Background
Doug Hogue and Wendell Dutcher, friends and homebrewers for years, opened Kenai River Brewing in 2006. When they opened, both had day jobs: Dutcher worked for Homer Electric Association and Hogue was a teacher. The original brew house was shared building on Aspen Street. Eventually they included a small tasting room at that site.
In 2011 Kenai River Brewing began canning and soon their canned beer began popping up in the area. In January 2016 the owners began planning to move into the new building by mid-year. The new brewery roughly triples the company’s production, from a maximum of about 2,200 barrels to approximately 7,000. In addition to more pub space for customers a kitchen was added.
Experience
We arrived on a Wednesday afternoon to a pretty busy tasting room. Kenai River Brewing is a large modern facility with plenty of parking. They offer a large tasting room with many tables, and a bar. There was not a noticeable patio area when we were there. One thing we didn’t care for is there is one area to order beer and another to order food. We ordered a flight of four beers. The beers were drinkable, didn’t find anything exceptionable.
This is one brewery that distributes a lot of beer and it is available in many stores. No nearby lodging noted.
http://www.kenairiverbrewing.com
