A Drink with Alex Acker: The Low-Down on Jing-A’s 8x8 Beer Fest, What to Expect, and What to Drink

Jing-A's Alex Acker Gives Us the Low-Down on What to Expect at 8x8 Beer Fest

Tracy Wang, Senior Editor | Oct 25, 2017 2:30 pm | Add a comment | 1396 reads

Starting with the humble 700L brewing facility at The Big Smoke in 2013, Jing-A has since expanded a taproom at Courtyard 4 with popular year-round beers, small-batch, seasonal, and experimental brews, and also transformed what was formerly their home at the Big Smoke into their first brewpub at Xingfucun at the end of September. If that's not exciting enough, they will soon hold their 8x8 Brewing Project, pairing eight breweries from greater China with eight foreign breweries to bring a free-flow tasting festival at UCCA on Nov 3-4 (tickets and the full list of beers here). We had a drink with co-founder Alex Acker, and talked about the upcoming 8x8 beer festival.

TBJ: Explain what 8x8 is, in a nutshell – how is it different from other beer festivals in China?
Alex Acker: The 8x8 Beer Fest at UCCA/798 on Nov 3 and 4 is the culmination of an international brewing project we kicked off in April, whereby we paired eight brewers from around Greater China with eight of the hottest brewers from the Pacific Northwest, USA, to brew eight totally new collaboration beers.

At the fest, the pairs will be unveiling their collabs for the first time. Each brewery will also be pouring a rotating selection of their own beers during each of the four three-hour sessions, for a total of 136 different beers on tap over two days! We'll also have DJ Jay 1,2 on the decks both days, tattoos by Needles & Pins, and food trucked in by our friends at Hatchery, LA Palms, and Pak Pak/Susu, plus BBQ sandwiches by Jing-A Xingfucun, all in a beautiful 798 factory/gallery space. For beer fans and party fans alike, what this means is that 8x8 is going to be an awesome, super fun, all-you-can-drink beer festival in three-hour sessions, where you can try new China X Pacific Northwest collabs for the first time, as well as many beers that have never been seen in China before. Quite a few are even hard to get in the US.

What inspired you to organize this festival?
The idea behind 8x8 was to encourage a meeting of the minds and more international collaboration between Chinese brewers and our friends overseas as craft beer continues to blow up here in China. There's a lot we can learn, as brewers, in making beers with some of the best in the world, and a lot I think we can show off too. At the same time, we felt it was time for Jing-A to do a beer fest of our own, but as in all things, we wanted to do something a bit different and special. Thus, the 8x8 fest was born.

Was it easy to convince American breweries to come to Beijing for 8x8?
Beer geeks out there will know that the American brewers we have coming in are truly rock stars in the craft beer world. Breakside just won more medals at GABF (The Great American Beer Festival) for their beers than any other brewer at this year's competition (two of which we'll be pouring at 8x8) and we've got four breweries that are either a Ratebeer 99 or 100 in the group.

That being said, all the American breweries were really interested in joining the brewing project and coming out for this festival. That's the beauty of craft beer – people in the business are passionate about it, and there is a real sense of excitement everywhere in how the craft beer revolution is catching on in China.

How do you choose the breweries?
We chose the Pacific Northwest, USA as our region to collaborate with for our first year of the 8x8 Brewing Project, mostly because they've been an epicenter for amazing craft beer since the beginning, and also because we're friends with some of the breweries out there already from previous collabs and festivals.

For Chinese breweries, we went with a broad geographic spread of brewers that we think are really doing a good job with their beer. It was a tough choice and we do plan to mix it up each year to give other breweries the chance to join the project.

What were the challenges you faced in organizing 8x8?
Organizing a beer fest and brewing project is a tremendous amount of work, and it's been a busy year for us – launching our new Xingfucun brewpub, getting our beer into bottles (our Worker's Pale Ale, which just won a Gold at the International Beer Cup in Japan), and a bunch of other stuff. We're all ready to party and let loose a little on Nov 3 and 4!

What has Jing-A got planned for their collaboration?
Jing-A was paired up with honestly one of our favorite breweries in Seattle, Holy Mountain. For our collab, we're working on a brett [a type of non-spore forming yeast] fermented farmhouse ale, dry-hopped and fruited with fresh kumquat. We can't wait to taste it ourselves!

What else can people expect at the festival?
With 40 unique beers during each three-hour session, the focus is on the beer, but there's going to be a lot going on besides that at 8x8. We'll also have DJ Jay 1,2 on the decks both days, and great food from our friends at Hatchery, LA Palms, and Pak Pak/Susu. It's going to be an awesome day out!

Do you have any tips for people who'll be attending? What's the best way to try 40 beers in three hours?
First, make sure you get your tickets! We have a bunch of different ticket options, from single session passes to all-session passes and even a VIP pass that includes a bottle share with the brewers before the first session. Check out our 8x8 ticket site on Yoopay for more details.

In terms of tackling 40 beers in three hours, that's just one every 4-5 minutes. Plenty of time to try them all and go back for seconds on your favorites, in my opinion.

Any special beer at the festival you particularly expect?
I'm most excited to try to collaboration beers from each pair.

Which is the favorite of your beers, what makes it special?
My favorite beer is usually the one we've brewed most recently. We've got a collaboration with Pohjala in the tanks now (a Baltic Porter aged on smoked figs and dates) that is tasting pretty great. For a session beer, probably my go-to beer is still our Flying Fist IPA.

Where do you draw your inspiration?
We draw inspiration for our beers from a number of sources: our city, seasonal ingredients, culinary traditions, social memes and trends, also internationally from new techniques we learn or styles we've tried. To be honest, brewing new beers is what we like to do best and why we got into craft brewing. We love the creativity and art of it.

What’s your favorite thing about what you do?
I love the creativity and art of brewing, of creating something new and unique and striving to make the best beer possible. Also, the feeling of doing something with your hands and bringing happiness to people with it is very rewarding. Finally, craft beer is just an awesome industry to work in. I can't think of anything we'd rather be doing.

What’s unique about your brewing style/philosophy?
Not sure it's unique, but we're fanatical about trying new things – new ingredients, new processes, and constantly brewing new beers. We're never completely satisfied with our beer and always looking for ways to improve.

What do you consider the most underestimated style of beer?
Pilsner. Ironically, it's often a brewer's favorite as it can be very delicate and nuanced, and requires a lot of technique to brew well.

What’s your golden rule of drinking?
Be open to trying new things.

What’s your most outrageous drinking experience?
Nothing fit to print here!