Baerlic Brewing and Loyal Legion Collaborate On Old Bald Farts

For Immediate Release – Baerlic Brewing and Loyal Legion Beer Hall will hold back-to-back release nights Thursday and Friday for a collaboration beer based on a 21-year-old recipe from Baerlic sales manager Jim Parker’s first brewing job.

Old Bald Farts is a hoppy strong ale Parker first brewed in the winter of 1995 at the short-lived Dimmer’s Brewpub in Fort Collins, Colo. This year’s version is 8.6 percent alcohol by volume with a pronounced hop bitterness, flavor and aroma. The copper-hued beer doesn’t fit neatly into any beer style. The original batch was listed as an “ESB on steroids.”

“Back in 1995 Colorado – when it was just called Old Bald Fart — this was a fairly extreme beer,” Parker says. “In 2016 Portland, it’s not far outside of the mainstream.”

Loyal Legion’s Herb Apon, who shares both chronological and follicle similarities to Parker, came to Baerlic’s brewhouse to participate in the brew to celebrate Parker’s one-year anniversary as Baerlic’s sales manager.

“Herb had been after us for months to do a collaboration brew and we could never pull it together,” Parker explains. “But when we set the brew date for Old Bald Fart and I ran into Herb the next day, one look at the top of his head and I knew this was the perfect collaboration.”

Baerlic will release Old Bald Farts in their taproom at 6 p.m. Thursday. Loyal Legion will release Old Bald Farts the next night with a mini-tap takeover.

This isn’t the first time Parker has resurrected his namesake beer. In 2006, he brewed a batch at the New Old Lompoc brewery when he and Lompoc owner Jerry Fechter were co-owners of Oaks Bottom Public House.

“Even though the beer was originally brewed in the aftermath of a particularly bitter breakup, it’s still one of my favorite beers,” Parker says. “And after 21 years, I think it still holds up.”

Parker and Apon observed a 21-year-old tradition on brew day: They brewed “Parker style.”

“I used to insist that whenever anyone came and brewed with me we had to do a hot Scotchie (wort and single malt Scotch) at the start of the brew day and a shot of Jameson’s with each hop addition,” Parker says. “Old Bald Farts has a hop addition every 15 minutes during a 60-minute boil. It’s a good thing Herb and I were only tasked with milling the grain, stirring and emptying the mash tun, while (brewer Sean) Rubbo did all of the real work.”

After this week’s releases, the beer will be on tap at Baerlic’s Taproom, Loyal Legion and a few other select accounts. In about three months, Baerlic will release a barrel-aged version, aged in a Bull Run Distilling Oregon Single Malt Whiskey barrel.