Cincinnati Summer Beer Guide 2019

Cincinnati Beer continues to expand and evolve, and we are on the forefront of some of the major happenings, beer releases and trends across the community.

One of the advantages on our craft brewery tours is being in and out of locations all over our region every day to get a peek inside and find out what is going on in their individual marketplace, as well as identify trends across the region.

This Summer we reached out to our brewery partners to find out what they have going on and we are here to present our very first Summer Beer Guide.

I am excited to put this program together for you, I reached out to all of our brewery partners to see who wanted to showcase some things and the breweries below are the ones who responded (in case you were curious as to why some are omitted or left out).

One trend that continues to evolve in our market and beyond is the initiative toward a healthier lifestyle and the production of light lagers, ales and quite a few locations producing Hard Seltzer. I had a chance to talk with our local Beer Celebrity, Del Hall, about a beer they are doing at Fifty West which is made with electrolytes (see Fifty West section below). Running clubs, yoga, goat yoga, canoeing, biking, volleyball, boxing matches and more health inspired events span across the region as breweries continue to foster the idea of a healthy community in their respective towns and cities.

We have quite a few new breweries slated to open a taproom, or who have recently opened like HighGrain in Silverton, Cincy Brewing in Lockland, Deadlow in California, Northern Row in OTR, Happy 2 and a few locations that have a little bit more time like Big Ash in Anderson, Esoteric in Walnut Hills, and Cartridge Brewing in Maineville.

Here are some fun Summer Beer releases, events and things celebrating Cincinnati’s rich craft brewery culture.

Enjoy a fun filled Summer!

Moerlein Malt House- 1621 Moore Street, Over-The-Rhine, Cincinnati, Ohio

Weekly – Friday Night Pizza Night with featured Musical Artist. Hand-tossed pizza’s from $6 (cheese) to $9 (works) and everything in between. No cover and free parking in our lots. Here is link: https://www.facebook.com/events/345281392955158/

Weekly – Beer Hall Singalong. It’s a Cincinnati tradition Every Saturday night 8-11PM live band playing all the hits for your dancing and singing good time. Requests taken by the band. Think of hits like Sweet Caroline, Benny and the Jets, we are the champion, and more. No cover and free parking in our lots. Here is a link: https://www.facebook.com/events/346874492541867/

Fibonacci– Compton Road, Mt. Healthy, Cincinnati, OH

We have a lot going on this summer. We have a Summer Solstice celebration coming up that will include beer releases, monthly farmers market, we have our 4th birthday party on July 27th with beer releases, we are brewing a beer for the Ohio Tourism Board for the 50th Anniversary of the Lunar Landing, we are brewing an all Ohio beer with OEFFA for their 40th anniversary, and we were just recently covered in the CORV guide as the brewery in Cincinnati and Dayton using the most local ingredients in our beers by far.

Rhinegeist Brewing-Elm St- Over-The-Rhine

This year Rhinegeist will celebrate our 6th year of existence. To celebrate this, we will have a new Brut IPA infused with tea of all your favorite summer flavors, the tea is Findlay Market exclusive called “Findlay Fresh”.

Come hang with us as we celebrate our 6th Anniversary. On June 29th, kick back and cool off as we mark our next journey around the sun with a torrent of hot activations, sweet treats, live music, a giant piñata, and a smorgasbord of rare beers that will keep your head firmly in the clouds.

Nine Giant,Montgomery Rd., Pleasant Ridge, Cincinnati, Ohio

Third Anniversary Bottle Release – Sat June 29^th 10am – 12am

We’re releasing Double ImPeachMint Peach Apricot Mint Imperial Gose along with four VERY limited edition 750ml bottles spiked with copious amounts of Pineapple, Guava, Passion Fruit and Lychee, respectively.

We’re doing a complete menu takeover for the day—scrapping the whole menu and doing legit Mexican food—a trio of tacos, chips and queso, taquitos, etc. We’re been menu testing for a while and it’s going to be rad.

Fretboard, Creek Road, Blue Ash, Ohio

Fretboard Collaborates with Klosterman Bakery: https://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2019/05/22/exclusive-craft-brewery-partners-with-klosterman.html via @BusinessCourier

America’s Best Brew Band:

Musicians that actively work for a brewery are encouraged to bring their band or form a group to compete on-stage in front of judges and crowds at Fretboard Brewing Company. Although this is a fall event, the call to action for breweries to start forming their band and set-lists is NOW! Our brewery-infused battle of the bands is going to be the first of it’s kind in Cincinnati, and maybe anywhere! Email [email protected] for more info.

