GABF 2024: Ryan’s Top 40 Beers
Most of our thoughts on this year’s Great American Beer Festival in Denver are contained in our podcast episode (along with interviews from a few folks responsible for some of the beers below), but I’ll sum it up here: the new layout was a bit chaotic and not optimized for quickly locating any brewery, but the themes brought something of a new energy to a fest that was desperate for an update. Considering this was my 8th year attending the festival in person, I have to say that this year was as fun as those early years and didn’t feel stale in any way. But if there’s one constant every year at GABF, it’s the ridiculous number of outstanding beers available for all attendees, and very few of these had lines to wait in for any longer than a minute. So without further ado, here are my Top 40 beers from GABF weekend, separated by festival pours and brewery visits.
Ryan’s Top 36 Beers from GABF 2024
36. Pure Nonsense | Imperial Stout w/ cacao nibs, marshmallow, graham crackers, and lactose | Dade City Brew House | Dade City, FL | 10.9% ABV
With so many incredible beers to choose from on the GABF floor, I’m usually not going to sacrifice my taste buds on a lot of pastry stouts. But this is the gold medal-winning pastry stout for this year, and it does an excellent job mimicking a s’more with a full and coating mouthfeel that never goes beyond a comfortable level of sweetness. The marshmallow and chocolate take the lead, but an almost cinnamon-like graham cracker note comes in halfway through that helps bring it all together.
35. Fresh Hop Double Wanderlust | Double IPA | Breakside Brewery | Milwaukie, OR | 8.4% ABV
Breakside is one of those brewery groups that I’m extremely jealous of Oregonians for having as locals, especially around hop harvest time. They make a lot of killer fresh & wet hop beers, along with making just about everything else exceptionally well. This beer smells like pungent cannabis and has notes of sweet citrus, candied grapefruit, and sticky pine.
34. Salt Creek Citra IPA | American IPA | Gruner Brothers Brewing | Casper, WY | 7.7% ABV
This was a somewhat accidental discovery, as we had a side quest at GABF to drink a beer from every state we’ve never had a beer from in the past. Although we didn’t get all 50 states covered, this was a delightful surprise of an IPA. It’s vibrant in flavor and aroma, pushing out some of the usual tropical and citrus notes, but also adding in notes of watermelon candy and honey cracker. It’s got a good amount of bitterness, and if this was my local IPA, I’d be extremely satisfied.
33. BOYCOTT ULINE | American IPA | Cloudburst Brewing | Seattle, WA | 7% ABV
The folks at Cloudburst aren’t playing around here, and if you read the writeup on this beer, it’s literally two paragraphs pointing out that the billionaire CEO of Uline is one of the top donors to anti-abortion and pro-gun legislation around the country. And I quote from Cloudburst, “SERIOUSLY F*** THIS GUY.” They also offer links to alternate companies that offer similar services, so it’s worth going to their website to seek those out if you’re in a position to need something like that. Anyways, the beer is also very good – a combination of sharp citrus and pine resin atop a decent malt sweetness.
32. Wild Riot | IPA blended w/ Oak-aged Golden Ale | Strangebird & Prison City Brewing | Rochester, NY & Auburn, NY | 8.2% ABV
When we talked with Eric Salazar of Strangebird, formerly a barrel-aged sour master at New Belgium and Other Half, he was psyched about the possibilities of “blended IPAs” – which he clarified are not Sour IPAs. Instead, the idea is to take the possibilities of juicy IPAs and blend them with the complexities of oak-aged sours, and this beer is a perfect proof of concept. It’s certainly unlike any IPA or Sour IPA I’ve ever had; it’s far more complex with tannic barrel notes mixing in with notes of pink grapefruit, orange pith, and a touch of herbals. It’s really something to behold.
31. Spudweiser | Potato Adjunct Lager | Live Oak Brewing & Hold Out Brewing | Austin, TX | 5% ABV
The literal first medal of the GABF awards ceremony – a bronze for collaboration beer – was given to this one from two of our absolute favorite Austin breweries, so it was a real treat to see these crews be the first to cross the stage. As much as I’d like to say it “tastes like potatoes,” that would be stretching the truth a bit – and frankly, I don’t know if I want that. It certainly had an “other” character that was hard to pin down despite being familiar, and in the end, it was just a perfectly crisp and clean lager that shreds its namesake into tiny little strips of hash browns.
