A quick aside: As I watched craft breweries open in seemingly every nook and cranny of the Indianapolis community during the last eight years or so of my time in Indy, there were many times I opined (sometimes quietly, and sometimes aloud) that micro-brewers were overlooking our neighborhood as a locale for such an establishment. In the interim, I faithfully patronized the closest craft brewery to me -- Fountain Square Brewery.
And of course, less than a year after I pulled up roots and moved to North Carolina in July 2017, a Garfield Park area resident got the brainstorm idea to open (you guessed it) a micro-brewery in my former neighborhood. Garfield Brewery opened in spring 2018 (or thereabouts); October 2018 was my first chance to visit it after its opening.
On my son's wedding day, there wasn't a lot of time to appreciate the brewery or take in the ambiance (it's a very modest-sized establishment, although someone told me the owner is contemplating some kind of expansion in the future). We got a growler fill of a pale ale (and they let me sample two other brews, a pumpkin spice and a berry ale, neither of which I cared for) and quickly left. There was a band performing that night (see photo below), and I understand the brewery has live entertainment pretty often on weekends.
It its previous life, the building now occupied by Garfield Brewery was a diner called Sisters' Place (which I never set foot into at that site while I was there). Sisters' Place eventually uprooted about 15-20 years ago and moved north to the southeast corner of Madison and Terrace avenues, and the site remained unoccupied until the brewery took over.
(And to show you how time flies, Sisters' Place at Madison and Terrace has since been sold and now operates as Christina's Pancake House). Before the Shelby and Hervey location became a diner (which was before my time in the neighborhood), I have to believe the property was home to a gas station of some kind. Sisters' never bothered to remove the filling station infrastructure in the front, nor did the brewery, which must have decided to retain it as old-school charm (see photo below) ... and to provide cover for its outdoor seating area.
But I digress ...
Garfield Brewery's beverage menu is sprinkled with brews named for local streets, landmarks and the like. As the photo leading off the post shows, there's a Tickle Belly berry ale, named for the neighborhood's moniker for a slightly belly-tingling sensation one feels while driving on the somewhat humpy Pleasant Run bridge near the fire station at the north end of the park. My kids have known about Tickle Belly Hill almost since we moved into the neighborhood. Some small kids in the neighborhood had troubled pronouncing "belly"; you'd occasionally hear them say "berry" instead. No doubt, the brewery knew about that malapropism when it picked the name for its berry ale.
Of course, the Sisters Coffee porter is named for the brewery's previous iteration (as mentioned above). The Red Line American red ale is named for the Red Line rapid transit bus system under construction at this very moment along Shelby Street, a portion of the much larger Red Line rapid transit system under development throughout Indianapolis (and into Fishers, I understand).
The Pagoda Fresh Hop pale ale is named for the iconic pagoda in Garfield Park, the Mac Oktoberfest (presumably a seasonal brew) I'm guessing was named for the park's MacAllister Amphitheater and the Hervey Street Hefeweizen's origin should be obvious. I just visited the brewery's website and noticed the Pagoda pale ale is not listed currently, which is a shame. It was delicious.
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