By Tiney Ricciardi
Pegasus News
The unrelenting wind and near freezing temperatures Saturday were enough to make any sane person hunker down at home, given said person didn’t enjoy craft beer.
Fort Worth’s second annual Untapped festival took over the outdoor venue Panther Island Pavilion this weekend, bringing with it a slew of tasty brew and great music. Comparatively, this year’s fest could have been more enjoyable had the vendors been selling hats, gloves and scarves — and they would have made a killing — but you could still count the successes.
For one, Untapped invited some of the most creative brews to date. Austin-based Jester King Brewery revealed its Cerveza de Tempranillo, a beer so exclusive it was listed simply as “A Beer So Awesome We Can’t Even Tell You” before the fest. The 9.4 percent alcohol-by-volume brew takes nearly one year to properly make because it ferments with California tempranillo grapes and wild yeast, which sour the beer. Its purple hue warned drinkers of its champagne-like taste, though not of its magnificent and pungent bite.
The Jester King representative pouring Saturday said enough people preregistered to buy the beer online that the 1,500 bottles (750 mL) produced sold out in less than 24 hours.
Southern Tier Brewing Co. of Lakewood, N.Y., served another highlight: the Crème Brulee, a vanilla bean-infused stout that smelled and tasted like its eponymous treat. The sultry combination of a thick body and little carbonation manifested as dessert in a glass — dangerously delicious.
Cocktail enthusiasts would have been pleased stopping by the Widmer Brothers Brewing Co. (Portland, Ore.) tent for a sample of Gentlemen’s Club, an old-fashioned-inspired ale brewed with cherries and oranges, which gave it a distinct pre-Prohibition flavor.
The Untapped festival also succeeded in the way of music. Though crowds were sparse when the gates opened (I can’t blame them for waiting out the rain), local acts Sam Lao and Quaker City Night Hawks catered tunes at the afternoon’s prime time and inspired dance parties that forced people to forget about their frozen toes. By the time California-based rap duo People Under the Stairs hit the stage, standing in the bathroom lines took serious commitment and some did so preemptively, sipping samples as they waited.
After nightfall, however, crowds thinned quickly as the wind blew ravenously and the temperature continued to drop. The most that festivalgoers could do was drink coffee-flavored beer and pretend they were sitting in a toasty café listening to indie music over the speakers. (This reporter had to leave briefly and warm up due to lack of feeling in hands and feet.)
A respectable amount of hopheads and music lovers toughed it out, though. Headliner Allen Stone shared his body-rocking blend of blues, rock and soul with a couple hundred, as did British rockers The Joy Formidable, whose lead singer Ritzy Bryan didn’t seem to mind the chill in just a dress and tights. There was a sort of pack mentality throughout the remaining attendees, who gathered close using one another as wind barricades.
Eight hours after Untapped began, I sat in my hotel room waiting to regain feeling in my extremities and wondering if the experience had been worth it. Despite the weather, the festival was organized, the vibe was solid and music was energetic. Plus, the beer was cold.
Tiney Ricciardi writes for Pegasus News.