You and I know how far this craft beer thing is reaching. It’s not just the new brewers spring up every single day of the year. Not just the established beer bars being joined by old “shot & a beer: joints in sprucing up their beer menus… although I admit a bit of satisfaction at seeing a bar near me finally changed their changeable road sign from “Miller Lite Bucket Special” to “Check Out Our New Craft Beer Menu.”
For a local bar, adding more craft can be caused by more patrons asking for it, or by a distributor who convinces the owner to add a few more taps and see what happens. There are also chain restaurants or bars that, at some point, put a finger to the wind and see it’s time to put more taps and nitro dispensers in all their stores. I only point this out because of the surprising number of chain eateries that still don’t try to seek out brewers near their store.
This is my roundabout way of explaining how I came to visit the Fox & Hound Sports Tavern in Aurora. More directly, it was one of the invitations I sometimes get to visit various establishments, and this one happened to be close enough that I could drop by for lunch and a beer or two (transparency: they comped the beer for me). They wanted to get a bit of coverage for their American Craft Beer Week activities, and I did pop a few into my Events articles. But because I was then caught up in daily updates for Chicago Craft Beer Week, I just now get to write up the place.
Fox and Hound is a chain of sports bars in 21 states, including three in Illinois (Aurora, Schaumburg, and Arlington Heights). The Aurora location has been open 15 years, at a mall just west of Rt. 59 on New York Ave. I talked to the Manager on duty at that shift, Mike Hochstetler, who had been working there for 1½ years. In the time the bar has been open, Mike said, it has gone through its share of redecorations and menu changes, and has recently added craft beer to their mix.
“We have always been an upscale sports bar, with over a dozen big screen TVs for local sports and UFC matches,” Mike said. “We also have game and party rooms, with pool tables, darts, shuffleboard, darts, air hockey and Foosball, and giant versions of games like Jenga and Connect Four.
“We have great food; even the usual bar fare like appetizers, nachos, beer battered food or wings, we think it’s all great.’
What Mike and the staff have seen most interest from patrons has been their 36 beer taps, along with 50 bottled beers in their menu. While they still need to keep tapping BudMillerCoors and their associated “lites,” they also have rotating beers from Goose Island, Solemn Oath, Revolution, and Lagunitas, plus some beers not normally seen on tap, like Victory Golden Monkey or Boulevard 80 Acre.They also keep a handle with Small Town Brewery’s Not Your Father’s Root Beer (the 10.5% abv draft version, as opposed to the 5.9% bottled version now at stores). “That’s what most people who come in here ask for,” Hochstetler noted.
I was there over lunch time on a weekday, so I asked the server what specialty she would recommended. That’s how I got myself the “Black Forest,” a pretzel roll with grilled turkey, bacon, and Monterey Jack cheese, served with Parmesan-crusted fries. The fries came in an 8-ounce cup, which for lunchtime turned out to be a suitable size. Among the burger choices, she proposed “The Pastrami,” a burger with a Reuben’s worth of Pastrami, sauerkraut, dressing a Swiss cheese on top.
But I was working around to the conflicting Craft Beer Weeks. Fox & Hound’s restaurant were marking the American Craft Beer Week with $2 pint specials and nights with discounts on a specific brewer’s beers. To encourage patrons to sample beers during ACBW, the restaurants had a Craft Beer Bingo promotion: Bingo-type cards, each printed with a different array of craft beer names, with the promise of free appetizers, swag and discounts for making a “Bingo.” Mike told me “A guy who won last night here filled in his Bingo by trying (Lagunitas) Hop Stoopid for the first time, and he said he loved it.”
The Fox & Hound bars have all the expected accoutrements of any such operation, like a loyalty program, this one called the All Star Club. But from the beer fan’s view, the company decision to go in for craft beer as a way to attract customers demonstrates the idea that craft beer is going mainstream. But that decision from upstairs needs to be backed up at the individual store level.
“I make recommendations to the customers looking for new beers,” says Mike, “and every server that works here has sampled each beer on tap at least once; so they know what we have, and they can make recommendations based on style preferences.
“Personally, I think Chicago is really the next craft beer capital. And that’s from watching so many new breweries downtown that haven’t started distribution yet. I think people shouldn’t have counted Chicago out when Goose Island sold out (to Anheuser-Busch). Because now we get Revolution, which is awesome; we also sell a lot of local brewers like Solemn Oath and Two Brothers. And after them, I think Off Color will be the next local brewer to hit nationwide recognition.”
Fox & Hound Sports Tavern
4320 E. New York Ave, Yorkshire Shopping Center, Aurora, IL 630-236-9183
1416 N. Roselle Rd., Units 30-32, Schaumburg, IL 847-884-6821
910-918 W. Dundee Rd., Suite A01-A03, Arlington Heights, IL 847-590-9019
Other restaurants from New Jersey to New Mexico, with other locations operating as Bailey’s Sports Grille.
