Wild Heaven Beer - West End Brewery and Gardens - West End Atlanta

From Parking - walk around on the left then turn left

You can find Wild Heaven Beer - West End Brewery and Gardens at 1010 White St SW, Atlanta, GA 30310 in the building to the right (from the parking) of Monday Night Garage, ASW Distillery, Hop City West End and the Boxcar - this will be on the Westside Beltline. This complex is becoming quite a brewery row destination with the upcoming Best End Brewing opening soon. You'll be able to sample and enjoy beers from several purveyors. Parking is in the fairly large lot out front - thus far I haven't seen the lot filled and have attended one very large event.

Soft Opening Day

Main Taproom

20 Main Taproom Taps

8 Patio Taps

I attended the first day of Wild Heaven Beer - West End Brewery & Garden's soft opening, which will continue for a couple of weeks  - seems the grand opening will be in another month (target is September 7). In the meanwhile the facility is being opened to the public to work out any kinks, receive additional glassware and continue populating areas with furnishings - the interiors are industrial modern with high ceilings and large vistas. Currently there's a main taproom with tables and about 20 taps, an outside patio with about 8 taps (not open on this first day), a smaller event space or maybe spill-over room (20 or so taps) with stairs to a mezzanine, and a large event space towards the back. The facility is about 21000 sq ft of space if earlier reports are right and the brewing system can do batches up to 15-barrels on a 7-Barrel system.

20 Second Room Taps

Double Line Kitchen

I spoke at length with Nick Purdy (who showed us craft beer nerds around in a short tour) who indicated that the idea is for this facility to create smaller batches - think of experimental beers - that can be bottled or kegged for the local craft beer scene and sold direct to the public in this facility. Also the kitchen will serve up food for visitors and as a catering facility to the main event space. They have a huge pizza oven so look for something special spun out as various pies.

7 Barrel System

Conditioning Tanks (Brights)

Large Event Space

Soft Opening Beer Menu

While there I sampled two beers (only had about an hour before another event):

Westy American Wild Ale

Westy American Wild Ale - Mixed fermentation with golden raspberries and service berries - tart, a bit apple-juicy and easy drinking - brewed especially for this event this. is a new beer not available in the Decatur location.

Wild Monster Fruited DIPA

Wild Monster Fruited Double IPA made with cactus fruit - Hoppy fruited NEIPA, brilliant red hue, fruity nose and finish. Surprising how good this is.

The people behind the bar are still learning the systems and are a bit disorganized but I think they'll come up to speed soon. Overall I had a great time and have high hopes for this new location!

Wed July 31 – 4pm-10pm
Thur/Fri Aug 1/2: 4pm-11pm
Sat Aug 3 – Noon-11pm
Sun Aug 4 – Noon-6pm
Mon Aug 5 – Closed
Tue/Wed Aug 6/7 – 4pm-11pm
Thur/Fri Aug 8/9: 4pm-11pm
Sat Aug 10 – Noon-11pm
Sun Aug 11 – Noon-6pm
More Info here: https://wildheavenbeer.com/west-end-brewery-and-gardens

Here's to Wild Heaven Beer!

Cheers! John

(also posted to yelp)

STATS Brewpub - Downtown Atlanta Georgia

You can find STATS Brewpub at 300 Marietta St NW, Atlanta, GA 30313 just up from the College Football Hall of Fame near Centennial Park. Speaking of park, the parking situation around this area basically sucks - you'll have to pay - your best bet is to leave your car in one of the nearby decks or take MARTA and walk around to several nearby things-to-do.

I knew nothing about STATS prior to being invited to attend a private event during DevNexus held by Object Frontier (shout out to those guys for doing this right). I initially entered downstairs in the main bar and then traveled upstairs to a private event space where there was food provided by STATS along with beer, both on tap and in bottles. I've since come in a couple of times and have had their brewed beer (this is a real Brewpub that offers up a few taps of whatever they happen to be brewing).

First the food - I've only eaten what was catered so probably not the ideal experience. I found it pretty generic but filling - for technology groups there's generally a lot of vegetarian options and that was the case here with hummus and pita chips, crudites, etc. They also had nachos and chicken wings that seem to be pretty good (no idea what they are on the menu so there may be a separate catering menu). On my initial visit I had a Kostritzer Schwarzbier black lager and a Paulaner Hefe-Weizen that were both pretty good.

