For Ryan Allen, co-founder and master brewer at Memphis’ Soul & Spirits Brewery, this week’s Great American Beer Festival in Denver won’t be just about pouring beer.
It’s about being part of the country’s biggest craft beer gathering and competition — and making sure Memphis has a seat at that table.
“We go to have a good time, first and foremost, to see friends, colleagues,” Allen said.
“But we also go to get national recognition — putting Memphis on the map, talking about Tennessee, talking about the South. Everyone always looks to the West and the East Coast, but there’s really good beer down here, too. We think we make good beer, and we want to tell people.”
The Great American Beer Festival (GABF) draws hundreds of breweries and tens of thousands of attendees for three days of tasting, judging, and celebration. This year’s event, which is put on by the Brewers Association, will be Oct. 9-11 at Denver’s Colorado Convention Center.
Soul & Spirits will be the only Memphis brewery serving beers at GABF in 2025. In fact, Nashville’s Blackstone Brewing Co. — along with its historic Nashville Brewing Co. brand — is the only other Tennessee craft brewery at the event.
A balanced lineup of offerings
For Soul & Spirits, GABF is a stage to highlight both their flagship beers and the playful, experimental side that is one of the brewery’s hallmarks.
Allen has a playbook for what he brings to GABF to achieve maximum impact: something hoppy, something sour, something high ABV and barrel-aged, something experimental, and one “brewer’s beer” to showcase craft and technique.
“That’s the formula in my head — odd things, plus things the general consumer is really looking for,” he said. “We want five equally ‘purchased’ beers.”
Here’s what Soul & Spirits is pouring on Thursday, Friday and Saturday in Denver:
Bring It Home Helles, 4.9%
One of Soul & Spirits’s flagship beers, Bring It Home is a German-style Helles Lager and the “brewer’s beer” served at GABF
Soul & Spirits has pushed this beer further toward traditional Reinheitsgebot techniques, even producing its own Sauergut — soured wort used for pH adjustment.
The result is a softer beer with a clean malt character that Allen says reminds him of drinking a fresh Helles — his favorite style — in Munich.
“It just drinks so beautifully,” Allen said. “It will always be my baby.”
The names of all Soul & Spirits beers are inspired by songs written by or performed by artists in the Memphis area and greater Delta region.
Bring it Home was named after Carla Thomas and Otis Redding’s “Bring it on Home to Me.”
DDH Hoochie Coochie IPA, 6.7%
Another Soul & Spirits flagship, Hoochie Coochie is being amped up for the hopheads at GABF.
Soul & Spirits double-dry hopped this version of Hoochie Coochie, loading it with Citra Cryo from Perrault Farms in Washington and Riwaka from Eggers Hops in New Zealand.
The brewery has been experimenting more with terpenes and hop oils, and used both Krush 586 hop-derived terpenes and Motueka Amplifire hop oil in the batch.
The result, Allen said, is “banging — lots of hoppy goodness on the nose.”
The beer, of course, gets its name from Muddy Waters’ “[I’m Your] Hoochie Coochie Man.”
Dead Leaves and Dirty Coke, 10.1%
During tastings of this barrel-aged Imperial Stout, one iteration reminded the team of Coca-Cola.
They leaned into it, adding more than 17 spices to mimic cola flavors and push it even further, resulting in Dead Leaves and Dirty Coke.
“It drinks semi-thick, nice and sweet. We took the carb level up on it to mimic what a Coca-Cola would be. Then I made some fresh oat milk and infused it with lime so that we could have a Dirty Coke,” Allen said. “It’s going to be interesting. That’s been a fun one to experiment with.”
The beer’s name is inspired by The White Stripes’ “Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground,” which was recorded at Easley-McCain Recording in Memphis in 2001.
Mango Mustard BBQ Sauce Memphis Sour, 6.5%
At last year’s GABF, Soul & Spirits served a “Strawberry Sweet Heat” version of Sauce, the brewery’s “Memphis Sour.” It was a hit, judging by the long line at the Soul & Spirits table.
This year, the brewery is bringing Mango Mustard BBQ Sauce, which will be served with smoked sausage and BBQ shake.
“It’s a gluten-free sour that … mimics mustard-based barbecue sauce, with a heavy fruiting,” Allen said.
Finding the right fruit providers who sell purees that make beers silky and smooth — while also looking great in the glass — has been a journey for Allen.
“If I get a fruit in — and it’s oxidized and brown — that’s not going to work. … So every fruit gets sourced from a different provider based on who does what best,” Allen said.
Soul & Spirits’ “Sauce” sour beers are named after Millington-native Justin Timberlake’s “Sauce.”
La Gravy Sage Ale, 4.5% ABV
Perhaps the quirkiest beer in the lineup, the experimental La Gravy starts with a Sage Ale, a modern interpretation of the historic brewing tradition in which herbs were used in ales before hops became common.
The Sage Ale is infused with salt, pepper and spice before getting the “gravy treatment” on the backside — fresh oat milk and additional spices to mimic a Southern gravy.
To complete the experience, Soul & Spirits CEO and co-founder Blair Perry baked 1,400 servings of buttermilk biscuits to serve alongside the savory beer at the festival.
La Gravy is a playful nod to ZZ Top’s classic “La Grange,” one of Rolling Stone’s “100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time.” The song was recorded at Ardent Studios in Memphis for 1973’s Tres Hombres.