01 May 2009

Dear Hoosier Beer Geek: Fort Wayne Edition

Fresh from the mailbox:
Hello,
I'm traveling from Lansing, MI to Fort Wayne tomorrow (Sat 5/2) - just for the day.

Was wondering 3 things:
1. Can you direct me to an establishment in Fort Wayne that specializes in and sells craft brew?
2. Does Three Floyds distribute to Fort Wayne?
3. What other IN craft brews are out there that are a must try?

Thanks in advance for your help/advice!

John
Question 1: The obvious answer is Mad Anthony, who Jason recently visited. Although they don't have a brewpub or sell directly from the brewhouse, Warbird's beers are also worth a visit. Indiana Beer also has a nice writeup on Fort Wayne beer locations. And although we haven't stopped in yet, Granite City is a beer option.

Question 2: A search on World Class Beverages Beer Finder shows that Three Floyds Alpha King is available at nine locations in the greater Fort Wayne area. A heads up to anyone looking for Three Floyds beers in Indiana: look for Alpha King.

Question 3: All of them? The bottled Indiana beers that reach "would buy again" status from our roundtable reviews include Brugge's Black and Triple De Ripple, Barley Islands Beastie (Bourbon) Barrel series, most of Oaken Barrel's lineup, and Upland's Lambics, which surprised us with their further developing flavor when we recently revisted them. Mad Anthony's IPA is a favorite amongst many of the KOTBR - though we haven't reviewed it yet - and we're all quite fond of Warbird's Shanty Irish and Thunderbolt Wheat as nice sessionable beers.

Since we're all located in Indy, I can't give suggestions at to which Fort Wayne liquor stores are best, and I'm sure we're missing a few locations worth visiting. Can any readers weight in?

4 comments:

  1. This is off topic, but did anyone see that the NBC show Parks and Rec had everyone drinking Upland Dragonfly Ipa on the show last night? That is some nice free advertising for upland.

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  2. Link
    http://tinyurl.com/df2tcx

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  3. There's not too many good beer stores in Ft. Wayne, at least while I was living up there.

    Belmont Beverage at 636 Dupont Rd had a decent selection, but nothing like some of the stores in Indy.

    Mad Anthony's gets my vote for craft beer if you're looking for a brew pub. There's a new Granite City chain as well, but I don't know how their beers are.

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  4. Nice to see a post on my hometown.

    The Ft. Wayne homebrewing club (MASH) is participating in the AHA "Big Brew" day tomorrow. We are being hosted at Warbird and we have at least 12 brewers signed up to brew and others signed up to enjoy the festivities. If you'd like to stop by, shoot me an email.

    As far as package beer and Three Floyds, I recommend the Belmont on Lima Rd near Cook.

    Here's a copy of a post I recently put on beeradvocate.....


    Belmont Beverage Lima Rd.

    Three Floyds:
    Brian Boru
    Rabbid Rabbit
    Behemoth
    Broodoo
    Dreadnaught (new batch/label)

    Dark Horse Perkulator

    Moylans IPA
    Moylans Double IPA

    Hoppin Frog IPA
    Hoppin Frog BORIS the crusher oatmeal stout

    Dogfish Head Red & White

    CapNCork Coldwater Rd/Washington Center

    Founder's Cerise

    New Belgium:
    Fat Tire
    1554
    Mothership Wit

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