Chicago Craft Beer News Roundup 2/20/12

February 23, 2012 By Leave a Comment

What’s kicked

Josh Noel, beer writer at the Trib, broke some details about Chicago Craft Beer Week (May 17-27) today. Seems like it will be more centralized for consumers and friendlier to craft-centric bars and restaurants. All good things.

Image: newhollandbrew.com

Noel also penned a feature on chef-brewer collaborations featuring Cleetus Friedman of City Provisions. Check out his latest, Marsha Mallow’s Malted Milk Stout brewed with New Holland, on tap at the deli.

A new competitive reality TV show called “The Next Great American Brewer” will be based in Chicago and prominently feature the Goose Island brewpubs’ Jared Rouben and Haymarket’s Pete Crowley.

Greenbush Brewing keeps popping up, largely because they make beer geeks pop up. KnowwhatImean? Good Beer Hunting wrote up an epic beer run he and I made to Sawyer, Michigan, to get some bottles the hard way, you know, before they actually start selling them in Chicago not long from now. I broke the Greenbush bottles-to-Chicago news at Chicagoist last week. Just yesterday, The Bangers and Lace crew, led by cicerone Ria Neri, was at Greenbush brewing a rye porter.

Crain’s Chicago Business profiled some of the new breweries popping up around town after reading our list of Chicago breweries-in-planning. Kid Carboy, Jr. at the irreverent beer blog Aleheads gave his assessment of their prospects as well.

Speaking of upstarts, a new Bruery-esque production brewery and taproom will open in April in Naperville.  Exciting stuff coming from Solemn Oath, watch for it.  In other new brewery news, Spiteful sent off its paperwork to the federal government, Pipeworks started brewing, and New Chicago signed on with River North as their distributor.

A beer distribution expert just had a lengthy, provocative guest spot on beernews.org called “Why Craft Brewers Should Be Thanking the Three-Tier System.” Uh, really?

Good Beer Hunting leveld some much needd criticism at popular beer app Untappd. Sorry. Had to do that.

Last week, the Chicago-based Cicerone Certification Program added its 10,000th Certified Beer Server to its ranks. An otherwise very cool story in the RedEye neglected to mention the momentous milestone.

312 is coming in cans on 3/12.

Goose Island kicked off their Fulton & Wood series with Gavin and John’s Old Town Yard, a traditional Munich helles that will only be available on draft in Illinois. John Laffler, the John in the beer’s name, spends his time at Goose Island tending to the imaginative beers in the brewery’s expansive barrel-aging warehouse, so the traditional style he chose when given free reign is quite a surprise. The spot-on execution, however, is not. Great to see Goose Island’s commitment to innovation and Chicago coming through in projects like this.

Rock Bottom Chicago brought a serious ski lodge vibe to its rooftop for their Polar Beer festival this Saturday. Brewmaster Chris Rafferty was profiled at Girls Like Beer Too not long ago.

Brad and Ken of the popular Chicago-based craft beer podcast the Hop Cast were featured in an AV Club profile.

Chicago-based MillerCoors craft unit Tenth and Blake acquired Crispin Cider. Meanwhile, a student association in Edinburgh banned SAB MillerCoors products from its bars.

Today’s Chicago Woman magazine ran a story on today’s Chicago’s craft beer scene featuring Metropolitan’s Tracy Hurst.

A new Chicago-based craft beer journal will release its first issue during Chicago Craft Beer Week. The man behind The Mash Tun is Ed Marszewski of Maria’s Packaged Goods and Community Bar and Lumpen Magazine. Beer + publishing = beer journal. Got it. Got a story idea, photo, or recipe to contribute?

On Tap

5 Rabbit and Nana chef Guy Meikle are putting on a “spirited dinner” this Thursdaywith the 5 Rabbit crew and the chef in attendance presenting their pairings.

SmallBar Fullerton is throwing a second anniversary party on Friday with a killer lineup of sours and a live blending demonstration.

Next Tuesday Fountainhead is tapping three Half Acre beers.

