The beer that made Milwaukee famous was Schlitz, but to be fair that was according to Schlitz themselves:
As an aside, there’s no truth to the popular rumor that their beer caused digestive problems which led to the phrase “I’ve got the Schlitz today”.
As you can see from the above advertisement it has been a few years since the famous sales slogan was popular, back in the days when it was not considered unusual to show men as the workers and women as the people who filled the refrigerator full of beer.
I strongly recommend if you plan to visit Milwaukee (Although I’m not sure why anyone would plan to visit Milwaukee) don’t go in December. If you must go at this time make sure you go prepared - plan as if you are trekking across the Arctic with Ranulph Fiennes - During my visit it was -20 degrees centigrade (including wind chill factor).
These days the only major brewer in Milwaukee is Miller but as with the rest of the US there are lots of smaller breweries including the Horny Goat Brewing Company.
The Horny Goat has a very small list of brews, as can be seen below, but they are all good (yes, I did try them all):
I’m not sure the Horny Goat will ever become famous though. Its location is second only to Area 51 for places in the US that are hard to find on a map. It turns out that they call this location the Horny Goat Hideaway - very apt.
My guide for the early part of the evening managed to deliver me to the location and for a while I thought I was being taken to have some concrete shoes fitted as we turned off I41 and into an area that would have made people from Salford (pre-upgrade) shudder:
But despite appearances, there was indeed a bar in this area (that’s it on the left of the picture below, in an old pump house):
With hindsight, although the beer was good I’m not sure I can recommend going to a bar in the middle of nowhere, alone with no form of transport, especially when its -20 degrees centigrade outside. But what else can you do? Who’ll fill your refrigerator with Hopped Up ‘N’ Horny while you are out at work?...