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Tour Stop 12 - Penrose Brewing - 1/18/2017
Penrose Brewing Company, 509 Stevens Street, Geneva, IL 60134 phone: (630) 232-2115 website:
PenroseBrewing.com
Let the adventure continue!! "Brad, can you believe this will be our 12th brewery stop", "No I can't Clyde". We're cruising in my Chevy Cruze towards Geneva, IL to visit Penrose Brewing Company. We have my big buddy, Beer Drinking Brad riding shotgun and my brother-in-law Guy "Retired and catching fish" Tenini visiting from Beaumont, Texas riding in the back seat. We're comfy and cozy in that little car and we're on a mission. Your mission Brad & Clyde, should you choose to accept it, is to seek out every brewery you can, sip their brews, talk to the folks, take some pictures and write about it, making it interesting enough where people other than your momma and your old high school girlfriend will want to read it. As always, should you or any of you brewery tour guests be caught, the secretary will disavow any knowledge of your actions......this tape will self destruct in 5 seconds.....Good Luck Brad & Clyde!! Well I guess you can see, we accepted the mission and we're finding out that anything and everything is possible.
Have you ever done a fishing trip to Canada? I know there are a lot of fish in Canada and I'm sure they have some breweries. Brad's the man when you're talking Canadian Fishing Trips because he's done a few of them. Brad said, "The most fish we caught in one morning was 80". "You catch so many fish you eventually get tired of catching fish"! Now you have to start planning in the fall for a one week fishing trip sometime in May/June timeframe, first ice-out for the big
Northerns. Well 2017 is shot......let's start planning for 2018.....done, yeah buddy!! I'm kind of digging this retirement thing!
Before we could get on, we had to let the passengers get off the plane from the flight that brought the plane in. There was a thin strap separating those of us who stood in line and the folks who were walking past us while they disembarked. I noticed a familiar face coming out of the jetway and I froze. It was Bart Starr and he was walking right at me! He brushed my shoulder as he went by and to this day I wish I had said hello or something to acknowledge him but I was slack-jawed.
After he went by I turned to Matt and said, "Do you know who that was?". He said no and I told him, "That was Bart Starr!" He turned around and asked, "That guy who just walked past?" and I said yes. He asked me if he should go after him and get an autograph. I said, "Definitely!" So he got out of line and started going down the airport terminal to catch up.
Bart, I mean Mr. Starr, went into a bathroom and Matt followed right after him. He approached him, and here it's a little fuzzy because I don't know if he had the conversation right away or if he waited until business was finished, but he asked him, "Are you Bart Starr?" He said "Yes", so Matt asked him nicely for an autograph. Bart said something to the effect that ". . . I usually carry some 8 X 10 pictures and a nice Sharpie to sign them with but I don't have any with me right now . . .".
There it is, Penrose Brewing Company. Nice colorful sign, time for the "stand out front and smile" picture. Heading for the front door and we cross paths with a hot sauce guy who's going to make custom yummy jalapeño hot sauce for the brewery and he's smiling from ear to ear.....nice!!! The three amigos shuffle into the Penrose and low and behold, it's the brewery shuffle board to our left....that's always a crowd favorite. We have 4-6 picnic tables and a book case holding a ton of board games.....luv this place already. The bar runs about 20' along the back wall. It's 3:30 on a Wednesday afternoon so we have a couple guys hangin at the end of the bar and that's about it. We take our places at the other end and start settling in and checking the place out. Clean, organized, tidy and did I mention clean?
Well it's time to add to our frequent flyer miles. My flight started out with Columbus Red - Hoppy Red Ale (7.0%). Next we have the Taproom IPA (7.1%) brewed with Chinook hops. Since Brad is the passenger on this tour he orders a pint of Navette - Belgium Black Ale (6.0%) and our guest "Guy" takes off with his flight starting with Cherry Brune - Belgium Brown Ale with cherries (5.6%) and then right into the Abbey - Belgium Inspired Dubbel (6.0%).
I look to my left and there sits a younger guy drinking a nice tall glass of water. He knows Don the bartender and I can't help but overhear something about drinking too much over the holidays. I blend in by saying good for you for drinking water and he continues to tell me his younger brother, who he hadn't seen for 2 years was in town and they partied a little to much. As I sip my 3rd flight brew'ah the Coffee Tripel with fresh ground coffee (9.0%), I introduce myself and told him about the tour......"Have you heard about us?", "No". Come to find out his name is Conrad and his brother Travis is a Major in the Marine Corps...OO-RAH! Travis is stationed in Hawaii. Very nice guy and you can tell there's a lot of brotherly love and respect going on. Conrad said he and his brother, when they were younger, would wrestle each other and carry on but not anymore. Travis knows all the pressure points and has learned to take care of him. Tours in Iraq and Afghanistan and the Marines are normally the first ones in. Conrad said next up is Thailand. God bless you Travis, thank you for your service and be careful out there!!!
Well until next time, and remember.......
Go get'cha one!!
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I grew up in Wisconsin (K-12) and my Dad and I always watched the Packers. We watched the first two Super Bowls together in fact. So I was a big Bart Starr fan (still am). A number of years ago, my son Matt and I went to Nashville. I had some work to do and he hung around with me and we went golfing and had a great time. When the trip was done, we were at the airport gate ready to get on the plane.
So, he handed Matt his personal business card and told Matt to call his office and ask his secretary for a signed picture and she would send it right to him! What a great guy! Matt thanked him, took the business card and came back into line and told me the story. Personally, I think the business card and the story is better than the autograph itself!