Cincy Bräu Stein Society:

Limited to 50 members, our mug club is $150/yr and includes a handcrafted stein from Perrino Pottery, a membership card, CBSS shirt, and exclusive tastings. Membership is now open to the public, and launching in July.

Micro Brass Cincinnati Lager Release & Special announcement about beer with Mitch Steele:

Continuing in the Cincy Bräu tradition, we will be releasing our annual collaboration with the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra, “Micro Brass”Cincinnati Lager on Thursday,June 27. On this day we will also be brewing a special collaboration beer with Mitch Steele, C.O.O. of New Realm Brewing in Atlanta, and formerly of Stone Brewing. As a musician himself, Mitch will be jumping on our stage to shred the guitar during happy hour. More info about this beer (ie, name, style, canning details) will be released in the coming week or two.

We’ve also got a big event in mid-August that we have yet to announce. So keep a lookout for that! We are planning on making the announcement late next week!

Fifty West-Route 50,Mariemont, Ohio

Fifty West has one of, if not the, very best programs in the City for the health-conscious beer drinker. Located on the Little Miami River they have a Volleyball court, a Canoe Livery, a Bike Shop, Running Clubs, and after talking with Del Hall they are offering a beer to replenish your electrolytes after all of that action!

I asked Del Hall to tell me more about that.

Del Hall: “So one of the major themes this year at the Craft Brewers Conference was “active” lifestyle consumers and making “activated” beers. People are looking for healthier alternatives to beer, that’s why seltzer is taking up so much of the market these days. Spirits are taking up another huge portion as well because distilled spirits are low in carbohydrates. If a beer has health benefits (electrolytes, low carb, low calorie, etc) health conscious consumers may reach for a beer, instead of a seltzer. We feel like we are one of the breweries in the country that actually has a culture of a healthy lifestyle and felt like we needed to pursue this style. Watermelon Quencher was our first attempt. It’s a low abv fruited beer with a high amount of pink Himalayan sea salt which adds trace amounts of minerals (sodium, potassium, chloride, calcium, magnesium, bicarbonate, phosphate and sulfate) which provide electrolytes. We are absolutely planning on doing more of these and will have several offerings this summer, when you need electrolytes the most because they’re lost in sweat.”

Fifty West has Punch-Out 4 the greatest Beer Boxing event in the United States! July 13^th, get tickets and more information here: https://g.co/kgs/GZMqg8

Fifty West opening new Brewpub in Chillicothe: https://www.citybeat.com/food-drink/whats-the-hops/blog/21063145/fifty-west-brewing-company-expands-with-new-brewpub-in-chillicothe-ohio

Wooden Cask, York Street, Newport, Kentucky

 Farmstand Café- We are going to start opening for lunch starting Monday June 3rd. Hours will be 11:30-2pm and we will reopen at 3pm.

Hazy IPA release- https://www.facebook.com/events/451254192302376/

Grainworks Brewing-Cox Road, West Chester, Ohio

Grainworks is putting on what we are calling our “Second Saturday Concert Series”. We have partnered with amazing local bands to play outdoors here at the taproom every second Saturday of the month through September ending in our Second Anniversary Music Festival September 6th-8th.

These will be full blow concerts including us hiring professional sound company to come in and set up a full light show and high-grade sound system.  Our spring beer sensation is our “Pink Lemonade Stand”, a Pineapple Cherry Berliner Weisse.  This super refreshing tart will be sure to please the palate.

Band Line up:

June 8th:  Matt Water Band – Current Rock Pop and Country

July 13th: Queen City Silver Stars – Steel Drum Island Music

August 10th:  StrangeLove  – 80’s and 90′ pop hits.

September 6th:  StrangeLove(opener)  Matt Waters (headliner)

September 7th:   TBD (opener)  DAT Band (Headliner)

Cheers!

Bad Tom Smith- Eastern Avenue, East End, Cincinnati, Ohio

Hope all is well! We had a visit from 2 of our Cleveland location Brewers last month and brewed a couple of their beers here in Cincy and are on tap now and for a few months. Not exactly summer beers but they are very tasty and complement our lighter beers that are on as well. They are “Cocked and Loaded Smoked Porter” and a black IPA called “Hangman” See description below:

Beer Description

• Hangman Black IPA –  ( 6.95% ABV 87.6 IBU) With a smooth, medium-bodied mouthfeel, the dry, hop-forward balance leads to a bready malt flavor with a piney, citrusy finish.
• Cocked & Loaded Smokey Porter –  ( 5.6% ABV 40 IBU) Brewed with mesquite smoked malt, the pronounced smoky flavor and medium hop bitterness, along with the assertive smoke malt aroma

We expect to be in our new Madisonville location in early August, which will allow us to expand to 18+ beers (similar to what we have in Cleveland) & serving of 15+ high end bourbon (including our bourbon brand later this year) & cocktails.

