Looking Back – 2011 at BBAY

Another year is winding down and before we say hello to 2012, we thought we’d say a fond goodbye to 2011 with some of our favorite moments of the past year.  Here at Boundary Bay Brewery, 2011 gave us lots of opportunities to expand on previous successes and was jam packed with brand new adventures as well:

giddy while filling the Dry Fly barrels with Scotch Ale!

* We partnered up with Dry Fly Distillery (in Spokane, WA) to try barrel aging a couple of our beers.  First up was our Scotch Ale which was consumed with gusto and our Oatmeal Stout is currently aging – to be released soon.  The project was a great success and we’re already looking forward to trying more barrel aging in the new year.

* We brewed up our very first Cascadia Dark Ale and cast our two cents in the debate about what to name this elusive beer style.  We still think Black IPA just doesn’t cut it and retain our vote for Cascadia Dark Ale in honor of the region this iconic style was birthed in.

* We jumped in to our first of (hopefully) many Beer vs. Wine dinners at Semiahmoo Resort.  Craft Beer is gaining ground as a food pairing phenomenon and we’ve had a lot of fun challenging Washington wineries like Chateau Ste. Michelle to see which beverage comes out on top.  We’ve got our next Beer vs. Wine dinner on January 28th, so why not make it one of your New Years resolutions to join us and open your mind to the possibilities of beer and food pairings?!

* We began highlighting our Local Connections through short video blogs, which turned out to be a great way to connect our customers and our suppliers.  It’s been inspiring to connect with those who are passionate about what they do, and we’ve enjoyed visiting the farms who grow our food and the great cafés, bars and restaurants who serve our beer!   We’ll start the new year with a behind-the-scenes peek at Ralf’s Bavarian Pretzels and show you exactly why we love working with this awesome local business.

our shirt on the Discovery Channel!

* We came up with some new merchandise to tempt you: a new 2L growler and a Cabin Fever Hoodie.  Our hoodies continue to be known as Bellingham’s unofficial uniform and our Save the Ales slogan is recognized far outside of our little corner of the Northwest.  We hear about our customers being stopped in Disneyland, in New York and even in New Zealand when someone recognizes our iconic shirt.  A lot of you have probably even seen our Munzinger shirt on the Discovery Channel special “How Beer Saved The World.”

* Our relationships with craft beer lovers across the country (and into Canada!) are continuing to grow and strengthen: our beer was officially poured for the first time in Hawaii when we took part in the Kauai Beer Festival, we’ve expanded our distribution into British Columbia which has been received with MUCH enthusiasm and our little brewpub was even written up in the Vancouver Sun, EnRoute: the AirCanada in-flight magazine and the American Airlines in-flight magazine!

* We were honored to find out that Bellingham Firefighters refer to our brewpub as Station 7 (since there are 6 official fire stations here in town) – so, with their input, we created a Station 7 shirt and are donating the proceeds from shirt sales to Camp Phoenix which is a camp for child burn victims.

* We have continued to take full advantage of our own success and to spread that love by doing everything we can to support local nonprofits.  Every year, we donate to over 100 local charities and  this year, for the first time, we became a sponsor of the Dirty Farm Trek – a physical and mental obstacle race put on by the VZ Foundation.

at the St. Patrick's Day Parade, 2011

* The Bellingham Firefighters Pipes & Drums band has, unofficially, become our house band!  We’re delighted that they feel welcome enough here at the brewpub to just drop by for spontaneous performances and entertain our customers with their tunes.

* Our General Manager, Janet Lightner, has been the driving force behind Bellingham’s St. Patricks Day Parade and we were thrilled to help her put on another successful parade in 2011 despite the unfavorable weather.  Amazingly, it’s almost time to start thinking about next year’s parade too!  This year, the 2011 Paddy’s Day Parade will fall on the 17th – St. Patrick’s Day itself, so mark your calendars and plan on a whole day of Irish-inspired festivities.

