Learn & Discover
Learn & Discover
Pinvitational: Welcome to the first cask beer festival in Texas
It’s early March in Austin, Texas, just days into the city’s flagship visitor-driven event, the South By South West (SXSW) cultural festival. The sun is shining as it should be, and in a busy downtown beer garden, tables of Stetson-clad, Western-booted drinkers are passing on the festival to line up in front of racks of cask beer, filling their branded miniature English pint glasses with an array of pin, firkin and gravity cask pulls from across Texas and the US.
Photos by Justin Brummer
Ruvani de Silva
A travel-loving beer writer,with a host of bylines, Ruvani blogs about beer in Central Texas and beyond, as Craft Beer Amethyst. A vocal advocate for diversity, equity and inclusion in beer. As a British South Asian woman living in Texas, Ruvani brings a unique voice to the world of craft beer.
Mexican Lager: A History of Colonialism, Adaption, Appropriation and Ascendence
What springs to mind when you think of a Mexican lager? Sinking your toes into gorgeous smooth white sand as you recline on a beach in Cancun or Puerto Vallarta with a Dos Equis or Pacifico? Stuffing a lime down the neck of a Corona or Sol in a student bar? Or sipping a Modelo or Victoria over plates of sizzling fajitas? In the UK, Mexican lagers might lack the enormous popularity and ubiquity they enjoy Stateside but it’s likely that most beer drinkers will have encountered them sufficiently to have their own idea of what to expect when ordering one.
Ruvani De Silva
A travel-loving beer writer,with a host of bylines, Ruvani blogs about beer in Central Texas and beyond, as Craft Beer Amethyst. A vocal advocate for diversity, equity and inclusion in beer. As a British South Asian woman living in Texas, Ruvani brings a unique voice to the world of craft beer.
Pinvitational is the first cask festival in Texas – hosted by local breweries Acopon Brewing and Hold Out Brewing, on whose site the event is taking place, and New Yorkers Dutchess Ales, whose founder Michael Messenie has recently relocated to Austin. The event features over thirty Texan and national breweries of all sizes, from the mighty Sierra Nevada to local celebrities Jester King, cask specialists Hogshead out of Denver and North Carolina superstars Fonta Flora Brewing. The turnout is enormous and excitement is high. Austin drinkers are nothing if not adventurous and for many this is their first cask experience, yet not a word is uttered about the beer being warm or flat, despite the balmy weather. This is also an educated urban audience, keen to participate in the next big beer trend. And in the US right now, cask is big news.
Pinvitational is the first cask festival in Texas – hosted by local breweries Acopon Brewing and Hold Out Brewing, on whose site the event is taking place, and New Yorkers Dutchess Ales, whose founder Michael Messenie has recently relocated to Austin. The event features over thirty Texan and national breweries of all sizes, from the mighty Sierra Nevada to local celebrities Jester King, cask specialists Hogshead out of Denver and North Carolina superstars Fonta Flora Brewing. The turnout is enormous and excitement is high. Austin drinkers are nothing if not adventurous and for many this is their first cask experience, yet not a word is uttered about the beer being warm or flat, despite the balmy weather. This is also an educated urban audience, keen to participate in the next big beer trend. And in the US right now, cask is big news.
“This is also an educated urban audience, keen to participate in the next big beer trend. And in the US right now, cask is big news.“
— Ruvani de Silva
“After just a year of formation the CIU had helped 13 clubs to begin, growing to 55 by its second.”
— Rachel Hendry
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East Coast Cask
Many British readers might not think of Texas as being at the forefront of forging US beer trends, and in this instance, that perception is correct. The current cask boom started, unsurprisingly, on the East Coast, where, for the best part of the last decade, breweries like New York’s Strong Rope, Fifth Hammer and Wild East and DC’s Blue Jacket have been steadily growing their local cask-drinking demographics and cask festivals and events are growing in number and popularity. Strong Rope founder Jason Sahler points out that there had previously been a burst of cask popularity in the mid 2000s – and the NERAX New England Real Ale eXhibition (which operates in conjunction with CAMRA) has been going for 25 years – but as craft beer hit its peak, US cask fizzled away until a newer generation of brewery and bar owners with experience of drinking cask in the UK and an interest in cask from a flavour and quality perspective began to quietly take the reins.
East Coast Cask
Many British readers might not think of Texas as being at the forefront of forging US beer trends, and in this instance, that perception is correct. The current cask boom started, unsurprisingly, on the East Coast, where, for the best part of the last decade, breweries like New York’s Strong Rope, Fifth Hammer and Wild East and DC’s Blue Jacket have been steadily growing their local cask-drinking demographics and cask festivals and events are growing in number and popularity. Strong Rope founder Jason Sahler points out that there had previously been a burst of cask popularity in the mid 2000s – and the NERAX New England Real Ale eXhibition (which operates in conjunction with CAMRA) has been going for 25 years – but as craft beer hit its peak, US cask fizzled away until a newer generation of brewery and bar owners with experience of drinking cask in the UK and an interest in cask from a flavour and quality perspective began to quietly take the reins.
