Rockin' Rockford...

Rockford, IL that is. We left New Buffalo, MI at 9:00am eastern time and made our way around the Windy City in morning traffic. When we saw the Rockford Brewery opening at 11:00am central (because we're now in central time), we decided it was time for a flight and a pub pretzel! The brewery is in a really old warehouse kind of building right along the river. They've got an outdoor patio with docks right on the water and several different indoor seating areas. Very cool facility. The tap handles are old wrenches, drill bits, etc.... They had over a dozen brews on tap, we settled on the pale ale, west coast IPA, special black and blue blackberry and blueberry infused kolsch and the vanilla kolsch. The black and blue was by far the standout. It was very light and mildly sweet with blueberry flavor. This beer was brewed for summer! And it would be easy to drink a lot of it! The black and blue's sibling, the vanilla kolsch was a very light kolsch with mild vanilla flavor. The brewers here have the kolsch recipes perfected. Sometimes they can be kind of heavy...like a Budweiser or something...but these were light and crisp. The best kolschs we've had. There wasn't anything real special about the pale ale or west coast. Both were very mild...no over the top hop here. These brew masters must appreciate subtlety and they do it very well!

We also split a huge pub pretzel with honey mustard, cheese and jalapeño herb cream cheese dipping sauces. Awesome. We didn't think about taking a picture until after we had started eating ... But it was an awesome sight!