Once you’ve been on one brewery tour, there is no reason to ever visit another beer making facility. Right? I mean, the science of brewing is basically the same. Any Brew Master can easily walk you through the various malts and barley and fermentation stages. And that’s really the only reason one visits a brewery in the first place, isn’t it? Education is the driving force here.
But then again, there is the free product sampling at the end. So perhaps I’m wrong.
The beer making process hardly differs from one brewery to the next, but the Brew Masters conducting the tours, as well as the amount of sampling you’re allowed to consume, are as different as the beers themselves. Indeed, I’ve discovered that brewery tours range from intolerable to just as fun as a Saturday night.
So how do you separate the wheat from the barley? Take a moment to pop on over to USA Today where Michael Kuderka, author of The Essential Reference of Domestic Brewers and Their Bottled Brands, discusses his ten favorite small brewery tours from San Francisco (Anchor Brewing Co.) to Philadelphia (Yards Brewing Co.).
If you’re really a true beer-lover, visit all ten; it will be a vacation you will truly forget.