Our Favorite Brewery From Each State

Our go-to first stop in every state we visit is a craft brewery, but which one stands out above all others in each place we visit? See if your favorite is on the list below!

Having both worked in the craft beer world for the better part of almost 15 years, we gravitate towards breweries whenever we get somewhere. Sometimes it can inform how much more we love a place when they happen to have killer beer.

If the city or town has an awesome brewery, we might stick around a day or two longer just to hit it one more time before we lose their beers til the next time we make it back there.

We're both pretty big hop heads, but we also have our own individual tastes - Bekah will grab a stout way quicker than I would, and I'm the sour beer drinker of the two of us - so you might notice that our favorites might be IPA-heavy breweries. But we do try to grab a bunch of tasters at all these places and find really well-rounded spots. Honestly, this list will probably be growing and evolving as we travel around and try more and more spots, so check back in and give us your suggestions in the comments. Also, if you want even more than what's on this list, head over to our Beer Map to see all our favorites out there!

California - Oregon - Washington - Arizona - Colorado - Wyoming - Missouri - New Jersey - North Carolina (coming soon) - Georgia (coming soon) - Tennessee (coming soon) - New York - Vermont - Maine - Massachusetts

California

This should be one of the hardest ones because there are a million breweries in CA, but living in San Diego for 5 months we found these two and our opinions never waivered.

Bekah's Pick: Burgeon Beer - Multiple locations around Carlsbad and San Diego, CA - Carlsbad Crush, Juice Press, and Clever Kiwi blew us away and kept us coming back anytime we saw it on draft Farmer's Pick: Humble Sea - Santa Cruz, CA - These guys put out an unreal amount of the juiciest, foggiest West Coast IPAs out there, but also cool experimental sours and pilsners.

Oregon

This is a tough one, there are sooooooo many killer places here. But we both agree on this one: Fort George in Astoria.

Bekah & Farmer's Pick: Fort George - Astoria, OR - We were posted up working in Astoria, while Bekah finished up her work, I rode my bike into town to kill some time and stumbled across Fort George. So glad we stopped in. Not only was their taproom gorgeous and cool, literally every beer we had (and I had two flights before Bekah got there haha) blew our minds. They nail everything we love about the west coast style of hazys - juicy, tropical, but refreshing, dry, and just a slight hop bite - so good. Also, they're available all over Oregon and some of Washington 2nd Pick: Boss Rambler Beer Club - Bend, OR - Also a west coast haze heaven, in a cool ass city, with amazing design and branding. This felt like a fully formed place that had been around for 10 years but it just opened in 2019.

Washington

Another hard choice, the west coast is so stacked with amazing places, but we narrowed it down to these two.

Bekah & Farmer's Pick: Cloudburst - Seattle, WA - We went up to Washington for work a few times and loved these guys, so when we were up there to visit family, you know we stopped by again. They're still our favorite. They nail every style they try - IPAs, lagers, stouts, sours - they kill it. #IYKYK we're probably not telling you anything you haven't experienced before. 2nd Pick: Just about any place in Ballard - Honestly, you could throw a rock in this neighborhood and hit a brewery that makes some of the best stuff in WA - Reuben's, Great Notion, Urban Family, Stoup - they all call this area home. When in doubt, just head there.

Arizona

Our musician buddies in AZ sent us to the spots we tried around PHX, so to be honest they kinda tied for us. One was one of the coolest places to hang in AZ (especially during Covid when patios became the way of life) and the other had killer IPAs. SO we'll call it a tie here

Farmer's Pick Tie: Wren House and AZ Wilderness - Phoenix, AZ - Wren House makes incredible IPAs (Spellbinder won gold at GABF in 2020) do not sleep on this place. AZ Wilderness has one of the best patios of any brewery we've ever been to. It's massive, comfy, their food is good and their beer is super tasty.

Bekah's Pick: Mother Road - Flagstaff, AZ - We, unfortunately, didn't make it to Mother Road's brewery but that did not stop us from buying the Tower Station IPA right off many shelves. It must be the Pilsner malts they use in this beer that makes it light and crisp without skimping on the hazy hop profile. Every sip fills your mouth with grapefruit, pineapple, and pine flavor profiles that kept me sipping.

Colorado

Probably one of the toughest calls on this list since this is our backyard and so many of our friends work at incredible places. Whether you hit up RiNo, head to Fort Collins and try the mountain towns, you're sure to find delicious brews.

