What We Drank (and Loved) at CBC 2025
Now that the dust has finally settled from Craft Brewers Conference 2025 and we’re all back in our somewhat normal routines, we’ve had a chance to reflect, relive some good times, and think back on the beers we were able to share and taste with friends and attendees. We’re pleased to report there was no shortage of wonderful beers nor lack of creativity and innovation this year.
For three days, RahrBSG had the honor of sharing beer from partner breweries and suppliers with attendees at RahrBSG Village. We poured a dozen or so different beers each day at our Malt Shop Bar. Join us now to recap some of our favorite beers from the event, including fantastic fonio beers (What’s fonio? You’ll see.) lavish lagers, hoppy beers, and a very special trio from Brasserie Cantillon, compliments of Mouterij Dingemans. Pull up to the bar, and let’s dig in!
Fonio! Fonio! Fonio!
The talk of the RahrBSG Village all three days was fonio. The ancient West African grain is a hot topic in brewing right now partly from praise and projects by Garrett Oliver of Brooklyn Brewery and Vinnie Cilurzo of Russian River Brewing. Brewers sampled three very different beers featuring varying percentages of the grain at the conference.
Perhaps the most jaw-dropping was an alternative grain beverage from Kiitos Brewing. Utilizing the brewery’s mash press, Fonio (5.0% ABV) was brewed with 100% Terra Fonio, no hops, and fermented with Fermentis SafAle™ US-05. The beer poured nearly water-clear with a bit of cloudy haze, and had attendees absolutely boggled. Kiitos director of brewing Patrick Bourque enjoyed watching the fun, often confused, faces of people as they tried it for the first time. “We taste a lot of passionfruit, lychee, and white peach,” he said. “I do think it falls a bit into the sake of soju-like category, or even a seltzer that actually has its own character.”
Other brewers’ comments were entertaining as well: “It’s sake meets Sprite” and “Is this an unfiltered mead?” With its lush, almost creamy coconut milk mouthfeel one person noted, “This is a piña colada if it was a beer.”
Two more “beer tasting” fonio beers were also on tap. Russian River Brewing Company Fonio Beer, a 4.5% ABV beer brewed with 25% fonio, Rahr Standard 2-Row, and Rahr White Wheat Malt, and hopped with HVG Hallertau Tradition, was crisp – almost champagne-y, noted one brewer – bright, slightly tangy, with notes of tropical fruit, orange zest, and melon.
In the Fermentis Hospitality Suite we were treated to New Fonio, Who Dis?, a rice lager riff from Talyard Brewing Company. The beer was brewed with 15% fonio in a grist that also included Rahr North Star Pils™, Rahr Standard 6-Row, and Crisp Torrefied Flaked Rice. “We knew very little about fonio, so we treated it similarly to how we would a cereal grain – like rice, in this case,” said brewer Sean Maloney. Talyard also used the newer Fermentis SafLager™ E-30 lager yeast, a strain promoted for use in adjunct lagers for a subtle fruit character. Overall tasting notes were of a familiar rice lager with some fruity undertones. Attendees found harmonious flavors between subtle esters from the yeast, zesty Citra hop additions, and lychee from the fonio.
Fonio is definitely intriguing to many brewers, so we won’t be surprised to see more beers featuring the adjunct hitting taps soon. If your brewery uses fonio in the brewhouse, please share your experiences with us by tagging @RahrBSG in your brew day photos and video.
Before we get to more beer we have to give a Honorable Mention shout-out to Pink Drink, a pink lemonade hard seltzer from Sun King Brewery featuring a handful of products to make a very unique beverage: Kerry Pink Lemonade Flavoring, Kerry Cloud Emulsion, Kerry Raspberry Powder, Pathfinder TY-Pure yeast, Pathfinder N-Pure nutrient. The end result is a warm-weather crusher, slightly tart, medium-bodied, and very fruity with the expected juicy/hazy appearance of actual pink lemonade that makes it a cut above your average hard seltzer. Many brewers were surprised at how much they enjoyed it, and it was an especially big hit with this year’s HVG Hop Queen.
Live, Laugh, Lager
CBC is a marathon, not a sprint. So, it’s not surprising that some of the biggest hits at The Malt Shop Bar were light, highly drinkable lagers with low-ish ABV.
