Beverage of the Week - New Mexico Breweries

The modern world is a wonderfully small place - Sierra Nevada, Anchor Steam and even Rouge can be found most anywhere in the country nowadays. In fact, if you sit stationary enough it's quite easy to think that all there is to be had is everywhere at your fingertips....

Ah, but everywhere you trek out far enough there's another brewery you can't find down the trail. Right before I left Indiana I was growing enamoured with People's and Sun King, which I'm willing to guarantee no one outside the state has ever heard of. New Mexico has offered me a whole new bounty of local, privileged appreciation. This week's BoW is both homage and enticement in case anyone want's to visit...

I. La Cumbre Brewing Co.

It's gotta tell you something when a brewery in an out-of-the-way, industrial neck of town fills every seat on a Tuesday night. This is a place that consistently has 1-2 of their beers on cask and specializes in high-alcohol, high flavor beers. Not for the weak at heart, but certainly aimed at my heart. The recent Three-Legged Dog IPA was a 10%+ monster, with a surprisingly mellow hop flavor. My standard is the Malpais Stout, which is drier than most with burnt chocolate notes, really sitting somewhere between a stout and a Baltic porter in my opinion - it sounds rough, but it's amazingly well balanced. As a bonus, they don't serve food so they can stay dog-friendly. I've taken Chester there a couple times now.

II. Marble Brewing Co.

Located a short hike off the strip downtown, Marble is by far the most consistent brewery in town, if not the most interesting. Their IPA is quite nice - the hop-forward without being overwhelming, the sort of IPA you can dig into several glasses of. They have an Irish style strong red that shows up occasionally and is probably their most interesting offering. I hear the white ale is nice as well, but I'm not a white/wheat guy so no commentary from me. Bottom line is this is not the best brewery in town, but it's pretty good and by far the most widely available (right now, they're the only ones bottling for outside sales). It's my local Sierra Nevada equivalent - always tasty and usually an option when faced with a sea of Macrobrewed Pisswiser.

III. Chama River Brewing Co.

Hands down my favorite brewery in town. Their Sleeping Dog Stout is excellent - a nice balance of dark chocolate and rich coffee, but with the bitter notes smoothed out and light bodied enough that I was actually glad when they stopped the 22oz mugs - I'd almost make it through two before Courtney polished off a 16oz pint. Best of all, they have 3-4 rotating taps with seasonals that are often excellent and always interesting. They had a kick-ass Bourbon aged stout last winter, and recently did a very nice Marzen (which you don't see microbrews doing too often). Top that off with an excellent, top-class dinner menu at the main location, and a dig-able, dog-friendly microbar downtown.