This Saturday at Perennial Artisan Ales, Cory King releases his first three beers from his new brewing company, Side Project Brewing. Through Side Project, King, who also works as head brewer at Perennial, is making small-batch ales, all aged in wine or spirits barrels.
King untaps his beer at noon, but the fun begins much earlier. At 8 a.m., Strange Donuts provides free doughnuts and coffee to the first 100 people, and at 11 a.m., the food truck Hot Aztec rolls up.
Getting a little food in your belly might be a good idea, seeing as The Origin, one of King’s new beers, clocks in at 14.3 ABV. The Origin is a blend of Imperial stout, black oat-wine and Baltic porter aged for 20 months in a Rittenhouse Rye barrel with Madagascar vanilla beans. The second beer, Saison du Fermier, is a robust, chardonnay barrel-fermented saison, yet, according to King, is “balanced with the brightness, depth and rustic character of [yeast strains] Brettanoymces and Lactobacillus found in traditional saisons. It is the harmony of new and old.” Lastly, look for Brett Project #1, the first in a series of beers fermented and aged in wine barrels with different Brettanomyces strains. The series explores “how single strains of Brettanomyces ferment and condition a Saison malt bill.”
Can’t make it to this release? Don’t worry; there are more to come. In the pipeline are more Brett Project beers, along with a wheat saison aged in a chardonnary barrel, a blonde American wild ale fermented in chardonnay barrels and aged with white peaches, and a Flanders-style red ale fermented in chambourcin barrels and aged with blueberries.
This article appears in September 2013.