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Your favorite local brewery

The two best in Jacksonville are Bold City Brewing (my favorites are the Mad Manatee IPA and Duke's Brown Ale) and Aardwolf Brewery.
 
Four Peaks breweries. Two of my favorites are Kilt Lifter

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And White Ale
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I am so jealous of you. I've considered moving to the Phoenix area just so I can be closer to Four Peaks. Their pumpkin porter is amazing.
 
My favorite local breweries here in Las Vegas are Big Dog's and Boulder Dam Brewing. Big Dog's closed all but one of their pubs down to increase their bottling output (a dumb idea in my opinion) but they make some really tasty brews. Try the 38 Special. If you visit Vegas and take a trip out to Hoover Dam, stop into Boulder City and have a few beers at Boulder Dam brewing. The food is tasty and the beers are fresh.
 
I just finished up a Weyerbacher mixed case in July. The standouts were:
  • Merry Monks 9.3% ABV, Belgian-style Tripel
  • Blithering Idiot, 11.1% ABV, hearty ale
  • Old Heathen, 8% ABV, Imperial Stout

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TexLaw

Fussy Evil Genius
We've been fortunate to see a bunch of breweries pop up in the Houston area over the last several years, but my favorite still is twenty-one year old Saint Arnold. My favorite, year-round offering from them is Endeavor DIPA. It packs one heck of a punch, but you wouldn't know it to drink it. Very, very smooth and balanced. Among their seasonals, I'm torn between the Summer Pils and the Christmas Ale. The limited offerings arelit of fun and typically top-notch.
 
In Detroit, Atwater is probably my favorite local brew. They've got this pilsner called "Purple Gang Pilsner" and its one of the finest beers I've ever had...

I also like 312 from Goose Island down in the Chicago area....I think they've gone national now, but its still a heck of a good beer.
 
My favorite truly local (in town) brewery is a place called Block 15. Fantastic food and really solid beers, especially their farmhouse ales, IPAs, and sours. Their porters and stouts are also very good.

Local within 100 miles is Breakside, which is near the top of my top 10 list of breweries. Breakside also makes the best burger I've ever had (American Kobe beef with blue cheese and local thick-cut bacon). The rest of their food is outstanding, as well. We have trouble forcing ourselves to try other places in Portland because no one else provides such an amazing beer list and food menu. They're doing truly innovative work at Breakside. HUB, Occidental, Upright, Ecliptic, Base Camp, and Gigantic are some other great Portland breweries.

I'd go as far to say that planning a beercation in Portland, OR is something anyone who truly loves beer should make a priority. There are now around 70 commercial craft breweries there. On top of that, it's a really fun and interesting city surrounded by stunning countryside (mountains, Columbia River gorge, waterfalls, the coast, etc.) and packed full of wonderful restaurants.

Bonus: If you like pinot noir, wine country is just west of Portland.

Oakshire is my favorite brewery in Eugene, which also meets the local within 100 miles criteria.

It's 128 miles to Bend, OR, but if you ever see anything in cans or bottles produced by Crux, Bend Brewing, Silver Moon, or Boneyard, buy it. Almost everything those breweries produce is outstanding. Those places all on my "favorites" list.

-Andy
 
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My favorite truly local (in town) brewery is a place called Block 15. Fantastic food and really solid beers, especially their farmhouse ales, IPAs, and sours. Their porters and stouts are also very good.

Local within 100 miles is Breakside, which is near the top of my top 10 list of breweries. Breakside also makes the best burger I've ever had (American Kobe beef with blue cheese and local thick-cut bacon). The rest of their food is outstanding, as well. We have trouble forcing ourselves to try other places in Portland because no one else provides such an amazing beer list and food menu. They're doing truly innovative work at Breakside. HUB, Occidental, Upright, Ecliptic, Base Camp, and Gigantic are some other great Portland breweries.

I'd go as far to say that planning a beercation in Portland, OR is something anyone who truly loves beer should make a priority. There are now around 70 commercial craft breweries there. On top of that, it's a really fun and interesting city surrounded by stunning countryside (mountains, Columbia River gorge, waterfalls, the coast, etc.) and packed full of wonderful restaurants.

