Thimble Island Brewing Company

Average beer with some poor service.
A convenient stop that I will not visit again.

 

 

 

Cool place, went down to the brewery for a tour as well as a flight and a takeaway pint glass and growler of beer. Good selection, very impressive high quality beer. Nice outside area to enjoy a few beers and hang out.

Very friendly service. Beers are a bit generic and inoffensive. Their ginger chipotle stout is very good and worth trying if you find yourself there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Good choices and variety. Good place to have a few beers and talk.

 

 

 

 

Place was crowded. Got a seat in the bland back room (folding tables and chairs) to wait for tour. Guide was entertaining but couldn't hear some of what she was saying.

 

 

 

Great fun-- the tasting area was like going to the Dry cleaner's. Great beer, attentive staff. Well worth the trip to get your shirts pressed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The venue was really nothing special, but the beer is as good as most breweries in CT besides NEBCO. The brewery is located in an commercial office-type area - the area most of us are trying to avoid when getting a beer...There were board games and decks of cards on every table, which didn't really make for a lively environment. However, the bartenders and the beer were both very good. The bartenders were very knowledgeable about the company and the beer, very attentive, and helpful. The beer was great ($8 for a flight isn't bad at all), and I thought their IPA was one of the best in the state. I would like to see them expand their selection as they only had 4 beers on tap (1 of which was a Black & Tan, which was just a mix between their Am Ale and Coffee Stout).

 

 

 

Nice place, currently located in industrial park, but supposedly moving into larger new facility soon. Their beer is consistent and the 2 ladies that were filling growlers and pouring tastings at my last visit were knowledgeable about the brew offerings, friendly, fast, and professional.

Re-Review 07/13/2015. Went here on Thursday 07/09 and this is a review of the new location. I believe this is the first or second day there were open to the public. Nice big space now, a long room that is filled with tables and a small bar for about 10 people. Service was prompt and super friendly.

They have expanded their selection and when I was there about 6 beers were on tap and ready for growler fills. Merch behind the bar. I saw on Facebook they put their IPA in a cask about a day or two after I was there. All in all a solid improvement. The Imperial Stout and Brown ale were positively fantastic! Good job, Thimble Island.

Original Review:
Went here back in October of 2014. They're crammed into a little commercial space down a road with a bunch of other commercial and light industrial buildings. Tucked away in this little plaza is the "cozy" Thimble Island Brewing Co. I've been told they are working on a move to a bigger facility about a mile away. Good for them!

Service was good, one of the owners took us on a tour and was a cool dude. Beers were actually pretty darn good. I had the pumpkin porter and the Ghost Island DIPA and they were excellent. They only had about 4 or 5 beers available at the time.

This place was pretty cool, and hidden in a small commercial complex at the current location. They had a decent selection of beer, all of which were fairly interesting. The service was good and bad. Two bartenders, one was not so friendly was was very friendly. The one that did the tour was very nice. Altogether a nice place, would visit again at their new location.

 

Nice friendly vibe to make up for the rather drab current location although I heard the brewery is moving to a larger facility. Once inside all is ok, though. Not the best beers in CT but there were samples in front of us before we reached the bar. Very friendly and knowledgeable staff. Left with a B&T growler. Only real issue is that they were out of 3 drafts by 1:00pm. I will definately be back.

A remarkable 13 person operation given their relatively brief history on the CT craft brewing scene. Hopefully their soon to be opening new facility (summer 2015) will give them the capacity and physical breathing room necessary to scale the business through the next series of milestones.

Beer quality is great, flavor profiles run the gamut from well balanced and easy drinking ales to fantastic limited released like ghost island imperial ipa and some of their high ABV stouts like MAD.

Thimble Island put Branford on the beer map in Connecticut and any hop heads passing through on I-95 are encouraged to pop in for a pint. This place is doing it right.

Great staff and great beers. Looking forward to their expansion