Junk Ditch Brewing

Disclosure: Our meal was provided. I was not compensated for this post. All opinions are my own.

Hubby and I took a little trip last week through Northern Indiana to Fort Wayne. The fall colors along the way were beautiful. On our way there, we paid a visit to the Auburn Cord Duesenberg Museum in Auburn, Indiana. I'd been there once, but it had been almost 20 years, so I was excited to stop again and see some of the most beautiful luxury cars of the 20th century. After we left the museum, we arrived in Fort Wayne, checked into the hotel and then set off for dinner. We love to visit breweries when we travel and once in a while we find one that has not just good beer, but good food, too. This meal went beyond good. It truly blew me away. It puts most other brewery food to shame.

We started out ordering a flight, as I almost always do when visiting a brewery for the first time. I love to sample and a flight looks so pretty when lined up from lightest to darkest. I love mild, light beers and saisons are one of my favorite styles. Celeste is a 5% ABV French Saison that I could have sipped on all night. Another favorite was the Tsar Bomba Imperial Stout (9.2%ABV). We liked that so much that before we left town we paid the place one more visit for a growler of it to take home. And I ordered a dessert a regretted passing up the first time and enjoyed it was a small 5 ouncer of Tsar Bomba. I just love stout with dessert.

Anyway, back to this visit. I went back and forth on the appetizers and ended up getting two. I can never pass up a cheese board, but in this case it was a "Bread Plate" that was on the menu that included some lovely cheese, bread and other goodies - brioche, focaccia, coppa, Haymaids semi-hard cheese, fig preserves, jalapeño butter, cashews and honey crisp apple.

The second was the Crb Okonomiyaki, a large crab cake with cabbage, corn, carrot, scallion, sambal aioli, sesame and bonito. It was my first experience of warm flakes of bonito swaying atop my plate and it had amazing flavor.

Next up were the entrees. At the chef's suggestion I ordered the chuck roast gnocchi and it could not have been more delicious. The chuck roast was perfectly cooked and fell apart at the touch of a fork. The gnocchi was so fluffy and pillowy and the sauce had just the right amount of kick.

Hubby ordered the fisherman's stew, a big bowl of mussels, shrimp and the best halibut I have had a in a long time tucked in with saffron corn broth, patatas braves and micro greens. And all those colors together...it looks as pretty as it tasted.

The halibut in the Fisherman's Stew was amazing!

At that point, I was so full, I broke my own rule of "never pass up dessert" and I skipped it. I knew we'd be eating a lot on this trip, so I passed on ordering a full dessert. But, we finished off with a couple truffles that I enjoyed with the last of my 3 Rivers & Junk Ditch Brewing rye barrel collaboration Porter Detrius.

I was so impressed with the food here and will definitely seek it out on future visits. It was probably the best brewery food I've had in my travels (although we visited another brewery the following day that was also amazingly delicious and I might have to call it a tie). Fort Wayne's brewery game is no joke. So much so, that I'd say that if you were in Fort Wayne and could only have meal, you should head to Junk Ditch Brewing. Or do as I did, plan a foodie trip and make this stop #1.

Junk Ditch Brewing
1825 W. Main St
Fort Wayne
(260) 203-4045
junkditchbrewingco.com