Little Miami- Route 50, Old Milford, Ohio

Right now, we have these coming:

Dayton strong milk stout

Dragonfly raspberry apricot Berlinerweiss

Belgian Dubbel

Pineapple Wheat Ale

Eat A Peach Summer Ale

We are having a special event on July 6th called Bicycle Day, to promote summer and outdoor activities such as biking and kayaking, with music all day! Here is the Facebook event:

https://www.facebook.com/events/1562726367194210/

Urban Artifact- Blue Rock Rd, Northside, Cincinnati, Ohio

Bewilderfest, our summer music festival is August 23 and 24.

https://www.facebook.com/bewilderfest/

Cool.  Here is a short list of events for the summer…

June 11- Paperweight Release (Apricot Midwest Fruit Tart)

Jun2 22- Paperweight Variant Release

June 25- Pickle Gose Release

June 29- Pickle Day (Pickle eating contest, pickled food, pickled drinks, etc)

July 3/4- Northside Rock n Rock Carnival (Music Festival)

July 9- Fire Iron Release

July 20- Fire Iron Variant Release

August 13- Centerpiece Release

August 23/24- Bewilderfest (2 day AMAZING music festival)

August 31- Centerpiece Variant Release

There is also a HUGE event in the works for September 28th, still fleshing out details and name.

Alexandria Brewing- Route 27, Alexandria Pike, Alexandria, Kentucky

1. June 22: We will have our Cecilias Grace Belgian Quad on Cherries aged in New Riff Barrels. (this will be featured at KY Craft Beer Bash but will be tapped here too for those who dont go to the fest).
2. About a month after that we will have our JWR Belgian Tripel on Peaches aged in New Riff Barrels.
3. We will be at the Farmula Fest selling beer at AJ Jolly Park, we will be releasing a Peach Gose for this event as well.
4. We have RECA Ralph on tap now. It is a Red Rope Licorice Gose with sweet cherries. Made for an upcoming event at the Alexandria RECA Roller Rink.
5. 6/29 – Bluegrass Doberman rescue event.

Darkness-Route 8, Bellevue, Kentucky

Our 3-year anniversary celebration is July 20th. We’ll have plenty of fun new beers and variants to try along with special Man on the Moo (our staple milk stout) to celebrate the 50th anniversary Moon Landing on the same day.

We also invested in our very own food truck which will be serving by July.

13 Below Route 50, Saylor Park, Ohio

Here are the happenings at 13 Below Brewery over the summer.

13 Below Brewery will be launching a summer Kolsch around the summer solstice.

The brewery continues its Live Music Series over the summer featuring local artists: Rusted Gun, The Remains, Freak Mythology, Shivelight, No Sorrow, Sullivan & Janszen, and others  – check out their website for bands dates, and times.

13 Below Brewery will close out the summer the weekend of Sep 21^st celebrating its 2^nd anniversary with new beer releases, live music, food trucks, games, and lots of fun.

Sonder Brewing-Duke Blvd, Mason, Ohio

• Oktoberfest September 27 & 28 at the taproom
  • Traditional German style beers
  • Live music
  • Games
  • Vendors
  • A whole lot of drinking good beer out of liters!
• Our New Tap Tuesday program where we tap a new beer on Tuesdays
• Taproom happenings
  • Yoga & Brunch every Sunday morning
  • Themed trivia every month
  • Live music and exercise events weekly

Municipal Brewing- High Street, Hamilton, Ohio

We’ve got cans of Approachable Blonde, Orange Agave and Scout IPA for the
summertime.  They’ll be sold in the taproom only.

Also, on June 7-9 we’ll be celebrating our 3rd anniversary with bands,
foods, and one-off beers (on the 8th only for that one). We went and it was a blast!

On August 10th is Ales for Tails which is a big event where we pair with the Animal Friends Humane Society to get a bunch of pets adopted as well as raise money for their efforts.  It’s like the anniversary in that we block off the street and bring in a stage and they’ll be bands and vendors and animals that can be adopted.

