Five standout beers from L.A. Beer Week’s opening gala

L.A. Beer Week’s reenvisioned opening gala was held Sunday, and hundreds of craft beer fans took to downtown Los Angeles to sample tastes from more than 50 breweries.

Historically, the official L.A. Beer Week festival has been held at Union Station on the final Sunday of the weeklong celebration of L.A.’s local craft brewers, but this year the fete was moved from the L.A. landmark’s courtyards and gardens to the air-conditioned ticketing hall and moved up to the start of the week.

The tickets were more expensive (up $20 from last year’s $50 cost) and the crowd was smaller (limited to 600 attendees), but the excitement about the beer was undiminished. L.A.’s growing cadre of breweries poured their beers next to guests from places ranging from San Diego to Portland, Maine, offering more drafts and bottle-pours than could be counted.

Here are a handful of standout brews from our time at the festival.

Eagle Rock Brewery - Unity

The official beer of L.A. Beer Week is a “red mild” that uses honey and hibiscus, and the light and easy-drinking brew strikes a great balance between malt, honey, and the fruity hibiscus. I couldn’t get enough of this refreshing beer at the festival, and, at just over 4% alcohol by volume, the beer is made for enjoying multiple pints.

Lips of Faith - Le Terroir

This paradoxical brew from New Belgium Brewery kept getting hushed mentions from festival attendees who managed to score a bottle pour of the dry-hopped sour beer. Typically, sour beers don’t see a lot of hop additions, but Le Terroir uses a hop variety known for big tropical fruit flavors, and the result was refreshing, pungent, and memorable.

Beachwood Brewing + Drake’s Brewing - Mind Melder IPA

Perhaps the stand-out India pale ale of the show, there seemed to always be a knot of beer fans around the Beachwood station even when lines were otherwise nonexistent. Mind Melder features the layered-hop character that Beachwood’s IPAs are known for with Drake’s signature dry and clean finish.

Kinetic Brewing Fresh Hop Torque

“Session IPAs” -- a relatively new hybrid style that brings the hop aroma and flavor of an IPA to a beer under 5% ABV -- have been gaining popularity with brewers and beer drinkers, and this version from Lancaster’s Kinetic Brewing has a resinous and fruity hop punch while staying under 4% ABV. Thirst-quenching and intensely flavorful, the beer was a welcome relief from the stifling afternoon air in Union Station.

The Return of Craftsman

Craftsman Brewing Co is the undeniable forerunner of the craft beer movement in L.A., and the brewery’s absence at last year’s festival was conspicuous. Thankfully, the Pasadena brewery returned for the fifth anniversary of L.A Beer Week in a big way. The Craftsman booth got its own corner of the ticketing hall, and the six (!) taps were manned by founder and brew master Mark Jilg. The brews on offer ranged from the flagship 1903 Lager, to a selection of the brewery’s wood-aged sour beers, to the fan-favorites Tripel White Sage and Oktoberfest.

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