New Craft Beer Variety Packs Celebrate The Holidays

The winter holidays are closer than you think. And brewers are addressing the changing season with new variety packs that are making buying in bulk cool again.

Schlafly Winter Warm-Up Variety Pack

Schlafly Beer, St. Louis’ original craft brewery, has released a cold-weather all-stout sampler that’s perfect for the season. And this year’s it features three different hand-picked fan favorites.

The “winning” selections featured in the Winter Warm Up sampler are determined by the crowd favorites at Schlafly’s annual Stout & Oyster Festival. Schlafly brews ten specialty stouts for the annual March festival. The Irish Cream Stout and Raspberry Coffee Stout were this year’s standouts.

“Each year, people look forward to seeing what stout flavors will make our winter release,” says Schlafly CEO, Fran Caradonna. “We listen to consumer requests, and our popular Stout & Oyster Festival in March is a fun way to test out new stouts from our creative brewing team. Festival attendees get to be a part of the process to help us curate what stouts are considered for a winter pack, and this year, we opted for three approachable but toasty stouts for the winter months. Now we can enjoy them again for the winter.”

Schlafly’s Winter Warm-Up Variety 12-Pack features four bottles of each of the three beers, including the once-retired brew Raspberry Coffee Stout, as well as Mexican Chocolate Stout.

And here’s how the brewery describes them…

• Mexican Chocolate Stout (6.0% ABV): A classic American stout inspired by all the characteristics of real, Mexican-style hot chocolate. Creamy, roasty, sweet elements provide a perfect base for the addition of cocoa nibs, which the brewers add directly to the fermenter to age until their finest flavors blend with the stout
• Raspberry Coffee Stout (5.7% ABV): Like opening a fresh bag of coffee, but better because it’s beer. Opulent aromas of coffee and raspberry blend together with a flavor that only comes from real coffee and real raspberries in the fermentation process.
• Irish Cream Stout (ABV: 6%): A classic that delivers exactly what you’d expect in an Irish-Style stout. Brewed to showcase the boldness of rich barley and the smooth creaminess of lactose, this definitive Irish Stout is brimming with bright caramel and vanilla notes that are offset by fiery whiskey undertones.

Short’s Hoppy Holidays Variety Pack 2023

Leaves and temps aren’t the only things dropping in much of the country.

Short’s Brewing is once again upping the ante on the traditional holiday 12-Pack concept by offering an even more bountiful package with 18 uber-hoppy beers for the holidays…A huge undertaking for the Elk Rapids, Michigan-based brewery that takes up tons of tank space and two days spent hand-packing each individual case.

Short’s gracious 18 pack of six varieties returns these “blasts from the past” that will pair especially well with the winter holidays.

Short’s 2023 Hoppy Holidays Variety Pack features…

• Slurm (6.5%): Light orange in color with a prominent haze, Slurm is a hazy New England style India Pale Ale with big pineapple and mango aromatics and bright tropical fruit flavors.
• Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster (9.8%): Featuring a slight yeasty sweetness, that changes everything, Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster is a Belgian-style Double IPA brewed with Australian Galaxy hops.
• The Curl (8.1% ABV): One of the first Imperial beers made at Short’s, this American Pilsner has an appealing clear, bright, golden straw color. Hefty doses of hops create a pronounced dryness that seamlessly blends with the crisp, clean finish.
• Stellar Ale (6% ABV): Medium bodied, and impressively well balanced, this American Pale Ale is a showcase of snappy grapefruit flavors, a playful spiciness and the perfect bitterness.
• Superfluid (8% ABV): Short’s Superfluid is a massive Double IPA that was first brewed in 2013 to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Clean Water Act.
• Good Humans on Nitro (8.3% ABV): Bursting with layers of caramel and toffee flavors, Good Humans is a very big and bold Brown Ale that is dry-hopped with Simcoe and Golding hops and infused with creamy nitro.

Available in November in Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, Wisconsin and Colorado Short’s Super Hoppy Holidays Variety Pack is a holiday gift for craft beer lovers that will keep things festive all-season long.

###