Casks & Caskets – There’s No Other Beer Fest Like It

We’re just a few days out from our city playing host to the most unique beer sampling in the State of Wisconsin. On Saturday, November 2 the Society of Oshkosh Brewers will present Casks & Caskets, a homebrew event for charity. If you love real beer, this is a tasting you should not miss.

Calling this the most unique beer sampling in the state is no stretch. Each of the beers, wines, meads and ciders at Casks will be one of a kind. Unlike the offerings at other beer festivals, you’ve never had any of these beers before. Everything that will be poured has been hand crafted for this event by local hobbyists who have a passion for creating distinctive brews. And these beer won’t be doled out by the sorts of disinterested folks who usually man the tables at beer fests. The people on the other end of the tap lines at Casks will be the people who made the beer. Whether they’re brewers, vintners or both they take an enormous amount of pride in what they’ve made for this tasting. They’ll be more than happy to tell you what’s in it, why they made it and why they would like you to try it. There’s nothing anonymous about these beers. Each of them comes with a story. I know this because I’ll be one of those pouring their homebrew.

Here’s my story: one of the beer’s I’ll be serving is a Farmhouse Lager I brewed with my nephew, Tyler Demge. We made this beer with wild hops I picked in Allenville in September. If you visit this blog from time to time, you may have seen my post about Silas Allen, a hop farmer who in 1846 settled in what is now Allenville. The hops used in the Farmhouse Lager we brewed for Casks were from plants that grow wild on land that was a part of Silas Allen’s 1850s hop farm. It’s very likely that these hops trace their lineage back to the cultivars that Silas Allen planted there more than 160 years ago. Like I said, you can’t get beers like this anywhere else.

Casks and Caskets will take place at the Oshkosh Convention Center on Saturday, November 2. Tickets for the 7 p.m. general tasting are $30 in advance or $40 at the door. There will also be a VIP dinner and tasting beginning two hours earlier at 5:00 p.m.  Ticket information and other details can be found at the Casks and Caskets website.

And here’s a list of some of the beers that will be pouring at Casks. Hope to see you there!