* We brewed the very first Ski to Sea ESB  – commemorating 100 years of racing and look forward to continuing that tradition next year.  And, the Boundary Bay Brewery women’s Ski to Sea Team enjoyed another win in the Competitive Women’s Division and continues to be the ONLY team in Ski to Sea history to win their division 11 years in a row!

* We are thrilled to have been named the Best Brewery in Washington, the Best Brewpub in Washington and the Best Scotch Ale in the Northwest by the Northwest Brewing News Reader’s Choice Awards and were named the Best Bar in Bellingham by the Bellingham Herald Readers Choice Awards.

* And, the biggest news of all for 2011, is our impending expansion!  We’ll take over the lease of the new space on January 1st and are excited to start the new year with lots and lots of construction.  ;)

As we look back on 2011 and ahead to whatever may come in 2012, we want to take a moment to say thank you to all of YOU – our beloved friends and customers who have become a part of the Boundary Bay Brewery family!  We are so proud to be a part of this incredible community (both Bellingham and the craft beer community at large) and honored to have your support as we move on to another year of handcrafted beer and great local food.  We truly couldn’t do what we do without you.  Cheers, from all of us here at Boundary Bay Brewery!

Barley Wine Food Pairing

One of our brewers here at Boundary Bay Brewery has a lovely wife who hails from The Heartland.   His Mother-In-Law came to visit recently and we sent a few bottles of our Barley Wine back to Iowa with her and asked her to take it to Jay Wilson, a fellow beer blogger whom you may be familiar with through his blog Brewvana or his recent side project: Diary of a Part-Time Monk.

Old Bounder, our Barley Wine brought home a 2011 Gold Medal from the North American Beer Awards and we wanted to share some with our pal back in Iowa.  The beer ended up on the Brewvana blog where Jay recommended pairing it with a Midwestern classic:  Beanie Weenies.  Seriously!  Check out the whole article here where he describes why the combination works so well.

Now, being a Northwest brewery, we don’t get much call for dishes like Beanie Weenies.  And I’m not sure we’d have ever come up with this beer and food pairing, but that’s what is so cool about craft beer.  It can work in a multitude of ways.  Recently, at one of our Brewmaster’s Dinners out at Semiahmoo Resort, our Old Bounder took the high road and was paired with Fig Tart with chèvre filling in a walnut crust with caramelized figs and  grand marnier.  And we’ve even made our own gelato, here at the brewery, with our Old Bounder…but those are classic barley wine pairings.

Barley wine has strong flavors of it’s own and easily overpowers most main dishes.  It’s common to see it matched up with strong cheese or dessert.  Think of it more like port – a great after dinner drink on it’s own, wonderful with stilton and walnuts or with something rich and sweet like chocolate torte.  And, apparently, it’s great when paired with fatty dishes that make you want to scrape your palate clean (Jay’s words, not mine!).

So we wondered, what other regionally specific classic flavors are out there that would pair well with our Old Bounder?  Tell us which dishes are classic flavors for you and how the big, bold flavors of Barley Wine compliment them.  We’d love recipes too, if you feel like sharing!  Cheers.

BBAY Brewery On The Go

Busy people don’t need beer any less.  In fact, one could argue, they need beer even MORE!  Luckily, we’ve got a mobile version of our website that allows you to access all our vital info on your phone wherever you are.  We’ve been tweaking our website a bit too, to make finding what you’re after even easier.

Now, if you’re not right here in Bellingham at our brewpub, but you’re suffering from a hankering for a pint of Boundary Bay Brewery beer, you can search by city for where to find our beer on tap or in bottles.  And if you already know WHERE to get your hands on our beer, check our awards page to find out which awards the beer you’re drinking has brought home.  You can search by beer, festival or even year!

If you head to our website on your phone you should be automatically redirected to the mobile version of our site.  But, if you’re not, you can always click on the mobile phone icon in the top left corner of our home page.  Once you’re on the mobile sight, you’ll see a bunch of icons. We’re gonna give you the low down right here in case you’re confused.  And, if you’re on the go and you need a quick reminder of the icons, just click on the question mark in the bottom left corner of the mobile website to access this same information.

