On Saturday I stopped by Denver’s newest brewery, Hogshead Brewery. Located just North of Sloan’s Lake in a repurposed 1950’s gas station, Hogshead will focus on English ales - with an emphasis on cask conditioning. While a few breweries in town have begun offering cask conditioned beer (namely Copper Kettle and Dry Dock), the only place that served traditional English ales on cask was Pints Pub… until now.

Operating on a 7bbl system, Hogshead has only just now begun brewing on their own equipment. Prior to this week they had been brewing at Copper Kettle Brewing Company, who have the luxury of a little extra fermenter space after a recent upgrade.

Technically Hogshead is still in their ‘soft opening’ period with fairly sporadic days and hours that they’re open. The goal is to maintain three beers on tap while offering them on CO2 and cask - an ESB, English Bitter, and Porter. All three beers have an ABV below 5.5%, a stat typical of traditional English ales.

Lake Lightening, their English Bitter, was only available on CO2 during my visit but I enjoyed it nonetheless. True to style with moderate bitterness and a very clean, dry finish. I look forward to trying this on cask.

Chin Wag ESB was available on both CO2 and cask, but after trying it on cask I couldn’t get myself to order it on CO2. I absolutely loved this beer. It was extremely creamy with a nice malty backbone and just the right amount of bitterness. You know it’s a good cask ale when you’re constantly wiping it off your mustache.

Sadly, the Gilpin Black Gold Porter was out on both CO2 and cask but since they’re not even technically open yet it’s hard to get upset. I will definitely be back to sample their other beers and I’d highly recommend you do the same. While an opening date still hasn’t been posted, you can find tentative days/hours on their website.