Last Thursday marked special day for beer lovers in Montana. The legal alcohol limit in beer was increased to 14 percent alcohol by volume, allowing brewers and retailers to sell more potent beers such as barley wines and many new imperial brews. Representative Deb Kottel of Great Falls, a proponent of the HB400 (the bill that changed the legal limit for beer),  argued for the change, claiming “Montana has the potential to become the Napa Valley of beer.” In Helena, HB400 going into effect meant the release of an imperial bitter (9.18ABV) and a barley wine (10.9ABV) at the Blackfoot River Brewery. I’m wondering what sort of other delicious beers Montana Breweries now have to offer, although I’m sure I’ll see a number of them at the upcoming MBA Oktoberfest. If you have been out and about and tried something great at your local brewery, let us know!

“We have everything in place now to make this a beer Mecca. We have the malt; we now have our very first hop grower,” Topper of Helena said. “This is a micro revolution. We’ve got everything that we need right here and right now.”