Northern Lights: Spokane's coolest mini-mall

Stopped off in Spokane on the way east to check out Northern Lights Brewing. Situated between the Spokane River and the Gonzaga campus, these folks have made the most of their location.

The brewery and pub share space with a fly-fishing tackle shop, a Thai restaurant, a chocolatier, and a new distillery.  The website emphasizes the three signature beers here: the Born & Raised IPA, the Crystal ESB, and the Silent Treatment Pale.  They do play with other styles as well; I sampled the Chocolate Dunkel and the Bulldog Cream Ale during a short stop.  The three main beers show up on the t-shirts and other swag they sell, but the Bulldog (Gonzaga's mascot) does not.  He just growls on a window in front of some of the fermenter tanks.

A very enjoyable stop, enhanced by the ardent embrace of their community these brewers show.

(Visited 5/14/12)

Philadelphia.city of brewerly love: Pt. I (PBC)

  While hanging out in Philly with T.J. and Gregg and discussing their October wedding near here, we got a couple of brewery visits in.  First, the Philadelphia Brewing Co., working out of a good looking old brick building in the Fishtown neighborhood.

They make a nice lager, Kenzinger, a tasty porter, and my fave, a wheat beer called Walt Wit, with a pic of the Leaves of Grass guy on the label--yes, I had to pop for the t-shirt.  They gave us a notice tour of the plant, where I got a shot of the bright daughter by the brite tank.

And she took one of me hamming it up in a cutout.

More east coast brewstops will be posted soon, but I just can't help but talk about this afternoon's visit to Monk's Cafe on S. 16th in Philly, the beating heart of Belgian beer enthusiasm in the USA.
Monk's has an incredible bottled beer list, around 300 labels and half of them from Belgium, where the greatest trippels, wits, saisons, and all that good stuff can be sampled.  Another quarter of the list is many of the best American beers, like Russian River, Dogfish Head, Firestone Walker, and Ommegang.  Got no pix but my taste buds will long remember Monk's.
(Phila. Brewing Co. visited 5/19/12)