American Craft Beer Week collaborative brew

Beer week stories usually sound big and official — calendars, promos, nationwide slogans. But this one is smaller and more revealing. In mid-May 2014, during American Craft Beer Week, Ryan Harkins from Grill ’Em All met up with Eagle Rock brewer Lee Bakofsky to start a collaborative homebrew project, and that tiny garage-scale session says a lot about how craft beer culture actually worked then. It was national in branding, sure, but local in practice — people making things together because they could. ### What actually happened? The first step was just a meetup with a plan. The Big Year in Beer blogger wrote that he kicked off the week by getting together with Harkins and Bakofsky to talk about creating “our own collaborative beer.” That was the seed of the project — not a product launch, not a brewery release, just the beginning of a brew day built around shared enthusiasm. ### Who were these people? (thebigyearinbeer.blogspot.com) Ryan Harkins was the Grill ’Em All guy — a burger-world name in Los Angeles with deep ties to punk and metal culture. Lee Bakofsky was the experienced brewer, tied to Eagle Rock Brewing, and in the later writeup he’s clearly the one guiding the process. The blogger and Harkins were the rookies; Bakofsky was the pro in the garage showing them how not to screw it up. That matters because this wasn’t two brands slapping logos together. It was skill getting passed person to person. (thebigyearinbeer.blogspot.com) ### What kind of beer did they make? They went for something ambitious right away — a strong imperial oatmeal stout at roughly 11% ABV. So, not a safe little pale ale for first-timers. A dark, heavy beer with enough body and booze to make the “it goes to 11” joke inevitable, which is exactly what happened. Later, the batch got a name: “None More Black.” The name came after the brew day, but it fits the whole vibe perfectly — metal-adjacent, self-aware, and a little ridiculous in the best way. (thebigyearinbeer.blogspot.com) ### Was this an official brewery collaboration? Not really — and that’s the point. This was a homebrew-scale collaboration that involved people from the orbit of a brewery, a restaurant, and a beer blog. American Craft Beer Week itself was a national Brewers Association event running May 12-18, 2014, with celebrations in all 50 states and more than 2,800 small and independent craft breweries in the broader movement. But this particular story lived below that official layer. It showed how the scene spread through friendships, side projects, and local hangouts. (thebigyearinbeer.blogspot.com) ### Did the beer ever get finished? Yes. A later post fills in the arc. After about a month of fermenting, they tasted it. Then they bottled it a few weeks later, ending up with 36-plus filled bottles and some rejects. About two-thirds of a keg was also set aside to age with wood for a later version. So the “let’s make a beer” talk during beer week turned into an actual completed batch, not just beer-nerd daydreaming. (craftbeer.com) ### Why does this little story matter? Because it captures the real unit of craft beer culture at the time — not the press release, but the collaboration. American Craft Beer Week gave people a banner to rally around. But the energy came from scenes like this one, where a brewer, a restaurant guy, and a blogger got together in a garage and made something strong, weird, and personal. Basically, the national campaign mattered because it encouraged local behavior like this. (thebigyearinbeer.blogspot.com) ### What does it say about that era? It shows a moment when craft beer still felt handmade in a very literal way. The Brewers Association was already talking in national terms, and the industry was getting big fast. But the culture still ran on informal trust — borrow the capper, fill the bottles, drink a couple pints at Eagle Rock, learn by doing. That mix of growth and intimacy is what made the period feel so alive. (craftbeer.com) ### Bottom line? The collaborative brew itself was small. The signal it sent was bigger. American Craft Beer Week in 2014 wasn’t just about celebrating breweries as institutions — it was about showing how beer culture moved through communities, one garage batch at a time. (thebigyearinbeer.blogspot.com) (craftbeer.com)