Nimbus Brewing Company - Nimbus Red Ale

This brew presents an attractive medium amber color with good clarity and nice crop of foam from an aggressive pour. Look for a prominent aroma of caramel, along with notes of toasty bread, nuttiness with a bit of a hazelnut bent, and a wisp of cocoa powder. Some toffee and apple can be found here too, accompanied by light earthy and herbal hop notes that overlay the malt core. On the palate, Nimbus Red Ale offers a variety of well-integrated flavors while packing a pretty big malt punch. Big caramel, bready, toasty notes bring along a bit of residual sweetness that helps contribute a nice, smooth roundness to the medium-full body. We picked up hints of red fruit and some floral, herbal hop tones, while the hop bitterness is enough to provide some balance while allowing the sweeter, maltier notes to still claim center stage. Nimbus actually cold-conditions this red ale like a lager, which helps augment the beer's impressive smoothness. In fact, this ale reminded a few of us of some of the more malt-forward German Märzens (Oktoberfest beers). Enjoy this brew with brats or burgers off the grill, or a roast beef sandwich. Cheers!

Nimbus Brewing Company opened for business in the spring of 1996, and like most brewing companies struggling to get a foothold in the beer industry at that time, production was miniscule at first, totaling just 200 barrels that first year. But, as the craft beer industry began to pick up some steam, Nimbus found plenty of welcoming customers for their beer in Tucson and throughout Arizona. In June of 2000 James Counts joined the business as Managing Partner and oversaw a significant brewery expansion including the installation of a top-of-the-line 35-barrel brewing system. Fast forward to today and Nimbus has grown into the largest brewery in Arizona, although they're still quite small for a regional brewer with production of just over 22,000 barrels per year. That might sound like a lot, but even in the world of craft beer it's fairly small; many other regional craft breweries produce hundreds of thousands of barrels per year.

Under Head Brewer Scott Schwartz, Nimbus has brought home numerous awards, including silver medals at the World Beer Cup for both of this month's featured beers. The brewery makes a point of acknowledging the groundwater of the Tucson area, which happens to be very hard and very similar to the water of England's famous brewing town, Burton-on-Trent. It's a perfect water for brewing ales, and the only treatment the brewery performs is charcoal filtration for purity. Plans are in place to install a reverse osmosis system to give them the ability to remove the minerals in their water supply, opening up the option of brewing lager styles with the kind of soft water found in central Europe.

For more information, visit them at www.nimbusbeer.com or call 520-745-9175.