    Call the Brewery or Restaurant.

    Send us an Email. info(at)bbaybrewery.com

    Find us on Google Maps. 1107 Railroad Ave. Bellingham, WA 98225

    See what’s on tap. Click on a beer style for a description.

    Our event calendar. Click on a highlighted day to see all the events for that day.

    See our full menu, descriptions, and prices

    Subscribe to our podcast on itunes.

    Operating hours are listed here.

    Visit our Facebook Page for great info about what’s happening at the brewery.

    Follow us on Twitter, for real time updates on events, what’s on tap and more

    Read our blog for an in-depth look at brewery related events

    Subscribe to our RSS feed to see most of the brewery events listed in one place.

    Need beer to go? Here is the scoop.

    We have a brand new Cask Engine. Learn about Cask conditioned beer

    Find our beer in Seattle, Spokane, Everett, etc with this list of our outlets.

    Everything that is Happy Hour is listed here

    The Boundary Bay YouTube channel. Stay entertained during a boring flight.

The Best of 2010

It’s hard to believe, but another year is already drawing to a close and it’s got us in a reflective mood over here at Boundary Bay Brewery.  So, today…we’re looking back!

Cheers to our 15th Anniversary!

2010 marked our 15th anniversary and we had a fantastic party here at the brewery to celebrate!  We ranked as the largest selling brewpub in the nation for the third year running and were voted the Best Brewpub in Washington by the readers of Northwest Brewing News – also for the third year in a row.  The Northwest Brewing News Readers choice awards also named Boundary Bay Brewery for Best Scotch Ale and Best IPA…which makes our IPA the winner for the last five years consecutively!

In 2010, we brewed our first Tripel, made an anniversary ale called “15” and created a special brew to help celebrate the 30th anniversary of Village Books…and all were met with rave reviews! We got a new Mash Tun and installed our very first beer engine which now lets us provide our thirsty customers with not one but TWO cask ales every day.  We brought home medals from the North American Beer Awards, the Great American Beer Festival and the World Beer Cup:  Silvers for our Dunkles Bock (WBC) and our Porter (NABA) and Bronzes for our Cabin Fever (WBC), Imperial IPA (WBC) and Imperial Oatmeal Stout (GABF).

our logo come to life in St. Paddy's Parade!

We had the pleasure of helping over 100 local nonprofits and in bringing the community together for Bellingham’s first annual St. Patrick’s Day parade (thanks to Janet, our General Manager!).  We had a Locks of Love donation party with free haircuts in our beer garden and brought together lots of local and sustainable businesses for our very first Earth Day Sustainability Fair.  We surpassed 10,000 fans on Facebook, held our first (possibly THE first ever?) Virtual Brewers Night and took back the tap as the House IPA at Beveridge Place Pub!

And, besides all that, we’ve kept on keeping on…brewing and bottling all our usuals that you’ve come to know and love, serving up fresh and local Northwest food, hosting events here at the brewery throughout the year and doing our best to help keep Bellingham a strong, local, sustainable community.  It’s been a whirlwind and we’ve had a fabulous time!  We just want to say thank you to all of our incredible fans who are such an important part of what we do.  We could never be a success without the love and support we receive from our community.  So, cheers everyone…and thank you!

 

 

You Be The Judge Of Our GABF Beers

The Great American Beer Festival is happening this weekend and we know that not everybody can take a week off and fly to Denver to take part in this holiest of beer festivals.  So, for those of us left behind, we’re pouring our GABF beers this weekend here at Boundary Bay Brewery!  We’ll have Pilsner, ESB, Imperial Oatmeal Stout, Dunkles Bock and Cabin Fever on rotating taps throughout the weekend…starting Friday morning.  Taste them all or just the out of season faves like the Cabin Fever.  Judge them for yourself and tell us which gets your vote for the gold!  Cheers.