30. Alma | Oak-aged Farmhouse w/ Brettanomyces & peaches | Von Ebert Brewing | Portland, OR | 6.2% ABV
This is another case where the beer that brought me to the booth ended up taking a backseat to a different option. Though their Volatile Substance IPA is an exceptional example of the Pacific Northwest-style West Coast IPA, this delicately tart and funky saison really sang for me with its bright peach character, notes of wet hay, and slight tannic oak notes that help lead it to a sublimely dry finish.
29. Interiority (2023) | Imperial Stout aged in whiskey barrels w/ cacao nibs & vanilla beans | Trap Door Brewing | Vancouver, WA | 14% ABV
The only brewery with two beers on this list, Trap Door was completely new to me prior to this year’s fest – and here’s to hoping they’ll be GABF regulars far into the future. This is one of those stouts that makes you turn to the rest of your group and mouth “wow” over the din of dropped glasses and Luchadors being slammed down into the ring. It’s a chocolate-dipped marshmallow with a slight whiskey aftertaste – all soft and sweet yet balanced in the end.
28. Superpower IPA | American IPA | Comrade Brewing Co. | Denver, CO | 7.3% ABV
I first tried this beer back at GABF in 2014, and it really opened my eyes as to how Denver’s IPAs can be just about as “West Coast” as actual West Coast IPAs. This one still holds up beautifully, all grapefruit, orange pith, dank weed, and resinous pine – it’s a quintessential Denver IPA in my mind.
27. Delicate Defiance | Rye Brett Saison w/ blueberry & lavender | False Idol Brewing | North Richland Hills, TX | 7% ABV
We had great experiences with a few of False Idol’s barrel-aged dark beer blends last year, and this beer shows off their versatility with two fairly challenging ingredients. Blueberry is so often a “miss” in my experience that I was pleasantly surprised that this one gives off just enough of the sweetness without any weird medicinal or artificial candy notes. The lavender brings out the floral and rye bits of the saison just perfectly and avoids tasting like a bar of soap. The name makes total sense to me now.
26. Dragontail IPA | West Coast IPA | Icicle Brewing Company | Leavenworth, WA | 6.7% ABV
This beer won a gold at the World Beer Cup this year, and that was why I set my sights on it. It’s a real juicy and fruit-forward take on a West Coast, with notes of melon, citrus, and stone fruits up front and an even-keel malt character that gives it a bit of weight before the moderately bitter ending.
25. Cafe Deth 2024 | Imperial Oatmeal Stout aged in bourbon barrels w/ coffee | Revolution Brewing | Chicago, IL | 14.8% ABV
This was a booth surprise along with this year’s Deth by Bramble as they weren’t “officially” pouring, and it dispelled any notion I had that Cafe Deth could never eclipse the Supermassive version. Certainly, this one has a bit less of the coffee, but the Deth base really shines alongside the barrels. Sweetness hits the front of the palate before expanding out in the middle to give it a full and chocolate-forward character. The end is where the slightly vegetal, evenly bitter coffee beans come in and dry it out to the point of no residual sweetness.
24. Fresh Hop Green Battles | American IPA | Pinthouse Brewing | Austin, TX | 6.3% ABV
This was my first Fresh/Wet Hop beer I tried at GABF this year, knowing that Pinthouse has built quite a reputation around seasonal hop harvest beers down in Texas. And this Amarillo wet-hopped IPA (with a myriad of other hops involved) really sings with peach, mango, and other tropical fruits along with dank notes of cannabis and resinous pine.
