By Bobby Tanzilo Senior Editor/Writer Published Dec 01, 2020 at 12:03 PM

As the pandemic has canceled Sahale Ale Works’ annual chili contest benefiting Family Sharing of Ozaukee County this year, the Grafton brewery has replaced the event with another one on Saturday, Dec. 5.

From noon until 4 p.m. 10 area breweries will take part in The Little Outdoor Big Beer Fest on the patio at Sahale, 1505 Wisconsin Ave. in downtown Grafton.

“Since it is the beginning of December, not only will we need to dress warm, but consuming higher octane beers are in order,” reads an event page for the wee festival of heavy beers.

“All beers are made right here in Wisconsin and include a wide variety of styles and flavors. The only requirement for the beer to be in the fest is that it is at least 10 percent alcohol by volume.”

Here are the breweries participating:

  • 3 Sheeps Brewing Co.
  • Delta Beer Lab
  • The Explorium Brewpub
  • The Fermentorium
  • Foxtown Brewing
  • Indeed Brewing Co.
  • Lakefront Brewery
  • Mobcraft Beer
  • Sahale Ale Works
  • Wisconsin Brewing Co.

"We'll have our Drinksgiving release – Three The Hard Way – and a selection of our barrel-aged beers, including Warm Fuzzies and the Maple Warm Fuzzies," says Sahale owner Matthew Hofmann. "Some other selections are 3 Sheeps Veneration Barrel Select, Indeed's Black Friday Release Milwaukee Honey Barleywine, Foxtown's 1st Anniversary release Barrel-Aged Imperial Oatmeal Stout.

"We're especially excited that Lakefront offered up a beer that hasn't been sold/consumed outside their brewery, which is their Small Tank Series Imperial Pumpkin, which was aged for five years in rum barrels. Big thanks to (Lakefront's) Russ (Klisch) for letting us have such a special beer for the event!"

 

 

Beers will be available to-go in bottles and cans, and on-site you can sample them on a pay-by-sample basis. Samples are $3 for three ounces or $10 for four samples.

The Grafton High School Cheer Team will be doing a brat fry on-site, too, so you can fortify yourself for those high ABVs.

Please, have a designated driver, if you don’t live close enough to walk over.

All proceeds from the beer sales will benefit the great organization at Family Sharing of Ozaukee County, founded in 1978, which runs a food pantry and a resale shop to help fund it and to provide winter coats to families in need.

Bobby Tanzilo Senior Editor/Writer

Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.

He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.

With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.

He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.

In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.

He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.