Newbies – Red-Blooded American Imperial Red Ale

For only the second time in the four years that we’ve been publishing, we’ve an addition to Newbies that we can humbly say we were part of. Last summer, we were blown away when American Brewing reached out to us and invited to do a collaboration with them. Clearly they’d gotten us mixed up with somebody else – but we jumped at the opportunity anyway.

So there’s only one beer in this week’s newbies but we’re pretty damned excited about it….

An Trans-American Collaboration (Washington, DC / Edmonds, WA) – American Craft Beer has a pretty solid following in the Pacific Northwest, and we did generate some buzz when we did a collaboration with Kent, Washington-based Airways Brewing a while back, but that only partially explains why American Brewing would invite us to get creative with them.

But like any rock critic invited onstage with a favorite band, we were psyched when they offered and agreed immediately. The hard part was keeping something like this secret.

Next came the many months of planning with Adam Frantz, American Brewing’s gifted Head Brewer, and ACB’s executive team. Production dates were bantered back and forth – but once we heard more about the style of beer that Adam was hoping to do with us – a fall release seemed obvious.

Now on to the beer itself…

We originally tossed around all kinds of styles, but Adam’s excitement about doing something different with a Red Ale s kept coming up, and we quickly came onboard. In the last six weeks leading up to the planned brew date, Adam tested several batches with his team, constantly refining things, until he finally let us know that we were ready to roll.

Our National Sales & Marketing Director (and himself a homebrewer) Matt Lyman, represented us on brew day, working closely with Adam to make sure that everything came off as planned… And honestly the resulting beer is their baby.

Red- Blooded American Imperial Red Ale is a deep, dark, and dangerously well-balanced 7% ABV “Imperial Red” that’s perfect for the longer nights and soon to come, colder temperatures. This is a big beer, but not so big that you can’t have another.

The label art was designed by ACB’s own Jeff Chenault. He’s our Creative Director and responsible for 100% of our site’s look. He’s also a Grammy-nominated rock & roll artist with serious cred, who’s worked with some of the music industry’s biggest name. In addition to all that, Jeff’s a huge craft beer guy and has helped many a craft brewery with their own imaging. We’re proud of his work on this collaboration piece and privileged to have him here with us at ACB.

So that’s the deal…It was an honor and a total blast working with Adam Frantz and the whole American Brewing crew on this newbie. And, oh yeah, Red- Blooded American Imperial Red Ale is a commercial piece and it’s available now in Washington State (and some parts of Oregon) on draft and in 22oz bombers.

 

 

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