We’d call Sun King Brewery Pachanga Mexican Lager our unofficial conference beer as we enjoyed it many times throughout the week, not only at The Malt Shop Bar but also out at bars — including our Night Cap Party at The Dugout. (BTW, thanks to everyone who joined us there!) The multi-award winning 4.2% ABV beer — with a grist of Rahr Standard 2-Row, Rahr North Star Pils™, and Rahr Standard 6-Row, and hopped solely with terpenes — was extremely easy to drink. Clean, crisp, lightly toasty with soft lime notes. A pleasant, perfect balance of alcohol and esters. One brewer described it as “Sunshine in a glass in a cornfield” — although there’s no actual corn in it.
Neue Wave Rice Lager from Noble Beast Brewing Co. (4.9% ABV) was a hit at The Malt Shop Bar and also at the pre-conference HVG Hospitality Suite party. It was brewed with Weyermann® Extra Pale Premium Pilsner Malt and Thai Hom Mali Jasmine Rice, which was cooked in a cereal cooker separately and added to the malt for a step-mash temperature bump. Neue Wave was hopped from first wort to whirlpool with HVG Hallertau Mittelfruh and HVG Hallertau Blanc. “Hop choice was all about balancing delicate flavors,” said Noble Beast head brewer Shaun Yasaki. “I knew the impact of the Jasmine rice would be incredibly subtle, and it was hard to use restraint with the hops. Mittelfruh for that classic floral nose and Blanc to bring in some melon and white wine as a foil to the floral and nutty Jasmine rice.”
Another crowd pleaser at both the HVG Hospitality Suite and RahrBSG Village was Heller Bock from lager-centric Goldfinger Brewing Company (7% ABV). The beer features Weyermann® Pilsner Malt and Weyermann® Munich Malt, and what one attendee lovingly described as a “HVG hop salad” of Hallertau Mittelfruh, Saphir, Tradition, Hersbrucker. Goldfinger first brewed the beer in collaboration with HVG for CBC 2024, and it won a Top 20 Beers of 2024 nod from Craft Beer & Brewing, so they brewed it again this year. Rich malt flavors of yellow cake and candied almonds with mouth-warming alcohol, plus a melange of hop notes from earthy and herbal (rosemary, dill) to piney made this not-your-average Maibock brew.
Complex in a totally different way was Comparison Is The Thief of Joy, a collaboration between Streetside Brewery, Forbidden Root, and Guggman Haus Brewing Co. The West Coast Pils (5.0% ABV) was brewed with Crisp Haná Heritage Malt and hopped with New Zealand Motueka™ for a powerfully dank brew from which we got notes of marijuna flower, fruity vape pen, rosemary, and whisper of white grape.
New Paths to Hoppy Beer
Ultra-hopped beers were also well represented at RahrBSG Village, and included some of the more innovative brews.
How can you beat having a small serving of Pliny the Elder (8.0% ABV) as the first beer of your day? You can’t! Russian River’s OG and most quintessential Double IPA is brewed with a base of Rahr Standard 2-Row. It has gone from a two-bottle limit at the brewery back in the day to the shelves of Whole Foods. And yet, it has lost none of style-defining goodness: a citrus bomb packed with flavors of orange peel/pith, bitter but silky, dank but balanced. One brewer compared it to the orange slices your mom used to hand out after soccer games. Goal!
Mash hopping and thiolized yeast were utilized by Shoreline Brewery to give Hop the Mash Thiolized IPA (6.8% ABV) its unique flavors. With a base of slightly bready/biscuity Gambrinus IPA Malt and a small amount of Weyermann® Acidulated Malt, the beer was mash hopped with Cascade to increase production of thiol precursors, and then hopped in the kettle and dry hopped with Mosaic and Citra. The final beer had a delicate softness to it, low bitterness, and layered but not overpowering tropical fruit flavors of guava, papaya, and tart citrus.
Two notable hoppy beers were brewed using a variety of Totally Natural Solutions (TNS) hop products: high-quality, chemical-free hop oils and flowable hop extracts that boost flavor, increase yield, and cut loss in the brewhouse.
