New Belgium Brewing Company Cofounder and CEO Kim Jordan has traveled the world in search of great craft beers to enjoy with great brewers. Her globe-trotting dream six-pack pays homage to brewing talents around the world.
You wouldn’t expect the founder of a brewery devoted to popularizing Belgian beer styles to love overly hoppy beers, but Kim Jordan enjoys defying expectations. As a pioneer and leader in the craft-beer market, she’s shepherded New Belgium from humble beginnings in a basement to its current position as the third-largest craft brewer and eighth-largest brewer in the United States. Along the way she’s befriended a cast of world-class and map-spanning craft brewers, so it’s no surprise that that her dream six-pack includes . . .
Pliny the Elder
(Russian River Brewing Company, Santa Rosa, California)
If I’m drinking Pliny the Elder, Dick and I are likely to be drinking it with Vinnie and Natalie [of Russian River Brewing], and the four of us together is always a really fabulous time. It may surprise some, but I love hoppy beers, and when you consider sublimely hoppy American beers, certainly Pliny would be at the top of my list (and probably almost anyone’s). Pliny reminds me of that milieu—the camaraderie of the four of us drinking beer and goofing off, not talking about work.
When we enjoy it, it’s typically over a meal, and we love to prepare big, flavorful things such as barbeque. Cutting that with a nice full-bodied IPA is such a pleasure.
Brooklyn Sorachi Ace
(Brooklyn Brewery, New York, New York)
I’m pretty sure that the first time I had [Sorachi Ace hops] and the first time I had that beer I was with Steve Hindy and Garret Oliver [cofounders of the Brooklyn Brewery], Dick Cantwell [founder of Elysian Brewing], and I think Peter Bouckaert [New Belgium brewmaster]. About eight or nine years ago, we were having a conversation about how breweries can collaborate—wandering through big ideas. On that day we had that beer and that hops profile—lemony, citrusy, and a tiny bit waxy (in a good way). I love that beer. It was an eye-opener to me.
Red & White or Noble Rot
(Dogfish Head Brewery, Milton, Delaware)
I was out to dinner with Sam Calagione [founder of Dogfish Head] and some other brewers. Red & White and Black & Blue had just been released. That was my first experience, I think, with beer and wine together—having wine be a part of the blending and fermentation process of the beer. Not only was the beer terrific, but it was a real [epiphany] to think about opening that whole door of blending the two things for flavor.
And the Noble Rot, I realized while thinking about this, that I really do love saisons. The last time I did a list like this, I had a different saison on the list. Red & White is a Belgian wit base, and Noble Rot is more of a saison base. You get that sort of grape must characteristic that, for me, is really appealing.
Get beer reviews and so much more in each issue of Craft Beer & Brewing Magazine®. Subscribe today!
Duvel Tripel Hop
(Brouwerij Duvel-Moortgat, Belgium)
I’m good friends with the folks at Duvel-Moortgat, and I really respect the way they’ve branded. In Belgium, there’s more of the mindset of “we make beer, we don’t brand,” but they’ve done a really good job of understanding how people like the story of a company and visually connecting with the beer and who the brewers are. They’ve been really masterful at that.
They saw that in the United States, hops were gaining notoriety. They took their really well-made, always consistent, lovely sort of very effervescent, very high-alcohol, and yet very clean beer [Duvel] and played around with it. That’s their flagship beer, and it could have been seen as risky, but I think it was a stroke of genius. I’ve already said that I like hoppy beers, and this year’s combination with Mosaic hops has just been terrific. If I’m drinking that beer, I’m likely to be in their tasting room talking with the crew. That’s always fun.
Gingerbread Stout
(Hardywood Park Craft Brewery, Richmond, Virginia)
I’ve only had Gingerbread Stout once. I don’t typically like sweet and dessert beers, but that was so delicious. You didn’t need dessert because the beer was just so incredible. It’s a young company, and the brewers decided to go ahead and figure out how they could get a local farmer to grow Hawaiian ginger for them in Virginia, and it was delicious. It’s a great story behind the beer and a great beer.
Orval Trappist Ale
(Brasserie d’Orval, Villers-devant-Orval, Belgium)
I hate to be redundant because everyone has Orval on his/her list, but no beer in the world is like it. If I’m drinking it, I’m likely at the brewery, sitting up in the brewmasters’ tasting room, which is kind of at the top of an eave above their commercial area next to where the brewhouse is.
Anne Francoise, their new brewmaster, is one of the first women brewmasters in Belgium, at least at such a revered brewery. One time we were in that room and a bat flew in, which I always felt was some sort of kismet.
My other Orval story is that when my youngest son was ten, he asked me if I could take him to the liquor store so he could buy bottles of Orval for his dad for a Christmas present. I always thought it was kind of funny and sweet that a ten-year-old would know that his dad would really like that as a gift. So we went. I bought it, of course.
One of the other things I love about Orval is that the Brettanomyces in it can often be subtle enough that you don’t think, “Oh, Brett.” You think, “This has a subtext that’s a bit grabby, maybe? Rough, but in a really pleasant way?” The way they do that in a very beautiful and subtle way is one of the pieces of the art form of that beer.