We’ve already waxed poetic about beer, wine, and spirits choices for Thanksgiving, but what if you want to go Pilgrim-style with your beverage choices? Cider is a traditional (read: the actual first) Thanksgiving beverage and we have many to offer. Here are some suggestions to get you through your festivities.

For pre-dinner drinks, we suggest our Velo44 by Sociable Cider Werks ($9.99/4pk). This deliciously dry cider was created specifically for France 44’s 60th Anniversary and can only be purchased here. You can treat your guests to a bright, refreshing cider that has passion fruit and guava that they will only be able to have this season.

During dinner, we suggest Keepsake Wild Dry Cider ($12.99/750ml bottle) to pair with everything you might put on your table. It’s a dry, full-bodied cider made with wild yeast, giving it a uniquely “Minnesota” twist. It’s far too easy to drink and comes in a lower ABV than wine.

After dinner, we suggest you consider Ice Cider. Ice cider is a sweet cider made through cold fermentation and has a much higher ABV than other cider. It is served as you would serve a cordial – small glasses or over ice cream. We have six varieties of ice cider to choose from–stop by the beer cooler and ask a beer guy/gal to show you what we’ve got!

As we set reminders to move our clocks back an hour, a heavy precipitation of new, adjunct-laden, dessert-style beers is blanketing our beer world. The mercurial evolution of craft beer has pushed brewing creativity to new heights, stretching the definition of beer along the way. This new family of futuristic, food-inspired brews colloquially referred to as “pastry beers” has become one of the latest hits in the craft community.

Pastry beers aren’t recognized as an official BJCP beer style, and thus are guided solely by a brewer’s unshackled imagination. They can showcase a broad spectrum of flavors and don’t necessarily have to mimic a pastry or even contain traditional pastry ingredients. Principally, they are beers that let adjuncts (added ingredients) be the star of the show—not the malt, hops or yeast. With a near innumerable list of adjuncts available, the aim is to achieve a combination that suggests flavors and aromas of certain foods, usually baked goods. Popular ingredients include milk sugar, vanilla beans, cacao nibs, cinnamon, coffee, coconut, maple syrup, graham crackers, citrus zests, fruit purées, nuts, spices and more.

Brewing a high quality pastry beer is much tougher than one might think. Choice ingredients such as vanilla beans and coconut are both expensive and temperamental. The natural oils in the latter can emit sunscreen aromas and even kill the head retention of a beer. Finding the right balance of flavors requires the brewer to see through the eyes of a baker. Flavors should be suggestive and not blunt, and the final product must still resemble a beer. When made properly they can be a delight to enjoy, with layers of flavor and just enough sweetness. Luckily for us, we have some local breweries making top-notch pastry beers that are worthy of your palate. So come on by and get your hands on some of our current favorites!

Fair State FSB 2019 Imperial Pastry Stout Part 1 (Forager Collab.) — $6.99/Can

A massive s’mores-inspired pastry stout brewed in collaboration with Forager from Rochester, MN. Featuring marshmallows, graham crackers, cacao nibs, vanilla, and honey.

Modist Bite Size Chocolate & Vanilla Pastry Stout — $11.99/4pk

A 6.7% pastry stout brewed with pale, wheat, crystal, roasted chocolate malts, Ghana cacao nibs and Madagascar vanilla beans.

Drekker Slang du Jour Blueberry Pancakes Sour à la Mode — $18.99/4pk

This breakfast sour features blueberry, maple syrup, cinnamon, lactose, brown sugar and vanilla beans to create a flavor and aroma like the real thing!

The Brewing Projekt Cherry Shove-It Sour Ale — $15.99/4pk

An imperial kettle sour with cherry, honey, molasses, cinnamon and brown sugar. Grab a slice!

Oliphant Blizzard of ’91 Pecan Pumpkin Pie Ale — $9.99/Crowler

A pastry ale brewed with pecans, lactose and pumpkin pie spices.

Others of Note: Boulevard Hold the Pancakes Barrel-Aged Imperial Pastry Stout, The Bruery Bakery Banana Bread Imperial Stout, Disgruntled Berry the Hatchet Pastry Sour Ale, Oddside Ales Hipster Brunch Stout

Sometimes it can be hard to talk about your birthday. It means you are getting old(er). You think to yourself, “I want to go back to the time when I could ride my tricycle with reckless abandon down the block”,  “Is it still weird to jump into a random pile of leaves as an adult?” “Can I wear footie-pajamas to work?”.

However, getting older also has many perks.  You are (hopefully) more responsible and put-together.  You have built long term friendships and connections. You have learned from mistakes and grown from them.  You can even buy yourself pizza any night of the week that you want. You have lived!

At France 44 we are embracing our birthday; and like George Clooney, we are proud of our Silver-Fox look.  This weekend we are celebrating our past and looking forward to our future. As the most interesting man in the world would put it:  “We don’t always celebrate our birthday, but when we do – we celebrate big!”. Not only will there be food, live music, and dogs in costumes; we will also be releasing two exclusive brews that we made in collaboration with Modist Brewing and Sociable Cider works.  Please join us for our 60th anniversary as we celebrate stepping into another year. We know that the best is yet to come!

Modist/France 44 Silver Fox DDH New England-Style IPA

For an anniversary as big as this, we’re celebrating the best way we know how, by brewing a hazy IPA! With help from our friends at Modist, we brewed a New England-style IPA with 70% pilsner malt and 30% white wheat malt then hopped it up with cryo Citra, Mosaic and Cashmere hops. It’s bursting with juicy tropical fruit character and packs enough bitterness to keep everything in balance.

Sociable Cider Werks/France 44 Vélo 44 Passionfruit Guava Hard Cider

Sociable made our jaws drop when we first tried their limited batch of Passionfruit Freewheeler hard cider. We decided to up the ante by adding Bennett’s favorite fruit infusion, guava! The classic Freewheeler blend of Haralson, Honeycrisp and SweeTango juice makes up the base of our cider that we then spiked with passionfruit and guava purée. Fermented dry, this tropical apple graf has vibrant aromas and tantalizing tartness.

Ah, the ceaselessly-divisive pumpkin beer—a perennial autumn release that is met with a medley of excitement and displeasure. Whether or not you care for it, beer brewed with gourds has been a staple of North American civilization since before our country was founded.

Keepsake is not interested in providing a homogenous product. They prefer to let the apples speak.

Beyond the rich history and academia surrounding the Weihenstephan brewery, the beers are extraordinary examples of style and finesse. In the age of wild ingredients, gimmicks, and distracting marketing it’s important to remember that sometimes a small list of ingredients can make a big statement.

It’s the week all things cider are celebrated at the various cider houses and restaurants throughout Minnesota!