Butler Brew Crawl

Typically when you're looking to go out on a Saturday night and visit a few breweries, you head downtown. A lot of times they can be found nestled into nooks throughout the city and many are in places that are being revitalized. With the amount of new breweries popping up in the Pittsburgh area there are also some other routes to enjoy. For a change of pace, we decided to head in the opposite direction and went north to Butler. 

We traveled to four different breweries in one night, all located in Butler County. As with any voyage like this you'll want to make sure that you have a designated driver because there are some miles between some of them. One perk is that won’t find yourself driving in circles looking for a place to park or fighting crowds. Some have their own parking lot and others have ample parking close by.

Stop 3: Reclamation Brewing

After visiting Butler Brew Works we walk down the street just a block or two and find ourselves at Reclamation Brewing. We open the door to a comfy pub atmosphere and take a seat towards the back at a large solid wood table under a mosiac of their logo made from 9,000 bottle caps. Dimly lit and no TV in sight, with just the right level of background music, this place is all about drinking some good beer paired with great conversations. The only distraction here would be your phone so set that aside and bring your friends, before you know it hours could pass by.

I order a pint of their Best Bitter and it matches the setting. If this wasn't the third stop I would drink a few of these delightfully sessionable beers. The Best Bitter is true to style with bread and biscuit notes and an ABV of 4.5%, making it a true pub beer. They brew a wide variety of styles including monsters like Lupulin Rex, an American IPA clocking in with massive 100+ IBU (International Bittering Units). Though this beer is for the bitter hop lover, you can save the bitter beer face for a different one because even with such a high IBU it is a very well balanced beer.

Being a few breweries in to our crawl, now was a good time to order something to snack on. Reclamation's Pub Pretzel is bigger than your head and hits the right spot. It's big enough to share but tasty enough to eat the whole thing. After relaxing and chatting with the group we decide to add at fourth stop to our brew crawl. We finish our beers and head back to our cars and travel down the highway to our last stop, Recon Brewing.