Ghostfish Brewing Company

Ghostfish Brewing Company 24Nov2017

Ghostfish brews gluten free beer and is located in SODO. I rode the D-Line and when downtown caught a 21. I walked a few blocks to find Ghostfish and ruefully noted a bus stop right across the street. My last visit to this brewery was in July of 2015.

The brewery is housed in a former night club with the brew kit installed in what was a ginormous dance floor. The building sits at Hanford and 1^st Avenue South with the front entrance on 1^st. 

Ghostfish Brewing on 1st Ave South

As you enter the front door you see a few tables in front of you and to the left is a bar and beyond is more seating and the brew house. 

The view as you enter the front door with tables, the bar, and a hint of the brewing area.

As you approach the bar you can see the tap list posted near the ceiling. If you are nearsighted like I am, don’t fret, the beer list is available in printed form at the bar. 

The beer list above the bar

The greeting at the bar is friendly and polite. Flights of 5 x 4 ounce samples, pints, growlers, and limited selections of canned and bottled product are also available. I studied the beer list and ordered my five tasters. 

From l to r: Shrouded Summit, Vanishing Point, Ghost Pepper Saison, Kick Step IPA, and Watchstander Stout

Then I settled in to watch Iowa dismantle the Nebraska football team.

Tasting Notes:

Shrouded Summit (Wit style) (4%, 20IBU): Clear pale yellow. Spicy, grain, and ester aroma. Full body, orange, wit beer yeast profile, corriander. Faint bitterness and fruit. Medium sweet finish with a slight sourness. Refreshing. I know that calling a beer without any wheat a wit is a misnomer, but the entire taste profile is that of a wit beer.

Vanishing Point (5.3%, 40 IBU): Pale clear gold. Ester aroma. Tastes of rich grain, hop bitterness, C-hops with touch of hop perfume. Bitter-sweet finish.

Ghost Pepper Saison (6%, 20 IBU): Slightly hazy yellow-gold. Fruity and peppery aroma. Heat, esters, some smoky phenols, low bitterness. Sweet and hot finish.

Kick Step IPA (5.5%, 60 IBU): Hazy yellow. Piney and citrus hop aroma. Sweet grains, hop bitterness, citrus and pine hop flavors. Bitter finish. A proper IPA.

Watchstander Stout (6.5%, 30 IBU): Dark red brown with red highlights. Roast (not burnt) grain aroma. Sweet grain, roast (more toward chocolate than coffee). Bitter sweet finish. This is a complex beer.

When they opened in 2015, Ghostfish was the only dedicated gluten free brewery in Seattle. They still are and I suppose they could have relied on that status to keep customers coming back. But like most of the breweries I have revisited tin the last two years, Ghostfish has continued to improve and refine their beers and experiment with new styles and variations. All of the beers I sampled were uniformly drinkable. They all tasted like beer in that the grains, hops, and yeast were all playing a role in the flavor profile. The grain flavors were interesting and had me wondering, “Now what does barley malt taste like exactly and how is this different?” A person could spend some time drinking Ghostfish beer while trying to answer that question.

A limited food menu is available stocked with gluten free items as you would expect. The menu has expanded since 2015 when the only selection was gluten free pizza. I didn’t try any of the food but the guy next to me at the bar reported that the food is good. Since the taproom is in SODO, they draw people in on game days and because the competition is fierce in that area, the food has to be good enough to bring people in. The taproom crowd on this Black Friday was not what I would expect on game day, but was still of a respectable size.

The brewery building is modern steel and glass construction. The taproom atmosphere is warmed by the wood laminate floors and abundance of wood furniture. The crowd is typical for a Seattle beer crowd – polite and friendly as well. I rarely have difficulty striking up a conversation with other patrons and Ghostfish was no exception. If you find yourself at Ghostfish with a friend who is gluten intolerant or suffers from celiac, don’t despair. Keep an open mind, drink the beer, and eat the food – I think you will be pleasantly surprised.

The buses were running on a normal weekday schedule and, since fewer people were at work, less crowded. I grabbed the 21 back into downtown where I watched wall to wall buses try to navigate 3^rd Ave shopping traffic. Lastly I caught the 15 Express – along with about 5 other people instead of the normal standing room only crowd - back home.

