Founder Jim Mills packages Caldera's first bottled beer

Ashland, Oregon’s Caldera Brewing has added a new dimension to their craft beer repertoire, a line-up of seasonal craft brews soon to hit shelves for distribution…in bottles. A pioneer in canned craft beer, Caldera is the first Oregon brewery to can their product since the craft beer revolution. Beginning with their brightly hopped Pale Ale and now also selling their India Pale Ale and Ashland Amber in cans, the brewery has won over the hearts and taste buds of several Northwest beer lovers. Now, with the help of Green Bottling, who works with more than 17 Northwest craft brewies, Caldera will feature a special seasonal line-up of beers in 22-ounce bottles. Known as “the Kettle Series,” this rotating assortment of brews, according to brewmaster and founder Jim Mills will feature eight different beers annually.

Brewpublic recently visited Caldera Brewing’s new taproom in beautiful downtown Ashland, Oregon. There we met with founder and head brewer Jim Mills to learn more about one of Oregon’s best breweries that resides a stone’s throw from the California border. Caldera is Oregon’s first microbrewery to can its own beer and has aadding to the bold flavor profiles to give them a seemingly cult following around Beervana.

A recent visit to Fort George Brewery in Astoria revealed five new things about the brewery. Since some of this news is premature and there are not any details, this will be a short and sweet post that will share some exciting news to come from Fort George.

First, lets start with the news that can be experienced right now.

Fort George has some new fancy growlers available at the brewery for purchase. Now you may be wondering what new beer could you fill your growler with. Well, the Spank Stout was just released and it is delicious. The Spank Stout used 40 pounds of habanero, jalapeno and anaheim peppers and starts as a mellow full bodied slightly chocolaty stout and slowly grows to a spicy finish that leaves the palate warm and wanting more.

Oskar Blues: A canned beer pioneer

The first thought that leaps into many folks’ minds when they hear the phrases “canned beer” or “beer in a can” is the proverbial old swill that Pa used to drink after a hard day of work.  Perhaps quite fitting for this Pa character to be sittin’ in his favorite arm chair in a wifebeater watching the boob tube, or out on the porch counting cars.  These days the perception of Pa and his metal-clad accessory is changing thanks to breweries like Oskar Blues Brewing Company of Lyons, Colorado, who started hand-canning their flavorsome microbrews in 2002 and haven’t looked back since.  With full-bodied craft offering such as Dale’s Pale Ale, Old Chub Scottish Ale, and Gordon, a double red IPA, the microbrewer was the first of its kind to can its product. From those days of two-at-a-time hand-canning, OB first thought the idea of putting a “bold, hoppy pale ale” in a can to be humorous and claim it made them “laugh for weeks.”  This pale ale named after main man Dale Katechis changed a lot of misconceptions about canned brews.  Says Katechis: “We discovered that the belief that cans impart flavor to beer is a myth. The modern-day aluminum can and its lid are lined with a water-based coating, so the beer and the can never touch.”  The use of cans on quality brews serve other advantages over bottled brews.  “Cans, we discovered, are actually good for beer. Cans keep beer especially fresh by fully protecting it from light and oxygen. Our cans also hold extremely low amounts of dissolved oxygen, so our beer stays especially fresh for longer. Cans are also easier to recycle and less fuel-consuming to ship.”  Today, the Oskar Blues is still hand-canning their delicious beer, but with a more advanced mechanism that allows for five cans at once to be filled and sealed.