Great Divide Brewing/Biker Jims - Denver, CO

Finally headed into downtown Denver and of course I just had to stop at Great Divide. I will say this was the biggest let down of the trip. The brewery is small first off..which I understand it's downtown but maybe expand? Next thing is the only beers on tap are the same beers I get in Buffalo. When I went to Troegs and Victory and other big name places they had at least 2-3 sometimes 5-6 taproom exclusive beers. I was full from lunch, the other breweries and the Yeti was going down rough.

Neither of us finished our beers and we were on our way. I'm not hating on Great Divide I enjoy the Yetis and other beers they make but the overall experience was underwhelming and I would never go out of my way to visit there again since I get all those beers down the street from me. But check them out for yourself...http://greatdivide.com/

Now before I move onto another brewery I had to throw this in here. Before Great Divide we stopped for lunch around the corner at Biker Jim's Hot Dogs.

Just look at the menu below to see how outrageous these hot dogs are! But I must say I loved Alaskan Reindeer it was so flavorful and get it whatever way they recommend. You have to try this place...http://bikerjimsdogs.com/

Stout Tasting

My second big tasting at my place was Stout night.  I had seen so many stouts from all over and wanted an opportunity to not only try each one but share them with others since it is hard to drink a lot of stouts completely on your own.  You will see below there is a massive number of stouts compared to my other tastings and I can say we did not make it through more than 60-70% of them.  This tasting had a very good turnout with about 10 people tasting. Stouts have such a good variety.  In our tastings we had Milk Stouts, Bourbon Aged Stouts, Chocolate Stouts, Russian Imperial Stouts, Imperial Stouts, Coffee Stouts and a few other random kinds.

Since it has been over 8 months and I didn't use a rating system for this night, I am strictly going off a shady memory.  I do recall that the Yeti's were popular from Great Divide...that included the Oatmeal, the Chocolate and the Espresso.  I also recall my shock when Butternut's Beer & Ale's Moo Thunder Milk Stout was adored by many of the girls at the tasting.  A few other stand outs were Alesmith Speedway Stout, Founders Breakfast Stout, Full Pint's Night of the Living Stout, and Southern Tier Choklat.  Lastly, Sam Adams Gingerbread Stout from what I can remember may have been the nights winner with a strong but not overpowering taste of gingerbread and smooth backbone. This beer night was very filling to say the least, but introduced people to a lot of new stouts and weeks following a lot of the tasters would tell me they went out and bought so and so beer since they loved it at the tasting...so I did the job right and created new fans of the delicious stouts!