Warped Wing Brewing Company (Dayton, Ohio) - 19 January 2014

Dayton, OH is a hotbed for new breweries and Warped Wing Brewing Company joined the fray this weekend.  I only had a short time to visit, but I wanted to get there on the opening weekend to check it out and offer congrats to Joe Waizmann.

Entrance to Warped Wing Brewing Co

Warped Wing is located at 26 Wyandot just blocks from the Dayton Dragons 5/3 Field and the Oregon District.   Way back in 1911, the building was the site of the old Buckeye Brass and Iron foundry.  It has been many things since then including a concert venue where I saw the band Guided By Voices many years ago.  The interior still sports the industrial look which is a great look for a brewery in my opinion.  Another great thing about the location is a large parking lot just across the street from the brewery.

Tasting Room

When I was there around 5:00 on Sunday afternoon, the 80 seat tasting room was comfortably full.  There is a nice bar with seating and a dedicated area for others to be served pints or growler fills.  There is a large area with tables arranged in rows so you can meet new friends in support of the Warped Wing motto "Share a Pint, Make a Friend".  The room is full of natural lighting from the windows along the top and the garage door in front which can be opened when the weather is nice.   The exposed walls, concrete floors and odd nooks and crannies provide an industrial feel which complements the sleek lines of the Warped Wing logo, the colorful bar area, and professional graphics that provide warmth to the surroundings.

Brewing Equipment

Warped Wing is different than the other Dayton breweries in that it is a production brewery.  Some idea of the scale can be seen in this picture where the mash tuns are visible.  In the Tasting Room picture you can just see a portion of the kegs stacked 10 feet high.

I was only there for a short time, but tried out the Flyin' Rye IPA.  It was excellent, clean and crisp, nothing out of place.  It is easy to see this being a go-to beer for any hop-head.

I am looking forward to a return visit to try out the others.

Flowers?

No detail is too small at Warped Wing and I was impressed with the potted flowers just outside the entrance.  They may be plastic, but a nice touch on a cold day with snow all around.

Baying Hound Aleworks (Rockville, Maryland) - 10 JAN 2014

On Friday, 10 JAN 2014 I drove my son from our home in Kettering, OH back to school at American University, in Washington, DC.   Because I was by myself and my son wanted to connect with his friends, I decided to find a hotel outside of the city.  I knew that there was a Dogfish Alehouse (see other post) in Gaithersburg, MD, so I decided to find a hotel there.  But curiosity sent me to the internet to see if I could find any other brewpubs and that is what led me to Baying Hound Alehouse, in Rockville, MD.

Entrance to Baying Hound Aleworks

I had a bit of trouble finding the place mostly because it didn't present itself as I expected.  See for yourself in this photo.  It was however, right at 1108 Taft Street, just as advertised.  (I later learned from the brewer that they aren't allowed to have external signage in the industrial park where they are located).





When I later told a friend that I had been to a nanobrewery, he remarked that if that description was correct then it would be 1000 times smaller than a microbrewery, located in someone's garage and selling beer by the bottle.  He wasn't too far from the mark.  Although this was in an industrial park, it was pretty close to someone's garage.  You literally had to step over things in the office before entering the brewery and even my messy garage was more organized than this place.  There was interesting artwork on the walls (particularly the "pictures" made from broken glass  bottles), a mannequin that caught me by surprise more than once, a guitar in the corner, and stuff piled every which way.  In further support of his assessment, they only distributed their beers in bottles.

Because of weird Maryland liquor laws, they were only able to sell samples at the bar which suited me just fine as that is what I wanted anyway.  For eight dollars I got six samples including puppy sweater, scratch-n-sniff black IPA, hop shot IPA, long snout stout, taj mahound, and s'more stout, all for $8. (As and added bonus, we were treated to Darwin, a sour that was still aging in a Buffalo Trace barrel acquired from Heavy Seas, that the brewer pulled out with a "beer" thief, if that is a real term.)  All were good, but I was particularly fond of the puppy sweater barley wine.  The scratch-n-sniff black IPA is part of an ongoing collaboration with Pub Dog, a brewery in Westminster, MD.  Hopefully it didn't take you as long as it took me to get the significance of the name of this series of collaborative brews.

I've been to dozens of breweries, brewpubs, and the like, but I can honestly say that I've never been to one quite like this.  I had a great time and highly recommend it to anyone in the area.