What city have you been to that has great beer and brewerys?
What city has the most brewerys?
Please list favorite beer and description.
I’ll go first.
I can honestly say that I live in a GREAT beer city! Grand Rapids Michigan is home to:
Founders (Reds Rye, Kentucky Breakfast stout, etc),
The Hideout brewery (which one an award for their Belgian tripple),
Grand Rapids Brewing co.,
Schmoz brewery,
BOB’s house of brews,
Hopcat, which has an AMAZING selection of beer AND brews their own!
and just opening a few weeks ago, Brewery Vivant, which does Belgian style open fermentation. Haven’t been there yet, but it was started by one of the original brewers from New Holland brewery.
All these breweries can be reached on foot or on a short bus ride!
If that isn’t enough, Bells, Darkhorse, Arcadia, and New Holland are all just a short drive.
My favorite Grand Rapids beer is still Founders Reds Rye. One of their original beers. Founders also makes a killer oatmeal stout, but you have to go to the brewery to get it!
I also really like Darkhorse Crooked Tree IPA, Hopcats Dortmunder lager, and when I can find it, Founders harvest ale.
Have to give mention to Bamberg in Germany. The place is amazing. If you’ve never been there, you need to treat yourself to one of the greatest beer cultures on earth! 11 outstanding brewerys, all within walking distance. I’ve been there 3 times and plan to go back as soon as I can.
My favorite beer from there is Keesman brewerys Herren pils. Best pils on Earth! Period! Second favorite is Spezial Rauchbier. It’s not as strong as Schlenkerla and goes down much smoother.
In fact, I find it hard to find a bad beer in Bamberg!
Portland OR is the answer to both.
Seattle and Denver are both great, Portland is great, Bamberg is awesome too. Really, how are we supposed to pick a favorite? Maybe we don’t have to.
London. Fourteen breweries. Some awesome beer. (And incidentally where I grew up, which may influence things).
Munich has to be rated up there for beer experience.
Instead of a rambling life list of good drinking cities that everyone already knows, here are my up and coming beer towns in my state. Grand Rapids was covered above. Kalmazoo has Bells and several smaller brewpubs, along with 3 new multitaps we sampled a few weeks back. A little farther north of those are Traverse City and Bellaire, in a very pretty setting with about 5 breweries total(I had to include Bellaire because of Short’s brewpub). This is flyover country for most, but it is worth a stop.
Ft. Collins, Denver, Eugene, and San Diego. I get to all of these cities regularly and they all offer something unique!
Ft. Collins- Odell IPA, Bourbon Barrel Stout
Denver- Breckenridge Vanilla Porter
Eugene- Ninkasi Total Domination IPA
San Diego- Ballast Point Sculpin IPA, Stone Anything
Well in that case - Bristol and the surrounding area certainly seems to be going places.
I understand what you mean, but I’d still like to hear what peoples favorite beer and brewerys are. For instance, alot of people know how great Bamberg is, but there are 300 brewerys in the surrounding area that I’ve never been too. I’d love to hear about these.
I’m partial to the other Portland (Maine!)…2nd most restaurants per capita (last time I heard…) and a lot of them are brewpubs too!
Shipyard, Geary’s, Gritty’s, Casco Bay, Sebago…damn, I need a vacation sometime soon…
I’m with euge…
München ist meine Lieblingsstadt
Augustiner Bräu
Paulaner
Hacker-Pschorr
Hofbräu
Löwenbräu
Spaten-Franziskaner-Bräu
Meine Lieblings-Brauerei ist Schlossbrauerei Maxlrain in der nahegelegenen Stadt von Bad Aibling.
Maxlrainer Leo Weisse ist das beste!
So jealous. We have the Frog pubs around here, and that’s about it - everything else is produced in the countryside. Of course, there’s the Lamb Family Brewery, which has received a great many accolades, but I’d love some competition.
If we are throwing out up and coming areas, why not Asheville, NC. Buncombe county has 230K people which equates to about 300 people per square mile. The NCABC currently lists 11 breweries in the that county (North Carolina has 100 counties doncha know) and another is now under construction. In the counties surrounding Buncombe are 5 additional breweries.
Asheville alone has 10 of the breweries and the population of Asheville is 69K.
If you haven’t been to Ashvegas (FWIW - there is no gambling there), I’d suggest you go. There is a reason it has won or tied for Beer Town USA the last few years.
People always think of Sam Adams (sometimes unfavorably) when they think of Boston, but in reality, Boston is a wonderful beer city home to underrated gems like Harpoon (SO much more than Harpoon IPA), Pretty Things (amazing), John Harvard, Boston Beer Works, Cambridge Brewing Company, etc…not to mention dozens of amazing beer bars like the Publick House and Sunset Grill and Tap…in addition to the fact that it’s hard to find a bar anywhere in the city that doesn’t have at least one great beer on tap.
Asheville, NC is another new favorite of mine. Amazing beer city with tons of great options including but not limited to Highland and French Broad.
Need to make a pilgrimage to Portland soon.
Beer cities? Try any town in Belgium. Brewery cities? Portlandia can’t be beat. The next best would probably be Seattle (apologies to San Diego). My favorite style? Hard to pick, but I love IPA, a hoppy red/amber ale, black IPA, porter, dubbel, geuze, and a hoppy Belgian (Gouden Carolus, for example).
I like the beer in my town, Colorado Springs. I used to live right across the street from Bristol Brewing, and I loved the smell when they were brewing a new batch. My current fave is the Black Fox Shyela. Phantom Canyon is pretty good too. Their honey blonde is killer! We’re also only an hour away from Denver, an hour and a half from Boulder, and two hours from Ft. Collins. I think Colorado in general has some of the best beers around.