23. Utopias Aged on Cherries | American Strong Ale/Doppelbock | Samuel Adams/The Boston Beer Company | Boston, MA | 28% ABV
This is one of those experience beers – if you can even call it a beer – and in my past experience, it’s always been unbearable in its abrasive booziness. That doesn’t deter hundreds of people from jumping into line for a pour, and we were lucky to be able to sample this one without much of a wait. I was really taken aback by how much more drinkable this was than what I remember. Certainly, it leans closer to a cocktail than a beer, but it surprisingly reminded me more of a Cherry V.S.O.J. from Revolution and finished somewhat easy. I’d drink this one again, as long as I don’t have to drop $200 on a bottle.
22. Small Giant | Grisette | True Anomaly Brewing | Houston, TX | 4.4% ABV
Labeled as a “Summer Saison” and described as their “Little Saison,” I kind of wish True Anomaly would embrace the Grisette designation, which is what this actually is. I get it, though – most consumers have little experience with Grisettes compared to Saisons. And this does carry a lot of those great Saison notes – citrus and banana bubblegum esters and a touch of pepper phenols – but it’s lighter, more effervescent, and drier in the end.
21. Tripel | Belgian Tripel | Allagash Brewing Company | Portland, ME | 9% ABV
Maybe one of the first American takes on a Tripel I ever tried, this one still stands far above just about any other I’ve had since. This in no way was influenced by us riding the high of finally getting Rob Tod on the podcast (well maybe, kinda, sort of) – it also took home a silver medal this year. Like other great Tripels, this one’s ABV warms the back of the cheeks and chest while still being bright, floral, and fruity. It has a touch of sticky honey and passion fruit flavor in the front half, but the palate is dried out by the end.
20. Neu! Pils | German-style Pilsner | Hold Out Brewing | Austin, TX | 5% ABV
I thought this had a real shot at taking home a medal this year, but it still holds the honor of taking a gold at this year’s Texas Craft Brewers’ Cup, edging out the legends at Live Oak (with whom Hold Out took a GABF bronze this year for an excellent potato adjunct lager collaboration called “Spudweiser” – see above.) This delightful pilsner has a simple cracker and biscuit base on which the hops lay all sorts of lovely citrus and berry notes, and the effervescence of the mouthfeel helps lead this one to a crisp and dry ending.
19. Robust Porter | Robust Porter | Reuben’s Brews | Seattle, WA | 5.9% ABV
Reuben’s booth is always a must-stop for me, and an honorary mention goes to their Three Ryes Men at the Heavy Medal taproom, a decadent barrel-aged rye wine that drips with caramel and bits of chocolate and spicy pipe tobacco. But that beer has a whole medal pedigree, so I want to shine a light on this excellent chewy porter that drinks bigger in flavor than the ABV suggests, all roasty chocolate and licorice with a smooth dry finish.
18. Perle Haggard | German-style Pilsner | Ex Novo Brewing | Corrales, NM | 5.1% ABV
Director of Brewing Operations Dave Chichura is someone who has overseen massive scale-ups of beers from the likes of Oskar Blues and Melvin (just to name a few), and his involvement with New Mexico’s (by way of Oregon) Ex Novo made me seek them out. This pilsner previously medaled at GABF, and it contains those straw-like and grainy notes of a classic German-style while leaning into a floral and earthy noble hop character.
17. Fonio | Belgian Blonde | Russian River Brewing Company & Brooklyn Brewery | Windsor, CA & Brooklyn, NY | 5.65% ABV
Knowing the story behind this beer and the collaboration that made it possible certainly helped my appreciation for it, but if I had it while knowing nothing about it, I’d still put it on my list of highlights. Fonio is a West African grain that grows in harsh conditions, and the great Garrett Oliver of Brooklyn Brewery has worked with some of the top breweries in the world to help show off what the grain can do for beer in addition to its environmental and philanthropic benefits. It’s certainly fruity and doughy in a unique way, and the way it interacts with the light esters of this Belgian Blonde brings out a lot of brightness along with a touch of peppercorn and clove.
16. Celebration | Fresh Hop IPA | Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. | Chico, CA | 6.8% ABV
Ok, admittedly it seems redundant for me to heap any more praise upon this one, a beer that’ll occupy my fridge from basically late October (or whenever it’s released) through January. But this year’s Celebration that was pouring at GABF was weeks old, dripping with sticky fresh hop goodness. Though Sierra beers famously hold up very well in the bottle or can, having a super-fresh version of one of my all-time favorite beers was a wonderful experience.
