Cerveza: The First Beerfest for Local Brewers

Festivals are forms of reverance to celebrate times of importance for cultures and societies.

All around the world, festivals are celebrated with various intentions. From the first yield of rice, to the start of the rainy season and definitely, the start of beer drinking season.

Everybody is familiar with Oktoberfest. For today, I’m tackling a different beerfest. It’s name is Cerveza.

Last Saturday (March 8, 2014), was Cerveza, marketed as the country’s first craft beer festival. Organized by UP JMA (Junior Marketing Association), it was held at Circuit Makati, the venue for previous events such as the Wanderland festival.

The festival was a great showcase for the local brewers of the country. The participating brewers during the event were Katipunan Craft Ales, Fat Pauly’s Handcrafted Ales and Lagers, G Point Smorgasboard  and Palaweño Brewery.

From 5 pm to 12 midnight, the beers kept pouring from all of these establishments. It was great to see people taste beers beyond the usual selection.

As the night went on, I was able to talk to all the brewers and get a glimpse of they’re affinity for the liquid bread.

The first brewery that I visited was Fat Pauly’s. As one of the older breweries among the participants, I was familiar with his brews and it was rhe first time for us to meet each other in real life.

Fat Pauly’s brewing philosophy goes with incorporating local ingredients or experimentation into the brews. Some of his brews  infuse coconut (Coconut Porter), local coffee(Sultana Coffee Latte Stout). Other brews follow the standards of other styles such as the Iligan Pale Ale or the Bagpipe Scottish Ale.

Pauly was a great source of information about viewing in the country. He’s based in Iligan and he loves gastronomy as well. Pauly’s personality is evident through his brewing.

The next brewery that I visited was Katinunan Craft Ales. Readers familiar with the blog know that I regularly visit the events where the Katipunan trio participate.

For this event, the Indio Pale Ale and Dear Fred were the brews available on tap. I always recommend having Katipunan Craft Ales’ brews on tap. As with most beers, having the wonder liquid on tap is fresher and better most of the time.

After the two, I got a chance to talk to the brewmaster of Palaweño brewery. It was a great experience for me. Earlier last week, Mr. BooksBitesBrews said that the brewery’s Belgian Wheat Beer was one of the best that he has tasted.

To my surprise, the brewmaster was an alewife (I will tackle this in a future article) and her name was Ayah. It was her first time to showcase her brews to a wide audience.

We also got into the intricacies of brewing (I brewed beer twice in my life) and I was fascinated with her inclination to brew a beer that is considered by most brewers to be hard to do consistently. To add to that, her reputation as a good wheat beer brewer is enough justification for the potential of her brewery.

Last but not the least was G Point Smorgasbord. I’ve always been fascinated with the brewery for they have made craft beer at affordable prices. All their brews were available for the night at only 60 pesos.

The line for their stall never wavered throughout the night. It was great to see a brewery making good beer at accessible pricepoints. Personally, I liked the Black Bitch Stout. The dry and chocolatey flavors were great and the price at 60 pesos is a deal worth every centavo. Morgan, the owner of the brewery, can definitely take my money.

Speaking of Morgan, I was able to talk to him too. I told him that I was going to visit his place one day. It’s a little hard to visit the Ermita area given the high density and high congestion of the area. Hopefully, in the coming weeks, I can cover the brewery and bar of G Point Smorgasbord.

At one point in the night, all the brewers had a celebratory photo for the event. It was great to see the camaraderie of people sharing the same passion for beer.

And for that, it was a great night for beer. More power guys.

Much love from the Beerman.

Out!

For more information about the breweries, check out their Facebook pages:

Palaweño Brewery: https://www.facebook.com/palawanbrewery

GPoint Smorgasbord: https://www.facebook.com/GpointBars

Fat Pauly’s Handcrafted Ales and Lagers: https://www.facebook.com/FatPaulysHandCraftedAlesLagers

Katipunan Craft Ales: https://www.facebook.com/KatipunanCraftAles