Bonus: If you like pinot noir, wine country is just west of Portland.

Oakshire is my favorite brewery in Eugene, which also meets the local within 100 miles criteria.

It's 128 miles to Bend, OR, but if you ever see anything in cans or bottles produced by Crux, Bend Brewing, Silver Moon, or Boneyard, buy it. Almost everything those breweries produce is outstanding. Those places all on my "favorites" list.

-Andy
Andy have you tried Heater Allen? They're in McMinnville, all lager-style beers so maybe not a great match for the styles you mentioned above but pretty much everything they do is really good stuff
 
This got me thinking that I need to start visiting the local Breweries.
Here we have quite a few, but the most popular are probably:

New Belgium
Sierra Nevada
Wicked Weed
Olde Mecklenburg
Duck-Rabbit

Highland has a number but I like their Gaelic $Gaelic_pair_2014.gif
and also their oatmeal porter $Porter_pair_2014.gif
Sierra Nevada should be easy to find, they have a wide selection one of my favourites from them is Beer Camp $beercamp201512oz.png
Duck-Rabbit has a really good Milk Stout$milkstout.png

Olde Mecklenburg they have Fat Boy $fat-boy.png
 
Old Belgium is another one widely available. Enjoy their Ranger$ranger_l.png, and 1554$1554_l.png

And finally Wicked Weed Freak of Nature double IPA $lIxDqab.jpg
and some bretts- Bretticent and Serenity$Wicked-Weed-590.jpg
I had Black Angel- it was quite interesting.
 
I'm not yet acquainted with my new home, so I'll just mention a couple one, two or seven of my favorites from the Philadelphia area.

First, the obvious one, old standby. Yuenglng. If you're on the east coast, Lager is pretty easy to come by. It's fairly simple, just another lager. Maybe a little better. But if you're in Pennsylvania, or if you can find it in your area, try to get some of their Porter. Not the best beer you'll ever have, but it ranks as far as large breweries go.

Now for the fun ones. I'll try to rank these in the order that I think you'll be most likely to find them.

Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA. This is possibly my all time second favorite beer, and Dogfish Head has a pretty wide distribution as far as craft brews go. Highly recommended. 94% on Beer Advocate. http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/64/2093/

Victory Brewing Company Hop Devil IPA. As the name implies, it's QUITE hoppy, a little far on the bitter side for my every day sensibilities, but definitely a fantastic brew. 91% on Beer Advocate. http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/345/1005/

Troegs Troegenator Double Bock. Another good one that has a time and a place, but isn't for my regular consumption. Beloved by most, but definitely not all. 87% on Beer Advocate. http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/694/4109/

Stoudt's Gold Lager. Definitely my all time favorite. Taste's like a stout, looks like a lager. If I could only drink one beer for the rest of my life, it's this. 88% on Beer Advocate. http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/394/2106/

Appalachian Brewing Company Outta Focus Double IPA. Another solid one, not one of my favorites, but worth checking out. 81% on Beer Advocate. http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/1336/61716/

Lancaster Brewing Company Milk Stout. A great, heavy beer. One of my favorites, but will almost always reach for a Stoudt's first. 87% on Beer Advocate. http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/743/3960/

I hope that's enought to keep you busy for a while, and I hope you enjoy my suggestions, if you get to try any. Happy hunting!
 
Great North Aleworks

$GreatNorth_cans_year-round_04-320x200.jpg

My new favorite local brewery. Okay, I'm biased because Rob and Lisa North are good friends of mine and we are all members of the Brew Free or Die homebrew club. But without doubt Rob brews excellent beer as both a home brewer and a commercial brewer. He has won several significant home brewing competitions and brewed commercially with Newburyport Brewing Company for a time. Great North Aleworks is a 20-barrel brewery and their three flagship beers are a robust vanilla porter, an IPA and Smokin', a take on a German rauchbier. Their first seasonal is Thai Dyed, a wheat-based summer ale brewed with Sorachi Ace hops. Coming up soon is a cranberry witbier.

They are currently canning and kegging and distributed primarily in New Hampshire (they just opened two weeks ago) but hopefully their beer will soon be available near you.
 
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