Tin Dog Brewing

Tin Dog Brewing 12Nov2017

Tin Dog Brewing is in the South Park neighborhood near Burdick brewing and its taproom. The bus route to get there is one bus on two routes – the 28X from Ballard through downtown Seattle where it becomes the 132 and continues through various industrial areas to South Park.

The brewery is housed in a business park that presents a strip-mall-like face to South Cloverdale Street. 

The face of Tin Dog Brewing. In warm weather the garage doors open to
accommodate an outdoor seating area.

An entry door and two garage doors form the face of the retail space with some limited parking in front. Today the garage doors were closed because of typical November cool rainy weather. As you enter the door you see the tiny (two barrel) brewing area straight ahead and the seating area plus bar to the left. 

The view straight ahead as you enter the front door

Seating area and bar

The greeting is friendly – kind of wait and see neighborly – and the beer list is chalked up behind the bar above the taps. 

The beer list and food menus

No tasting flights are offered so the choices are schooners, pints, crowlers, growler fills and limited one-off bottled selections. I had a quick taste of the Tripel then ordered schooners of three beers. 

From l to r: Saison, Azacca Saison, and White IPA

Later I dove into the Tripel. 

Oaked Black Tripel

I sat at the bar and sipped, took notes, and conversed with the bar tender. On a rainy non-Seahawk Sunday afternoon the place was pretty quiet.

Tasting Notes:

White IPA (5.1%): Clear yellow-gold. Black pepper and smoky phenolic aroma. Some sourness from the wheat – sour and dry. IPA bitterness followed by Belgian yeast profile (again the black pepper and smoky phenols). Dry, bitter and beery finish. After a few sips I tasted a bit of lemon.

Azacca Saison (5.2%): Clear yellow-gold. Pepper phenols and dank hop aroma. A complex mix of dry malt body, peppery phenols, bitterness, fruity hop flavor and fruity esters. The lower alcohol (compared to the Saison, below, expresses the hop flavor nicely. Bitter-sweet finish.

Saison (6.8%): Clear reddish gold. Band-aid phenols (mostly pepper and smoke) aroma. Soft but dry malt flavor, slight bitterness and that characteristic Belgian yeast profile that I just can’t pick apart. Bitter-sweet finish. Tin Dog’s flagship beer.

Oaked Black Tripel (10.9%): Opaque black with no highlights. Sweet alcoholic malt and ester aroma with some barrel notes. Sweet malt, astringent barrel, grape and ester flavors. Dry finish. Very drinkable strong ale that belies its strength.

Tin Dog is a community resource in South Park. A couple of years ago, while sampling beers and talking to the bartender, I realized that the business model of a small brewery serving most of its beers on tap to the local community could be viable. Tin Dog gets a mix of locals from the residential neighborhoods and people knocking off work at surrounding businesses. The model works in the right neighborhood – I am not sure how they would fare in the Ballard Brewery District.

Tin Dog brews beers in the Belgian style, which lends their beers a fruity and phenolic profile from the yeast. They source their malt from Skagit Valley Malting, which gives the beers a unique flavor profile. Most of the beers I had were dry to the point of being austere – a taste that I prefer. To be sure, some malt sweetness was present in the beers but more as a dextrinous presence as opposed to sugar sweetness.

The brewery atmosphere is minimalist. When you go to use the restroom, you will walk right past the brewkit, all clean and shining and not very imposing. A lot of good beer originates there, nonetheless. 

Like the concrete floor the minimalism is continued into the taproom. It’s cozy and really needs the presence of people to warm it up. On a slow rainy Sunday afternoon I was not sufficient numbers to fill the room with laughter and conversation. But then one of the reasons I go on Sundays and Wednesdays in the afternoon is that most breweries are quiet then.

After drinking most of that Oaked Tripel I knew the bus ride home was going to seem long. An hour and twenty minutes door to door is not bad but I still felt on the verge of disgracing myself right up until the last minute when I got in the door at home. On the reverse commute the 132 morphs into the 26X which goes nowhere near my house, so I had to transfer to the D-Line once I arrived downtown.

