News

Harvest 2025 is wrapped, and wow, what a ride! We’re officially in the books with around 3 million pounds of barley safely tucked in storage bins, enough to fuel about a year and a half of malting magic here at Root Shoot. But beyond the numbers, this season felt like a big step forward in mastering winter barley, pushing regenerative practices, and learning the fine art of farming without a manual (because Mother Nature likes to keep us on our toes).

March 1st, 2025 the Craft Maltsters Guild hosted the 7th annual Craft Malt Cup and Root Shoot continued its winning streak! If malt had an Olympic team, we’d be waving a flag right now. For the seventh straight year, Root Shoot has medaled at the Malt Cup, making us the only malthouse to do so since the competition began. That’s 15 medals total since 2019, spread over 9 different varieties of malt we make.

We never truly got a chance to say thank you! To each and every one of you who came out to celebrate EIGHT years with us…and those who helped Field Day happen!

For those of you just joining…here’s the 15-second version: Thunder and Lightning are two fall-planted barley varieties, a rarity in Colorado where barley is typically spring-planted. We’re trialing them as part of our attempt to be more resilient in a changing climate. We’ve never grown them before and it’s been a wild ride, including nearly losing both crops to hail, but despite the odds, they rallied, enough to harvest some grain and so…we malted our first batches!

We were just sitting in front of the fire, enjoying a couple of craft beverages when - boom! - just like lightning, we realized… New Year’s Resolutions don’t have to be boring.

We’ll run you through some of the numbers that created that craft cocktail you’re enjoying.

Our Spotify Wrapped list just isn’t as exciting as most. Stuck on a tractor for days end, Todd’s playlists veer much more toward podcasts than music, and until people get as worked up about hour-long talks on soil health as they do their own personal top five artist lists (“Bro, have you heard that new banger on mycorrhizal fungi? It is dope!”) we’ll probably be the outliers.

As we launch into this holiday season, we’re encouraging a little relaxation for all! Join us in slowing down this month and not sweating the small stuff. Take time off, nap on the couch, stare at the sunset, and serve yourself up a tasty beverage…preferably one sown, grown, and malted with love by some farmers we know.

We never truly got a chance to say thank you! To each and every one of you who came out to celebrate seven years with us…and those who helped Field Day happen!

Blue Spruce owners, Rick and Theresa Kane, were inspired by the vibrant craft beer scene that defines Colorado and decided to retire from teaching to pursue their passion of brewing great beer. They opened their first location in Centennial and, outgrowing that with the help of a dedicated and supportive beer-drinking community, opened their second location in Littleton which allowed them to drastically increase the brewing operation.

Last fall, we shared a post about two experimental varieties of fall-planted barley that we were testing. The hope was that these varieties, Thunder and Lightning, might prove to be viable alternatives to spring-planted barley, giving us a leg up by allowing it some of the winter moisture in the form of snow.

It comes as a bit of a surprise to learn that a man dead-set on “making Northern Colorado become a world-renown location for beer and beer ingredients,” wasn’t always aboard the local train.  Why the change in heart?  The good influence of good friends.

Long famous for the epic scenery in Rocky Mountain National Park, Estes is a fantastic destination for all things outdoorsy…but what do you do post-adventuring? When you’re all sweaty and have bug bites, and drank all your water, and just want to sit down and give those hiking boots a break? Swing over to Avant Garde Aleworks, of course!

It’s May and we’re off to a great start to the farming season! All of our grain except for corn is in the ground, and with the moisture we got this past winter, everything is looking happy and healthy. Plus (as always!) we’re up some experimental shenanigans and busily taking notes on how it’s going.

After three years of remote Craft Malt Conferences, we (and everyone else we met) were thrilled to be able to meet with our craft malt community in person again. Friends and colleagues, handshakes and hugs, beer and whiskey in glass-clinking toasts were a welcome change from the COVID shadows of the last few years.

Distillery 291 ranks high among these locally-focused, artisanal producers. Nestled in the stunning foothills of Colorado Springs, Distillery 291 is a globally-acclaimed, yet locally-focused small-batch distillery. 

This is Green Mountain Beer Company. A small brewery in the western suburbs of Denver, Green Mountain Beer Co emanates Colorado soul. Founded by those rock climbing buddies (and longtime friends) that we mentioned Cassidy Hill and Brian Milhaupt, have worked hard to create a space that serves up craft brews inspired by traditional methods but that cater specifically to the tastes and desires of the Colorado community.

That’s right. We built an entire malthouse before we even knew how to make malt. That’s kind of shocking, even to us. It gives us serious anxiety in retrospect if we think about it too long. Luckily, despite our rather non-traditional timeline of doing things, it all seems to have worked out in the end.

We’re working hard to up the soil health of our fields, with the belief that healthier soil will produce more resilient crops. We’re also trying to stay on the cutting edge of all thing well...barley! Which is why, this year, we kicked off 2023 by joining the American Malting Barley Association.

There’s a new brewery in Denver! Public Offering Brewing Company, on South Broadway. And their beer recommendation for folks checking them out for the first time? Open Spaces Kölsch.