Plus we’ll have Woltermelon available sometime in July – we haven’t come
up a release date yet. This release commemorates a local firefighter who gave the ultimate sacrifice.

Cheers!

Wiedemann- Vine Street, St. Bernard, Cincinnati, Ohio

Wiedemann Brewery is featuring a special Fruit Beer Flight of Four all summer for just $7. It includes short pours of our Pink Boots Raspberry Tart Wheat Ale, WeZen the Juice Strawberry Vanilla Milkshake IPA, Blood Orange Blonde Ale, and our citrusy Ivorydale Pale Ale. Perfect refreshment for breakfast … or any other time of the day!

We also have live music scheduled for our tree-lined Bohemian Beer Garden and spacious sun deck four night a week, Thursday through Sunday. Enjoy world-class brews and world-class blues from the Warsaw Falcons, Ricky Nye, Ben Levin, Lagniappe, Brian Lovely and the Flying Underground, Thom Stephenson, Everything’s Jake, the Cheryl and Shorty Show, and many more.

Relax by the canal in historic downtown St. Bernard – conveniently located, minutes from anywhere, and plenty of off-street parking. Let’s Get Together!

Braxton and Braxton Labs7^th Street, Covington, Kentucky and Route 8, Newport, Kentucky

We’re of course promoting The Official Beer of Summer! Summertrip is our 4.2% ABV passionfruit Berliner weisse – crafted for time spent in the summer sun. Whether you’re on the lake, grilling out, or just having a beer after the workday. Summertrip is supremely refreshing and only 130 calories.

We’re really pushing Summertrip in June! It’s just tart enough to provide plenty of refreshment, and doesn’t leave you feeling too full like many fruited beers.

Braxton announces plans to launch a new Barrel House and taproom for their Barrel aging program in Ft. Mitchell Kentucky: http://www.braxtonbrewing.com/blog/a-brand-new-brewing-experience-introducing-the-braxton-barrel-house/

Braxton and Greaters create another flavor in their beer lineup: https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2019/05/21/key-lime-pie-ale-braxton-and-graeters-collaboration-perfect-summer/3751547002/

Braxton Labs 2 Year Anniversary 6/15/19

Moerlein Lager House – Joe Nuxhall and Mehring Way, Cincinnati, Ohio

We have several beer related events going on this summer. Here are a few:

Rockin’ the Roebling Every Thursday 6PM – Thursday night summer concert series on the event lawn next to the Lager House. Each event features Moerlein beers, food and live music from area bands. Event is free to attend.

Brunch, Brews and Baseball Away Game Sundays 11AM & 1PM – Enjoy brunch and a beer tasting while learning about the history of beer and baseball in Cincinnati. Then head to Great American Ballpark for a special tour. You also get a voucher to the Reds Hall of Fame and a free membership to Moerlein Mug Club with your ticket purchase. Tickets are $45.

Cincinnati Pride Keg Tapping 6/14 6PM – Special keg tapping and beer dedication fundraiser for Cincinnati Pride. We’ve brewed a special Raspberry Kolsch we’re calling “Stonewalled” that Cincinnati Pride has helped us name. Beers are $3 from the pin and $3 of every Stonewalled sold during the event will be donated to Cincinnati Pride.

June Brewer’s Table 6/14 7PM – We hold a special beer pairings event on the second Friday of each month after our keg tappings. June is Cheers to Cheese! We’re pairing a flight of 4 Moerlein beers and 4 gourmet cheeses chosen by our chefs for $16.

Cincy Blues Fest July 13 4PM – This year’s Cincy Blues Fest will take place on the Schmidlapp Event Lawn next to the Lager House. We’ll be selling Moerlein beers out on the lawn for the entire event. The show’s headliner is the Blues Beatles.

Glier’s Goetta Keg Tapping 7/17 6PM – We’re tapping the official Glier’s Goetta beer on July 17 to kick off the Gliers Goetta Pub Crawl! It’s a smooth golden lager that features a touch of smoked malt, sea salt, black peppercorn, and oats provided by Glier’s. It brings home the essence of what makes Goetta so delicious!

March First – Kemper Rd, Sycamore Township, Ohio

In the place of a big event the one thing we would love for your customers to know about us is that we’re Cincinnati’s only brewery, cidery, and distillery.

We have something that everyone can enjoy from beer, cider, hard seltzer, whiskey, rum and vodka.