Find more at our always-updated craft beer calendar. Did we miss something? Send events our way to chitownontap (at) gmail.com

Note: Chitown On Tap is currently experiencing hosting-related technical issues, temporarily limiting the quality of content and user experience. I apologize for the problem, which means that there are no images in this post.. If you have experience administering WordPress sites and would be willing to help, please contact me at chitownontap (at) gmail.com

Filed Under: Beer News, Roundup Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Chicago Craft Beer Roundup – November 11, 2011

November 11, 2011 By 1 Comment

What’s Kicked

Finch’s Beer Co. launched a contest with Threadless to design the can for their Threadless IPA. That’s very cool, but clearly the best part here is that they’re going to start canning Threadless. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Roundup Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Chicago Craft Beer Roundup – November 8, 2011

November 8, 2011 By Leave a Comment

What’s Kicked

In an interview here at Chitown On Tap, Greg Koch of Stone Brewing Co. opened up about the dirty underbelly of pay-to-play tactics in Chicago’s beer business and offered some pointed words about Goose Island. In the interview, Koch claimed that he pulled out of a reputable Chicago craft beer bar for a book-signing event after its people demanded discounts and freebies in exchange for hosting. Commenters have since alleged that the bar in question is Sheffield’s. The bar has not yet returned my request for comment.

Greg Hall, former Goose Island brewmaster, is increasingly candid about his cider venture, Virtue Cider. He gave TimeOut Chicago a sneak peak at his Roscoe Village headquarters and lab and talked openly about sourcing apples in southwest Michigan. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Roundup Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Craft Beer Spilled All Over Chicago Magazine

June 20, 2011 By Leave a Comment
The July 2011 cover of Chicago Magazine.

The good suds grace the cover of Chicago Magazine this month.

The July issue of Chicago Magazine is covering readers with the good suds, 10+ pages of it. The centerpiece is a guide to the 36 locally produced beers that the Chicago Mag writers loved–how do I get that job? They cover a lot of ground and make it through a nearly exhaustive selection of Chicago’s breweries.

Check out the $12 digital subscription deal or find it on stands.

You’ll also find the writers’ favorite bars (Hopleaf, Map Room, Quenchers, Maria’s Packaged Goods, Sheffield’s), gastropubs (Bluebird, Fountainhead, Gilt Bar [at first I thought, "Really?" Then I looked up their beer list], Owen & Engine, Publican), and liquor stores (Armanetti, Binny’s – Lincoln Park, Lush, Vas Foremost, West Lakeview Liquors).

I have to give Chicago Mag props for knowing who to go for expert advice. They interview Ray Daniels of the Cicerone Certification Program on tasting beer and Beejay Oslon of Pipeworks Brewing on homebrewing. You’ll also find tips on beer and food pairings from The Publican (oysters), Bangers and Lace (sausage), Marion St. Cheese Market (take a guess).

It’s great to see craft beer get the front-page treatment and a nice little nod for homebrewing, too. Add this to the body of evidence that craft beer is becoming more mainstream. Hopefully the resources here will nudge more swill-sippers toward the many great local, hand-crafted brews that are readily available. And maybe some oenophiles will come to realize–gasp!–that beer is a better mate for food than wine.

To top it all off, the guys at Pipeworks Brewing have developed a special batch of summer brew for Chicago Magazine that they will be pouring at a time and place that I won’t share with you because I’m going to drink it. All of it.

Filed Under: Bars, Beer Culture, Beer News, Beer Reviews, Breweries, Brewpubs, Homebrewing, Trends Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Four of America’s 100 Best Beer Bars in Chicago

January 29, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Four Chicago bars showed up in DRAFT Magazine‘s collection of America’s top 100. They are:

Map Room – 1949 W. Hoyne – I don’t know what I like best about this place–the selection of Belgian ales and American craft, or the fact that you can always count on the tamale guy to save your life.

Hopleaf – 5148 N. Clark – What’s better than Hopleaf? More Hopleaf. I’ve had nothing but great food and beer experiences here. 20 new tap lines, a lunch menu, and more tables coming soon.

Local Option – 1102 W. Webster – Smaller menu but great options.

Sheffield’s – 3258 N. Sheffield – Epic beer garden and burgers. Sadly, Chicago lost a beer icon when owner Ric Hess passed away unexpectedly last week.

Notably absent: Quenchers (2401 N. Western) and Long Room (1612 W. Irving Park).

Any others you think should have made the list?

Filed Under: Bars Tagged With: , , , , , , ,