I'm not really a fan of craft beers. For the most part I think they are overpriced and it is always a gamble whether or not it going to be decent or taste like crap.
I would imagine that this industry is really competitive because a brewer always has to be innovating even though in my opinion everything that needs to be done, already has been done. There is only so many fruit flavors we can slap into an IPA before you don't really feel like it belongs there.
On this one day though a friend invited me to a party that the 7 Bridges Brewery was throwing in the nearby city of Hoi An, which is only 20 km away or so and is quite popular with tourists.
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this entrance doesn't look like much, but it's a really awesome place
This place was admittedly pretty damn cool and wow did they invest a lot in their tap room. There must have been 40 different beverages on the chalkboard behind the taps and all of them had descriptions of what they are, the IBU (a measure of how bitter it is) and the ABV (amount of alcohol in it.) They also had all of these things on tap connected to a wall that had a massive walk in cooler behind it where all the kegs are stored.
So even though the dining area itself was not very impressive and surprisingly small, I think that this actually is exactly how many places they need to have for people to sit. That is if they are not having a charity event complete with food stalls in the garden seating area.
It was pretty crowded but I managed to find a place to sit and even though they had live music it wasn't too loud. This is something I really dislike about live music, if I go to a place and the music is so loud that I cannot talk to the people that I am there with, I no longer want to be there and it really doesn't matter how good the band is. If I didn't pay for a ticket to specifically see that band play, I don't want to be subjected to super loud volume that makes it impossible for me to socialize.
They did a good job with this though.
Maybe it is just normal for all of you folks in the west but for me, I have never actually seen a tap setup like this before. In Vietnam it is really rare that a place has so many things on draught and I also had never seen this contraption they have where they put your glass upside down and it swirls clean water inside of it to I guess get any dust out of there or something.
I ended up having 3 different kinds of beer and honestly, I still don't think that craft beer is for me. one of them had a hint of watermelon in it and I guess that was just fine. The problem I have with this and basically all craft beer is the price. I'm not really all that fussy when it comes to the beer having amazing flavor but each one of these 3 pints that I had cost 3-5 times as much as a bottle of local beer that I would normally have.
It doesn't matter though because it was for a good cause. All the proceed went to some organization for children and families affected by Agent Orange. I guess it is a win/win for 7 Bridges because even though they didn't make any money they did get a guaranteed huge audience and a lot of exposure.
If you are in this part of the world you will almost certainly end up traveling towards historic downtown Hoi An and I recommend you do so. It's pretty unique and a lot more quaint and less crazy than Da Nang. If you want a wide variety of choices for craft beer then 7 Bridges is a pretty good place to stop. HERE is there location if you wanna have a look.