As we finish up another year of beer, it’s time to look ahead to what we’ll be pouring, sipping and loving in 2018. I’ve reached out to a few of our town’s best brewers to see what we can expect from them in the next Year of Beer.
It was just a year ago when St. Louis’ best-kept brewery secret, Narrow Gauge, became very well known when Ratebeer.com named the Florissant mainstay, its “Best New Brewer” in Missouri.
From this beer lover’s perspective, the success of Narrow Gauge and head brewer Jeff Hardesty has been and remains the fact that the team brews what they know, do it well, and leave room for experimentation.
They’ve made their mark brewing IPA’s, Imperial IPAs and American Pale Ales. At the heart of Narrow Gauge’s beer menu are three cornerstone brews. Fallen Flag, Old Town Porter and O.J. Run.
2018 should be an interesting year.
“We ordered some additional equipment back in May of this year, which will increase our capacity by 66.7%,” said Hardesty. “This will allow us to keep up better with can sales as well as give us more availability to brew more stouts and beers more outside of what our customers demand.”
Hardesty pushes himself to make a different style of beer every few months. In 2017, they brewed a Czech Pilsner, Saison, and London Brown Ale.
MORE: What to drink and eat at Narrow Gauge Brewing Company
“In 2018 I would like to try and push forward with making some of these beers again as well as some new styles. In 2017 we filled 24 wine barrels with various styles of beers from Table strength Saisons with Brettanomyces to Lambic inspired beers, as well as some 100% Florissant yeast and bacteria, fermented beers.”
Hardesty also purchased some Foeders from Foeder Crafters that will arrive sometime in the early new year, which will help them get more beer aging in oak.
“So, the goal for 2018 will be to have more of our beer readily available in cans and brew up some more variety as well as getting more oak aged (wine barrels, bourbon barrels, foeders) beers packaged and released,” said Hardesty.
