The beer camp bus traveled more than 5,000 miles, attended seven festivals, and poured beer alongside nearly 700 breweries on its journey... and it didn’t break down until it got to North Carolina. When it finally pulled into Mills River, the grand opening celebration of Sierra Nevada’s new brewery was in full swing.
“Sierra Nevada was vocal and intentional about becoming a part of the Asheville community,” says Luke Dickinson, the head brewer at Wicked Weed Brewing. Dickinson and John Stuart of Green Man Brewery were the two representatives of the Asheville Brewers Alliance (ABA) who brewed the Beer Camp collaboration with Sierra Nevada.
“Asheville is a funky place. We wanted the beer to be unique to our region, where traditionally Scottish settlers came to live,” explains Dickinson. So he, Stuart, and the brewers at the new brewery in Mills River wrote the recipe for the Tater Ridge, a Scottish Ale brewed with North Carolina’s state vegetable: the sweet potato.