15. Coconut PVW23 Medianoche | Imperial Stout aged in bourbon barrels w/ toasted coconut chips | WeldWerks Brewing Co. | Greeley, CO | 13.5% ABV
The WeldWerks booth is like the North Star of the fest – it helps to orient yourself in relation to its location. But it’s also a bit of a black hole, because coming anywhere near it will cause you to be sucked into the line for pour after pour. This wasn’t our first pour; it had to be the Soy Sauce Barrel-Aged Sushi Gose which was paired with an exquisite rice ball. That beer, odd as it was, worked very well for a weird food-inspired gose experiment – something WeldWerks excels at annually for the fest. This Medianoche variant, aged 41 months in 23-year Pappy Van Winkle barrels with toasted coconut, is smooth and rich, sticky without being cloying, coconut-forward without being oily. It’s another stellar entry in one of the best barrel-aged stout series in the country.
14. Hell Yes! | Helles Lager | The Austin Beer Garden Brewing Co. | Austin, TX | 4.5% ABV
This might be the best Helles in the country (although our local Goldfinger Brewing might like a word…), and we’d had it from the can before for a Patreon-only Low ABV. But having this amongst the panoply of flavors on the festival floor was an oasis of pure, crisp, honey biscuit-forward refreshment.
13. Nightmare Fuel | Imperial Coffee Stout | River North Brewery | Denver, CO | 12% ABV
Between both River North booths at the fest, this beer was the “session” option, as everything else was higher in ABV, and many were barrel-aged. This was a straight shot of espresso on a body of brownie, and though I love a great barrel-aged coffee beer, this was pure concentrated flavor with no oak to dampen the edges.
12. Hand of Josh | West Coast Pilsner | Highland Park Brewery | Los Angeles, CA | 5.8% ABV
We Midwesterners seem to be just finding out about “West Coast Pilsners” as a style, and this one from GABF’s Brewery of the Year is a stellar medal-winning example. It’s bombastic in its hop flavor and aromas, but it stays true to the pilsner in its light notes of grain and supreme drinkability. If you already like West Coast IPAs, have dabbled in Cold IPAs, and even scoffed at the term “India Pale Lager” despite ordering one – then West Coast Pilsner is the next style to seek out.
11. The Rusty Nail (2024) | Bourbon Barrel-aged Oatmeal Stout w/ licorice and cinnamon bark | Fremont Brewing | Seattle, WA | 14.1% ABV
Admittedly, I was a bit “stouted out” at GABF this year, so I wasn’t going to booths to try many big, sticky, barrel-aged dark beers. But this one totally got me. It reminds me of the early 2010s salad days of BA Abaraxas and BA Mexican Cake and basically any stout that was rich, barrel-forward, and a bit spicy. It’s dark chocolate-dipped snickerdoodle with a little licorice kick and a good amount of booze burn that dissolves into a smooth finish.
10. Anniversary Two | Dry-hopped Barrel-aged Sour Saison | Mythmaker Brewing | Fort Collins, CO | 6.7% ABV
Though their brewer landed on our radar due to a Count Chocula-inspired beer when he was at now-closed Black Bottle, it was evident from their booth that Mythmaker is showing off a variety of styles made extremely well. Their 2nd anniversary dry-hopped BA saison was a late-Saturday session choice and amazingly stood out despite whatever palate fatigue I was experiencing at the time. Floral, grassy, and fruity up front, the combination of hops, oak, and souring bacteria made this one deeply complex, offering up some slightly puckering tartness upfront that leads to a dry finish.
9. White Label Mai Tai P.A. | West Coast Double IPA | Alvarado Street Brewery | Monterey, CA | 8.5% ABV
This imperial version of their multiple medal-winning Mosaic-focused IPA takes everything good about the original and makes it better. That’s not always the case when turning a single into a double, but this one turns up the fruit melange of berries, passion fruit, lychee, and pithy grapefruit alongside a sticky and resinous herbal character. But be sure to sit back and enjoy the explosive aroma before it disappears from your glass.
