Breweries Opening in the Minnesota 2016/2017

Really good beers tonight out at Wild Minds. Excited to see what they'll do with their sours.

 

I concur. Great start tonight at Wild Minds. Hoppy French Saison and table beer were my two favorites. Looking forward to th kolsch and upcoming sours.

 

The rye was my favorite. I look forward to seeing them progress. I wish more breweries would become less reliant on flagships.

 

I concur with Wild Mind assessment. Stopped in yesterday. Good sized crowd, but handled well. Beers are solid for opening week, and those foeders are exciting to see. They've set up a nice space. Will be nice to have in this area. It's the only taproom within at least a 5 mile radius, so it should do well.

 

I have the same sentiments about Plymouth. I emailed the mayor and she emailed me back saying they changed the city laws a few years ago to make the city more Brewery friendly and she said they've basically been begging for someone to open one ever since.

Several large businesses have relocated to Plymouth within the past 5 years and the city is really trying to keep residents from spending their food & beverage dollars elsewhere.

Someone please open a brewery in Plymouth!

 

I went to the backer party for Angry Inch last night. Obviously it's early so take this with a grain of salt, but nothing there was worth the drive. I was cautiously optimistic because the Untappd ratings/reviews for their 6 beers from the previous night's backer party looked promising. Their beers were average at best, with one serious diacetyl bomb. We finished all except the flawed beer - the porter named 42.

I also stopped at Lakeville because it's across the parking lot. I had heard they had major diacetyl issues with their first batches, but when I arrived the lineup of the 4 in-house beers was completely different, so I figured I would give it a shot. All 4 seemed free of brewing flaws, but all were forgettable and kind of boring. We also got some food - huge portion sizes, way more than one normal person could eat.

Overall, AIB and LBC have a long way to go. Next time I want to drive 35 minutes for a beer I'll go in the opposite direction.

 

Perhaps such "family size" portions are the desired approach to draw-in clientele from Lakeville and nearby cities? I know a few young families for whom there may be such an appeal.

 

Thanks for the report. We've gone to zero south/southeast metro breweries a year ago, to a few, & I'm going to be looking hard for one I can cheerily support!

 

Growing up we called it Ditchfield. My dad a Richfield grad loved it.

 

Then they will not be around if they are less likely to have a reliant on flagships.

 

My first "attempt" at opening Dave's BrewFarm was in Plymouth - in 1996! I bought 2.3 acres of commercial dirt just across from City Hall (it's now a bank and chiro if I remember...). I chased it for nearly FOUR years and finally had to toss in the towel due to the dreaded late 90s meltdown.
I had full City approval, two banks ready to write the loan and then *poof* - crickets. Thankfully, in that four year span, land prices increased to the point where it enabled the current BrewFarm to be built in 2008 - another *great* time to open a business.
PS - The BrewFarm is open this weekend 7/30-31 from 3-7 each day. I got eight tasty beers you won't find anywhere else and a unique rural setting - escape the Big City and the same old!

Cheers,

FarmerD

 

I went to Wild Minds. They are doing great things over there. The farmhouse table beer is approachable to all type of style drinkers. Hoppy Rye wild ale was real good but the Dark Farmhouse ale stole the show. I believe they put it in oak barrels to give it a really intense depth flavor. That beer really tied the taproom together

 

The menu noted the Dark Farmhouse was stainless steel fermented and they have only been able to brew for about 3 weeks, so I doubt it went into a barrel. I recently homebrewed a black saison and I found roasted malts in combination with saison yeast and Brett produces an intense oak flavor.

 

Wild Minds was pretty incredible for a new brewery. Their beer and taproom is easily the best I've tried of the 2016 opened taprooms and stands way above Modist and Inbound which I thought were pretty boring considering the early hype around them.

I think Wild Minds will be very successful if these early indications are a sign of what's to come.

 

Right all are Stainless Steel now.

