Brewery Introduces its First Lager, a New Line-up of Seltzers and an Pale Ale Made in Collaboration with Ocean Beach Brewery
Tasting Room Features Décor Donated by the Ocean Beach Community
SAN DIEGO (May 4, 2020) – California Wild Ales, San Diego’s Sour House, and the city’s only all-barrel-aged American sour brewery, today announced the opening of its new tasting room in Ocean Beach, California located at 4896 Newport Ave. Starting May 4, the tasting room will be open to the public and offer a wide selection of its barrel-aged sour ales featuring local and seasonal fruit, as well as the brewery’s first-ever lager, a variety of seltzers and a pale ale made in collaboration with Ocean Beach Brewery.
The new tasting room in Ocean Beach is an expansion for the brewery and will be an extension of its existing Sorrento Valley, California brewery and tasting room. The tasting room will be open Sunday.-Thursday 12:00pm-10:00pm and Friday-Saturday 12pm-12am. The new location has a capacity of 49. Upon opening, the tasting room will be open with limited capacity due to Covid-19 restrictions.
The fun and funky tasting room features a number of art installations by California Wild Ales co-owner Bill DeWitt. CWA was able to source pennies from the OB community to create a copper penny floor, which took over 150 hours to complete. The backsplash of the draft system was created using Legos which were also collected from friends and neighbors in the OB community. In addition, wood planks from Ocean Beach, including old pallets and fences, adorn one of the walls as well as ornate mirrors, following the same style of the Sorrento Valley location.
“Designing the new tasting room and creating it the way we wanted was a dream come true and a true community effort,” said Bill DeWitt, co-owner of California Wild Ales. “Everyone pitched in to help and a number of community members donated everything from wood, pennies, legos, and old mirrors. This was truly a community effort.”
Bill continued, “We have a very clear vision: to be a place where people come to celebrate life in San Diego’s funkiest neighborhood. It’s also exciting to offer an expanded range of beverage offerings including seltzers, and beer flavored beers. Our collab with OB Brewery should be ready in the upcoming weeks.”
In an effort to offer patrons a wider variety of ales beyond sour beer, California Wild Ales partnered with Samantha Olson, head brewer at Bivouac Ciderworks, to create our very first lager for the new Ocean Beach location. The new lager uses mostly German pilsner malt with a small addition of white wheat and Hallertau Blanc and Saaz hops. The result is a crisp and semi-sweet ale with a slight bitterness. A great beer for any moment.
“We are truly humbled by the outpour of support by the OB community and are extremely excited to introduce Ocean Beach visitors and locals alike to our unique sour ales, “said Zack Brager, co-owner and founder of California Wild Ales. “At the same time, we are happy to now offer ‘clean beer,’ and seltzers, giving people several options and helping to create a welcoming atmosphere for everyone.”
The brewery’s new tasting room in Ocean Beach will offer a wide variety of beers on tap including some of its most popular such as Pineapple Upside Down Cake, Carlsbad Blueberry made with blueberries from The Flower Fields in Carlsbad, CA, Rosé made from grapes from Summer’s Vineyard in Escondido, and a number of other small batch beers made with local fruit and ingredients. The brewery will also introduce new beers regularly on an ongoing basis.
The California Wild Ales brewery and tasting room in Sorrento Valley is located at 4202 Sorrento Valley Blvd., Ste. L and is open Wednesday and Thursday 12:00-3:00pm PST and Friday, Saturday and Sunday 12:00-5:00pm PST. Customers can visit: www.californiawildales.com or call (855) WILD-ALE or (855) 945-3253 to place orders in advance.
In addition, California Wild Ales can ship its beer to Alaska, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Florida, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and New York.
About California Wild Ales
California Wild Ales, San Diego’s Sour House, is San Diego’s only all barrel-aged sour brewery. It began creating fresh and funky sour beers in 2015 and opened its tasting room in 2018. The brewery’s sour beer is aged in American, French, and Hungarian oak barrels for a minimum of nine months and uses fresh, seasonal produce from local San Diego farmers resulting in a refreshing, tart flavor profile and depth often associated with fine wine. The brewery uses mixed and wild fermentation methods using probiotic yeast and bacteria strains including Lactobacillus, Brettanomyces, and Pediococcus. For more information, visit: https://www.californiawildales.com/
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