First beer festival of the year set in Vail

January 3, 11:01 AMNorthern Colorado Beer Examiner'Chipper' Dave Butler

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Happy New Year!  It's already beer festival time and one of the best of the year will be in Vail Colorado next week.  It's the 9th Big Beers, Belgians & Barleywines Festival from January 8-10, 2009.

This year's festival in Vail is going to be as big as ever.  There will be three days of events including some gourmet dinners, tasting sessions, seminars from top brewers and a huge homebrew competition. Last year, beers from over 77 different breweries were on hand and none of them were less than 7% ABV.  This is one good reason why you should plan on spending the entire 3-days for the event.

Brewmaster's Dinners

This year there will once again be two separate Brewmaster's Dinners featuring gourmet food and beer pairings and talk from world famous brewers.  The first dinner on Thursday, January 8th will feature the food of host chef Mercer Mohr of Vail's Ocotillo Restaurant and brewmaster's Adam Avery of Boulder's Avery Brewing and Dog Fish Head Brewery's Sam Calagione.

The second dinner will be held on Friday night, January 9th hosted by chef Darrel Jensen of Vail's Centre V Brasserie and will feature the brews and brewmasters of Flying Dog Brewery, Matt Brophy and Russian River Brewery's Vinnie Cilurzo.

Tasting Sessions

Saturday afternoon, January 10th will be the big tasting event with big beers, belgians and barleywines from over 75 different breweries.  This is a great chance to try some of the best beers in the world and also to expand your beer horizons at the same time.  Guests will be limited to one sample of each beer (and believe me that will be plenty).

Homebrew Competition

Homebrewers from all over the country will be competing  over 12 different style categories for the best of show.  The grand prize winner will have a professional batch of their beer brewed at Dry Dock Brewing in Aurora and featured at Denver's Falling Rock Taphouse.  This competition typically brings out the best in the homebrewers who enter.  This is one of the best homebrew competitions in the country.

Seminars

There are over 9 beer seminars available to festival goers.  Scheduled speakers include: Vinnie & Natalie Cilurzo of Russian River, Matt Brophy of Flying Dog Brewery, Julia Herz from the Brewer's Association, JoAnne Carilli-Stevenson from White Labs Yeast Co, C. Andrew Brown from Wynkoop Brewing, Casey Hughs from Flying Fish Brewing, Nick Ison from Sierra Nevada Brewing, Kristen Zantop from A-B InBev, and cicerone Ron Kloth of Papago Brewing. 

Tickets and Lodging Available

There's plenty of tickets left for the Big Beers, Belgians & Barleywines festival.  For more information, please visit the official festival web site.  Individual event tickets or entire weekend packages are available.  Discount lodging is available specifically for event goers.  This event happens just once a year in Vail.   Well worth the trip for any craft beer fan.