I remember the first time the guys at Half Acre rolled into Murphy’s Bleachers to sample out their Lager.  They were using a contract brewer in Wisconsin to make it and the batch we first tried had an aggressively hoppy grapefruit note for an Amber lager.  They mentioned something about looking for a space to bring production into the city and the Murphy family happened to have a warehouse full of junk near Lincoln Square.  Flash-forward a few years and these guys have dumped the Lager, turned the Murphys’ warehouse full of junk into their own brewery and taproom, and are producing what I think is the best Pale Ale in the Chicagoland area.

Sure there’s a certain famous brewery in Indiana with some delicious beers that get lumped in with American Pale Ales, but with alcohol contents up over 6% these would be IPA’s at any other time in history.  A Pale Ale should have a certain “guzzleability” (yeah, there’s probably a better, real word, but I like this one) and to me Daisy Cutter is the most guzzleable American Pale Ale around.  Full of the kind of West Coast citrusy, piney, grassy, hop flavors that not too many other Midwestern breweries have really mastered, but without going over the top on the booziness.  This is the kind of reliable friend who will stick with you late into the evening.  We’re just happy to have played a small part in the story of what has become our favorite Chicago brewery.  Cheers to Matt, Gabriel, and the whole team at Half Acre.

Slainte.