Posts in Imbibe
Whether you know it or not, XOBC Cellars is your new favorite winery.
Whether you know it or not, XOBC Cellars is your new favorite winery.

Founded by wives Jeri and Amy Andrews, and Catherine and Brandi Carlile (yes, THE Brandi Carlile, multi-time Grammy Award-winner), the winery aims to combine inclusiveness with sipping your favorite variety.

On top of that mission, XOBC Cellars works to give back, partnering with charities like The Looking Out Foundation, which works to empower marginalized voices. They have also partnered in the past with War Child UK and Children In Conflict.

With a strong network of customers and “Collectors” (their term for wine club members), the winery has grown since its inception in June 2019. Of course it has! Brandi Carlile is undeniable and, together, the four founders know not simply what goes into a good glass, but what goes into a good conversation for a better tomorrow.

We caught up with co-founders Jeri and Amy Andrews to talk about XOBC’s origins, how it got off the ground and how it’s achieving new heights today.

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ImbibeJake UittiSip Northwest
4 Questions with Metiér Brewing Company’s Rodney Hines
4 Questions with Metiér Brewing Company’s Rodney Hines

Woodinville’s Metiér Brewing Company is doing big things. The suds producer, which is one of the only Black-owned breweries in the region, has announced a new partnership as part of its work to grow and diversify the state of craft beer brewing in the Seattle area. As such, Metiér and the Seattle Mariners baseball team have declared a new long-term relationship in which Metiér will take over the old Pyramid Alehouse, which is next door to the baseball stadium and, for many years, was a popular pre-game destination for fans until 2020 when Pyramid vacated.

The Mariners, which recently signed a long lease for the building on 1st Avenue in SODO, are excited to work with Metiér in the refurbished space. The brewery says it is set to move in and run the joint in 2022. The new location will feature game-day broadcasts inside and plenty of pints for fans. Other amenities include a restaurant with upwards of 250 seats.

We caught up with Rodney Hines, CEO and co-founder of Metiér Brewing Company, to ask him four questions about his partnership with the Mariners, the best beers to drink at the ballpark, and the impact that black-owned can have on not just the brewing industry, but the community at large.

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ImbibeJake UittiSip Northwest
Against the Grain
Against the Grain

One of the Pacific Northwest’s most innovative breweries sits not in the craft beer hubs of Seattle and Bellingham, but in the fertile farmlands of Skagit Valley.

Farmstrong Brewing Company’s story begins with the cover crop — the practice of planting soil-enriching plants after a more profitable crop’s harvest. In Skagit Valley, grains are the most prominent cover crop of all.

Farms have cultivated grains for decades as a way to reintroduce nitrogen into soil depleted by apple production, among other harvests. Historically, the “nitrogen-fixer” grains were simply ground up and added back into the soil as compost. But in 2013, Skagit Valley Malting began buying up the grains, roasting and curing them, and selling them to local breweries like Farmstrong. The result is a match made in craft-beer heaven.

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ImbibeJake UittiEdible Seattle
Buzzed Cuts: Barbers Entice Customers by Offering Beer
Buzzed Cuts: Barbers Entice Customers by Offering Beer

If you ask Louisville, Ky.’s Melissa Gray about the burgeoning relationship between haircuts and beer from craft breweries, the third-generation barber who opened her own shop in 2016 will list nearly a dozen reasons why she thinks the two were made for one another. At the top of that list is the hyper-local aspect of beer, the fact that it allows people (specifically, men) to feel more comfortable being groomed, and that it eases potential wait time. But Gray is also quick to say she never wanted Beards and Beers to become a bar with a barbershop in it.

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ImbibeJake UittiBeer Advocate
India Pale Ale Face-Off: Searching for the Best IPA in Seattle
India Pale Ale Face-Off: Searching for the Best IPA in Seattle

Conceived in England in the late 18th century, the iconic India pale ale has a storied past and a bright future. In the 1700s, beer makers added extra hops during the brewing process; hops was a natural preservative, and kept the beer fresh in the barrels that were shipped from England to the Indian colonies. This gave rounder pale ales a sharper bite and soon enough, the distinctive taste of IPAs became embedded in our culture. The style has lived on ever since.

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ImbibeJake UittiThe Stranger
Canna Parents: Does Smoking Make You A Better Parent?
Canna Parents: Does Smoking Make You A Better Parent?

People have been smoking marijuana for hundreds of years. And, inevitably, some of those people have been parents. Today, as cannabis becomes legalized in more states across the U.S., parents are facing the challenges—both privately and publically—of how to talk about the substance with their children, as well as how to orient parenting around their own usage. To get a better sense of how parents make these decisions and to see what they’ve learned on the job, we reached out to a few for insight.