Expressionism Tropical IPA (6.3% ABV) was produced by Rhinegest Brewery using both traditional T90 pellets and TNS HopPlus® Tropical. The grist was Rahr Premium Pilsner, Flaked Oats, Flaked Wheat, Rahr Dextrin Malt, and Weyermann® Acidulated Malt. On the hot side it was hopped only in the whirlpool with Citra®, Krush™, and Centennial pellets. It was dry hopped with Citra, Krush, and El Dorado®. Once transferred to the brite beer tank, it was dosed with TNS HopPlus® Tropical at 40mL/bbl ahead of packaging. “We really like how the HopPlus product shines through in this particular beer,” said Rhinegest head brewer Nick Brehm. “The flavor and aroma profile are impactful and mesh well with the pellet hops to deliver a big tropical experience to the drinker.” The result is low bitterness, full body, subtle malt sweetness and bold hop flavors of peach ring candy, apricot, tropical mango and guava. Like a fruit cup for grown-ups.
Perhaps even more jaw-dropping was Defy Gravity, a 2.9% ABV table beer from Twisted Wheel Brew Company in the United Kingdom, brewed with TNS HopGain® and HopBurst® products. This seriously hopped-up British session ale was smooth, bursting with passionfruit and pineapple, with subtle white wine grape, gooseberry, and citrus undertones. What was surprising to many was the amount of body present combining TNS with the use of wheat and oats in the grist. Session beers like this – especially hoppy ones – can often finish off-balance and watery, but this beer’s mouthfeel was like drinking a much higher ABV beer, which was appreciated by people who sampled it. It could be a good tool for your recipe development of lower-ABV beers.
On the Dark Side
It wasn’t all light-colored lagers and IPAs, don’t you know. There were also standout dark beers at the conference.
Rahr Technical Center brewers Sean Tynan and Jake Thompson were not only amazing bartenders for the three days of CBC, but also the folks behind the RTC Eagle Porter (6.0% ABV), an English Porter highlighting Simpson Coffee (Brown) Malt and Simpsons Export Pale Chocolate Malt. The beer had low roast and coffee notes with a decadently unique chocolate finish. Not so much a bittersweet baker’s chocolate, but more like milk chocolate without being actually residually or syrupy sweet. Quite a treat!
For something more dry and roasty, there was Garavogue Dry Irish Stout (4.2% ABV) from Dancing Gnome Brewery. Brewed with Simpsons Finest Golden Promise, Simpsons Finest Maris Otter, and Simpsons Roasted Barley, it was light-bodied and substantial with dark malt notes of dark roast coffee, toasted bread crust, and bittersweet chocolate.
Maybe you’ve already read the backstory of a very special collaboration between Sun King Brewery and Simpsons Malting Company in the form of Ouija Heavy (7.8% ABV), but we thought it was worth an update having now enjoyed the beer at CBC. A rich malty Wee Heavy style ale brewed with exclusive Sun King variety of malt from Simpsons – micro-malted just for this project – then aged for a few years in some of the most incredible and award-winning barrels of Buffalo Trace. And, it was well worth the Hwait. Ouija Heavy poured a dence, full-bodied beer boasting rich malt notes and flavors of chocolate, toffee, caramel and brown sugar, soft booze, and marshmallow.
And finally, Cantillon… on Tap!
Perhaps the apex of each day was the tapping of a trio of very special beers from Brasserie Cantillon. In celebration of the Belgium malting company Mouteriji Dingemans’ 150th Anniversary, fifth-generation maltster Karl Dingeman arranged for three kegs to be served at RahrBSG Village; he poured much of the beer himself each day to hype crowds of beer lovers.
- Day One: Gueze (5.5% ABV), the classic! Brewed with Dingemans Pils (for many generations), this world-renowned beer is a blend of Lambics produced during different years. It has a delightfully light acidic and fruity taste, delicate and woody fragrance, and a dry finish that lingers on the palate.
- Day Two: Nath (5.5% ABV), a blend of one- and two-year old Lambic with rhubarb. The copper-colored beer had a glorious jammy nose of rhubarb, and tangy/fruity taste with a bit of salinity and astringency that accentuated the finish.
- Day Three – Saint Lamvinus (7% ABV), a blend of 16- to 18-month old Lambics with Merlot grapes. This burgundy-colored beer had an intense fruity beer flavor, relatively mild acidity, and a long-lingering finish of grape and berry.
With another wonderful Craft Brewers Conference in the books, The Malt Shop Bar was closed, the RahrBSG Village emptied out, and everyone headed home. We had such a blast visiting with attendees, friends, and suppliers for the week, and enjoyed so many great beers. CBC truly is a special time for our community to come together, and we appreciate every one of you who came by to say hello. Let’s do it again next year in Philadelphia!
