Scarlet Lane Brewing Company | Monster Bash 2018

A birthday is always the best excuse to pull out all the stops: you put on your flashiest duds, invite all your friends, serve some terrific punch.

Eilise and her crew at Scarlet Lane did all of those things yesterday for their 4th Anniversary Monster Bash. From the coffin in the back converted into a tapline, to the lights in the Bride of Frankenstein’s hair, the whole place was decorated for the spookiest party in town. Art vendors brought their horror-themed paintings, and there were food vendors too.

And as for the punch, well, Scarlet Lane makes a mean brew. In addition to their regular lineup, that coffin was full of special anniversary beers. They also had tapped a Coconut Dorian especially for the party!

I started my day on the bigger side with the Dracula. That sucker was hunting me from the moment I saw it on the menu. This is not a lighthearted mead, for sure. It’s thicker than what you would find at New Day–the addition of barley really gives it some oomph. And the cherry finish is there, but mellow. I liked this, but definitely wanted something lighter afterwards.

To conquer that need for a more fresh taste, I switched to Scarlet Lane’s Gin Barrel Tiberius. Any time I see something aged in gin barrels, I have to try it–gin people are the best people, in my opinion. Where bourbon aging adds that dark sweetness to a beer, aging a beer with gin seems to brighten it, and marries the juniper with the hop spice for all kinds of floral wonderment. Tiberius is no exception to the rule, and, in fact, may be my favorite experiences with gin-barrel aging. This beer was exactly what I was looking for on that sunny spring Sunday.

The final full beer I ordered for myself was The Bride: a pale with a fantastic mix of grapefruit and ginger. There was some sort of spice at play here with the ginger and it was delightful. To be honest, I wasn’t going to order this one myself, but I had one taste and was HOOKED. It was absolutely delicious and I almost wished I had ordered it first–except that then I may never had tried anything else!

I did manage to snag a few tastes from others, I have a blog to write, after all! The Coconut Dorian, beer of the day, was something I knew I would not be able to drink a full pint of, however, it was a really solid beer. And I mean…you couldn’t see through it at all. HOLY SHIT the coconut in this baby was intense. I liked it a lot more than I thought I would–I was expecting pina colada coconut and this was more like a Samoa cookie.

The Asteria Australian IPA was fresh and hoppy, while the Whiteaker Haze was almost straight pine. Even for someone who typically likes that flavor profile (aka gin), it was too much for me. I also managed to sneak a taste of the Bourbon Barrel Erik, which was an interesting contrast compared to the Dracula I’d had earlier in the day. It was ALL bourbon, and I didn’t think it tasted as thick as the cherry booze.

The IndyCraftBrew team was out in full for the party, and it was amazing to finally get to meet the team behind our posts. Mike, Matt, Mark, Mick….there’s a theme there…and then Erikaa and myself. We had such a great time drinking, laughing, getting to know each other. The best thing about beer is the community it brings together–perfect strangers can hang out all day and be friends by the end of it.

Happy Anniversary Scarlet Lane. Here’s to four years of amazing beers, and many many more. Keep being spooky and doing things differently than everybody else!

Scarlet Lane Brewing Company LLC

7724 Depot St.

McCordsville, IN 46055

317-336-1590

https://www.scarletlanebrew.com



**Full disclaimer: The Indy Craft Brew team was provided VIP bracelets for free beer for the event. All opinions of the beer we drank are our own.**