Medals at the World Beer Cup

Brewers from six continents earned awards from an elite international panel of judges this week in the 2010 Brewers Association World Beer Cup—the world’s largest-ever commercial beer competition. The eighth bi-annual competition announced awards to brewers from 19 countries ranging from Australia and Italy to Iceland and Japan.  This year, 642 breweries from 44 countries and 47 U.S. states vied for awards with 3,330 beers entered in 90 beer style categories. The entries in each category were eligible for gold, silver and bronze awards. Judges presented a total of 268 awards.  And three of those awards went to Boundary Bay Brewery!

We are happy to announce that our Imperial IPA was awarded a Bronze Medal as was our Cabin Fever.  And our Dunklesbock brought home a silver medal!  We’ve got all three of these medal winners on tap now, so come try a pint or two!  It’s always an honor to compete against the best beers in the world, and to bring home a medal is just icing on the cake.  We think it’s amazing, as a small local brewery way up here in Bellingham, to be getting consistent attention on an international playing field.

We count our biggest successes, though, right here at home.  Boundary Bay Brewery was awarded the 2009 Small Business of the Year by the Whatcom Chamber of Commerce and was voted the Best Brewery in Washington for the last two years by the readers of Northwest Brewing News.  We’ve always placed a great value on having strong connections in our community.  We think it’s important to be a place that feels like home to our customers as well as to our employees.  Maybe that’s because we’re a family owned and operated business.  We’re happy to see locals feel that way too!  Check out what the 2010 Spring Entertainment Guide for the Cascadia Weekly had to say about Boundary Bay Brewery:

“One could easily say you can’t be a proper Bellinghamster without logging the requisite number of hours inside Boundary Bay.  But that’s not the case.  In order to truly be considered one of us, you must know the number of pints of the brewpub’s tasty but deceptively potent award-winning beer you can consume without succumbing to drunken foolery.  You also must know what your favorite menu items are and what nights you like to drop in to hear some of the plentiful live music that takes place there.  And when you realize you now spend your holidays at Boundary (everything from St. Partrick’s Day to New Year’s Eve comes to mind) instead of with your own family, that’s when you’ll know you’re here to stay.”

Whether at home or afar, it’s always nice to know that others like what we’re brewing. We’ve always brewed what we like to drink and it’s important to us to do it our own way.  We might not follow traditional style classifications, but we brew beers that we believe in.  We’re thrilled to add these three new awards to our collections.  Please visit our website to view the complete list of Boundary Bay Brewery’s awards.  Cheers!

Hops vs. Malts in the National IPA Championships

Brewing News is holding their 3rd Annual National IPA Challenge.

As with last year, participating IPAs from across the nation have been randomly chosen for a 1:1 single elimination bracket tournament. Winners of the first round will advance to the next. The events will be held at beer festivals across the nation, beginning February 14, 2010 and the judges will all be brewers!

Round 1 is on Valentine’s Day in Syracuse, NY.

Our opponent in this first round is the Marin IPA from Marin Brewing Co located in Larkspur, CA. This should be an interesting match-up as our Boundary Bay Brewery IPA is all about the hops and Marin describes their IPA as having “more malt than most.”

Team: Boundary Bay Brewery
Player Stats: A honey-amber colored India Pale Ale with good body, fairly strong alcohol content and an aggressive “fresh hop” quality. A very refreshing beer, IPA can be enjoyed by itself for its many interesting flavor highlights. It also goes well with lighter foods like chicken, pasta, seafood or spicy foods.
ABV: 7.4%
IBUs: 67.5
Original Gravity: 1.074
Hops: Centennial, Amarillo, Cascade, Crystal

vs.

Team: Marin Brewing Co.
Player Stats: Dank West Coast IPA with more malt than most.
ABV: 6.8%
IBUs: 70
Original Gravity: 1.068
Hops: Cascade, Columbus, Centennial

Wish you could play along?  Well, you can!  As with last year, IPA lovers will be able to choose their winners for each round on-line.  Log on to the website to see images of each beer and read their brief descriptions.  Then pick your poison…fill out the brackets with who you think will come out on top!  Prizes will be awarded for readers with correct NIPAC brackets.

