A sweet (and sour) welcome
No-Li’s latest collaboration beer mashes up old-school Seattle with new-school Spokane.
Re-Fresh Tart Pale Ale was brewed in cooperation with Bob Brenlin, founder of the pioneering Seattle craft-beer bar Latona Pub (and later Fiddler’s Inn and the Hopvine) and a longtime pal of No-Li owner John Bryant.
Bryant met Brenlin as a fledgling salesman for Portland Brewing in the early 1990s – “I sold him my first craft beer,” Bryant recalls – and they’ve stayed in touch over the years.
At breakfast in Seattle a couple of months ago, Bryant told Brenlin how the Spokane craft-beer scene was rapidly expanding and invited him over to check things out. That evolved into plans for brewing a beer together.
When Brenlin and Latona general manager Patrick Wilson arrived earlier this month, Bryant took them on a tour of area breweries and pubs plus some local landmarks.
“He (Brenlin) was like, man, Spokane is a pretty cool place,” Bryant says. “He hadn’t been here in a long time.”
As for the beer, No-Li brewers had been wanting to do another kettle sour using lactobacillus, like their base beer for last year’s barrel-aged Van Lambert Sour Cherry Ale.
“They kept reiterating, they didn’t want it to be mouth-puckeringly sour,” head brewer Carey Fristoe says of the Latona crew.
The resulting Re-Fresh (4.5 percent alcohol by volume, 15 International Bitterness Units) is sort of a cross between a Berliner Weisse and a session pale. A brilliantly clear straw golden, it’s pleasantly tart with tropical fruit and cherry notes from Mosaic, El Dorado and Amarillo hops. Wheat and rye provide a smooth, subtly spicy character.
The limited, draft-only release went on tap Tuesday at No-Li and makes its Seattle debut Monday in a brewer’s night at the Latona.
But beyond the beer, Bryant says, “It was more than just doing a collaboration. It was about earning some respect for the city of Spokane, the brewers of Spokane, the pubs of Spokane.”
More to come: No-Li is keeping the collaborations coming. Yesterday, it brewed a dry-hopped saison – starring Equinox and Mosaic – in cooperation with the folks from Moscow Alehouse. Look for that one around mid-August.
And No-Li has invited seven out-of-town breweries to pour at its Aug. 22 event, The ‘KAN JamBEERee (which also will feature food trucks and live music): Seattle’s Schooner Exact, Redmond’s Black Raven, Portland’s Alameda and Base Camp, Eugene’s Oakshire, Boise’s Payette and California’s Firestone Walker.
Like the Latona visit, Bryant says, “It’s a good way to get an exchange of beer cultures. I think these (brewery) people will come in and find they enjoy drinking Spokane beer.”