November 28, 2007
Meet Market Adventures: Yards Brewing Tour
Last Saturday afternoon I spent two hours drinking free beer at a singles-only tour of Yards Brewing Company.
Yards, in case you don’t know, has spent more than the past decade as the only brewery in Philadelphia (a distinction it gave up this summer when Dock Street reopened) and brews about ten ales in a nondescript brick building off Kensington Avenue. Yards’ jolly co-owner Tom Kehoe graciously led a group of malt-thirsty ruffians who’d signed up through Meet Market Adventures through his sudsy operation. For about an hour, he explained the process of brewing beer, from grain to bottle. It’s much easier to appreciate a tour of a brewery when your palate is partaking of examples, of course, so the samples we were given upon entry (I had the Poor Richard’s Tavern Spruce ! deliciously crafted from a Ben Franklin recipe) kept my tongue satisfied and mouth quiet while we jauntily trailed after him.
Being a Saturday, most of the machinery was still so the place was kind of quiet save a few employees who were milling around, checking on oversized tanks and pawning cases of Saison out of the on-site store (yes, it’s open seven days a week, until the end of this year).
More after the jump!
I didn’t spot anyone sneaking off with a new “friend” for a little fermentation, but after my third event, I’ve noticed that Meet Market Adventures attract a lot of regulars who keep coming back because the events are fun and the people are engaging. So although I didn’t meet the man of my dreams over a Love Stout, I did appreciate the excuse to spend a few weekend hours chatting with pleasant strangers, learning about the beer making process, and tasting my share of India Pale Ale, Extra Special Ale and Philadelphia Pale Ale.
Mmm. Beer.
Editor’s Note: Public tours of the facility have stopped because Yards’ brewing operations will be moving to 901 N. Delaware Avenue on January 1, 2008. Owners hope to begin tours of the new brewery sometime next year. The current building will remain open in order to brew a new, as yet unnamed, Philadelphia beer.
Yards Brewing
2439 Amber Street, Philadelphia, PA 19125
(215) 634-2400
www.yardsbrewing.com
Meet Market Adventures
www.meetmarketadventures.com
(877) 668-6338
(no responses)
November 28, 2007, 10:03 am
Anon says:
The brewery on Amber Street is now The Philadelphia Brewing Company. The folks that brewed Yard’s beer there for many years will now be brewing new recipes under a new name in the same great building. I can’t wait to taste test them all.
November 28, 2007, 10:03 am
Stevie says:
If you are including Dock Street as a philly brewery than you have to include the other Philly brew pubs. Nodding Head, Manayunk Brewery and Triumph (although they are originally from Jersey). So thats 5 places in philly that currently make beer and as Anon said soon there will be 6. Although only one brewery brews beer to be bottled and sold both inside and outside of Philly currently and thats Yards, Dock Streets bottled stuff is contract brewed somewhere else.
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