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ImbibeJake UittiDOPE Magazine
A Pioneer, Reinvented: The Humble Beginnings and Hopeful Future of Seattle’s Redhook Brewery
A Pioneer, Reinvented: The Humble Beginnings and Hopeful Future of Seattle’s Redhook Brewery

Walking into Redhook Ale Brewery’s new experimental brewpub facility, Brewlab, you might experience a moment of cognitive dissonance. On the one hand, you’re in the center of Seattle’s hippest neighborhood, Capitol Hill, inside a bright, shiny new watering hole, surrounded by beer lovers of all kinds—from tech nerds to indie rockers. On the other, you’re in a Redhook facility, a realm no longer associated with recipe excitement and brewing innovation. So your next thought might be, “Wait, what’s going on here?”

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ImbibeJake UittiBeer Advocate
After City Shuts Down Chef’s Weed-Infused Dinners, Unika Noiel Finds a Danksgiving Workaround
After City Shuts Down Chef’s Weed-Infused Dinners, Unika Noiel Finds a Danksgiving Workaround

Seattle’s Unika Noiel, head chef of the Pioneer Square Italian restaurant Che Sara Sara, is also one of the city’s foremost experts on cooking cannabis-infused food. Whereas most retail edibles are sweet, like cookies and gummy worms, Noiel’s infusions are more of the soul food variety, ranging from fried chicken to catfish to watermelon salad.

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ImbibeJake HansonThe Stranger
Too Drunk to Rock: Seattle Musicians on Why They Went Sober
Too Drunk to Rock: Seattle Musicians on Why They Went Sober

Michael Wansley remembers very clearly the day he first got sober—Seafair Weekend 1999—after waking up in bed with a stranger, full of regret. He remembers a night in Paris while on tour with Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, in a small club surrounded by hundreds of people waving bottles of champagne at him from every angle after he’d finished his famous deep-voiced hook on “Thrift Shop.” And he remembers a simple but effective idea his AA sponsor told him one afternoon: “Michael, you never have to take a drink again.”

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ImbibeJake HansonThe Stranger
Is N/A Body Making Good Non-Alcoholic Beer?
Is N/A Body Making Good Non-Alcoholic Beer?

If you’ve ever worked in a bar—or sat in one long enough—you’ve likely heard a patron or two ask if the bartender has any non-alcoholic beer. With less than .5% alcohol by volume, it’s drunk by folks who like the premise of a cold one but, for any number of reasons, want to avoid its buzzy effects. Well-stocked bars can oblige, often offering a bottle of Kaliber (owned by Guinness), O’Doul’s, or St. Pauli Girl (both owned by Anheuser-Busch). These beers taste relatively terrible compared to, say, a nice glass of Georgetown Brewing’s Bodhizafa IPA—so one wonders why no craft brewery has cornered this unclaimed market by attempting its own tasty n/a.

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ImbibeJake UittiSeattle Weekly
Pike Brewing Company Gets Refined With Tankard & Tun
Pike Brewing Company Gets Refined With Tankard & Tun

Born in 1996 during the waning days of the grunge movement, Pike Brewing Company’s historic subterranean pub, just a few blocks from the center of Pike Place Market, The Pike Pub, is adorned with random stickers, exposed grating, and pipes painted black. The pub, which brews and serves some of the city’s most recognizable beer, feels comfortable and familiar, like your favorite ripped jeans/flannel shirt combo. But the famous locale has recently changed significantly.

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ImbibeJake HansonSeattle Weekly
Inner Experience, Collective Empowerment: Women.Weed.WiFi’s Revolutionary Platform
Inner Experience, Collective Empowerment: Women.Weed.WiFi’s Revolutionary Platform

When you start a new project—whether that’s a platform, publication or business—it’s important to create and maintain a balance between a set mission statement and an openness or malleability. It’s a hard thing to attain, and the reason why many ventures fail. But for the founders of the Seattle-based Women.Weed.Wifi collective, this balance comes naturally—even telepathically.

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ImbibeJake UittiDOPE Magazine
Why Does Craft Brewing Keep Growing?
Why Does Craft Brewing Keep Growing?

In 2011, there were some 2,016 craft breweries in the United States, according to the Brewers Association. Just five years later, there were 5,234—and many believe this number will continue to grow. But why, exactly? What is it about craft breweries that the country adores? I asked some of Seattle’s most renowned brewers for their insights.

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ImbibeJake UittiSeattle Weekly