Association has published the 2014 statistics for American craft beer, and the numbers are staggering. Craft beer sales now make up 11 percent of all beer sales nationwide by volume (up from just 5 percent in 2010) and 19.3 percent by dollars spent (up 22 percent since just last year). More than 22 million barrels of craft beer were produced last year, by 3,418 craft breweries. The number of craft breweries has doubled since 2010, with 615 opening last year, while only 46 went out of business. Small brewers employed more than 115,000 people in 2014. While sales of AB-InBev and MillerCoors products are stagnant or dropping, craft beer sales continue to grow at a rapid pace. By every standard, the future of craft brewing in the U.S. is bright.

Here in Alaska, we’ve seen much the same trends. Established companies like Alaskan Brewing and Anchorage Brewing have completed major expansion projects. Haines Brewing Co. just broke ground on a new brewery. Resolution Brewing opened in Anchorage and several other new breweries in various locations across the state seemed poised to join the ranks of the Brewers Guild of Alaska and begin supplying their communities will fresh, locally produced craft beer. And now Soldotna is joining in the brewery construction boom.

As is obvious to anyone who has visited it recently, Kenai River Brewing Co. outgrew its current location quite some time ago. When it opened in May 2006, the brewery occupied only half its building. In early 2012, it expanded to occupy the entire building and opened its current taproom. However, space is still at a premium, with several storage containers located behind the building holding cans waiting to be filled, and no room remaining on the brewery floor for any additional fermentation vessels or expanded equipment. For the brewery to continue to grow, it is obvious that it needs new quarters. The management of Kenai River has been searching for a new location for several months, and it now appears that a suitable one has been found.

Doug Hogue, one of the owners of Kenai River Brewing Co., has announced the purchase of a 1.4-acre parcel in Soldotna, where KRB will build a standalone brewery. The lot is at the corner of 47th and Homestead Streets, behind the new Walgreens being constructed at the intersection of the Sterling and Kenai Spur highways. The new building should be easily visible from the Sterling Highway with a sightline between the new drug store and the existing Auto Zone.

Now that the purchase of the land has been finalized, Hogue said that the brewery hopes to break ground in August.

Drinking on the Last Frontier: Alaska hops to it — Brewers nurturing a growing local trend

Photos courtesy of Elaine Howell. From left, Lasse Holmes, Doug Hogue, William Miller and Zach Henry drink a toast prior to brewing with Alaska-grown hops on March 20 at Kenai River Brewing Co. in Soldotna.

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

One of the biggest trends in the food world today is locally sourced ingredients. More and more great chefs are latching onto the idea of serving dishes made from fresh, seasonal ingredients produced as close as possible to their restaurants.

Farmers markets are booming across the country, and more and more individuals are beginning to explore obtaining or growing some (or even most) of their food close to home. Such produce is generally much fresher, tastier and nutritious than the weeks-old stuff you might find at a grocery store.

Brewers across the country have also joined this trend, either growing their own ingredients or trying to partner with small, local farmers to supply them. Small maltsters have begun springing up around the country — these operations take the barley produced by local farmers and turn it into malt to be used by local breweries. Breweries are partnering with family owned hop farms or even starting their own farms to produce at least some of the hops needed for brewing.

An early adopter of this idea was Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. in Chico, California. For several years it has produced its Estate Ale, brewed with organic wet hops and barley grown at the brewery. All indications are that this trend will continue to gather momentum, as shoppers become more and more conscious of how and with what ingredients the products they consume are produced.

For brewers in Alaska, locally sourcing ingredients represents a real challenge. While this state is blessed with an abundance of ultrapure water, neither brewing barley nor hops have ever been produced successfully on a commercial scale.

There was a serious attempt by the state to promote large-scale barley production near Delta Junction in the late 1970s, but it ended in a costly failure. Additionally, the type of barley being grown was of low quality, as it was intended for animal feed, not malting.

Hop bines will grow in Alaska, but conventional wisdom has been that the extra-long summer days in these northern latitudes will prevent them from flowering, and it is the hop flowers or cones that are used by brewers. However, things may be changing.

On the barley front, the Alaska Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station at the University of Alaska Fairbanks has been working to develop a strain of barley which will grow well in our northern climate and produce grain of high-enough quality to be malted for use in fermentation.

Drinking on the Last Frontier: Resolute expansion — New breweries set to open

Photo courtesy of Elaine Howell. Resolution Brewing Co. in Anchorage plans to open March 15.

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

I hope you all had a chance to attend Frozen River Fest on Feb. 7. In spite of everything Mother Nature could throw at us, we still had a great festival, with 871 folks in attendance. Given that everyone was so pleased with the results, I think it’s safe to say that you can mark Saturday, Feb. 6, 2016, on your calendar as the date for the second Frozen River Fest.

There is big news from Anchorage, with two new breweries planning to open this month. Anchorage Brewing Co.’s new standalone brewery at 148 W. 91st Ave., under construction since June, will open at 2 p.m. March 14.

Owner Gabe Fletcher has spared no expense to create a truly exceptional craft brewery. From the radiant-heated floors to the walls paneled in reclaimed wood, state-of-the-art brewhouse from Newlands Systems and hewn tree-trunk bar tops in the tasting room, you can tell this brewery is a labor of love.

Patrons in the tasting room will have an open view back to the brewhouse through two rows of giant, wooden foudres, five on a side. The aging room has sufficient space to house some 800 barrels for secondary fermentation. Fletcher has already earned a world-class reputation for the beers he brewed by renting time on Sleeping Lady Brewing Co.’s equipment. Now his outstanding brewery will at last have a home of its very own.

The second new Anchorage brewery planning to open this month will be on a much smaller scale. Resolution Brewing Co. (originally to be named the Chugach Brewing Co.), is located in a strip mall at 3024 Mountain View Drive. Last week I stopped by to speak to owner/brewer Brandon Hall, check out the new space and taste a couple of his Belgian-inspired ales.

The focus of Resolution will be direct retail sales in its taproom. Hall plans to self-distribute kegs of his brews to about five restaurants around Anchorage, but will reserve most of his production to support sales at the brewery. Resolution’s brewing equipment is a three-barrel, direct-fired system from Stout Tanks and Kettles of Portland, Oregon, along with three, three-barrel conical fermenters and one three-barrel brite tank. Initially, Hall plans to only be open Thursdays through Sundays until he’s confident he can meet customer demand at the brewery.

“The last thing I want to have to do is close because I’m out of beer!” he said.