Newbies – New Releases That You Want to Look Out For

So many beers, So little time…Newbies is your essential map to the “best of the best” and the hottest new craft beers rolling out each week. From New Belgium’s bold herbal brew to the latest releases from Short’s Brewing and Rock Art Brewing – we’ve all kinds of beers that you’ll want to chase down.

So welcome to another edition of Newbies -Your ultimate guide to great new craft beers!

Dogged Bloodlines (Frederick, MD) – The Flying Dog Brewery just introduced a new “year-round” that was originally a limited release they made to celebrate the 2013 Craft Brewers Conference held last year in Washington, DC. Brewed with blood orange peel and juice, Flying Dog Bloodline Blood Orange Ale is a 7% ABV, Citra and Galaxy hop-bomb that begins with a huge grapefruit nose, followed by a balance of citrus bitterness and sweetness. Bloodline will be available on draft in the mid-Atlantic starting April 15 and followed by 6-packs at the beginning of June.

Collective Madness Accompanies Oberon’s Return (Comstock, MI) – There’s no surer sign that spring has in fact sprung than Bell’s Brewery’s latest release. Bell’s Oberon Ale officially returned in all its glory yesterday and there were midnight tappings, release parties, beer dinners, pub crawls, and all kinds of fun things going on.One of Bell’s most popular beers, Oberon is a wheat ale fermented with Bell’s signature house ale yeast, mixing a spicy hop character with mildly fruity aromas and making it a classic summer beer.

Bottled Superfluid (Bellaire, MI) – Short’s Brewing Company is bottling something super for the first time. Short’s Superfluid is a massive 8% ABV American Double IPA that was first brewed in 2013 to celebrate the 40^th anniversary of the Clean Water Act. Short’s is Northern Michigan’s largest craft brewery and a member of the Natural Resource Defense Council’s Brewers for Clean Water Campaign. This is the second consecutive year that they are tying a water issue to the brewing of Superfluid.

Gruit Times! (Fort Collins, CO) – New Belgium’s latest Lips of Faith release sounds exotic. New Belgium Gruit uses an ancient brewing style of incorporating herb mixtures into beer and is brewed using Bog Myrtle, Horehound, Yarrow, Wormwood, and Elderflower, making for an herbal, almost mint-like and bittered root taste. (Still don’t know what it is? We’ve got you covered). The flavor is bold and the botanicals play a big role. Gruit weighs in at 6.6% ABV.

UFO Sighting (Boston, MA) – The Harpoon Brewery has just introduced something new and it comes just in time for the warming weather. UFO Big Squeeze Shandy is a New England summer treat – a 4.5% ABV unfiltered wheat beer blended with all natural grapefruit juice. This seasonal offering from the brewer’s UFO Series, a line of unfiltered beers, is available for summer in bottles, cans, and on draft.