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“We don’t have any core beers,” says Tanner Scarr, general manager at Evil Twin Brewing. “We’re creating a new lager just about every other week.” Lagers are far from the only style of beer Evil Twin pro duces, but it is one of the most popular. In fact, Scarr says the brewery had to order and install more equipment about a year ago to meet the increased demand for lagers. He adds that Evil Twin has struggled to move those beers to distribu tion because they sell so quickly at the brewery. Even though its two taprooms have four lines of lagers apiece, demand is outpacing supply. Scarr says this was the first summer they couldn’t keep up. “It’s a nice problem to have, but at the same time, we want to get our beers out there. We can’t keep them on draft quick enough,” Scarr says. The demand for lagers is something Becky Hammond, managing director of beverage and brewing at Carolina Brew ery, says she saw coming as many as five years ago. Hammond says she noticed Mexican lagers were becom ing more popular and believed it was a harbinger of the rise in craft lagers. So Hammond started to develop Carolina Brew ery’s Costero, a Mexican lager with an ABV of 4.5 percent. She says the beer is currently the second best-seller behind the brewery’s flagship kolsch, though the former is gaining ground. The popularity of Costero has led to Carolina Brew ery rethinking its approach to lagers. “We wouldn’t call ourselves a lager house … but we’re cer tainly turning our attention to the style,” Hammond says. “We’re starting to dedicate more of our rotating specials to lagers. I think we will definitely be seeing more in the future.” Carolina Brewery’s two North Carolina locations also have full-service restaurants, and Hammond says she’s noticed lagers becoming more popular with dine-in customers. Simi larly, New Belgium’s Reif says restaurants have been stocking up on more lagers lately because of how well the style com plements various foods. “Lagers pair really well with different cuisines,” Reif says. “As craft beer knowledge has grown, specifically with craft lagers, they’ve found their way onto menus in restaurants.” Finding a way ontomenus is exactly what Evil Twin’s lagers have done, specifically the brand’s purple rice lager, which is a collaboration between the brewery and MáLà Project, a Chinese dry pot concept in New York City. The beer is brewed using a strain of purple rice, giving it a distinct, bright pur plish hue. Scarr says the beer has been so popular at MáLà Project that it’s the only collaborative beer they’ve made mul tiple times over. Craft lager’s rise in popularity isn’t ending anytime soon, Hammond says. She thinks the style will experience a similar boom much in the way IPAs did, with new and more experi mental variations. “The style is an important part of the brewing community,” Hammond says. “It’s certainly not going anywhere and will always be around.”

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