Out on the Road: Brewsic City, U.S.A

Nashville Breweries

Welcome back to Out on the Road! Last week I covered my and El’s wonderful little brewery tour in Huntsville, Alabama, but that was just the start of our amazing trip! Our next step was to explore some Nashville breweries to see what Music City, U.S.A has to offer!

If you wanna check out my initial reactions to the beers we got at these wonderful Nashville breweries -- or get a sneak peak at where we’re headed next -- then be sure to follow Out on the Road’s UnTappd profile!

El’s got family in Nashville, and has visited there plenty of times over the years, but this was my very first time! I was incredibly excited to get to see the city a bit -- I love exploring new cities and getting little peeks into local culture!

In my opinion, checking out breweries is a fantastic way to get those glimpses. Breweries shine with a good amount of local pride, while also being sure to stand out on their own and, of course, make some delicious beer. Though you can’t get a full picture of a city based solely on their beer -- and El and I certainly did other things while in Nashville -- breweries are always an amazing place to take a new city’s pulse.

The first Nashville brewery we visited was Tennessee Brew Works, and I think they’re a great example of what I mean! From what I can tell they’re a bit touristy, but that’s not a bad thing -- touristy places broadcast the pieces of culture that a city wants to show off! And Tennessee brew works did show off -- they had some amazing food, awesome music, and most importantly, fantastic beer!

We happened to be there on a Saturday, so the inside of the bar was hopping and had a pretty solid live band -- I particularly enjoyed the Grateful Dead covers they played. The upstairs patio was delightfully empty due to chilly weather, but I have no doubt it would be just as packed on a warmer evening.

Their menu was long and varied, giving lots of options and some creative rotating brews to choose between. In the end, we went with the following:

• • • •  
      • Old Burton Barrel-Aged

El’s order was on-brand, even if it wasn’t a stout. This boozy old Burton had a very distinctive bourbon taste -- almost like a bourbon that’s been watered just enough to really bring out the flavors. Sweet on the palette and not too heavy, it was a solid start to the night.

• • • • Key of Lime

My order did the New England IPA style right with the delicious, juicy haziness. It was tart from start to finish, with almost no hoppy bitterness or aftertaste -- the heaviness of the beer almost makes it sweet on the back of the tongue. Overall it was definitely a beer I’d love to have again.

After we’d finished our beers, we headed over to one more brewery to try for some more local flavor. This brought up to the TailGate Brewery taproom on Music Row. They had a cozy pub decor with interesting art and sports memorabilia adorning the walls, but their biggest and best decoration was their massive beer list!

They also had great pizza -- The Hawaiian was so good that El and I forgot to take a picture!

They had by far the most varied menu of any venue we went to on this entire road trip. After a good long while of deliberation and plenty of samples, we settled on the following for our full pours:

• • • • Nitro Peanut Butter Milk Stout

When it came time for El to pick a beer, they were perplexed. You see, they really wanted to have the imperial version of this stout -- but since we’d be spending the evening with their aunt and little cousin, they thought it might be a bit uncouth to be completely wasted. The Nitro version was also a solid beer that checked all the right boxes on a milk stout, but the peanut butter didn’t really come through.

• • • • Cherry Foeder Saison

I had just as much trouble picking a beer -- there were just so many options! I went with this option mostly out of curiosity, even though saisons aren’t always my jam. It was tart and funky without being overwhelming, and had a pleasantly heavy mouth feel for the style.

Unfortunately, Tailgate the last of the Nashville breweries we made it to on this trip -- but the two that we went for really made a great showing! There were tons more that we didn’t get the chance to visit, meaning that we’ve got plenty of ideas lined up for the next time we’re down in Nashville!

That’s about it for the Nashville breweries portion of our trip! I’ll talk a bit more about the non-beer things we did to pass the time in a later post, but that’s all I’ve got for now. Join us next week for our return trip to Chicago -- we took the long way around, and got to drink some absolutely AMAZING beer! You can check us out on UnTappd for a sneak peek at where we went.

Until next time, Cheers!