ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Crooked Run Fermentation will open its Del Ray taproom Friday, Aug. 28, according to signage posted in the window at 2003 Mount Vernon Ave.
The hand-lettered sign, photographed Friday evening, advertises “crispy lagers, hazy IPAs, fruit-forward sours” and what the brewery calls award-winning food. A decal on the adjacent window identifies the space as a Crooked Run brewery and taproom serving beer, wine and snacks.
That beer, called Top Gun, is what Endres described as the company’s first hop-saturated IPA — a hazy style brewed with 16 pounds of hops per barrel, roughly double or more what a typical hazy IPA uses. Endres wrote that the ingredient cost makes the beer viable only for a taproom-focused brewery and that it will not appear often. The recipe leans on Citra, Mosaic and Nectaron in cryogenically separated and extract formats, he wrote, and he declined to detail the methods used to keep the bitterness in check…