Since then I've had a couple of their own brews:

• Slug Nutty Imperial New England IPA - I liked this quite a bit - pretty awesome hazy DIPA from STATS. Citrus, juicy and a bit of hops, just like I like with great mouthfeel. 
• Ryes Up Rye IPA - More IPA than not, good rye nose and a clean finish. 

The service both during the event and in subsequent visits has been very good. At some point I'll come back with a group and try more of the food options. This is the only downtown brewery currently so if you're looking for options and staying near the park, this is a pretty good one.

(Also posted to Yelp)
 

Torched Hop Brewing - Midtown - Old Fourth Ward - Atlanta Georgia

You can find Torched Hop Brewing at 249 Ponce De Leon Ave NE, Atlanta, GA 30308 - this is the Southwestern corner of Ponce and Penn Ave (incidentally right across from Nancy's Chicago Style Pizza to the east and Mary Mac's Tea Room across Ponce, both I also recommend - see my last review for Nancy's). The business occupies the former location of "The Old Spaghetti Factory" for those of you familiar with the area. You can park for free at the Camden Apartments garage or you can sometimes find street parking on the blocks nearby. The entry has the Torched Hop logo prominently displayed and there's a sign on the Penn Ave side.

I ended up here with a few friends and fellow Yelpers - as I recall this was one of Michelle T's "Beer UYEs  or Sarah M who organized the gathering - that included several regulars - I'm not quite sure as it was a last minute thing for me to attend  - there were 8-10 of us sharing a big table upstairs. If you haven't experienced this place it's worth it just for the venue - industrial finishes with exposed brick walls, overlaid with rich woods and real hardwood flooring; and expansive views across a huge space. There's a mezzanine second floor (where we sat) that overlooks the first floor littered with tables, a bar and several manual-skill games. If you're looking for a venue for a party you could do much worse.

This is a brewery pub in the purist sense - they make beer here and offer decent food, much in the same fashion as 5 Seasons and New Realm. They also have a nice list of local Micro-brews as "Guest Taps" and a full bar with Featured Cocktails. I started by sharing a flight of the House Drafts - honestly I wasn't too impressed but I think this was more due to the styles offered:

1. Hops-De-Leon IP - fairly solid IPA, lots of hops with some citrus, this was just tapped
2. Sherma's Wrath Smoked Porter - I love porters but this one was maybe a bit too smoky and felt flat to me.
3. Cukes n' Cream - I normally don't care for flavored beers and cucumbers with beer just sounds weird to me, but this one was surprisingly good
4. Saison in the Raw - nope, I just don't like saisons in general, it's sour in just the wrong way for me, actually in the sour direction past a Dubbel towards the sours I tend to pass on.

I ended up with one of the guest taps, a Westbrook IPA which more than did the job for me.

For snacks we pretty much went down the list and ordered most of the Smalls:

1. Hummus - Red Lentil, w/veggies and veggie chips - frankly I thought this a bit boring but it did satisfy the vegans among us
2. Herbed Fries - w/sriracha, smoked mayo, kimchee ketchup - not much to these steak-cut fries and probably the weakest apps we tried.
3. Redneck Poutine - tots, sausage gravy, cheddar curd and bacon - loved this, but then again throw bacon and cheese on any tot and I-m happy
4. Cheese Board - Tomme, Sweetgrass Camembert, Hooks Blue - some decent cheeses here but there probably needs to be at least one other, either on the briny-side or bitter side to balance the sweet creaminess
5. Wild Game Nuggets - Duck and rabbit leg, w/blackberry Meaploy - I didn't get much from these - very crispy but not a lot of flavor.
6. St Louis Ribs - Sriracha butter, sweet pickled peppers - loved these and could probably finish a few orders by myself
7. Jumbo Whole Wings - Spicy and sweet paprika, peach chili garlic - not as spicy as I thought they would be and a bit over-fried.
8. Local Tomatoes - crumbled mozz, basil, croutons - loved these, perfect balance of acid-to-fat
9. Hot Crawfish Pimento Cheese - oregano parmesan crostini - awesome dip but I would have preferred it a bit spicier (it was perfect for others in our party - I just like really spicy)

I think in general the food is pretty solid if a bit on the "bar food" side but that's to be expected. We ordered a couple of extra items before moving to Nancy's across the street. The service was a little lacking - we were off to one edge and it took some flagging of servers to get water and beer glasses filled. Overall I think the experience was good but not great - more of a 3.5/5 so I'll round it up to 4. I actually like this place quite a bit and want to try the burgers, maybe next time. I'm glad I don't live nearby as I would be spending way too much time here.

(also posted to Yelp)