Bekah's Pick: Tie - Cerveceria Colorado and Ratio Beerworks - Cerveceria Colorado was the brainchild of our buddy Jason Buehler and he created some of the most delicious and cool Mexican-style beers. Buehler sadly passed away in 2020, but his passion and creativity is on full display in these beers and the collabs with Mexican breweries that he put together - go grab a Poblano Pils and raise a glass to one of the best dudes there was. Ratio Beerworks was our favorite place in Denver to hang for years and then it was a home for Bekah where she worked until the pandemic. All their beers are approachable and great, but the atmosphere is one of our favorite things. It's a punk rock brewery that embraces music and has awesome stand-up comedy too. Don't miss either of these. Farmer's Pick: Tie - New Image Brewing and Cerebral Brewing - Ok...so we picked our friends and former co-workers, but they're also genuinely some of the best places in Colorado! I worked for New Image designing cans, building relationships with musicians and venues in Denver, and drinking their delicious beers. Brandon Capps, founder/head brewer, makes some of the best IPAs in Colorado but also makes some of the coolest/creative sours in the game. Get over to their taproom in Arvada on your way to the mountains. And if you're sticking around downtown, go see a show at Lost Lake and walk across the street to Cerebral. Also making some of the best and most complex IPAs in Denver, they collab with some of the best breweries around the US, and really push the boundaries of the Colorado scene. Two of the best around.

Wyoming

Most of the beer we had in WY was in Jackson, and while there are other spots to try outside of this gorgeous mountain town, there are few spots with as amazing views as this.

Bekah & Farmer's Pick: Snake River Brewing - Jackson Hole, WY - Kinda like AZ Wilderness, this place's patio is unreal, their food is great and their beer is super good. You can find everything from a crushable pilsner to a big, bold double IPA here, and make sure to grab some cans to take to your campsite cause they're perfect to have while you chill by the fire at the end of the day.

Missouri

Granted, when we were in Missouri, a lot of things were closed and this was during the patio-only times. Kansas City is such a cool spot, so when we landed and need a place to camp out to get work done, we searched "brewery with wifi" and went down the list, sometimes that's the best way to find a pleasant surprise.

Bekah & Farmer's Pick: Casual Animal Brewing Co - Kansas City, MO - Kinda like AZ Wilderness, this place's patio is unreal, their food is great and their beer is super good. You can find everything from a crushable pilsner to a big, bold double IPA here, and make sure to grab some cans to take to your campsite cause they're perfect to have while you chill by the fire at the end of the day.

New Jersey

Alright, you're probably tired of hearing this, but we go to our friends' breweries a lot. Especially on the road, it's one of the ways to catch back up, see what they've been up to, and let them get excited to share their world with us. So when we were close in Philly, that's exactly what we did! We hopped over a state to New Jersey to see our buds at...

Bekah & Farmer's Pick: Flying Fish Brewing Co - Somerdale, NJ - An old friend from our days at Oskar Blues was running this place so we had to stop in, and damn if it wasn't a delight! Just a little tidbit about us, we LOVE pickles and they happened to be tapping this pickle beer made with these MASSIVE dill pickles from a deli up the road that uses them as the buns for their sandwiches (a whole other crazy story). Anyway, these guys are pretty well known around the southern Jersey/Philly area, highly recommend hitting up their spot if you're around there.

New York

Not an easy pick, there were so many damn good ones and we even made new friends while we were here buuuuuuuuuuut..

Bekah & Farmer's Pick: Other Half Brewing - Brooklyn, NY - Specifically the Domino Park location (because it was close to where we stayed) close to Willimasburg - this place blew us away. Beer after beer after beer was incredible and damn near perfect. If Tree House was the epitome of the NEIPA style, Other Half is trying to take their crown as perfecting the style. The smoothest, softest, mouthfeel you could ever ask for out of these hazies and yet the hop combos, additions and techniques made them all stand apart from each other. Sure there were tropical fruit notes across each, but then you'd get smacked in the face with fresh peaches, or intense tangerine, or lush coconut and pineapple. Even their lagers were tasty as hell. If you know your beer, then Other Half is not a foreign name, but they absolutely deliver. As for honorable mentions, our new friends over at Non Sequitor Beer Project are doing some cool and out of the box IPA work. Not just content to have 8 IPAs with different combinations of Citra, Mosaic and Galaxy, they're trying any experimental hops they can get their hands on to make new and unique flavors. Also, without a doubt, Evil Twin is making some of the strangest, interesting and bold sours around. Not just throwing 900 lbs of fruit in the tank, but actually pushing spices, fruits, cream, marshmallow in ways that are intriguing and fun.