 

Stopped by here (Urban Moose) today and agree with your assessment. Pretty nice place too. Had a pizza that was very solid. Great service all around. They do not allow tipping and say they pay all their employees good wages.. Prices didn't seem that much higher even with that built into the process.

I was happy with the beer quality. I had a flight that included everything from the lighter offerings to their IPA and DIPA. I feel you can find flaws easier in the lighter offerings some times. In this case the lighter offerings were rock solid. Notes are off memory...was with the wife and didn't want to spend the whole dinner jotting notes..

Using BA scoring system here is what I scored.

Blonde Ale--clean, malty, excellent basic beer. 4.2

American Wheat-Clean, cream of wheat..light citrus. 4.0

Belgian Golden-They really nailed this with the yeasty esters and pilsner maltiness. 4.4

Alpha Acid Theory IPA-Not bad at all but in today's day and age not a destination IPA although it sounded good on paper...Columbus and Citra in the boil, dry hopped with Mosaic 3.9.

Imperial IPA-Again on paper sounded great..Cascade, Equinoz, Citra, CTZ 9.4% 80IBU...leaned sweet rather than bitter and perhaps a little muddled...not as assertive as I hoped...3.8

Stout-Excellent roasty stout...best beer I tried...got a full glass of this one. 4.45

Apricot Ale...I agree with Victory Sabre. The worst of the bunch. Just not enough apricot fruitness comes through....Not terrible but probably average at best..3.0

Overall they are off to a very good start...better than Roundhouse...I'd take Disgruntled ahead of this place for pure beer though. I've got some new rankings coming soon.

 

As a preface: I really enjoy reading your assessments of local breweries (and the blind taste tests). Just out of curiosity, how do you qualitatively define rankings (in your head)? E.g., I use a lot of the BA descriptors as guideposts such that less than 3.0 is not good, 3.0 = ok, 3.5 = good, 4.0 = outstanding, above 4.0 = amazing to perfect

 

Thanks...appreciate the thoughts...My personal scale for how I have rated beers over the course of the past 15 years or so seem to go like this. (I know in theory 2.5 is average score for the 5.0 system but I've slanted higher over the years to where it looks something like this. I also rate to style probably more than most. I'm pretty sure my scores for some basic American Lagers like Coors Original, Miller High Life,etc are higher than most because I am rating it for that style of beer)

1.0 or less=Very flawed and undrinkable

2.0=Poor. Would not drink again.

2.5=Below average. Some aspects might be average and some closer to poor.

3.0=Acceptable. Nothing bad. No off flavors or notes. Nothing real noteworthy either.. Average in my mind

3.5=Good beers. People who brew beers at this level are doing a good job. Probably not the type of beers you'd get fired up about but beers I'd gladly drink.

4.0=Very good. Rock solid beer. If I owned a brewery I want all my beer to be around this level. Not saying it is easily accomplished but it should be the low range of the goal for each beer.

4.5=Excellent. Top 5-10% for beers in that style. Now you could probably do the math on my stats and find I have more that that rated 4.5 or higher for all I know. It would be interesting to check.

5.0=Perfect beer. Should be rare. I have too many on my docket..most from the years I was cutting my teeth on the rankings. I should adjust several of them down. Most recently I feel strongly that Andechs Doppelbock is truly a 5.0. Cycle Crank IPA from St.Pete Florida came close. Hoppulujah IPA from Fitgers also is a 5.0 to me. Or was. New brewer now so who knows if they even make it anymore.)

I guess that sums it up. Obviously splitting hairs often on the 3.5-4.0 beers. The really good and really bad do standout to me though....usually...once in awhile I'm stunned at how I first perceived a beer. For instance, Roundhouse Hefe I thought was good the first time....average but not bad the second and we just did a four beer hefe blind taster and it stuck out like a sore thumb for how bad it was in comparison to the others three (Schell, New Glarus Bubbler, and TH)..Schell won that by the way followed by TH, then NG. Not sure if maybe it was different batches and they don't have their consistency down but I was befuddled for sure. I didn't expect it to stand up to Schell but thought it would be in the mix with the others..

 

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