Another benefit of your local homebrew club is the opportunity to visit great local beer venues with like-minded enthusiasts. Periodically throughout the year, most clubs will host bus tours, brewery tours, pub crawls, etc.
Recently, I sampled some of Oakland’s finer beer venues as part of the Worts of Wisdom Summer Pub Crawl. Actually, the Worts refer to it as a stumble, not a crawl, and not without good reason. Suffice it to say, public transportation plays an important role for these kind of events.
The Worts Getting Started at Pacific Coast Brewing, Oakland
There may be other places in Oakland that deserve attention, but of the places we visited, The Trappist and Beer Revolution were the two standouts. Either one alone would be worth the trip to Oakland from the South Bay, but when both are in walking distance to each other (and to BART), well, let me just say you owe it to yourself to get to Oakland!
The Trappist has over 2 dozen rotating taps featuring “Belgian, local (California), and several specialty micro brews from the US.” They also have a bottle list of “approximately 100 Belgian, Dutch, Scandinavian and American craft brews.”
I personally tried the De Ranke Guldenberg which was amazingly hoppy for a Belgian Trippel. It was also well deserving of it’s high scores on both RateBeer and BeerAdvocate.
I also sampled perhaps a half a dozen other beers and would have been happy to have ordered any of them.
The Worts and Friends Enjoying The Trappist, Oakland
One interesting thing about the Trappist is that each beer is “served properly at the correct temperature and in the correct glass.” This is more than just marketing fluff. Many of the beers were served in glasses with a logo of the brewery in which it was brewed, and of the dozen or so beers being served at our table, it seemed that not one of them was in the same glass! No generic bar-ware here.
Beer Revolution is another Oakland gem. Aside from the dozen or so beers on tap, they also have 3 large coolers lining one wall with singles priced to go. If you want to drink it there, it’s only $1 more. Prices are as good as any other location I’ve seen craft beer for sale and the selection is excellent. I was able to take home a bottle of Saison Rue from The Bruery.
It was surprisingly busy for a Saturday afternoon – the place was literally packed. But then, our group alone was at least a dozen people. The owners (Rebecca and Fraggle) were pouring and serving and are some of the friendliest people you’ll ever meet. Another great thing about Beer Revolution is their outdoor patio. It was the perfect day to sit outside and enjoy a craft beer at a great venue.
The Revolutionary Worts at Beer Revolution, Oakland
I highly recommend checking out both of these venues as well as enjoying a pub crawl (or stumble) with a homebrew club near you!
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