Sometimes you just need a change of pace and that’s what this weekend will entail for KansasCityBeer.com. We’ll be road tripping to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, tomorrow and staying in America’s Dairyland until Monday.
Milwaukee Brewing Company Tour
Milwaukee is known for its brewing traditions, so it’s a perfect beercation for any beer lover. We’ll get to try beers we can normally drink from a bottle in KC, straight from the tap and try new Wisconsin beers that aren’t even available here. We’ll tour facilities to learn if and how the brewing process differs from breweries here.
If you have any suggestions, let us know. We’ll be posting all weekend on social media including Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, so be sure to follow us!
Summer is almost over and school is about to be back in session, so it’s time for some fall beer festivals. Grab your jackets and hats and read through to pick the ones you’ll be attending. This list is also available on the 2015 Festivals page.
Saturday, August 01
11am-6pm – City Market Free Beer Festival, City Market, Kansas City. The Pitch hosts the first City Market Beer Fest with 100 beers available for purchase. $10 for 4 beers or $20 for 10 beers.
Saturday, August 15
1pm-5pm – Zona Rosa Microbrew Fest, Zona Rosa, Kansas City. Lots of great beers and Missouri Mashers will be doing a competition as a part of the festival.
2pm-6pm – 75th Street Summer Beer Fest, 520 W 75th Street, Kansas City, MO, $35. A lot of local breweries are listed to be at the Summer Fest in 75th Street’s Alley.
Friday, August 21
6pm – Screenland Armour’s Arts and Crafts Beer Festival, 408 Armour Road, North Kansas City. Screenland Armour kicks off the event with exclusive film premiers, the best bands, artists, and even more rare beers!
1pm-4:30pm – Midwest Microfest, 800 The Midway, Salina, KS, $35 GA, $60 VIP. If you’ll be in the middle of Kansas on August 29, then this will be a good fest to attend. Over 20 breweries are set to pour their beer at the event, including Red Crow, Radius Brewing, Goose Island, and River North. There will also be live music.
Saturday, September 5
Festival of the Lost Township, Raytown, MO, $35 ($40 at the door) GA, $100 VIP. Hosted by Crane Brewing Company, this beer festival also includes meet and greets with local beer celebrities.
Saturday, September 12
2pm-6pm – Tour of Brews, 3365 SW Fascination Drive, Lee’s Summit. Formerly TKC Real Ale Fest, this beer fest will have one of a kind firkins, live music, and beer demonstrations. This event is in the middle of a fun-filled weekend in Lee’s Summit that includes a Tour of Towns on Friday, Small Biz Showcase on Saturday, and a community day with an adult scavenger hunt on Sunday.
1pm-6pm – Brewtopia, 4380 S Noland Road, Independence, MO, $30. Apex Brew and BBQ Supplies hosts their first festival. Taste a wide variety of beers from over 40 homebrewers and local breweries. Live music, food, and more.
Saturday, September 19
1pm-5pm – High Plains Brewhoff, Overland Park, free by invitation. This fun event that puts you in the judge’s seat asks you to prepare your liver. Celebrity brewers and homebrewers will be judged by you! Tickets are now available at Brew Lab.
1:30pm-6pm – KC Beer Fest, Power & Light District, Kansas City, MO, $35 GA, $60 VIP. This fest has been around for a while, so they’ve got it pretty well organized. Over 200 craft beers from around the world, rare keg tappings, live music, and food trucks will be spread across two blocks in downtown Kansas City.
5pm-10pm – Village West Wine Fest & Beer, 9400 State Avenue, Kansas City, KS, $75 GA, $150 VIP. That’s a hefty price tag, but this fest at Schlitterbahn will showcase over 200 wines and 100 beers from around the world, food from over 30 of KC’s finest restaurants, fireworks at 9pm, and dancing from 9pm until midnight. Limited to 2,000 attendees.
Saturday, October 17
12pm-7pm – KC Brew Fest Fall Edition, Union Station, 30 W Pershing Rd, Kansas City, MO, $40. Split between two sessions (12pm-3pm & 4pm-7pm), this fest will include tastings from over 50 breweries.
6pm-9pm – Brew at the Zoo, Kansas City Zoo, 6800 Zoo Drive, Kansas City, MO, $35-$45. Appetizers, music, beer, and wine samples as well as two drink tickets included in your ticket at this event. Breweries include KC Bier Co, Big Rip, Boston Beer, Crane Brewing, and more. In the Valley Below will be performing.
Saturday, October 24
1:30pm-5pm – Beerfest at the Ballpark, 1800 Village West Parkway, Kansas City, KS, $36. I’ll be honest, you should skip this one. The venue is great, but the beers and crowd were less than stellar, especially for the price. If you really want to go, they do have over 200 domestic, microbrewed, and international craft beers while a DJ will be playing.
Screenland’s Crossroads location may get more attention lately, but the Armour location has an ace up its sleeve. Winner of the Best Beer Festival 2014 from The Pitch Weekly, Arts & Crafts Festival is a two day festival that will take place on August 21st and 22nd at Screenland’s North Kansas City location on Armour. They promise the most rare craft beers, the best live local music, great local artists, film premieres, and more.
Along with being the sponsor of the event, 4 Hands Brewing Company will also host a Short Film Competition in conjunction with Kansas City Film Festival and Screenland Theatres. The top ten films submitted will be chosen by a panel of experts and will be screened at the festival on August 22. The winner will be chosen by a live panel during the screening and will get to work with 4 Hands and Screenland to create a unique short film advertising the brewery to be played at Screenland Theatres for no less than six months. The film must feature craft beer in some way. If you enjoy film making and beer, this would be a fun project.
I attended last year and it was a more cultured event than typical beer festivals. I was able to enjoy documentaries, indie films, exclusive and rare beers, local artist and bands, an industry Q & A, and food vendors. At the start of each day, the space was too small to accommodate the crowd. Their lobby should only hold about a third of the people who attended, but as events and screening opened up, the lobby opened up quite a bit. At the actual beer tasting on Saturday the live music was too loud for the space, but the beer was easy to get to. Some of the servers weren’t very knowledgeable of the beer, but most were actually from the brewery in which they were representing.
A portion of this year’s ticket sales will go to help support KC Pet Project.
Tickets are still available on their website, but will surely sell out as they are limiting it to 300 per day.
