The Sno Valley Eagles and Sno Falls Brewing Company are teaming up to give thirsty visitors to Railroad Days a purely local taste of the brew.
This is the first year that the Eagles’ Railroad Days beer garden features only local brews.
“It’s going to be all Snoqualmie beers this year,” said Janelle Pritchard, brewer and general manager at Sno Falls.
For Pritchard, it makes sense to focus on the local, what with Snoqualmie-based Northwest Railway Museum at the helm of the community festival this year.
“We’ve always been part of the beers poured at the Railroad Days beer garde, but this is the first time it will be exclusive Snoqualmie Falls beers,” she said. “We’re happy with it. We’ve always wondered why they’re bringing the big industrial ones, when we’ve got this.”
For the younger set, or those with a taste for sweet instead of suds, the brewery also will offer its classic root beer in a soda booth during Railroad Days. Their root brew is non-alcholic, made locally and went over big with families at the museum’s Day Out With Thomas tour.
The beer offered at Railroad Days includes the Little Si Kolsch, normally only available in the taproom. Sno Falls offers five year-round brews as well as seasonal ones. They send most of their beer out as kegs, and also bottle at the plant.
Each beer is made in a small batch and completed with no blending.
“We consider them to be unapologetically full-flavored, yet well-balanced,” Pritchard said. Sno Falls’ head brewer had been making beer for more than 20 years, coming here from the Thomas Kemper and Pyramid Ale breweries.
“He brings an excellent palate and huge knowledge of ingredients here,” Pritchard said.
Railroad Days will be a good way to let locals know what Sno Falls can do, she added.
“We are definitely a local brewery — we’re not someone who wants to get as big as Red Hook [Brewery in Woodinville]. We want to stay local, we want to stay in the Valley.
“This is a way to let more people realize we’re here,” she added. “There is a brewery here, it does have good fresh beer, and they should come down and try it some time, or go to one of their local watering hole.”
Local beers that you can sample at the Sno-Valley Eagles beer garden include:
Dubbed the “Balanced Hop Monster,” this India Pale Ale has helped define the Snoqualmie Falls Brewing Company’s Northwest style. It has big, bold hop flavors and enough malt backbone to stand up to them.
Little Si Kolsch
Kolsch, developed in Cologne, Germany, is a lightish ale with tremendous drinkability. Sno Falls brews its version with pale malt and a bit of wheat for a dry, slightly hoppy thirst quencher.
Summer Beer
This Sno Falls beer is crisp, clean, refreshing and hoppy, with a spicy herbal aroma and dry finish. Summer Beer is a pre-Prohibition Pilsner fermented with ale yeast to give it more character.
