Why The Great Taste of the Midwest Craft Beer Festival in Madison, WI is More Than Just A, Well, Great Taste

By Guest Indiana On Tap Contributors Jennifer Stojanovich & Noah Amstadter

Demand far exceeds supply. It’s one of the truths that makes craft beer an exciting and challenging, at times even frustrating, hobby. Beer geeks crash the Internet to buy Dark Lord Day tickets. We’ll drive 500 miles to pick up reserved bottles of Upland sours. Tap that keg of KBS? Hope it lasts an hour. No event better exhibits this dynamic than the Great Taste of the Midwest.

Now in its 28th year, this festival hosts more than 150 breweries hailing from Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, and Michigan. For manybrewers and beer fans, it is hailed as the greatest beer event of the summer–and for good reason: Festival organizers and brewers bring their A-game. This year, breweries from Indiana and nearby states played a starring role in the Midwest’s premier beer event. Our journey to our ninth Great Taste began just as it has six of the last seven years – parked in a camp chair in front of a liquor store in Madison, Wisconsin, the first Sunday in May. 

As the popularity of craft beer has exploded, so too has demand for tickets, which go on sale at 12 noon at various liquor stores, bars, and breweries in Madison (there is also a mail-in lottery). This year, we arrived at our ticket sales location before 6 am and found more than 70 dedicated beer enthusiasts ahead of us. The quest to attend the Great Taste has become an all-night affair! With the help of some generous friends, we returned to Northwest Indiana with six coveted tickets, and three months to anticipate and plan. Great Taste weekend (because after all, it is a whole weekend) finally arrived last week. Our friend and neighbor Ken hit the road at 4 am – destination New Glarus, which released a limited sour peach ale at 10. We started our journey a few hours later, picked up Great Taste rookie Karl in Chicago, and headed west on I-90 toward the land of cheese and suds. 

To anyone contemplating attending this event in the future, suggestion No. 1 is to make sure you’re in town early Friday for the Pre-Great Taste festivities. The number of events grows exponentially each year. Various restaurants and bars host breweries, which showcase some of their best and rarest beers. We met up with a sleep-deprived Ken and hit the Toppling Goliath party at Dexter’s Pub on Madison’s east side and three downtown events: Perennial’s tap takeover at Brasserie V, the Bell’s party at Maduro, and a celebration featuring New Holland and Surly at the Tipsy Cow. By the time the gates opened at 1pm on Saturday, we couldn’t wait to get in, set up our chairs in what we refer to as Camp Champaign (our former Illinois home for nine years), and start sampling.

Amongst the 1,400+ beers poured at the fest, Indiana breweries held their own. From the one-off beers from Flat 12 like Octogose (key ingredient: squid ink) and Punk Jack, to Three Floyds’ world famous imperial stout Dark Lord or their Berliner Weisse Deesko , the Hoosier state did not disappoint. Brugge Brasserie’s sour ales and Upland’s offerings were also a hit with the crowd. And Louisville’s Against the Grain had one of the festival’s longest lines throughout the day.

While breweries such as New Holland, Bells, and Shorts have been part of the event for years and always offer large elaborate set-ups, it was great to see a “rookie” like Sun King invited this year from our home state. Goose Island had an elaborate Blues Brothers music-and-jail-themed area featuring Bourbon County variations and the Sisters. The only state that we felt was missing was Ohio. The Cincinnati area has exploded with great breweries like Rhinegeist and Rivertown but only four breweries from the Buckeye state were in attendance this year. One cannot even begin to sample or even name every beer, but it’s safe to assume whatever your favorite style you can probably find 50 or so examples, many world class. Back at the hotel afterwards our Illinois friends mentioned their highlights being real ale offerings from Shoreline and Figure 8, which added coffee to a cask of their Camp 4 brown ale, and Upland’s Sour Reserve 5, which was great to hear.

The Great Taste is the event that we would suggest to anyone dedicated or connected enough to procure a ticket. While our friend Karl is a beer fest novice, it’s not a bad place to start either.  The key is to get the tickets in May, reserve a hotel room soon after, and start making plans with friends. As craft beer becomes more and more popular, this event has stayed relatively small (capped at 6,000 tickets sold). The ticket price has increased slightly as the number of breweries and festival grounds have expanded, but the sheer number of amazing breweries in attendance reduces the number of long lines you see at other events. Plus the beautiful lakeside location isn’t too bad either.  Hopefully next year will bring more Indiana breweries such as 18th Street, Function, Bare Hands, or Evil Czech.  This is truly an event put on a by a great, dedicated group of people that benefits charitable organizations. This year that included raising funds for Bare Hands Brewery owner Chris Gerard. From themed booths (Bell’s featured sharks) to rare beers to on-site musicians, the Great Taste is a perfect weekend that somehow gets better and better each year.

Jennifer’s favorite beers:
1.     Flat 12 Punk Jack
2.     Short’s Anniversary Ale 2006 Part Deux, Grapefruit
3.     Sun King Hop Up Offa That Bret
4.     Haymarket Mathias Imperial IPA
5.     Right Brain CEO Stout

Noah’s favorite beers:
1.      Side Project Blueberry Flanders Ale
2.      Goose Island Bourbon County Aged in Weller Barrels
3.      Toppling Goliath Zeelander IPA
4.      Surly Cacoa Bender
5.      Off Color Papillon – aka “I Can do this too, Cory King”

Ken’s favorite beers: 
1.      Side Project Blueberry Flanders Ale
2.      Goose Island Bourbon County Aged in Weller Barrels
3.      Surly Darkness (cask)
4.      New Glarus Sour Brown Peach
5.      Haymarket Clare’s Thirsty Ale

Karl’s favorite beers: 
1.     Side Project Blueberry Flanders Ale
2.     Goose Island Bourbon County Aged in Weller Barrels
3.     One Trick Pony Georgia Grande
4.     Perennial Saison de Lis
5.     Toppling Goliath Pseudo Sue