Popination Determination

a series of unhinged personal essays disposed as pub reviews. Today: Woods Boss Brewing Co.

There I was, wandering around just East of downtown Denver after church and a tattoo. Yes, again. My beloved Little Black Church was doing a flash sale to benefit the Immigrant Rescue Fund and I wanted (not only a nice small bit of new ink, but) to support the cause. I was a bit peckish after the process (and the service—The Eucharist does not a hearty brunch make), and so I wandered down the rough, sleeping-bag-lined street to a brewery that was new to me. I’d heard of it through a fellow burlesque troupe having put up shows inside Woods Boss, but I’d never been there myself.

Who’s the Woods Boss?

Woods Boss is an actual brewery, which is always nice, as I like to try an establishment’s unique creations, especially in the realm of a rich APA or IPA. They’re one of those breweries, though, that don’t really have food to speak of—it’s mostly snack type stuff. So know that ahead of time if you go there hungry like I did.

Outside, it’s a lovely, rather new-looking brick building with urban steel girders adorning it. It looks like it should share a block with a bank and a high-end clothing designer, not a crunchy lesbian bar and a club. But here we are, East of downtown, and I have to say the patio looked inviting, with all the stereotypically Colorado-dressed pint-sippers socializing with their dogs.

Inside, it’s warehouse-large and open. Cement floors and exposed brick and piping along the ceiling. Wall-sized picture windows. Two large group seating areas in the form of long wooden picnic tables and benches. Brushed steel and woodwork. Antlers and branches for the taps. Very much a Colorado mountain vibe, and I liked it.

One thing I wondered: How did they have burlesque here?! Where did they put it? Could people walking by just watch it through the windows, without buying a ticket? I remember the venue they used was called The Lodge at Woods Boss, so maybe there’s a back room somewhere that I missed? Anyway. No research in Popinations, remember?

This was a yummy IPA that was a nice refreshment after a tattoo. I don’t remember what it was called.

When I was young and just transitioning from high school to college, and from coffee to cocktails,¹ I didn’t like beer at all. The taste was a put-off² and this was in the very early ‘90s, just before the craft beer phenomenon hit Boulder with a Papazian-sized³ meteor. Once I was a year or two into my college career and drama school parties, Colorado (and Boulder in particular) became a microbrewery mecca. And so I started my beer palate with Fat Tire from Left Hand in ‘94, evolved to Java Porter and FYIPA at Mountain Sun as the millennium turned, and now I’m a devotee of Upslope IPA and straight Fireside whiskey. How tastes change. And as such, these days I’m always delighted to find a new-to-me pint to try. Colorado still remains one of the best places to live when you like craft beer, and my mature palate does, very much. Woods Boss stands up to the best of them. Maybe I’ll go back and try a new flavor, next time I get new ink.

1. I never actually gave up coffee, of course. And I’d actually call them mixed drinks, not cocktails, but. Yanno. College.

2. Same with cigarettes—I didn’t start smoking till after college graduation, when my colleagues in the aerial dance company introduced me to cloves.

3. Interested in beer? Don’t know who Charlie Papazian is? Go on a super-fun rabbit hole about him; you won’t regret it.