8. Sacred Tree | Saison w/ Patagonian pepper | Phantom Farms Brewing | Cumberland, RI | 8% ABV
This new-to-2024 brewery hired a husband-and-wife duo of award-winning brewers from Chile, and this saison uses Patagonian pepper to pay homage to their home region. On one hand, there are classic saison notes of fruity esters, bubblegum, and an almost wheat-like graininess. Deeper study brings out the spice from the pepper alongside some more herbal and floral notes, and the way they are balanced in the recipe makes you forget it is 8%.
7. Rode Vogel | Flanders Red | Strangebird Brewery | Rochester, NY | 7.2% ABV
This brewery landed on my list the moment I discovered that they had hired Eric Salazar as the head of their cellar. At a time when a lot of breweries are scaling back their sour programs, Strangebird made an investment in one of the architects of American sour beers, as Mr. Salazar was crucial to shaping the wood and barrel-aged sours that came out of New Belgium over the past two or three decades. This Flanders Red is classic, rooted in those flavors reminiscent of Rodenbach: sour cherries, red wine vinegar, grape skins, and tannic oak. It’s slightly sweet, sharply tart at times, and dry in the finish – and Strangebird will be in town for FoBAB, so our locals might get a chance to try it.
6. Chosen Family | Extra Special Bitter | Lady Justice Brewing | Englewood, CO | 5.5% ABV
A well-made ESB is a real treat, and this one delivers on all fronts. It’s a malt-first beer with notes of caramel, toasted walnut, and honey drizzled over fresh-baked biscuits. Then there’s a decent bitterness from a grassy and earthy hop that helps clean off the palate and leaves you wanting another. My only regret was not trying more from this brewery.
5. Fresher Than Fresh | Fresh Hop West Coast IPA | Trap Door Brewing | Vancouver, WA | 7% ABV
GABF is always better when it aligns with hop harvest season, because the glut of fresh and wet hop beers, many straight from the Yakima Valley area, are not to be missed. This beer took home the gold for Fresh Hop beers, and it’s absolutely dripping with herbaceous and dank Mosaic hops that also give off notes of overripe berries and tangerine. The whole Trap Door booth was maybe my Booth of the Fest – I sampled everything they had and walked away truly impressed.
4. Decorah Nordic Gruit | Gruit-style Ale w/ Juniper berries, rosemary, bay leaf, black walnuts, bog myrtle, and toasted caraway seeds | PIVO Brewery | Calmar, IA | 5.8% ABV
Head brewer and co-founder Craig Nuezil has a peculiar way of filling out his taplist. He also has an impressive medal collection, so he’s certainly on to something. PIVO, located about 10 miles from Decorah, doesn’t brew any flagships, and Craig bases releases around whatever yeast he’s currently employing in other brews. The closest thing to a taproom staple is this gruit – a style that almost no one makes. PIVO’s version of a gruit, with a forest floor’s collection of ingredients, just won its fourth GABF medal. It’s certainly earthy, floral, and a tad funky thanks to all of those ingredients, but the baseline beer is very easy-drinking, somewhere in the range of a sessionable saison.
3. Charles’ Kvass | Kvass-style Ale w/ cherries and rye bread | Burns Family Artisan Ales | Denver, CO | 3.5% ABV
On the subject of rare styles to see on the GABF floor, no one else that we know of brought a kvass. Wayne Burns and Laura Worley run a pretty adventurous brewery to begin with, but often, it’s with their above-20 percent barrel-aged beers. This one is a 3.5% peasant beer that originates in 10th century Russia, named after the brewer that has had a bit of an obsession with the style over a decade of experimentation. Think lambic-esque tart cherries up front before the graininess and flavor of dark rye bread keep it from getting sweet in the end.