We pride ourselves on making our ciders from 100% real Ohio apples, never from concentrate.

We are also looking forward to expand our distilling operations to Milford, Ohio soon.

We’ll be beginning construction in June and expect it to be a 1-1.5 year project

March First Starts construction on new Distillery in Old Milford: http://www.cincyweekend.com/march-first-brewing-announces-distillery/

Brink, College Hill, Cincinnati, Ohio

We’re doing 2 bottle releases this summer…

Street Corner Thieves – June (TBD)
A blend of our “Street Corner Karate” and “Barrel Thieves and Hired Guns” Russian Imperial Stout collaborations. We took the best of both beers and blended them together in a bourbon barrel and aged it for 9 months with vanilla beans and 44 pounds of raspberries. Flavors of fresh raspberry and subtle vanilla mingle with this roasty, chocolatey stout.

Duncan Clan – Saturday, 7/2
Our Scottish Style Wee Heavy aged for 10 months in Jefferson Barrels. This dark beer features rich, malty flavors of caramel and toffee balanced by a rich toastiness and a subtle rye spiciness. The barrels added smooth notes of vanilla and oak.

Bottles of Duncan Clan will be released during our inaugural Jack Fest to festival celebrate our beloved Uncle Jack who inspired the creation of Brink.

Notable July Beers Releases: VanHoppen Pineapple 2x IPA, Citrazest Milkshake IPA,

Saturday, Aug. 11th we will be holding our annual Pie Contest – more details to come.

DogBerry, Cresent Park, West Chester Ohio

DogBerry has a new patio that will be dog friendly as well.  Further we look forward tot he release of a couple of new fruited Summer Ales as well as the return of our Flogger Czech Pils Lager and Imperial IPA Mar’s Madness.

Taft’s Ale House- Race and 15^th, Cincinnati, Ohio and Taft’s Brewporium- Spring Grove, Spring Grove Village, Cincinnati, Ohio

• Events:
  • 7/19: Christmas in Julyat Taft’s Ale House
  • 7/26: Super Hero Night at Taft’s Brewpourium
    • Celebrating our new beer release – Juicy Justice DIPA
  • 8/2: Lock-Inat Taft’s Brewpourium
  • 8/24: Watermelon Gavel Banger Day in Washington Park
    • We’re making a watermelon variant of our popular Gavel Banger IPA, with fun watermelon events outdoors (bowling, corn hole, watermelon smashing, etc.)
  • 9/28: Carnival at Taft’s Brewpourium
    • We’re hosting a carnival with tons of games, both indoors and out with special beer prices

• Upcoming Packaged Beer Releases:
  • Juicy Justice DIPA
  • Oktubberfest Festbier
  • Gustav Vienna Lager

Swine City, Symmes Rd. Fairfield, OH

Adult Field Day

https://www.facebook.com/events/557908211365457/

Nuxy 41 Beer Release

In collaboration with The Joe Nuxhall Miracle League Fields and The Joe Nuxhall Character Education Fund we present Nuxy 41 a delicious and light Altbier to enjoy during any ballgame, with a portion of the sales going to these great organizations.

Father’s Day

Get your dad jokes ready, your white tube socks pulled all the way up, and raise a glass for dad! Swine City celebrates Father’s Day with $1 off pints for all men, and a dad joke contest for great prizes (being an actual dad not required).

MadTree Brewing

Gears and Beers- July 7^th– Gears and Beers returns with presenting sponsor Cincyscca!

Hyper car or hoopty, all are welcome! Drive your favorite ride, and hang out with like-minded auto enthusiasts. Grab some coffee from Deeper Roots Coffee. Catch-a-Fire Pizza will have their brunch menu available until 2pm and there will be plenty of beers to enjoy (responsibly).

Sam Adams Taproom

-June 29^th: Brew House & 21 Cellar Tours at 11:00 am. $20/ticket, can be purchased through Eventbrite.

– July 6^th: Jimmy’s Backyard BBQ Bonanza: FREE burgers and dogs 12-5, Cane Run Bluegrass band 12-4, water balloon/gun fight begins at 5:30, and sparklers at 9 pm! It’s a backyard BBQ so wear your shorts, tank tops, straw hats, and bring your water guns.

-July 18^th: Cincinnati Burger Week Flight Night with Nicholson’s. $25/ticket, can be purchased through Eventbrite.

-July 20^th: Brew House & 21 Cellar Tours at 1:00 pm. $20/ticket, can be purchased through Eventbrite.