Parkville Microbrew Festival this Saturday

(Graphic: Main Street Parkville Association)

The Parkville Microbrew Festival is this Saturday! We put together a little guide to maximize your beering at the festival. There are still tickets available as of posting this. The tickets are $32 online (including the convenience fee), or $35 at the door. I would guess that there will still be some tickets available the day of in the morning, but I wouldn't count on it as a certainty. The festival starts at 1pm at the English Landing in Parkville.

As per usual, they've got a great selection of breweries coming to the festival with 51 breweries total plus homebrew clubs this year. You can find the full list of breweries and beers that will be available on their website. All of the regulars are going to be there along with quite a few brewpubs and other breweries that don't distribute to the area (yet). It's always a good day when you get to drink Liquid Bread and Blind Tiger beer without having to go on a road trip! I've got a list at the bottom of all the breweries that you can't buy around here and new breweries to check out.


There's going to be some special beers in store at the festival. If I were you, I'd mostly likely spend half of the time just milling around the Firestone Walker table drinking their Pivo Pils and Opal Saison. McCoy's is going to have some of their Gose #2 on hand, which I can most definitely recommend. Speaking of sour beers, Boulevard will be bringing some of its reserve stock of the Foeder Projekt #1 and Saison Brett. They're also going to have their Ginger Lemon Radler, which might be making it into production soon (as long as you all make a big fuss about it on Saturday). New Belgium will also have some of their great sours for you to drink including La Folie and the new Gruit which is flavored with bog myrtle, horehound, yarrow, wormwood and elderflowers in lieu of hops. On the topic of New Belgium, I got a taste of their new Summer Helles at the MDL tasting a couple weeks ago and was very pleasantly surprised. If you're into German lagers, give that one a try. Also, don't forget to slam a few samplers of the Hoptimum before it hits the shelves!

This year, there will also be homebrew clubs setting up shop with their brews and some brewing demonstrations. The Missouri Mashers will be putting on a brewing demonstration and our very own David Schumacher will be pouring his SchuBrews. KC Bier Meisters will also be putting on a bottling demonstration. Kind of wondering about this one to be honest--I can't really think of a better way to scare off potential future home brewers: "Here's how you scrape the label off of a bottle. Now do that 40 more times. Next we get to scrub out the inside and sanitize each bottle!" Fun!

There will also be local bands playing, food tents, and you get a commemorative tasting glass. (Just don't break it lest you get a "Boooo!") You can also support Harvesters by bringing some canned goods with you to the event. Pets are welcome and DDs get in free. Now we just have to hope the weather holds out!

New Breweries/Brewpubs Opened in the Last Year:
Big John's Brewing Co (Salina, KS)
Big Rip Brewing Co (North Kansas City, MO)
Cinder Block Brewery (North Kansas City, MO)
Bur Oak Brewing Co (Columbia, MO)
Defiance Brewing Co (Hays, KS)
Heavy Riff Brewing Co (St. Louis, MO)
Kansas City Bier Company (Kansas City, MO)
Rock Bridge Brewing Co (Columbia, MO)

Out of Town Brewpubs:
Blind Tiger (Topeka, KS)
Broadway Brewing (Columbia, MO)
Gellas Diner/Liquid Bread Brewing Co (Hays, KS)
Kirkwood Station (Kirkwood, MO)
Little Apple Brewing Co (Manhattan, KS)
Springfield Brewing Co (Springfield, MO)

Breweries Not Distributed Here:
Confluence Brewing Co (Des Moines, IA)
Morgan Street Brewery (St. Louis, MO)
Urban Chestnut Brewing (St. Louis, MO)