brewery

Awards

Minnesota Craft Beer: Best of 2020

May 10, 2021

What a crazy year for craft beer – and every other aspect of our lives. I took a serious step back in 2020. Between COVID-19 limiting travel opportunities, the birth of my son, a growing daughter, and starting a full renovation of a circa 1870s farmhouse, beer took a back seat. Yet I still had great craft beer memories and writing these awards can be cathartic. Let’s go!

A quick reminder of the stipulations. Every award must go to a brewery that I visited in the calendar year. I won’t give a brewery the same award two years in a row. If I’m missing one of your favorites I’d love to hear about it.

Bartlett Hall

June 15, 2020

It was dusk. We were on the street outside the car rental’s parking garage. Our evening felt like a loss due to the break-in at Fieldwork. It was now the insurance company’s responsibility. A good meal was what we needed. A craft beer wouldn’t hurt either. Something close to our hotel would hit the spot – not in a long walk mood. Google told me there was a trendy gastropub with craft brews nearby. It was time to roll the dice on Bartlett Hall.

Fieldwork Brewing Company

May 23, 2020

“It seems like a lot of breweries are in bad neighborhoods,” my wife said. It was the tail end of our day. We picked up the rental car in the morning and took it across the Golden Gate Bridge for an afternoon admiring the redwoods at the Muir Woods National Monument. I angled to take the long way around the bay. It added thirty minutes to our trip, but we’d get to drive across the Richmond–San Rafael Bridge (I like bridges) and gave us a chance to try one of Berkeley’s highest rated craft breweries, Fieldwork Brewing Company.

Standard Deviant Brewing

May 10, 2020

If there is one thing that we organize our trips around more than craft beer it would be food. For our Honeymoon we went on a wonderful guided tour of Europe. We chose guided because planning a wedding was hard enough. It worked great but we had a fair amount of our meals to ourselves. Our plan was to wing it – something we’ll never do again. When you have two of your worst Italian meals in Venice and Rome, you’re doing something wrong. My wife chose Rintaro for our splurge dinner but we had some time to kill before the reservation. Why not go down the street to Standard Deviant Brewing for a drink or two?

Magnolia Brewing Co.

April 25, 2020

It was the first day of March, our second day in San Francisco. The day prior we’d walked to Fisherman’s Wharf and the surrounding area. We started Sunday with a trip to the Painted Ladies of Full House fame and a pit stop for coffee and a donut (or two). From there we set course to the Golden Gate Park through the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood. It was there that I scouted the brewpub we’d return to for lunch: Magnolia Brewing Co.

Cellarmaker Brewing Company

April 18, 2020

My sister in-law told us we should avoid the Tenderloin neighborhood. They had stopped in San Francisco during a California road trip and their hotel was right in it’s heart. The Tenderloin is a high crime area of the city. Not an ideal place for an evening stroll. But I’d heard fantastic things about Cellarmaker Brewing Company and the neighborhood lay between our hotel and the brewery. Despite the warning, we set course.

Inver Grove Brewing Company

March 28, 2020

It was the first day above freezing. My wife and I were out looking for a new place to live. I’ve owned a home in Bloomington, Minnesota for 13 years. With a baby in the car and another on the way our plans to move out to the country and settle down were in motion. Location is critical, not too far from work, not too far from the Twin Cities, and not too far from our families. And if there was a brewery nearby? A bonus. That’s why we were in Inver Grove Heights, and why we had pulled into Inver Grove Brewing Company.

Invictus Brewing Company

February 23, 2020

Most client meetings go well. In rare cases they throw me for a loop. I was standing in the parking lot of an office park, reeling from a meeting that just occurred. I wouldn’t say it went poor, but it wasn’t what I had expected or prepared for. I plugged “breweries near me” into Google Maps and put the car in drive. Time to decompress with a craft beer at Invictus Brewing Company.

Foxhole Brewhouse

February 18, 2020

“Where is it?” I asked. We had parked in downtown Willmar, Minnesota and I was looking around for the brewery. It’s funny that the word downtown is used to describe both Manhattan and a town with a population of 20,000, but that’s the English language. “It’s over there.” Holli said, pointing across the street. Sure enough, a tiny Foxhole Brewhouse sign featuring a mischievous fox was set above a narrow building. “That’s a small sign.” I said. “It’s a lot bigger inside than it looks.” Brady replied, as we made our way across the street.

Fair State Brewing Cooperative

February 15, 2020

“Where to next?” I asked. We had finished lunch with our friends Megan & Mitch at Hai Hai, which followed a morning of coffee and beer at BlackStack. They live a fair distance south of the Twin Cities. They also share our love for craft beer and breweries so we give them leeway to choose the destinations. “Is Fair State close? We haven’t been there yet” Mitch asked. “Very close” I responded.

Older Posts

Newer Posts

Minnesota Craft Beer: Best of 2020

Bartlett Hall

Fieldwork Brewing Company

Standard Deviant Brewing

Magnolia Brewing Co.

Cellarmaker Brewing Company

Inver Grove Brewing Company

Invictus Brewing Company

Foxhole Brewhouse

Fair State Brewing Cooperative

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