Fulton Beer - Tropical Lonely Blonde

Fulton brews a few variations on their original Lonely Blonde, including a Mexican-inspired Lime & Salt version, a lemon Shandy, and this spring seasonal Tropical variant brewed with passionfruit, orange, and guava that is a fan favorite among both the brewery’s customers and the staff. On the pour, we get the same bright golden color and pale foam head as the original, but look for the aroma to indicate this is certainly a different beer. In fact, the aroma will come looking for you. As soon as the beer hit the side of the glass, huge tropical aromas burst forth. Big passionfruit and guava notes jump out up front, with very juicy, fruity citrus notes evoking candied orange. Berry-like undertones appear as well, with notions of strawberry coming through. It’s a trippy beer. In the flavor department, the story continues with those bright and refreshing notes in full effect. The original base blonde ale remains crackery and light on the palate, lifted and invigorated by its crisp carbonation. For pairing options, we’d look to sync up with adventurous tropical and fruity dishes. On the other hand, grilled and barbecued dishes will provide an interesting contrast, with a bit of fruity BBQ sauce tying it all together. Of course, some Hawaiian kalua pork with mac & cheese sounds pretty darn good too. Cheers!

The story of Fulton Beer begins in 2006 with the four folks behind the business—Ryan Petz, Brian Hoffman, Peter Grande, and Jim Diley—starting to homebrew together in Jim’s piddly (and cold) one-car garage. Rest assured, Minnesota gets cold. But that homebrewing inlet, like so many unexpected and fiscally questionable paths into professional brewing, led them in 2009 to start Fulton Beer together. As the story goes: Ryan and Jim were in debt from grad school, Pete and his wife were expecting, everyone else was newly or about to get married... The four had no savings, no cache of brewing connections, and no real industry experience. The circumstances, in other words, were perfect.

In the time since, we’ve been able to watch Fulton Beer grow from a small, contracting brewery into something much more established—and all in spite of the less-than-super-great chances for the whole endeavor. The first keg of Fulton Beer was served at The Happy Gnome out in St. Paul; this was back in late October of 2009. The intrepid four signed a lease for their first brewery in September 2010, which became the first brewery taproom in the Twin Cities. And, having quickly exhausted that production space, they began building a second brewery in late 2013.

Today, the majority of Fulton Beer’s production takes place at their second location: a 51,000-square-foot facility in northeast Minneapolis, about five minutes from their original spot. Today, they brew several year-round brews in addition to a wide array of limited, barrel-aged beers, and sour mixed culture beers, plus a line of increasingly popular hard seltzers. To learn more, visit www.fultonbeer.com.