Booze notebook: Spada Farmhouse makes top 50 breweries list

The latest on Snohomish County’s breweries, wineries, distilleries — and occasionally coffeehouses.

Since opening last year, Snohomish’s Spada Farmhouse Brewery has been slowly unveiling some of the best sour beers in the region.

It seems the rest of the country is taking notice.

Spada Farmhouse Brewery was recently named one of the 50 Best New Breweries in the country by Beer Advocate, one of the premier craft beer magazines in the U.S.

“A sincere thank you to everyone who has supported us and enjoyed our beer since our opening last year,” said Spada Farmhouse owner and head brewer John Spada in a Facebook post after the announcement.

Spada initially opened a taproom in a large red barn near the brewhouse in rural Snohomish midway through last year, but later transitioned to a cozy downtown location in September.

Lazy Boy begins brewing Justice beer: Everett’s Lazy Boy Brewing has started brewing Justice Brewing’s White & Nerdy after the former Everett brewery was forced to shut down following problems with the building it was slated to move to in 2017.

After hearing about Justice owner Nate McLaughlin’s story, Lazy Boy owner Shawn Loring reached out to him and asked him if he could help. The two came up with an agreement in which Loring and his crew brew the beer, distribute it and the two entities share the profits.

“It would have been easy to brew some kind of Belgian beer like White & Nerdy and take it to Nate’s account and sell them on it,” Loring said. “But I felt like it was important to keep Justice’s name out there and help Nate out. I felt terrible for him. He got a bum deal.”

White & Nerdy is currently on tap at Lazy Boy and should be finding its way to taprooms and bottleshops in the Everett area soon. Loring said they’re in discussion to start canning White & Nerdy again.

In a Facebook post on Justice’s page, McLaughlin wrote that any profit will go into the bank as he continues to look for a new location for the brewery. He also mentioned that he’s working on more collaborations with other local breweries.

Everett coffee roaster aids in barista’s big win: Seattle’s Cole McBride used coffee from Everett coffee roaster Velton Ross to take first place in the barista competition at the 2018 United States Coffee Championships in Seattle.

McBride used 100 percent Typica, which is described as medium body having tropical aroma, soft pineapple, grapefruit zest and sweetness of brown sugar.

Ross wasn’t the only Everett coffee business to have big news this year. Earlier this year, Narrative was named Best New Cafe in the ninth annual Sprudgie Awards, which nominates and honors the best coffee businesses in the world. Sprudge, which is a popular craft coffee blog, can be found at www.sprudge.com.

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