Eulogy for the Chain Brewpub

Ah, that's you faking ChatGPT with good solid writing, right?

 

There was a time in the northeast when John Harvard's was a place to go. Those brewpubs were important in making craft beer mainstream, and accessible. But there is no role for those places anymore (at least I do not think so).

 

A lot of fantastic brewers came out from CB & Potts, aka. the Colorado version of RAM. Brewers from Prost, Bierstadt, Lost Highway, Zwei, DC Oakes, and more. Apparently working there wasn't a pleasant experience, but it did hone some serious skills. The company stopped brewing 2-3 years ago (and killed off all but one location), but the beers were still pretty damned good all the way until the end. Of the flagships, Total Disorder Porter and Big Red were my faves.

Around here all of the BJ's beers are brewed at one location (Boulder) and shipped to the other locations. They're mostly pretty good with a few (like the weiss and red) being particularly noteworthy. Unfortunately they don't seem to have any idea what kind of a restaurant they want to be. They shift back and forth between focusing on pizzas, "light menu" items, and sandwiches and every time they pivot the food (and service) suffer.

 

Yeah……are we still at a point that we can opt out of AI?

 

I wouldn't include it as they don't brew their own beer. They do have a great selection of beer and I've been to 2 of their locations and would certainly visit them knowing ahead of time what they would have on tap and in the bottle/can section for rare selections.

 

Iron Hill still seems to do pretty steady business around these parts. I agree with the notion, though, that most patrons likely view it as a restaurant more than a brewery these days.

A bunch of area brewers got their starts at Iron Hill. It’ll be interesting to see how a reduction in chain breweries impacts the training and business savvy of the next generation of brewers.

 

My all-time favorite chain brewpub is Beerworks. I think they only had a few locations in the greater Boston area. So many great memories. I initially liked the beer, but as I got more sophisticated (ha) I realized most of the beers were mediocre. That didn't stop me from having it as my #1 pre-gaming location before big Celtics/Bruins/Sox games. It was all about the experience and people. The food was pretty decent too.

All locations closed recently, a casualty of Covid.

 

I came to mention this too. The beers were great as I started my craft beer journey, but as I kept on drinking it after trying more stuff I realized how middling it was.

I do legitimately miss John Harvard's though. The one in Framingham was great until near the end. The second to last brewer there runs Stellwagen now.

 

You wish. We all wish.

 

Well, I laughed pretty good anyway. The language did seem to have a soul lurking in there somewhere or even overall. Greeting card artists are out of work worldwide..

 

Someone help us. My wife and I are trying to remember the name of a brewpub chain that was in Connecticut, certainly there was one in Berlin and one in Manchester, but probably other states also. We are pretty sure the name had "hop" in it.
Quick story- We went there maybe 20 yrs ago on mothers day with our three kids. My wife found something on the menu and knew that was the meal she would order. When she said it the waiter was extremely confused. Turns out she was the only one at the table given a menu that expired like 6 months ago.

 

Great Dane is still in business. True it's 5 locations in Wisconsin only, plus maybe 1 in Japan.
I have (3) 32oz crowlers of Uber bock in the fridge to drink.
https://www.greatdanepub.com/locations/wausau/
I wish I had some this:
https://untappd.com/b/great-dane-pub-and-brewing-company-eis-maibock-22/5237413

 

Great thing about these places, at least in my experience, is that I don’t ever recall having a seriously flawed or even bad beer. While maybe subdued, they always seemed clean and brewed to style, almost to macro like specs. I guess in someway, they were the macros of “craft” beer. I still enjoy going to them when traveling. Have been to Iron Hill, BJ’s and Old Dominion (if that counts) in the past 5 years and the food and beer were solid.

 

Harvards was good in it's day. |I can't speak to all of them, but the one near me always had good food. The beer was up and down to a degree, depending on who the head brewer was - there were a couple very good ones that went through, and a couple not so good.
They closed down finally during COVID; they had a patio b\ut didn't use it - |I think they were hurting anyways and this was the final nail.
BJs just opened one nearby, basically across the street from where Harvards was - I haven't been there but I've heard mixed reviews.
There was also Beer Works, also varying depending onthe brewer and chefs - Jack from Jack's Abby was the head brewer at one of their biggest pubs.
I won't say there's no place at all for chain brewpubs, but they do occupy a odd little middle ground, where a lot of people don't like them because they don't serve BMC, and others won't because they're not the hyper-local hazy of the day brewery.

 

John Harvards? Location in Westport as well. Great place, Manchester location turned into another (pretty good) brewery, that name is escaping me.

edit: I should have finished reading the thread first!

 

Gordon Biersch was the best of them IMO. The downtown San Jose location was awesome and the Palo Alto location wasn't bad but you would be more likely to spot me across the street at Empire Grill. The GB Marzen is still available in bottles around here. I guess I should try to track down a single for old time's sake.

Added: McMenamins is awesome too, just a long drive north. I stayed in their hotel in Bend a few times and it's awesome fun.

 

Boom, I knew you’d get that!