The top prize will be a free case of the 2010 NIPAC championship IPA!! And if that’s not enough of a reason to play, then maybe you just don’t love craft beer like we do!

Results of each round will be posted on-line within twenty-four hours of each round. Final results and winners will be published on-line and in the April/May 2010 issue of Brewing News.

Best Brewery in Washington!

Big news for our little brewery!  We were named the 2009 Small Business of The Year by the Bellingham/Whatcom County Chamber of Commerce last week.  And, earlier in December, we were awarded Best Brewery in Washington State by the Readers Choice Awards in the Northwest Brewing News publication.  These particular awards matter a great deal to us because they represent what the people who support our business think of what we do.  We have been fortunate to win many beer awards and each of those medals signal a triumph in the craft beer community.  But the awards we’ve received this month, reflect our connection to our community of customers, neighbors, friends and fans who make it possible for us to keep doing what we do. We have always tried to make strong connections with our customers and our community…in the hopes of making Bellingham as a whole a stronger community.  These awards make us feel like we’ve succeeded in doing just that.  Thank you, from all of us here at Boundary Bay Brewery.  And cheers!  (great image of our brewery posted on a Bellingham blog by lizziviggi.)

Voted Best Brewery in Washington State

We are oh so happy to announce that Boundary Bay Brewery has just been named the Best Brewery in Washington State by the Northwest Brewing News 2009 Readers Choice poll!

Each year, the publication asks hundreds of readers to vote online or by mail for best beer, best homebrew store, best bartender, best beer store, and best brewery…among many, many other categories.  We are honored to receive these awards, particularly because they are from the readers of Northwest Brewing News.  These are the people we make our beer for, the people who come in on a regular basis and sample our craft.  Sure, we brew beers that we like to drink, but with Reader’s Choice awards like this, we get to see that we brew beers that YOU like to drink as well!  And that really, really matters to us.

We want to extend a heartfelt thank you!  Not only to those who voted in this Readers Choice poll, but to all of our loyal customers, friends and fans who have supported us through the years.  We opened our doors in 1995 and have been lucky enough to have been a part of a supportive, involved community since the very beginning.  While our mission has always been to brew craft beers that are excellent examples of classic styles, it has always been equally important for us to have a strong connection to our community.  I think there’s a reason Boundary Bay Brewery has been dubbed “Pure Bellingham.”  And that matters a whole lot to us!

The official results will be printed in the Winter issue of Northwest Brewing News which comes out January 17th.  Click here to subscribe online!

Got Cabin Fever?

October is already over and cold weather seems to be upon us.  But don’t despair!  Our Cabin Fever will officially be on tap Friday, November 6th. This winter warmer has a dark red-brown color and a rich malty flavor that will complement your favorite spicy dish or any rich, hardy meal.

Specially brewed and bottled for the Pacific Northwest winters, this beer has been cold conditioned for a smooth, dry-hopped flavor.  Made with Mt. Hood, Warrior and Crystal hops, this big beer has a 7.2% alcohol level and is deceptively strong!  Just the thing to ward off the dark nights and cold weather. Our Cabin Fever has won a number of medals including a silver medal at the 2008 World Beer Cup (also won a bronze medal at the 2006 WBC!), the gold medal at the 2004 NABA, a bronze medal at the 2002 GABF, and a silver medal at the 1999 GABF.

Hurry down to the brewery on November 6th to grab yourself a pint of the long-awaited Cabin Fever.  Try it with our Mac and Cheese (everyone’s favorite!), our Hummus plate or one of Ralf’s soft pretzels if you’re looking for something a little lighter!

And, if you just can’t wait for the OFFICIAL release, join us for our Thursday Cask Night Happy Hour on November 5th.  We’ll be tapping the very first keg of our Cabin Fever for a little pre-release party!  Cheers.

Luckily, for those who don’t have the luxury of hanging out at the brewery as much as some of us, Cabin Fever will be available in 22 oz. bottles on Wednesday, November 25th!