With Burdick Brewery, my posts on the trifecta of new South Park breweries is now complete. Burdick was the first to open in late 2013, but so far I’ve only managed to visit once. Their hours weren’t terribly regular at first, and then they ran out of beer for a few weeks, but I finally made it in for a visit in April 2014. Then that August (about ten months after they opened) they closed in order to upgrade their entire brewing system. From recent Facebook posts, they finally got that done about three weeks ago and have just started brewing again, with a projected mid-April re-opening of the taproom. So yeah, the beers I tried last year might just all taste different. Life’s like that.

Burdick Brewery — Seattle, WA

Rob’s Picks
• ISA – 5.5% – Light and crisp. Subtle astringency, light smoke, and herbal hops. Great mix.
• Blonde – 4.8% – Crisp and light with some breadiness and light smoke. Bit of herbal hops, too.
• Red – 6.3% – Crisp. Caramel, with light floral and herbal hops, and a bit of an alcohol edge. Quite drinkable.
• Nitro Stout – 5.9% – Coffee/chocolate aroma and flavor. Fairly dry and smooth, with dark chocolate bitterness. Very easy to drink.

The Rest
• Pale – 5.7% – Floral aroma and flavor. Strong caramel malt with some graham cracker, as well. Some astringency on the finish.

With Burdick’s upcoming re-opening, I might be able to accomplish what I wasn’t able to do last year: visit all three of the South Park breweries on one bike ride. (Okay, so technically Odin is also a South Park brewery, but they’re in the process of moving to Tukwila, so I’m not counting them.) Will keep my fingers crossed.

The third new brewery that opened in South Park was Tin Dog Brewing, located a short ride away from the conjoined Lowercase and Burdick. Tin Dog is run by a husband and wife team, and they mostly do Belgian and Belgian-influenced beers. Nice folks, and they have their own bike rack they put out in front when they’re open. First time I visited they were doing samplers in little plastic cups (as pictured below), but when I returned several months later it was only schooners and pints.

Tin Dog Brewing — Seattle, WA

Rob’s Picks
• Saison – 6.6% – Crisp, with a nice mix of coriander, pepper, alcohol, and a bit of floral. Light funk towards the end and light bitterness.
• Hoppe the Belgian – 6.5% – Good mix of caramel, alcohol, and banana/clove flavors, with a bit of astringency. Makes you think.
• NW Pale – 5.5% – Bready, with some sweetness, some bitterness, some caramel, and a hint of astringency on the finish. Easy drinking.
• White IPA – 4% – Light, crisp, with coriander and citrus peel flavors. Herbal hop and nice bitter finish.
• Fresh Hop Pale Ale 2014 – 5.7% – West Seattle hops from brother’s backyard. Crisp, with an interesting mix of flavors: bubblegum, light grassiness, light herbal hops, and caramel. Touch of bitterness on the end.

The Rest
• Belgian Blonde – 5.6% – Smooth, sweet, light banana/clove, light bubblegum.
• Too Wit – 5.7% – Smooth, with light rosewater flavor, touch of honey sweetness, and a bit of astringency on the finish.

I was meaning to go back a third time to try their Black Tripel and Pumpkin Saison, but for some reason that didn’t happen. Now that spring is here, though, I’ll have to get back on the bike and pay South Park another visit.

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.

My final brewery visit of 2013 was to West Seattle Brewing (their facebook page has a lot more information, such as their address). They had just recently opened in a pretty cool space but were not yet equipped to do taster flights, and so I ended up getting several schooners instead. And, well, unfortunately, three of the five beers I tried had an off flavor, almost a sour mash aspect that should not have been there. Best I could hope for was they’d fix that before my second-chance visit. And I’m very happy to say that they did in fact clean up their act, so to speak, by the time I finally revisited nine months later. They also had an upgraded system, logo glassware for sale, and were doing taster flights. I’d prefer to forget about that first experience, but I’m including the other two beers from that visit, and if anyone reading this also tried them early on and haven’t been back, then I would definitely recommend giving them another shot.

West Seattle Brewing taster flight — Seattle, WA

Rob’s Picks
• Bavarian Lite – Light and lager-y with a slight alcohol edge. Touch of smoke. Bit of clove, almost no banana. Light bitterness on finish. Easy drinking.
• Wheaten Pale Ale – Honey and caramel malts. Herbal hops with underlying citrus. Fairly sweet and pretty drinkable.
• Triangle Tripel – 9.2% – Caramel malt with very light alcohol edge. Citrus hops. Nice sweetness and subtle coriander.
• House IPA – 7.2% – Big tropical fruit, light herbal and earthy hops. Good caramel backbone.
• Dunkelweiss – Big roastiness to light citrusy finish. Light on the tongue. Refreshing.
• Imperial Stout – Coffee/chocolate and roasty malts, with a touch of molasses. Alcohol edge and dark chocolate bitterness. Not too thick and pretty sharp.
• Road Rage Red – Big citrus and earthy hops. Lots of malt to back it up. Some lingering bitterness.
• Wieting Pils – 5.2% – Light. Lighlty bready, bit of honey, light herbal hops, light bitter edge.

The Rest
• American Wheat – Light, lemon-y, some breadiness. Herbal hops. Somewhat tea-like.
• Ratteburg – Sweet bubblegum and banana start to herbal hop finish. Tannic. Light caramel, pretty smooth, and a touch of bitterness. Not bad but not my thing.
• Honey Pale Ale – 5% – Honey and caramel up front. Light herbal hops, with some bitterness on the finish. A little too sweet for me, though.
• W ESB – Pretty well-balanced. Floral, herbal, light citrus hops. Caramel, toast, biscuit malt. Subtle honey/sugar sweetness on finish. Fairly bitter. But not quite my thing.

And there you have it, folks, my last 2013 brewery in my last 2014 post. Next up will be a summary of 2014 and 2015 stuff. So much to look forward to in the new year!