Raleigh/Durham Assistance

I would skip brewmasters. If you wanna replace it, go to crank arm, which is near tasty. Also, I work at tasty; shoot me a line as to when you're coming and I'll look out for you!

 

For Raleigh: Trophy and Busy Bee will fill your belly, and Tasty downtown is the best for retail.

 

Like others said definitely Trophy, Tasty, Crank Arm and Busy Bee especially since they are all very close together.

Other places in Raleigh I like: Bottle Revolution is a good place to go for singles and a solid draft list. Ridgewood Wine and Beer has a smaller selection than Tasty and Bottle Rev but they have a great draft selection and around 20 taps. And though I never see them mentioned on here I also enjoy Village Draft house, lots of beers on tap with many NC breweries.

But since you are going to be in Durham my first choice for bottle shops would be Sams Quik Shop. I think they have the best selection in the triangle and I always liked that you buy a beer and get to keep the glass.

 

Ridgewood had bottles of Wicked Weed on Thursday the 14th.

 

Go to Sam's in Durham and make sure to hit Allen and Sons BBQ on NC 86 between Chapel Hill and Hillsborough. No beer, but this is the real deal and they've been at it for decades. If you like BBQ, you'll thank me!

 

Trophy for the pizza and beer. Check the Bee's tap list, they sneak some quality liquid in every couple days. Tasty Beverage for bottles. Bottle Revolution for bottles and draft. (They released BA speedway this morning, and of course it was gone in an hour.) Then go to Sam's in Durham. Done!

 

FYI, there are two Sam's, the original and the new bottle shop. Raleigh Brewing, Ridgewood, and Bottle Revolution are all within 5 miles of each other.

 

In addition to Fullsteam, I'd recommend visiting Bull City Burger and Brewery for a meal and some beers. Great food and a wide range of true-to-style beers.

 

Another place to consider is Lynwood Grill - very good food and great beer. Fantastic IPAs , pale ales and stouts - really great beer!

 

Fellow Sweetwater IPA fan here...you can't go wrong with Tasty Beverage, got some great stuff there today and enjoyed a Wicked Weed Hop Burglar as I shopped. Love Busy Bee as well...I recommend the Fried Green Tomatoes there if looking for a snack!

 

I like it, mainly for their specialty and small batch stuff. Their standard beers are meh.

Yes and no. Sams Quik (the original one downtown) has a larger selection and smaller yet better tap list. The newer one is a bit smaller with a larger, less impressive tap list.

 

Another vote for Trophy, Crank Arm, and Sam's in Durham

 

I can't tell you a whole lot about Durham, but I know the Raleigh beer scene pretty well. The only brewery worth hitting in Raleigh IMO is Trophy. They have good beer and even better pizza.

Crank Arm would be the next one on the list. It's probably worth a visit if you're from out of town, as it's in a great location and you'll probably be right next door at Tasty at some point anyway. Their beer is pretty overpriced for what it is though. The Pit is also right there, which is not the best or most authentic BBQ place in the world, but it is very nice and generally has a pretty good tap list. You could do a whole lot worse than this for lunch, especially if you're already at Tasty or Crank Arm.

I would recommend going to all three of these bottle shops - Tasty, Bottle Rev, and Ridgewood. They are all three great, but for different reasons. Ridgewood will have the best taplist, Bottle Rev the biggest selection, and Tasty is kind of the best of both worlds - small but high-quality taplist and good size bottle/can selection. All three of them should have Wicked Weed bottles of some sort, but Tasty will generally have the most as they seem to sell out a bit faster at the other two places. There are at least 4 other bottle shops in town, but these are the ones you want to hit.

Busy Bee is solid, you'll enjoy it for sure.

 

From Tasty you can utilize the R-Line (a circulator bus) that will take you within in close proximity to sveral nice beer venues:
Busy Bee, Raleigh Times, Tyler's, The Flying Saucer, and Trophy Brewing.

 

Or just walk.