Saturday, December 13, 2008

Road Trip!

The Lapeer Area Brewers are opting for a road trip in lieu of a meeting this month. We will be visiting a homebrew shop in Taylor called Adventures in Homebrewing and a Brewpub in Linclon Park called Fort Street Brewery. These businesses are a good hour and a half from Lapeer, so we don't get there often if at all.

AIH is building a great internet business and has attracted a lot of us by the great prices on items like reconditioned corny kegs and the like, while recently expanding into fabrication of brew keggles and sculptures. Check out their website for a good view of what they have to offer. They recently moved from a location in Dearborn to the current Taylor address. The site is big and promises to be a better venue for this thriving business. Currently, though they are trying to fit things into the new digs and straighten out the moving mess. I hope to post some pics and a review of the operation after our visit on Sunday (I was there a week ago to get a used corny, so I cheated).

Fort Street Brewery has about three years in the location, which once "was an empty lot that at one time or another had been a pharmacy, diner, farm, and the boyhood home of Preston Tucker", according to the FSB website. The brewer, Doug Beedy, has a great reputation in Michigan craft beer drinking circles. The establishment seems to be well-received for beer, food and atmosphere. To give you an idea of what type of brewpub this is, they are currently serving the Twelve Beers of Christmas, a specialty beer on the average of two per week leading up to the New Year's Day, 12th beer offering. Two of the most recent offerings thus far (as described by brewer Beedy)are
The 6th Beer of Christmas, "Garde jusqu a Noel" is a delicious French
biere de garde style. It's dark, mysterious, and deceptively strong.
The 7th Beer of Christmas, "Seven Elf Monks" is a little bit like the
legendary "When Monks Get Drunk" it's light, mysterious, and obviously
strong (clocking in at 8.8% ABV and 100 IBU's).

There is also a cask conditioned ale tapped (yeah, with a mallet!) every other Thursday!

It sounds like my kinda pub! Too bad it's 75 miles away! At least we'll get to sample it once a year or so. Stay tuned for the reviews of this establishment and their beers, coming soon!

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Have a great time!
(Drink one for me)

Beerme said...

Thanks! I think I will!

Hawkeye® said...

Sounds like fun. Enjoy!

Alistair Reece said...

Teh more I read about the American craft brewing scene, the more I am looking forward to landing Stateside in July and getting well and truly stuck in - in the interests of research of course!

Beerme said...

Thanks, Mr. Eye!

Beerme said...

Velky Al,

I'm looking forward to that myself. Please share-as I'm sure you will-your observations on that scene when you do. I'm continuously impressed by the sheer size and imagination of the Michigan scene, with several very creative and active brewers in this state alone!

I will share my impressions of both of these establishments later on today-after work!