San Diego Beer Week 2015 – Must Attend Events + Favorite New Spots

We are a few weeks away from San Diego Beer Week 2015. You might be asking yourself: “Isn’t every week Beer Week in San Diego?” While there is no shortage of beer releases, beer festivals, beer dinners and more, the craft beer capital of the world really breaks out the big guns to show the rest of the country why they remain the king.  In this article, I will pick some of the must attend events listed on SDBW.org, and then I will give you a few awesome new spots that you might not have visited yet, or you haven’t gotten around to since your last trip to San Diego County.

Must Attend Events

Rare Beer Breakfast 2015  on 11/6/15 – Our longtime friend Dr. Bill hosts a wonderful breakfast at Stone Brewing World Bistro & Gardens and breaks out some very hard to get beers.  This is a fun way to kick off SDBW and is worth getting up early for. Dr. Bill has stacked the deck on the beer side of things, and Stone Brewing World Bistro is bringing their “A Game” for a hearty breakfast spread so you will be able to sample these beers with something good in your belly. LINK TO INFO,TAP LIST AND TICKETS

The San Diego Brewers Guild Fest 11/7/15 – DUH!! Sure you could spend 4 days trying to visit all 100+ breweries from San Diego, or you could to the lovely Guild Fest and try some of the best offerings from almost every brewery in SD. LINK TO INFO AND TICKETS

O’Briens Pub – Knee Deep In Kern River 11/10/15 – While San Diegans are spoiled with the best locally made beer, they don’t get their hands on Kern River Brewing often. O’Briens Pub kicks ass on an off night, this should be incredible. LINK TO EVENT INFO.

Toronado SD – Battle of The Guilds  11/13/15 – More fun than competitive for myself, the beer drinker. Breweries from San Francisco and Los Angeles bring down their finest. Guests will be able to vote for the best beer. LINK TO EVENT INFO

Favorite New Spots

If you live in San Diego, these places might not be new to you, but for many of us out of towners who only get to San Diego once or twice a year, these spots are places you should check out that are relatively new compared to your Stone, Ballast Point, AleSmith and such.

Bagby Beer Company – Owner/Brewmaster Jeff Bagby has more gold than Mr. T. That’s because he was a San Diego beer pioneer over at Pizza Port Brewing not too long ago. He has his own spot in Oceanside now, and it’s quite delightful.  This could be one of your first stops if you are driving south.  It has an amazing layout, great food and most importantly, world class beer. LINK TO WEBSITE

Carnitas Snack Shack – If you love pork, bacon, carnitas, ham, tacos, and craft beer, this place is Godly.  It’s a hole in the wall near a residential area, its worth the visit and when busy, worth the wait. I dream of this place. LINK TO WEBSITE

Monkey Paw Brewing – This place is owned by genius publican Scot Blair, who owns the very famous Hamilton’s Tavern.  It’s laid out similar to Hamilton’s, it has wonderful Monkey Paw beer, guest taps, kick ass food. It’s a great last stop of the night place in my opinion. LINK TO WEBSITE

Rip Current Brewing – A fairly young brewery located in San Marcos and now also in North Park. Rip Current makes some very fun beers, they meet the hop quotient the county requires, and you can tell the folks running it and brewing there are having a great time. LINK TO WEBSITE

Societe Brewing – While they are past their 3 year mark, I consider these guys to be one of the newer breweries in the mix. Societe makes some of the best, cleanest hoppy ales in the country. I could drink their The Pupil IPA all day, and if I was a bigger beast, I could drink The Butcher all day as well.  The tasting room is spacious, perfectly lit and staffed by some genuinely nice people. LINK TO WEBSITE

Toolbox Brewing – These guys are very new to the scene, and have successfully broken the typical San Diego Beer mold. Rather than being just another brewery with IPAs and Double IPAS, these guys have been making some experimental wild ales, sour ales with and without fruit.  Definitely worth a stop. LINK TO WEBSITE

Urge Gastropub – While hardly new on their 5th year, we made our first stop last year. We had food and beer, the place was roomy, the service was great.  I would recommend their beer cheese soup! During beer week, Urge is sure to have some extra special goodies on tap. LINK TO WEBSITE

Don’t be sad if we haven’t mentioned you. We still have many more stops to make!