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Something’s brewing around Lake Tahoe. California’s ever-expanding craft-beer movement has hiked into the Sierra and is blazing a trail with breweries, pubs and tasting rooms eager to pour you a cold one.
We made stops at tasting rooms both sophisticated and rustic, all with multiple taps and some with to-go beer available in cans, bottles and growlers. The eats vary from full-on menus to pub grub and snacks. One place even invites you to bring in your own food.
Let this sampling be your guide to sours and saisons, stouts and porters, double IPAs and ales, with ABVs (alcohol by volume) from a mellow 3.3 to a staggering 11. And don’t forget, the 12th annual Beerfest & Bluegrass Festival at the Village at Northstar (www.northstarcalifornia.com) will be July 6-8.
1 Fiftyfifty Brewing Co.
A sandwich board — “We are so HOPPY you are here” — sets the cheery tone at the entrance to the handsome, art-filled dining room highlighted by a long bar. Grab a seat there or a lounge chair on the patio.
Taps and bites: Choose from among 16 rotating taps or go the bottles, cans or growler route. Hungry? There’s calzone, fried chicken and burgers on the lunch and dinner menus.
Don’t miss: Try the coffee-infused Eclipse imperial stout, aged in oak whiskey barrels, and the Spring Fever honey blonde ale.
Details: Open 11 a.m.-9 p.m. daily and until 9:30 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays, at 11197 Brockway Road, Truckee; www.fiftyfiftybrewing.com.
2 Tahoe Mountain Brewing Co.
The tone here is Classic Tahoe, a mélange of knotty pine, dark wood and native stone.
Taps and bites: You’ll find eight dedicated taps, including one barrel-aged. The barrel-aged beers and sours are bottled and brought over from the mother-ship brewery in Truckee (where you’ll find 16 taps at 10990 Industrial Way). Pair those brews with pub grub, such as house-smoked wings and flatbreads.
Don’t miss: Try the hazy barrel-aged pluot sour and the Reno Noir, a barrel-aged cherry sour porter.
Details: Open 11 a.m.-9 p.m. daily at 475 N. Lake Blvd., Tahoe City; www.tahoebrewing.com
3 Sidellis Brewery
Imagine a Tahoe cabin-turned-woodsy tavern, complete with Edison lights and a mural of the Sierra. Weathered picnic tables, wood barrels and a hops garden fill the backyard (and dogs are welcome).
Taps and bites: Five dedicated and seven barrel-aged taps are on offer here, with stouts, porters, sours and saisons to choose from. Enjoy deviled eggs, beer-boiled bratwurst and other snacks and sandwiches. Don’t miss the house-pickled veggies and fruits — balsamic olives, Cajun bell pepper, pineapple, artichoke hearts and dessert-like kiwi-lime-strawberry with cinnamon.
Don’t miss: Try the cabernet barrel-aged Oakalee Doakalee, a Flanders — as in Ned from “The Simpsons” — red ale with cherry puree, and the Mangonada, sweet-spicy mango-jalapeño white ale.
Details: Open 11:30 a.m.-9:30 p.m. daily, until 10:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays; patio closes at 9 p.m. 3350 Sandy Way, South Lake Tahoe; www.sidellis.com
4 Cold Water Brewery
The brewery is on site, but out of sight, so the vibe is more full-service restaurant than brewpub, but an adjacent tasting room just opened.
Taps and bites: Fourteen taps include five guest taps. There’s a full lunch and dinner (mussels, steaks) menu here, as well as Sunday brunch service, and the food comes with culinary cred. Cold Water won the Sierra Chef Challenge — think “Chopped” — in 2015, 2016 and 2017.
Don’t miss: Owner Debbie Brown belongs to the Pink Boots Society, which supports women in the brewing industry. For their annual Collaboration Brew Day, Brown and her female employees brewed a batch of Hey Girl Hey honey malt double IPA. Or get a pour of Mr. Toad’s Wild Rye.
Details: Open 11 a.m.-9 p.m. daily and until 11 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays at 2544 Lake Tahoe Blvd., South Lake Tahoe; www.tahoecoldwaterbrewery.com
5 South Lake Brewing Co.
A polished cement-and-plank bar and floor, picnic tables, stacks of stainless-steel kegs and towering fermenting tanks help define this brewery’s industrial-warehouse character. Be sure to cruise the narrow gallery of local art for sale.
Taps and bites: The array of 11 to 16 rotating taps include five of the brewery’s flagship beers. Snacks only, but a food truck shows up three nights a week to sell wood-fired pizza.
Don’t miss: Try the Angora and Fog Nozzle hazy IPAs.
Details: Open 2-9 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 12-11 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, and 12-9 p.m. on Sundays at 1920 Lake Tahoe Blvd., South Lake Tahoe; www.southlakebeer.com
6 Lake Tahoe AleWorx
This striking taproom makes creative use of wood and stone, flattered by natural light. At night, the fire pit on the spacious woodsy patio is the place to be, with live entertainment offered Friday-Sunday. A second location is due to open soon in Stateline, Nevada.
Taps and bites: In this self-serve model, customers open a tab, choose from 25 taps to pull their own and pay by the ounce. Grazing is the way to go. The taps are in constant random rotation, sourced from a library of 500 beers from multiple breweries. The two house-brand beers are crafted for AleWorx by Alibi Brewery in Incline Village.
Seventeen thin-crust pizzas, blistered in a wood-fired oven, include a pear-arugula version with gorgonzola, mozzarella and honey.
Don’t miss: This is pure sampling fun. Try any or all.
Details: Open 11 a.m.-11 p.m. daily at 2050 Lake Tahoe Blvd., South Lake Tahoe; www.laketahoealeworx.com.
7 Alibi Ale Works
This dog-friendly tasting room is strictly no-frills. Its sister, the Truckee Public House, is much larger and more party-centric, with 14 kinds of nachos (10069 Bridge St., Truckee), but this one has its charms.
Taps and bites: Sample from 15 rotating taps. You can bring in whatever bites you’d like to supplement the taproom’s chips, popcorn and jerky.
Don’t miss: Try the flagship pale ale and oak-fermented Berliner Weisse plum-apricot sour.
Details: Opens at 3 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 12 p.m. Friday-Sunday at 204 E. Enterprise St., Incline Village; www.alibialeworks.com.