E78 Screwing Around with Aaron Sleger

Home Brew Rock Stars Podcast

Festivals are happy places, and you don’t really want to enjoy them on your own.– Christine and the Queens

Welcome back to Home Brew Rock Stars Episode 78. Festivals are back…oh yea! In this episode we bring back our longtime friend and cofounder of Rockford IL Screw City Beer Festival Aaron Sleeger to talk about the 2021 Screw City Beer Festival coming back after being shit canned due to the COVID mandates of 2020.

Aaron is the ideal person to organize a craft beer festival. He is a graduate of Ray Daniels Cicerone Certification Program , resident beer guy at our sponsor Artale & Co and a genuinely great dude that has his finger on the pulse of the Chicago and Illinois area craft beer scene.

The guys and Aaron talk about the upcoming Screw City event (is this the 10th or 11th annual?), the cancelling of the 2020 event, temporary changes to this year’s festival, who’s the new breweries coming in and the old favorites that will be back and the anxiety of who was making the cut. We sampled some beers from breweries that will be at the festival this year. They are in no particular order…

2nd Shift Brewery's Liquid Spiritual Delight - This is a hearty 11.5% Imperial Stout with great flavor and enough body that I think you can chew it

Pig Minds Brewing Cherried Enough – also an Imperial Stout (10% ABV) except this one has cherries in it. Plenty of chocolate and cherry to remind us of a chocolate covered cherry candy… Nummy!

Spiteful Brewing Co G.F.Y. Coffe Stout – Another dark one that has some great coffee flavor that is not overbearing and a respectable but sneaky 8% ABV.

So grab a couple of beers, settle in and check out the show! And if you are one of the lucky ones that scored tickets to this year’s Screw City Festival stop by the Forest City Brewers tent and say ‘High’. Sears will have a beer on tap there named Tangerine Dream.

If you have not figured it out WE LOVE BEER and if you have a homebrew that you would like us to try and review on the podcast contact us and we will make arrangements to get it into our thirsty hands.

Big thanks to our program sponsors Pig Minds Brewing, Artale & Co, and 815 Gardens and Brewing for all their suds and support, we love you guys!

Looking for a great craft beer and some of the best vegan food in the state line? Try Pig Minds Brewing. Seeking a hard to find commercial craft beer, wine or spirits to take home or as a gift? Stop in to Artale & Co, Anthony and Aaron have plenty of great suggestions. Looking to jump into indoor gardening? Stop in to 815 Gardens Bob will be happy to help.

Tell them that HomeBrew Rockstars sent ya.

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Prost! #drinkitup