When the Muddy Pig hosted its first Belgian Beer Festival last September, owner Mark van Wie wasn't prepared for the glut of beer lovers who came crashing through his doors.
"I was shocked," Van Wie said. "I bought all this beer and wondered if anybody would even show up."
Show up they did. Van Wie filled his draft lines -- 43 in all(!) -- with a cornucopia of Belgian styles. The St. Paul pub sold more than 7,000 5-ounce glasses of beer that weekend.
Five months later, he has a new beer extravaganza: The Festival of Hops. This time Van Wie will shift away from Belgians and focus his beer goggles on hoppy beers, famous for their pungent, beautifully bitter taste. Hopped-up beers are the style du jour among beer enthusiasts. Once again he's partnering with beer distributor Corey Shovein to pack 40-plus tap lines with nothing but hoppy beer.
This festival is perfect for the Twin Cities beer scene, which loves locally made craft brews such as Summit Extra Pale Ale, Surly Furious and Bell's Two Hearted Ale (from Michigan).
"This is die-hard hop land," Shovein said. "Summit has really conditioned the market to enjoy hop-forward beers."
Hops are the female flower cone on a hop plant, which sort of looks like a marijuana plant. In beer, the bitterness of hops is used to balance the sweetness of the malt. But before craft brewers were using hops to amp up the flavors, the leaves had a more practical use. The creation of today's most popular hops style -- the Indian Pale Ale, or IPA -- can be traced back centuries to when the British empire was conquering lands half a world away. Brewers found that hops -- a natural preservative -- could keep their beer from spoiling during the long ocean voyage to India. It tasted good, too.
In this country, hoppy beer began its renaissance during the microbrew boom of the 1980s. That's when Van Wie had his first taste. (It was a Redhook beer in Seattle.) "I remember saying 'Whoo ya!' " he said. "And that's what got me into the beer business."
