Hoppy Beerthday Sierra Nevada

Tuesday marks the 25th anniversary of the beer that has probably been the most successful beer at converting macrobrew drinkers to becoming craft brew drinkers. Sierra Nevada's Pale Ale was first brewed on November 15, 1980. To celebrate we will have $1.25 pints.
Sierra Nevada was founded by Ken Grossman and Paul Camusi who built a brewery from dairy tanks, a soft-drink bottler, and equipment salvaged from defunct breweries. Though the equipment was secondhand, they created a first-rate microbrewery in 1979 in Chico, California. Unlike macrobreweries, the ingredients they used were premium, including the copious quantities of hops that would become the brewery’s trademark. Before starting the brewery, Ken was actually one of the countries first homebrew store owners. In a way Papago has followed a similar path with having grown from Gunn Brew and if you have had our Hopfather or El Rojo Diablo you know that we also like to use copious amounts of hops (actually about 3 times the amount of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale).
Sierra Nevada Pale Ale was a unique interpretation of a British Pale Ale and it became so popular that it eventually became known as it's own style, American Pale Ale. The major differences between an American Pale Ale and a British Pale Ale is that most American Pale Ales use Cascade hops that provide it with it's fragrant bouquet and spicy flavor, they have maybe just a tad more alcohol and the yeast used produces a 'cleaner' tasting beer that is less fruity than British Pale Ales. An interesting fact about Sierra Nevada Pale Ale is that they use two other hops for bittering, Magnum and Perle, and just use Cascade as a finishing Hop. I think many brewers believe that they must use Cascade hops only when trying to make a clone of Sierra Nevada. The yeast used by Sierra Nevada is one of the more popular strains of yeast used by brewers around the country and it is even referred to as Chico yeast.
Sierra Nevada Brewing is one of the larger microbreweries in the country now with totally modern equipment and who are one of the larger breweries who try to be environmentally friendly with recycling and energy conservation. They produce over 600 times more beer than Arizona's largest brewery Four Peaks (Four Peaks and all Arizona breweries are limited to just 10,000 barrels a year at one location by crazy Arizona liquor laws). Remember this paragraph because I might be reporting a change in the Arizona brewing scene in a couple of weeks if a deal closes between a couple of different Arizona breweries.
Happy beerthday Sierra Nevada Pale Ale.
Ron