First Annual Kennesaw Craft Beer Festival

The First Annual Kennesaw Craft Beer Festival was held at the Depot in Kennesaw on September 27th.  And, of course, Spore was there.

This was the latest of the beer festivals that are being put on by Atlanta Beer Festivals.  They have been running beer festivals around Atlanta, and now typically hold a festival every 1-2 months.  It was nice to have a festival near where my humans live, as it made it a lot easier to get there.  They met up with some of there friends and accompanied me to Kennesaw.

Before entering the festival, my humans needed some sustenance to soak up all those craft beers.  Conveniently, there were a couple of restaurants right outside the gates, both with a number of good beer selections.  They stopped in at BurgerFi, which has great burgers and even better fries.  They have a few drafts and even more beers in cans and bottles.  Another great nearby option is Trackside Grill, which has more sit-down fare, and a number of craft beers including many local options, especially beers from the Kennesaw's own Burnt Hickory Brewery.  Both restaurants have outdoor seating upstairs, allowing you to overlook Depot Park and Kennesaw's small downtown area.

The festival had a pretty impressive beer list.  There were over 100 beers from around 55 breweries/cideries, including 18 from the Atlanta area.

This is actually my first beer festival, and they had a really nice setup.  It was spread out throughout Depot Park, so you weren't stepping all over each other.  Also, it was not overly crowded.  Often we only had to wait in a line of 2-3 people.  Even at the favorite booths, the wait was well less than 5 minutes.  That was a nice surprise.  I was concerned that this meant that this would mean that the turnout was less than expected and would make the 'first' Kennesaw beer festival also be the 'last' one, but the founder was satisfied with the number of guests, and was not surprised by the lighter turnout considering that this was the first one.

Once we entered the festival, the humans went straight to the Burnt Hickory booths.  Burnt Hickory is our favorite Atlanta brewery right now.  They're only a micro brewery for now, but are in the process of expanding.  They make some great beers, mostly higher-ABV.  Since the festival was in their backyard, they treated the festival as their open house, bringing some great beers and a live band.  Not only were they the first stop, they were also the favorite stop of all the breweries.  Some favorites included the Big Shanty Graham Cracker Stout (Yum!), the Cannon Dragger IPA and the Die Kreuzen Imperial Pumpkin Porter, which they were actually serving out of a pumpkin.  (Bonus for style points there.)

After Burnt Hickory, I'd say that the breweries were hit-and-miss.  Between the group, we hit every booth, and had a number of different beers since my human likes dark beers, Mrs. Human likes cider, and most of the rest prefer IPAs.

We really wanted to try some of the new Georgia breweries that we hadn't experienced yet, including Cherry Street, Eventide, Orpheus and Yes Face.  Unfortunately, we weren't really impressed with these.  Cherry Street's IPA was difficult to drink; one of the guys dumped it after a few sips.  The Orpheus Transmigration of Souls IPA was much better, but the high-ABV made it a little tough to drink after having been at the festival for a couple hours.  The Eventide stout was decent, but not great.  Yes Face's beers were just disappointing, and not worth drinking when there were so many other options.  Most of these are pretty new breweries, so we'll definitely give them a chance again.  We're hoping that they improve and have success.

A few other notable options included:

• Terrapin Chocolate Peanut Butter Porter - The peanut butter fragrance came through immediately, but the flavor just wasn't there.  It was tasty, but not very chocolaty or peanut buttery.
• Starr Hill Sabbath - a Black IPA.  This was my human's favorite discovery.  It was a really nice mixture of dark malts and hops.
• Monk's Mead - Interesting.  Mead is something new to most of us, and seemed a little too sweet to drink.  We'll need to give it a try again.
• Woodchuck Blueberry Cider - This was a favorite discovery for Mrs. Human.

Even with all these new beers to try, and the end of the day, everyone gravitated to their favorite beers that they were already familiar with:

• Sweetwater IPA
• Southern Tier 2XIPA
• Monday Night Mac Daddy Porter
• Burnt Hickory Big Shanty

  We all really enjoyed the festival, and look forward to going to the Acworth Craft Beer Festival on November 8.

  A few other upcoming local beer events:

• Wing Cafe & Tap House, Marietta
• October 20-26, Atlanta Craft Beer Week - All 42 taps will be taken over by Georgia breweries, featuring 23 different breweries.
• Burnt Hickory Brewing, Kennesaw
• October 18 - Monthly Open House
• Decatur Craft Beer Festival, Decatur
• October 18

• The Porter Beer Bar, Little 5 Points
• Atlanta Craft Beer Week.  October 21: Victory Tap Takeover, October 22: Boulevard/Orpheus/Second Self/Terrapin/Sierra Nevada Tap Takeover

• Sweetwater "Brew Your Cask Off", Atlanta
• November 8.  90 different brewers are providing cask beers.  Unlimited samples for $35 or $40 day of the event.
• Acworth Craft Beer Festival, Acworth
• November 8