Voodoo Brewing Company, Meadville PA

4 October 2026

As you can see, this place is huge … but there were just two other people there when I arrived just after 2:30pm. I sat at the bar and “enjoyed” a brisk breeze from the overhead ventilation system; I went back to the car before too long to retrieve the long-sleeved top I’d just taken off to keep from shivering in the wind.

I hate to spoil a good story, but the short version of this is that while I enjoyed some of what I had, there wasn’t enough goodness here to return even if I happen to be passing through Meadville again. Here’s the flight I had, described from right-to-left:

Lacto-Kooler GREEN – Sour Ale, 5.5% – I’d had a small sample of this at Robin Hood Brewing in Bellefonte PA in August so was delighted to see it available. It was still good, but I still wouldn’t want a full pint.

Lacto-Kooler PURPLE – Sour Ale, 5.5% – OK, it’s not purple, it’s blue. But it tastes just like grape Kool-Aid followed by a sour kick, more sour than the GREEN. In the end, I did like it, but I’d never order a pint — it’s far too sweet in spite of the sour.

Schnitzengiggle – Oktoberfest, 5.9% – This was good, but not outstanding among all the other beers of this style all the other breweries make.

Lil Vibes – Session West Coast IPA, 4.3% – This was probably the best of the remaining three. It didn’t call attention to itself, but for a session beer, that’s OK — it would go down well with anything.

Chill Vibes – Cold IPA, 6% – I have to admit this is probably the best Cold IPA I’ve had. I’ve never really understood this style — IPA but fermented with lager yeast at colder temps — but this one works for me.

Under Lizard – Double IPA, 9% – This beer, on the other hand, had far too prominent an alcohol presence that took away from the sweetness usually present in a DIPA.

And then there was the food:

I ordered one of their Oktoberfest specials, the Beer Brat with fries, and the fries were absolutely the best part of this meal. The brat itself was fine, and the pretzel roll/bun was good (if too heavy for what was in it), but that coagulated cheese/sauerkraut concoction? It didn’t work … if the sauerkraut, which there was too little of to start with, had any taste at all, it was smothered by the cheese.

I finished with an Oktoberfest dessert, a cinnamon roll, and a pint of Dancing Gnome Brewing’s Festbier, 4.5%:

The bartender was so excited because they have “an actual pastry chef now!” and I’m sure that under the right circumstances this roll would have been really good — the cinnamon level was perfect and the pastry was obviously extra flaky — but it was stale and room temperature. A gentle reheating would have done wonders for it, I think, but as it was, it was just heavy and dry. The beer was tasty, though.

So that was my visit to Voodoo, my first and my last. There were a lot of beers I didn’t try — up to and including a 12.9% Imperial Stout aged for 43 months in bourbon barrels — but I’m OK with that based on the ones I did have.