One of the perks of living at The Esplanade is the 100+ restaurants and bars located in walking distance of our home. Thankfully, "The Esplanade News" has our two in-house food and drink reviewers, Ted Broussard and Kurt Kwon, who provide us with a steady diet of reflections on these establishments. To read all of their past reviews of local bars and restaurants, click HERE.
Black Fleet Brewing is located at 2302 Fawcett Ave
Review and photos by Kurt Kwon
We’re so lucky to be within walking distance to many fine breweries. Black Feet Brewing is a recent addition in the growing Brewery District. What’s the story with the name? “Jeanne de Clisson was a French Noblewoman from the 1300's whose husband was accused of treason, and beheaded. In response, she sold their belongings, bought a trio of ships, painted the hulls black, dyed the sails crimson, and created the Black Fleet. Gaining notoriety for using an axe to behead French noblemen she found aboard ships, she became known as 'The Bloody Lioness' and 'The Lioness of Brittany.' The British even offered her safe haven on their shores related to her success.” – from the Black Fleet Brewing website.
Interesting story, a cool label, but not sure how it relates to brewing beer?
Black Fleet has 10 taps with 4 seasonal and 6 flagship brews. What I found unique was the flavor profile for each beer was different from each other. Most new breweries have different styles of beer, but the same type of taste is often found in the entire lot. On a recent visit, I tried the following beers:
- Crimson Sails Red Rye IPA – a deep copper color with a slight bitter after flavor. It has a mild sweetness, but the rye is forward on the tongue. If you like the taste of rye, you may enjoy this beer.
- Freebooter’s Dunkel Weissbier – a very banana bread up front smell with a nice smooth finish. I’m not a big dunkel fan, but this was tolerable to my palate. For those that like the banana taste, this beer is for you.
- Head West Oatmeal Pale Ale – I was looking forward to this brew as oatmeal and pale ale are my favorites. Unfortunately, this one could use a little more help with more oatmeal flavor. It did have a nice honey after taste, but it was overall a little bitter for a pale ale.
- Vengeance IPA – a very clean taste up front with bitterness adding over time. This beer has some bitter citrus notes. Overall quite tasty.
The nice benefit of this brewery is that they serve food. Many breweries just focus on the beer, but it is nice to have food on hand for hungry beer drinkers. The menu is made up of typical pub fare foods like fish and chips, sliders, brats, tacos, and nachos. There wasn’t anything unique that made this a destination for food only. With that said, the chicken wings were pretty good. I enjoyed the honey mustard chicken wings. They had a very nice crunch and $8.50 it was a great deal. My companion had the beer brat and that was very underwhelming unfortunately. It was just a brat on a bun with some mustard and sauerkraut served with some fries for $9.50. It seemed over priced for what was received. A few other patrons had the nachos and it looked pretty good and plentiful.
Go here to try the beers. There’s something for every palate. Plus, having food to soak up some of that beer tasting really helps. The space is inviting and comfortable and the brewers are really nice. Add the Black Fleet in your next pub crawl!
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