BYE-i
Traveling down to Albany from Saratoga Springs presents you with two routes. You can either take the direct and fast 87 South all the way down or the longer route through Troy, NY and across the river. Naturally, we took the Troy route and made our first stop in Cohoes, NY at BYE-i Brewing. BYE-i was established in 2019 and has one of the most functional flight paddles we’ve ever come across; no seriously, check out the photos below. Across our flight, the beer at BYE-i was consistently good with the great exception being the 131 Hab; a habanero pale ale. 131 Hab is in our humble opinion the right way to make a habanero beer. The aroma was rich with pepper and there was the perfect amount of heat on the backend. Hab’s pepper profile didn’t crush your palette, but enough is there to say hi and let you know that it would pair well with a beer cheese pretzel.
Shmaltz Brewing Company
After BYE-i, make your way into downtown Troy to hunt down a confusingly located brewery. By brewery, I mean that a small café/bottle shop that is the Shmaltz Brewing Company taproom. We were super confused because the Google Maps images show a massive brewing facility and not a corner café with a DJ out front playing party music for an impromptu street festival. The Shmaltz brewing facility is no longer open to the public, but Shmaltz beers (taps, cans, bottles) are available at their fun little taproom/bottle shop/café. Over the years, Shmaltz has produced several amazing beers like Bock Bock and He’Brew Funky Jewbelation.
Unfortunately we weren’t celebrating any holidays during our visit but the Hop Momma and She’brew #RBG IPA were good substitutes. The #RBG, obviously an homage to late Ruth Bader Ginsburg, is a delicious collaboration with Moustache Brewery. The breweries donated the proceeds of this raspberry, blueberry and grapefruit IPA to the Pink Boots Society one 4-pack at a time.
Rare Form Brewing Company
Leave the car where it is and walk .3 miles south to Rare Form Brewing Company. If you’re an NY/NJ native, I’m sure you’ve seen a few cans of their Moxie IPA’s floating around the gram or at a bar. Going in we expected a tap system stocked with IPA’s, however we were pleasantly surprised to find a well curated mix of styles. Even more surprising was that our two favorite beers on tap were the Dark Day Schwarzbier and the Karass Porter. The Dark Day is described by one untappd user as a textbook example of a dark lager and we completely agree that the Germans would appreciate the roasty pour. Karass was the perfect follow up after Dark Day, another roasty beer with more chocolate notes.
I know beer slushies are a bit of a touchy topic in the beer community, but if you visit during the warmer months, be sure to grab a few because they were very refreshing. Just bring your own straw – paper straws are really annoying.
Take a Long Weekend
If you’re planning a trip to Albany and/or Saratoga Springs, be sure to check out our other posts to help with planning. We believe you can hit the finer points of Albany and Saratoga Springs in the course of a long weekend. As usual, these posts are not a Top-anything list as we do continue to skip other delicious breweries that we’ve already visited. We’re always free to answer questions!
Albany, NY
Delmar, Catskill & Hudson, NY
On the way to Saratoga Springs
Saratoga Springs – Yes, there are real Springs
Arrowood Farms – A detour worth taking
