Ashby Brewing Co. – photo courtesy of their Facebook page.

This MinnPost article reminded me that I need to update my database… badly. I won’t make (many) excuses. MNBeer is largely a one-person show, with some awesome contributors that ring in here and there to help me keep my shit together. (Thanks Ryan, David & Jeremy.) In the last year-and-a-half my family moved twice, sold a house, bought a house, said goodbye to the Twin Cities and a very cool job at BSG in Shakopee. Life happens, right?

Though our brewery listing needs an update, I compiled a list of 34 (?) new breweries that arrived on the scene in 2017. True to the article linked above, more than half of these breweries have landed outside of the Twin Cities and its suburbs, gracing cities like Grand Rapids, Pine City and Ashby with their first breweries in recent times. Bubble? I’m not holding my breath. In 2017, 3 breweries officially closed up shop – South Fork, Wenonah, and Sidhe, though the latter had planned to re-emerge as Culhane Brewing in St. Paul’s former Station 4 building.

Here’s our big list of breweries that opened in 2017. As always, we consider a brewery “open” when then can legally put a beer in my hand, not the year that they printed their first t-shirt. 🙂 Corrections/additions/subtractions in the comments.

1. 12welve Eyes (St. Paul)
2. 14 Lakes Brewery (Crosslake)
3. Alloy Brewing (Coon Rapids)
4. Ashby Brewing (Ashby, duh.)
5. Back Channel Brewing (Sprint Park)
6. Barrel Theory (St. Paul)
7. BlackStack (St. Paul)
8. Broken Clock (Minneapolis)
9. Chapel Brewing (Dundas)
10. Cuyuna (Crosby)
11. Giesenbräu (New Prague)
12. Headflyer Brewing (Minneapolis)
13. Imminent Brewing (Northfield)
14. Hoops Brewing (Duluth)
15. Island City (Winona)
16. Karst (Fountain)
17. Klockow Brewing (Grand Rapids)
18. Loony’s Brew (Rainier)
19. Portage Brewing (Walker)
20. Pryes Brewing (Minneapolis)
21. Revelation Aleworks (Hallock)
22. Roets Jordan Brewery (Jordan)
23. Roma Restaurant & Brewery (Willernie)
24. Shakopee Brewhall (Shakopee)
25. Starkeller Brewery (New Ulm)
26. Starry EyedBrewing (Little Falls)
27. Tanzenwald Brewery (Northfield)
28. Three Twenty Brewing (Pine City)
29. Union 32 Crafthouse (Eagan)
30. Unmapped (Minnetonka)
31. Utepils (Minneapolis)
32. Venn Brewing (Minneapolis)
33. Waldmann Brewery (St. Paul)
34. Ward House Brewery (Waseca)

Notice the cap on the beer? It’s okay. We’re sure this photo is for illustrative purposes and not a blatant disregard for safety.

We’re told that there is indeed a giant hole in the ground outside of the brewery as well as some noisy equipment outside and things are happening… legally… and on an unspecified timeline. Kick back for a few paragraphs of PR that would fit nicely on the pages of McSweeneys and ponder just what is happening at Summit Brewing Co.

Recent visitors to the Summit Beer Hall & Patio may have noticed a giant hole in the ground outside our brewery, as well as a Komatsu PC35 Mini Excavator parked beside a large pile of dirt. This is because we have begun remodeling our brewery’s public spaces. As more changes take place in the coming weeks, rest assured the construction activity is temporary, beer production will not be affected, and we have obtained all necessary permits from the City of St. Paul.

Because we intend to remain open during renovations, we have taken a variety of precautions to keep the Beer Hall & Patio areas safe for our guests. We’ve installed a sturdy fence around the abyss, for starters, and we’ve strung up some bright yellow CAUTION tape, too. Respect these boundaries and everything will be fine.

Although we don’t want to divulge any specific details at this time — anticipation is the height of joy, as they say — we can confirm that we have enlisted David Heide Design Studio of Minneapolis to oversee the whole deal. Construction Results Corporation of Plymouth, Minnesota, is literally doing a bang-up job, too. Together they’ll guide us through the remodel, including a substantial facelift inside the Beer Hall itself.

Since construction was completed in 1998, Summit Brewing Company’s Beer Hall, also known as the Ratskeller, has served as a meeting space for community organizations and non-profit groups, free of charge; it’s still used in this capacity multiple evenings every week. In recent years, however, public interest in taprooms has increased. “The original design was meant to accommodate the community and public tours, and give staff somewhere to eat their lunch,” says Summit Brewing Co. Founder and President Mark Stutrud. “Now it’s time to upgrade the experience for beer drinkers when they come visit.”

For more information about the progress of our remodel and any updates regarding construction, altered hours of operation, or beer, please visit http://www.summitbrewing.com/summit-beer-hall.