Beer: It’s What Made Milwaukee Famous!
Where else can you get four six-ounce pours of beer for $7? That’s how much it costs to tour Lakefront Brewery, 1872 North Commerce Street, Milwaukee, Wisconsin (map) — and you even get to keep the souvenir pint glass!
Touring a brewery shows you exactly why the beverage has been called “bread in a glass”.
Then again, Lakefront is no ordinary brewery. It was the second brewery in the country to make a Pumpkin Beer and possibly the first to bottle a fruit beer in the country since Prohibition.
In 1996 Lakefront became the first certified organic brewery in the country and made the country’s first certified organic beer, the “Organic ESB (Extra Special Bitter)”.
In 2006 the Klisch brothers helped create a new category of beer when they became the first brewery in the nation to receive federal approval to brew a gluten-free beer.
In 2009, the brewery produced Local Acre, the first beer since before prohibition made with 100% Wisconsin-grown hops and malt.
There are tours every day of the week (more on Fridays and Saturdays than the rest of the days). Each brewery tour can take up to 60 people on the tour (up to 30 tix can be sold ahead of time online, but they also take walk-ins).
Friday night bonus: the Lakefront Palm Garden serves a fish fry dinner between 4 and 9 p.m.
The brewery was founded in 1987. Here’s how it all started: “According to Brewery President Russ Klisch, the whole brewery started with his brother, Jim. Near his birthday, Jim expressed interest in beer making, and Russ humored him by giving him a home brewing book. To Russ’ surprise, Jim read the book, and brewed a beer.” The brothers have never looked back.
(Photo courtesy of Lakefront Brewery)
