The New Belgium Abbey Ale was so amazing, that when I saw a "Folly" pack of 12 New Belgium beers on sale for $12.00, I decided to try 'em all.

New Belgium Brewery is in Fort Collins, Colorado. It began as a local brewery, inspired by the experience of its co-founder and brewer Jeff Lebesch. Jeff Lebesch spent time in 1989 riding a mountain bike with "fat tires" through Belgium, sampling the beers as he went. Inspired by the experience, the beers, and the Belgian malts, hops, and yeast, Lebesch returned to Fort Collins and began home brewing Belgian style beers. His first beers were a brown Trappist-inspired dubbel (later known as Abbey), and an amber that eventually became New Belgium's flagship brew, Fat Tire. Lebesch, trained as an electrical engineer, turned his engineering know-how to brewing, creating a home-brewery in his basement using recycled dairy equipment. His beers were received extremely well, after a bit of tinkering, by friends, relatives and family members.

In 1991, Lebesch and his spouse Kim Jordan opened up New Belgian Brewery. Jordan served as distributor, marketer, and art director, convincing a neighbor, Ann Fitch, to create water colors to serve as the labels for New Belgium brews. New Belgium, with Fat Tire and Abbey, began to sell the first commercial Belgian style beers in the U.S. As the brewery grew, Jordan and Lebesch added another brewer, Brian Callahan, and began to create an employee-owned brewery by making Callahan a part owner. All employees after a year at New Belgium begin to accrue ownership in the brewery.

New Belgium began to create new beers, including seasonals, and slowly began to increase distribution; they are now the third largest craft brewer in the U.S, and one of the greenest, since they use methane that's a side product of their brewing, as well as wind power, to provide substantial amounts of their electricity.

One of the reasons that New Belgium beers have so very recognizable right from the start has been the label art by Ann Fitch. In fact, it looks like New Belgium may have been influential in terms of establishing the "craft brew look" in terms of bottle labels and branding. It's a bit of a surprise to see that that they've decided to change the label to a more austere style for the four beers in their Explore series. Although the New Belgium Website list 28 varieties of beer, the Folly 12 pack contains three bottles each of Fat Tire, Ranger IPA , Mighty Arrow, and 1554 Brussels Black Ale. I'll let you know what I think.