FuzzyBrew

Tour de Fat, an annual traveling bike festival sponsored by New Belgium Brewing Company, makers of Fat Tire, will kick off a 15-city tour next month in Nashville.

The event aims to spread “the good word about the positive societal offerings of the bicycle” and features a costumed bike parade, New Belgium beer, music, food and more.

In Nashville, the bike Parade begins at 10 a.m. at Centennial Park, with registration starting at 9 a.m. The festival, which includes performances by Mucca Pazza, Ian Cooke, Yo-Yo People and Sssnakenstein, runs from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. For more information, go here.

The event, which is visiting Nashville for a second-straight year, will benefit the Sound Forest, Walk/Bike Nashville and Ride for Reading.

Here’s the full list of cities on the 2012 Tour de Fat calendar:

Nashville, TN – June 2 – Centennial Park
Washington, DC – June 16 – Yards Park
Durham, NC – June 23 – Diamond View Park on the American Tobacco Campus
Atlanta, GA – June 30 – Historic 4th Ward Park
Milwaukee, WI – July 14 – Coast Guard Event Area, McKinley Park
Chicago, IL – July 21 – Palmer Square
Minneapolis, MN – July 28 – Loring Park
Boise, ID – August 18 – Ann Morrison Park
Fort Collins, CO – September 1 – Civic Center Park Area
Denver, CO – September 8 – City Park
Los Angeles, CA – September 15 – Los Angeles State Historic Park
San Francisco, CA – September 22 – Lindley Meadow in Golden Gate Park
San Diego, CA – September 29 – Golden Hill Park
Tempe, AZ – October 6 – Tempe Town Lake
Austin, TX – October 20 – Fiesta Gardens

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So who’s been to the Tour de Fat? Tell us what it’s like in the comments below. And, New Belgium, how about adding Memphis next year? We’re down with biking, too!

On Saturday, more than 20 Memphis area homebrewers brewed beer on the parking lot of Boscos in Overton Square to celebrate National Homebrew Day.

The brew day was part of the American Homebrewers Association Big Brew, an annual event to celebrate National Homebrew Day held on the first Saturday in May.

Boscos provided the space and gave each homebrewer free wort to brew with, as well as yeast. Brewers brought their own hops and made whatever concoction they wanted with the base of mostly two-row malt, with some crystal malt.

Homebrewers from the Bluff City Brewers & Connoisseurs and the Memphis Brewer’s Association participated in the event, which is always one of the highlights of the year for the brew clubs.

Grant waits for his wort inside Boscos.

Homebrewer Joe Barnes fills the kettle. Barnes was among the volunteers who assisted Boscos brewer Adam Hargrove on Saturday.

Each brewer got 5-10 gallons of wort to boil.

Mark and Nate carry a kettle full of wort to the burner.

Some people didn’t need help!

Memphis-grown Cascade hops.

I made a single-hop Cascade American Pale Ale.

FuzzyBrew kettles.

After chilling, the wort is dumped into carboys, with yeast added soon after at home.

What did you make for National Homebrew Day? Leave a comment below.

James Ottolini, brewmaster at The Saint Louis Brewery Inc. and Head of Brewing Operations at Schlafly Beer since 1992, won an achievement award for innovation in brewing this week from the Brewers Association.

Ottolini won the prestigious Russell Schehrer Award for Innovation in Craft Brewing, awarded at the Craft Brewers Conference in San Diego.

Here’s more from the Brewers Association press release:

Described by a fellow brewer as an artist, a scientist and an inventor, James Ottolini of the St. Louis Brewery, Inc. is the recipient of the 2012 Russell Schehrer Award for Innovation in Craft Brewing. The list of his creative brewing solutions ranges from redesigned milling processes to reduce brewers’ exposure to dust to extensive research on dry-hopping, which has been said to result in “beer with bold floral characteristics, but a soft, inviting quaffability.”

Others winners were Doug and Wynne Odell and Doug’s sister, Corkie Odell, of Odell Brewing Co., recipients of the Brewers Association Recognition Award; and Tom McCormick, full-time executive director of the California Craft Brewers Association, who won the F.X. Matt Defense of the Industry Award recipient.

The Brewers Association is a trade association representing small and independent brewers.

Russell Scherrer winner @OttoAtSchlafly enjoying some @fourpeaksbrew Kilt Lifter cans at #cbc12 in San Diego tonight. twitter.com/Schlafly/statu…

— Schlafly Beer (@Schlafly) May 4, 2012

They’ve run through Downtown and Midtown in Memphis. Now the guys from Nashville’s Yazoo Brewing Company are organizing a beer fun run out east in Cordova.

Yazoo will host the “Barely a 4K Beer Run” on Saturday, May 26, beginning and ending at The Flying Saucer, 1400 N. Germantown Pkwy, Suite 114.  The run starts at 10 a.m., but you need to check in between 9 and 9:30.

With your $15 registration, you get a one-of-a-kind “Barely a 4K Beer Run” T-shirt and two complimentary Yazoo beers. Go here to sign up.

Here’s more from Yazoo:

There won’t be any challenging hills, nor will there be any time chips for your shoes. We are just jogging around the neighborhood and having some tasty beverages afterward.  …. As with all of our Barely a 4K Beer Runs, we will not be shutting down streets or stopping traffic, so you are running at your own risk. Heck, you don’t even have to run if you don’t want, but it is always a lot more fun if you do! All participants must be 21 or older, and we will be checking ID’s during the check in period before the run.

To see a map of the course, go here. Also, be sure to check out FuzzyBrew’s recap from the December run in Downtown Memphis.