In late 2012 and early 2013, three new breweries opened in Seattle’s South Park neighborhood. I tried waiting until all three had opened before biking down in order to kill three birds with one stone, so to speak, but I ran out of patience after the second brewery opened. So I hopped on the bike and pedalled down the Duwamish Trail. As it turned out, the first brewery was not open that day, and so I was only able to visit Lowercase Brewing. That’ll teach me to be patient. Instant gratification is the way to go, apparently. Anyway, it’s a nice short loop ride for me — after South Park, I cross the Duwamish via the 1st Ave Bridge or the shiny new South Park Bridge, hit a brewery or two in Georgetown and/or Sodo, then head back north.

Having a beer at Lowercase Brewing — Seattle, WA

Rob’s Picks
• Pale Ale – 5.5% – Light and citrusy, to passion fruit/tropical flavors. Good underlying malt. Fairly dry, too, with slight rye astringency.
• ESB – 6.8% – More malt forward than the Pale. Caramel and bready. Light citrusy hops and some lingering bitterness. Dry and slight astringent rye finish.
• Mexican Lager – 4.5% – Crisp and light, with very light breadiness and very subtle banana.
• Brown – 5.5% – Light, with good strong coffee flavor and some crisp bright sweetness. Good lingering flavors.
• Squash – 5.3% – Made with butternut squash. Caramel, roasty aroma and flavor. Creamy and smooth, presumably from the squash, but still has a crisp edge. Light underlying squash flavor. A bit watery, but enough going on to make up for it.
• Ginger Ale – 0% – Good crisp spicy ginger flavor with caramel sweetness.
• Root Beer – 0% – First batch I tried was pretty yummy stuff, with all sorts of interesting flavors going on. Later batch, though, had too much licorice for me.

The Rest
• IPA – 7.2% – Unfiltered. Citrusy aroma. Crisp and dry, but denser mouthfeel than Pale. Bigger biscuit and caramel malt base. Citrus and tropical fruit hop flavors not so prominent. Dry rye finish.
• Stout – 5% – Pretty thin for a stout. Kinda watery, with very light coffee and vanilla flavors.

A thing they did in 2014 was have Game of Thrones nights, which was very useful because I refuse to get cable for some reason. I hope they do it again this year.