Lowercase Brewing

Lowercase Brewing 01Nov2017

Lowercase once was in South Park along with Burdick Brewing and Tin Dog Brewing, but due to a ruling by the city they had to close their taproom. They found a space in Georgetown. So there I was riding the D-Line and the 124 to Georgetown to find Lowercase once again. They are in the same neighborhood as Machine House, Georgetown Brewing, and near to Two Beers and Counterbalance.

The front door is off a parking lot and a few feet from the street sidewalk. 

The entrance to Lowercase is easy to spot if you are southbound on Airport Way

As you enter the door the bar is on the right with the tap list behind. 

The view as you enter the front door.

The tap list. Year round beers on the left and seasonal beers on the left.

Beyond the bar are high tables and comfortable looking couches. The cement floors lack a certain warmth but the wood furniture and artwork on the wall help counteract that coolth. The greeting from behind the bar is friendly and informed and today the bartender offered many tastes (small sips) of various beers even after I had ordered my flight. Flights of 4 ounce tasters, pints and crowlers are offered but I failed to get the full line up of pour sizes. I was having a nice conversation with the barkeep, which gave my beers a chance to warm up a little, and then some more customers came in so I could get on with sipping and taking notes.

From l to r: sp, hi, w, e, i, b.

Tasting Notes:

sp (Strata Pale) (5.5%): Slightly hazy orange-gold. Fruity (pineapple?) hop aroma. Fruity (pineapple again) flavor, firm malt body, and late bitterness. Bitter-sweet finish. A collaboration with Laurelwood hopped with fresh Strata hops.

hi (hoppy, hazy IPA) (5.7%): Very cloudy reddish gold. Fruity and dank hop aroma. Minty, piney, and fruity hops up front, followed by bracing bitterness and sweet malt. Bitter finish. The recipe came from a homebrew competition held at the brewery and was the winner from among twelve contestants.

Witbier (4.9%): Slightly hazy pale yellow. Phenolic (mostly clove) aroma. Watery (coriander) spicy flavor. Sweet coriander finish. Thirst quenching.

Extra Special Bitter (5.2%): Dark hazy red with some brown. Malt and ester aroma. Bubblegum esters and sweet malt flavors chased by bitter hops. Dry, bitter finish.

India Pale Ale (6.4%): Clear copper red. Ester and piney hop aromas. Dry malt body, hop bitterness, piney hop flavor. Flavors attack almost simultaneously. Bitter finish. This is an old school IPA with a salute to the British.

Brown Ale (5.5%, 60 IBU): Clear brown. Coffee and burnt malt aromas. Coffee and sweet malt flavors with late bitterness. Bitter finish. Another coffee beer catches me unawares.

Lowercase attempts balanced malt-forward beers although the two IPAs I tasted might argue against that stated philosophy. More than a year ago I sampled Lowercase beers at their South Park location and found the beers to be not just malt forward but overly sweet. Since then they have decreased the sweetness of the beers while still keeping the pleasant maltiness. I also tried sips of the Mexican Lager, Squash Beer, and Pale Ale, which were all fine, well-brewed beers. I noted that the English style beers had an aroma profile, probably from the yeast, that was different from the yeast profiles of other ales I have tasted lately. I didn’t ask what strain they are using but I would guess it’s not one of the usual West Coast strains.

I asked about the clientele. I noted that South Park is a more residential neighborhood than Georgetown, so do they get locals at the new location? The bartender told me that they have become more of a destination taproom and so they get the after work crowd and the curious, who seek them out. I think they have increased their brewing capacity and so must be doing a bit of off-site sales, but since I don’t frequent a lot of taverns, I couldn’t say for sure. Business was picking up at 4:30 as I left to go catch a bus. On the way out I snagged a cork-stoppered, 750 ml bottle of barrel aged Squash Ale.

The reverse bus ride has become very familiar to me as has the slow, peak-hour traffic. The 124 showed up pretty quickly and the transfer to the D-Line was smooth (that is, I didn’t have to run), and I was home before 6.