The one benefit to being behind on my blog is I get to visit new local breweries multiple times, allowing me to sample a decent selection of their beers, before I finally get around to writing up their posts. Take Standard Brewing, for instance, the first brewery in Seattle’s Central District neighborhood. I visited them four times in 2013 and now have a respectable amount of tasting notes for a solid post. Then again, they just recently tapped a couple new beers that I want to try, but if I did that it would postpone this post even longer. It’s a careful balancing act, this beer-blogging. Anyway. Standard is very much a nano-brewery, utilizing pretty much every nook and cranny of a funky corner of a small building. In addition to the usual array of beers (well, usual for Seattle, I suppose), they also make a couple low-alcohol regional/folk brews.

Standard Brewing: from kettle to glass — Seattle, WA

Rob’s Picks
• Bee’s Wine – 2% – Ginger honey goodness. Really, really refreshing.
• Pale Ale – 6.1% – Tropical fruit aroma and flavor. Bit of floral hops, too. Good malty base with caramel on the finish, as well as some bitterness.
• Rye IPA – 6.5% – Good “frothy” mouthfeel. Malty with citrus and tropical fruit hop flavors. Subtle rye undertones. Solid but not big.
• Imperial IPA #1 – 9% – Floral aroma and flavor. Fairly strong maltiness with bit of a biscuity finish. Good bitterness.
• CDA – 9.5% – Roasty malt aroma. Great roasty flavor and underlying bitterness. Light but interesting lingering flavors.
• Wheated Red – 6.1% – Bready and caramel maltiness. Light, but with a touch of chewiness. Subtle spicy hoppiness, and even more subtle floral. Really drinkable.
• Tepache – 3% – Sugar-based, pineapple fermented beverage popular in Mexico. Sweet but not overly so. Has a bit of a balancing alcohol edge to the flavor even though it’s only 3%. Cinnamon and clove, too, for extra flavors to think about. Awesome post-bike ride drink.
• Beet Ale Juice – 5.5% – Made by a guest brewer, with mosaic, willamette and amarillo hops, as well as beets. Great citrus and piney aroma and flavors. Beet earthiness is an interesting mix that, despite my initial wariness, worked quite well. Pretty light on the tongue, too.

The Rest
• Saison – 7% – Made with Dupont yeast and grapefruit peel. Fairly strong banana/clove and citrus/grapefruit flavors. Complementary floral hop flavor, as well. Somewhat bitter finish.
• West Coast IPA – 7.3% – Citrus aroma. Some citrus flavor, some bitterness, big malt backbone. Hint of sugary sweetness in lingering finish.
• Imperial IPA #2 – 8.6% – Grapefruit citrus aroma and flavor, with a bit of pine. Some biscuit and caramel malt backbone. Big bitter finish that blended back in pretty well, but a bit too bitter for me.

It’ll be interesting to see how Standard grows. They’ve already taken over the space above them and turned a parking spot in the small lot into a year-round beer garden/patio. I’ll just have to keep visiting to find out, I suppose.