Snow Eagle Brewing & Grille, Idaho City ID

Summer Trip 2022, Day 16

To be honest, I’m not too keen on the idea of a “patriotic” Christmas tree in the middle of June, but the rest of Snow Eagle is quite pleasant. They have a good-sized space with a bar to the right that doesn’t show here, and everyone was very pleasant. There are only 8 taps with just 7 in operation at the moment.

I started off with a flight, as usual.

From left-to-right, these were:

Kolsch – I liked this one but I didn’t love it. It was refreshing but without the character that I’ve found in others of this type in other places. It just felt like they went with the most basic, run-of-the-mill recipe and left it at that. It wasn’t at all bad, but it didn’t stand out, especially against their other offerings.

Snow Eagle IPA – At first, I didn’t care for this one at all, but I came around to liking it enough to get a pint of it later. My initial impression was no doubt based on it not being at all what I was expecting – it’s very much like a Ten Penny Ale from the Olde Burnside Brewing Company in East Hartford CT.

Peach Lager – I was pleased that the peach flavor was subtle while still present, making this a very drinkable beer. It was almost a choice for a pint.

“Samurai” Japanese Lager – With half the barley malt swapped for rice, this has a distinctive Japanese flavor, clean and refreshing. This was also a candidate for a pint.

For food, I went with the Hickory Bacon Burger and didn’t regret it for a second! With 1/3 pound beef, their own BBQ sauce, cheddar, sautéed onions, lettuce and tomato, this was an extremely tasty burger. Unlike some others I’ve had, the taste didn’t wear thin halfway through – it was good to the very end.

Since my hotel was only a five minute drive away, I decided to follow the flight with two pints rather than just one. The first was their brown ale and I went with it purely because of the name (“Beaver Dick”). I’m not always keen on browns, but this one I really did enjoy.

The second pint, as I mentioned earlier, was the Snow Eagle IPA.

While this wasn’t one of my all-time favorite brewpubs, it was certainly a great place to spend some time this afternoon. Tomorrow, on to Casper WY!