During my stay in Anaheim, I visited a few breweries on and off the Disney grounds and enjoyed a wide selection of California craft beers. Thank the gods for flights, as they allowed me to taste a larger variety without having to order pints. Flights generally came as a group of 4 taster glasses, each 4 oz in size. I’ve always found the presentation of flights at different establishments to be interesting, as they all look different!
There are a number of restaurants and kiosks in Downtown Disney and in the California Adventure Park selling craft beer. I visited Ballast Point Brewery at Downtown Disney who had a TON of offerings. I went a couple times and had different samples each time, I won’t name them or rate them all here, you can find me on Untappd (social media for beer) for that!
Tried a number of other craft beers in the California Adventure Park, pretty expensive too considering all prices are in USD, but worth it to try!
Went to three breweries in Anaheim away from the Disney grounds. Took an Uber to the first one which was Backstreet Brewery and then walked to the other two which were Golden Road Brewing and Karl Strauss Brewing. Of course I forgot to track the route with my Fitbit (yaaargh!), so I created one with a Google map. I can’t remember how long it took us to walk from Backstreet to Golden Road, maybe 30 minutes or so:
Backstreet Brewery, it was a bit different seeing Ducks and Angels flags hanging from the rafters, but totally expected:
Golden Road Brewing had a wait time to be seated, so we walked to Karl Strauss and hung out there before coming back here. They had a huge selection:
Karl Strauss Brewing was directly across from Angel Stadium. So was Golden Road if truth be known. They had a large selection and I loved their ‘Make Beer, Not War’ slogan across the back wall. They had apparel for sale with the phrase on it, I wish they would have had a shirt in my size and style!!
Market Broiler was one of the last places I visited, a restaurant at The Outlets at Orange with is south of Disneyland:
All in all I think I sampled at least 25+ different beers during my stay, had the odd pint here and there as well. And that’s not even mentioning the bottles I bought and had at the hotel!! Overall I enjoyed most of them, and I’ll give high fives to the following:
Best tasting beer: Pumpkin Down by Ballast Point Brewing Company (Yes I’m one of those pumpkin people, but not all pumpkin beers are created equal. This one however, was truly amazing!!)
Best named beer: Dog Ate My Homework (Blackberry Saison) by Brouwerij West (I am DEFINITELY into trying beers based on their name alone! This one was very good too, I loved the blackberry and that it is more tart than sweet)
Honorable mentions to Karl Strauss for ‘Make Beer, Not War’, and to Mission Brewery for keepin’ things piratey, YAAARRR!
