Flying Dog Brewery

Flying Dog Brewery
4607 Wedgewood Blvd.
Frederick, MD 21703

Since seeing Flying Dog Brewery's gonzo, post-apocalpytic art festooned on the walls of Bierkraft, my favorite specialty beer retail shop in Brooklyn, I have been intrigued by the brand and its beer. I decided to take advantage of a recent change in Maryland state beer laws, and visited where the method meets the madness.

After touring several breweries, you realize they are one-in-the-same, and it is more about connecting with the philosophy of the individual brewery than anything else. (Also drinking good beer is a primary motivator.)

The tour of Flying Dog followed a similar routine: views of mash tun where they seep the barley, the lauter tun where they separate the wort, the fermentation tank where the yeast is added, and the bar where they serve the beer.

For $5, they allow you five different 3-4 oz. samples from the taps on hand. Fortunately, Flying Dog had most of the limited releases that are hard to find at retail and on taps: Gonzo Imperial Porter (regular and barrel-aged versions), Double Dog Double Pale Ale, Raging Bitch Belgian-Style Imperial IPA, DOGtoberfest, and Centennial Single-Hop IPA.

I found the history of Flying Dog considerably more interesting than the tour itself. George Stranahan, bon vivant and heir to the Champion spark plug fortune, gets the inspiration to start a brewpub in Aspen, CO upon seeing an image of a dog with wings at a Pakistani hotel bar after an ill-advised, ill-fated, and marijuana-induced climb of K2, one of the most dangerous ascents in all of the Himalayas. Several years after starting the brewpub, through his equally gonzo friend Hunter S. Thompson, he connects with artist Ralph Steadman, illustator of Thompson's literary works and soon-to-be demented genius behind Flying Dog's art.

The tour was passable, and the beer was decent. But if I had a single takeaways from my Flying Dog tour: sometime you (literally) have to get high to get inspiration for a truly great idea.