Beer Places

Has anyone else been to Brickstone restaurant and brewery in Bourbonnais, Il? It has been open for about 4 years. Friends and I have stopped there in the last year after a day of scubadiving at Haigh Quarry in Kankakee. My wife and I were northwest of Kankakee looking for some of her family history and decided to stop at Brickstone on the way home to Lowell. We decided to get the beer sampler to try a few different ones--what a surprise! They set down 11 different beers in 4 oz. glasses(10 were theirs and 1 was a guest beer) for $ 7.00 . I won't go into all the styles--you can see them at their website. [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] Some were average for the style, but I would have to say Golden Promise IPA @ 7.25% abv was my favorite. They have a special out now called Hop Injection @ 6.5% abv, which is pretty good in my opinion. Not sure about the amount of hops used though. If anything, check out the food menu. Like I said, some beers are average, but the couple times I have been there, the food has been very good.

Brickstone is a nice place. It's a little out of the way for us here in Crown Point, but if you're up for a road trip, it's not a bad drive. I agree, their hoppy brews are their best. They did have a nice porter on a while back that was brewed in collaboration with a home brewing friend from the BOSS homebrew club.

Another really nice new brew pub is Revolution up on the north side of Chicago, on Milwaukee Ave. The brewer is Jim Cibak, formerly of Goose Island, Three Floyds, Firestone Walker, and oddly enough, Crown Brewing. Very good food and awesome beer.[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Beer geeks in Griffith/Highland on 45th street is good. Plenty of micro brews, no food but pizza is next door and they don't care if you bring it in. Free live music most Saturday nights and if you are feeling up for it, free board games...i.e. sorry, connect 4, monopoly...after a few IPA's you can get really creative with the board game drinking games.

Our April club meeting is going to be held there. Talked to the owner yesterday, very cool dude. They are tapping a cask of Hopslam next Friday at 5.

BassClefBrews wrote:Our April club meeting is going to be held there. Talked to the owner yesterday, very cool dude. They are tapping a cask of Hopslam next Friday at 5.

Just to be clear... A CASK of Hopslam??? As in, NOT a keg? Thats got my interest!

Sorry to have answered my own question, but, YEAH! HOPSLAM served from the cask by beer engine. NICE!