By the CN&R staff
Chico is at the heart of America’s craft brewing story. When Ken Grossman and Paul Camusi launched Sierra Nevada Brewing Company in 1980, they couldn’t have known the business they were starting in the city would trigger a beer revolution across the Golden State and into the Pacific Northwest. Today, there’s nearly a thousand craft breweries selling bottles between San Diego and Seattle, though locals can still spend their days sipping at Sierra Nevada’s Chico tasting room on East 20th Street, tipping back those hop-forward and citrus-bright creations in the setting where it all started.
Given that Sierra Nevada did its trail-blazing with Pale Ales and Indian Pale Ales, it’s not surprising that such styles of brews have become dominate forces in most West Coast taprooms. In fact, IPAs are now so entwined in California culture that even brews with flavor profiles in the same stratosphere – especially pilsners – tend to enjoy broad popularity in our best gastro-pubs.
These days, it’s not uncommon to walk into craft breweries across West and Southwest to find menus entirely dominated by IPAs, pilsners, lagers and sours. Some great beer-making operations skip on producing stouts and porters all together.
But what about beer fans who are in love with the darker side of things?
In 2007, FiftyFifty Brewing in Truckee started showing what California beer-makers could do when taking inspiration from the Irish stout tradition exemplified for generations by Guinness and Murphys. FiftyFifty’s Eclipse barrel-aged imperial stout started a kind one-brewery rethinking of dark pours across the Sierra’s mountain-scape. Ever since, stouts have been slowly getting their own foothold in California and Nevada.
And now they’re also gaining ground in Chico thanks to Ramble West Brewing.
The business was opened a year-and-a-half ago by Brian Smith and Ryan Eley. Its tasting room has an clean rustic vibe, the atmosphere accentuated by its long live-edge wood bar and ruby camping lamps that are lit overhead. The venue hosts weekly activities, including Chico table tennis nights, trivial on every Wednesday and live performances from musical acts like Randy Morton and the Exit Route Jazz Combo. However, for lovers of thick, sable beer, it is what’s featured on Ramble West’s menu that really stands out. In addition to IPAs, Citra Pales, hazies and Mexican lagers, it has a trio of outstanding dark brews ready at the tap.
The lightest of the three is Ramble West’s Oatmeal Stout, the blackness of which is perfectly balanced as it radiates vanilla notes, hints of cinnamon and a soothing, satisfying essence of malt. This is a brew that almost any fan of darker beers is likely to go for.
Last October, Ramble West celebrated its first year in Chico by releasing a stout that’s aged in whiskey barrels. They simply call it The First Anniversary. This nuanced brew has a simmering chocolate center, light pings of peanut butter and the faintest hint of smoke on its malt effect. It’s big and bold and taste like a foam-topped creamy beer desert.
Ramble West also came up with a rift on The First Anniversary that adds a slight, sweet, refreshing zing, amounting to what the brewery calls its Peppermint Stout. That’s an offering that has its own collection of devotees.
The city of Chico continues to be a California beer hub, and Ramble West seems determined to help write the next glowing chapter on that front – doing it partly with the darkest of stuff.
Ramble West Brewing is located at 849 West 8th Street in Chico and can be found on Facebook and Instagram at ramble.west.brewing
Be the first to comment