2. Righteous Son | Blended Barrel-aged Old Ale | The Lost Abbey | Vista, CA | 12% ABV
As usual, the whole Lost Abbey booth is a highlight, with a wider variety of styles this year that deviated slightly from their usual lineup of legendary sour ales. This barrel-aged old ale is blended with a small percentage of stout, and it shows in its smoothness and drinkability. This beer is all maillard brown sugar and cigar boxes with caramel candy and a touch of nuttiness.
1. Smol | Barrel-aged Mixed-Culture Table Beer | Milieu Fermentation | Aurora, CO | 2.7% ABV
For a beer to stand out as my “beer of the fest” amongst literally hundreds of options, it has to check a few boxes: it has to be memorable to the point that just seeing the name enacts an aroma/flavor memory; if I had the chance I’d jump to drink it again; and it has to do something unique from the rest of the beers pouring. As far as I know, no other booth was pouring a sub-3 percent table beer, let alone one that was aged in oak for a year with lavender bark and wildflower honey. The first reaction to this was checking the ABV again, because both aroma and flavor suggested something much bigger. This beer carries a lot of classic saison character from the subtle notes of grain and fruity esters, but the floral touch from the lavender adds a vibrant complexity to mix with the notes of oak without ever tasting like soap. Co-owners Rob and Andrew will be back in their home state of Illinois for this year’s FoBAB, and you can expect to try this beer and fall in love with it like we did.
The Best Four Denver Brewery Beers I Had in 2024
4. Business Sox | New Zealand-style Pilsner | Jagged Mountain Craft Brewery | 5.1% ABV
The bar at Jagged Mountain on a Saturday evening was lively, but not packed, and several welcoming regulars were engaged in great conversation. It felt like the type of place you’d want around the corner from your house, with a varied beer list that also featured craft seltzers and ciders. Business Sox is sweetly fruit-forward and it gives off a heavy dose of lime and tropical fruit, but it finishes crisp and clean like a classic pilsner.
3. Polotmavý Ležák 12° | Czech Amber Lager | Cohesion Brewing Company | 4.7% ABV
Literally a “half dark lager,” this beer at the new industry hotspot for traditional Czech styles has some toasted malt character, slight notes of honey and flowers, and an endlessly easy finish. It’s amazing to see how this has supplanted Bierstadt, somewhat, as the “must-experience” Denver spot, and it’s not just due to traditional pouring methods. The quality of beer absolutely backs it up.
2. Chin Wag | Extra Special Bitter | Hogshead Brewery | 5.8% ABV
Speaking of “traditional pouring methods,” the hand-pumped cask beers at Hogshead have been a required part of our Denver trip since the very first time we visited the taproom in 2017. I also rarely skip getting Chin Wag as my first pour, as it shows off the beauty of what a cask can do to the mouthfeel of a toffee-tinted, moderately bitter ESB. The sip is long and satisfying, as the finish seems to go on for days. I’ve humbly kept my vow to never go to Denver again without a trip to Hogshead (especially after stuffing myself and walking from Hops & Pie).
1. Diablo Colorado | Belgian-style Strong Golden Ale | Bruz Beers | 9.5% ABV
There are two Bruz locations, and if you’re in for the festival, Bruz Off Fax is the location that’ll be the shortest rideshare trip. I couldn’t stop recommending this place to anyone who listened, and I’d be remiss to not thank listener and friend Ryan Lamb for pointing us in this direction in the first place. The Colfax location has only been open since 2019, so I shouldn’t be too mad at myself for missing out on this Belgian-focused brewery until this year. This particular beer is bursting with notes of baked pears, pink peppercorns, clove honey, and a warming, almost floral-like booze finish. It reminds me of one of my all-time favorite local beers: Dæmon by the late, great Lo Rez Brewing. But more than that, the space here is gorgeous. It’s very unassuming upon approach, but there are multiple levels inside, including a sunken bar with a few intimate booths just behind the seating area. The outside patio is colorfully adorned with comfortable seating options, and a separate shipping container bar – with heaters for the winter and a whole separate bar for special occasions, has no shortage of seating options. We drank a few other beers here and all were stellar, so now we have to work this into our already jam-packed yearly routine.
