Marking milestones at MashCraft

On Saturday, MashCraft Brewing in Greenwood marked its second anniversary with splash of live music and a food truck, and the party went off despite an afternoon of showers (and at one point, a very heavy downpour).

MashCraft also happened to be where relatives of mine decided to celebrate a birthday in the family; they picked it because MashCraft promotes itself as a family-friendly establishment, and we had several school-age children in our party.

Also, a daughter of mine and her husband had recommended the place to us, having been there very recently for a large gathering of friends and acquaintances. They said there were a good amount of children in that group. MashCraft has a room that it avails to customers with children -- it gets them away from the adult customers, and it satisfies legal requirements to create some kind of physical separation for minors who enter an establishments where alcoholic beverages are sold and consumed.

MashCraft has a corner spot in a strip shopping center on Ind. 135, just south of County Line Road directly across the street from Hal's Fabulous Las Vegas restaurant. I took a photo of the exterior (left) as we left for the day, which is when the first food truck, BoxBurger (partially visible at right in that photo) had arrived and was getting set up. The view you see in the photo at right is what you see when you walked into the brewery. You can see the production room in the far background, and just in front of that in the left of the photo is the main bar. The room where we gathered with the kids is not in this photo; it's off to the right.

OK ... let's get down to the important stuff: the beer. For my flight of five samples, I went with what I was pretty certain I'd be "safe" (for me) with. In the photo below, they are (left to right) the MashCraft Gold American blonde (5.0% Alcohol by volume, 25 International Bitterness Units); MashCraft Red amber ale (5.5 ABV, 35 IBUs); Ruze smoked amber lager (5.6% ABV, 31 IBUs); MashCraft American IPA, 6.5% ABV, 70 IBUs); and Kitty's Got Claws Imperial IPA (8.7% ABV, 110 IBUs).

I finished all of mine, and can say I would probably imbibe again at least three of them -- the Gold and the two IPAs. These three were exactly what I expected and what I enjoy in a blonde brew and IPAs. In fact, after trying the flight, I consumed a full pint of the Gold, which is easy on the palate but still manages a texture that lets you know you are enjoying a brew (hence, the relatively low bitterness rating) My regret is that I didn't get to the IPAs until last during the flight, so they weren't as cold as the first couple I tried in my sampling.

The amber ale had a rich, porter-like taste to it but not nearly as strong or bitter as a porter. So it was OK, but probably not something I'd try again. I thought I was going to be pleasantly surprised by the Ruze, but the smokiness and caramel/toast notes were more prevalent and distracting than I care for, so I'm sure I wouldn't return to it.

Joining me in sampling slights were my sons Joey and Ben. Ben's tastes are not too far off from mine, but he felt in an adventuresome mood Saturday, and added a variety of porters and other dark brews to his seven-sample flight mix. Turns out, he didn't care for a lot of the darks you see in his flight in the photo below. I know he didn't finish several of them, much less consumer more than a sip or two.

Ben included the Gold, Ruze and Kitty's Claws in his flight, and had the same reaction as me to the first two. He didn't care for the degree of bitterness in Kitty's Claws. Unfortunately, his server did not line up his flight in an particular order, so I'm not sure which ones are which. I do know the second from the left in the bottom row was the Last Light, an American IPA (6.4% ABV nd 70 IBUs) infused with blood oranges. When ordering his flight, Ben was intrigued by the IPA with a fruit infusion, even though -- like me -- he ordinarily eschews fruit-tinged brews. Unfortunately, he did not like it.


Joining Ben and me in a flight sampling was my other son, Joey. He favors porters and stouts, and he limited his flight to four darker brews. Far and away his favorite was Any Port in the Storm (5.0% ABV, 31 IBUs), which he said, in fact, that he liked a lot. He also liked the Ruze amber ale. He was not enamored, however, with the two James brews, Sir James (10.4% ABV, 10 IBUs), an English barleywine, and Mr. James (10.7% ABV, 80 IBUs), an American barleywine. Joey didn't finish either, and Ben and I both tried it ... and we concurred with Joey's dislike.