Newcastle, Maine- Coppertail Brewing Company, one of Tampa’s up-and-coming breweries looking to join the Class of 2013, is currently working on their first official beer. There is only one problem: they are not really able to make beer in their current setup. In many other American industries this would prove to be problematic, but not in craft beer. Craft beer continues to turn competing companies into good friends, thus it is only fitting that Coppertail’s first brew be born as a collaboration beer.

Back in June Coppertail’s head brewer Casey Hughes left on a jetplane for the Pine Tree State. There, he met friend and fellow brewers Tim Adams and Mike Fava of Oxbow Brewing Company and they chose to make a grisette (a Belgian style akin to a saison farmhouse ale, but a bit lighter) for the Oxbow/ Coppertail collaboration. The brewers used locally-grown spelt to make the beer and will hop and dry-hop it with an experimental hop known as Azacca. The beer should finish at about 5.4% ABV and hopefully a small amount may make it to Tampa.

For more details, see the Coppertail blog.