Robin Shepard
A wide angle shot of a 100-year-old building with blue sky and sun coming out from behind clouds.
McFleshman’s century-old building.
“If a beer has the word ‘English’ in it, it doesn’t matter if it’s the English IPA, English Brown or English pale ale — Bobby has the magic touch when it comes to bringing those English flavors to his beer,” says Garth Beyer of Garth’s Brew Bar in Madison.
He’s referring to Bobby Fleshman, owner and brewmaster of McFleshman’s Brewing Company. This small Appleton brewery doesn’t take up a lot of real estate on Madison-area liquor store shelves, but mention the name around ardent beer hunters and you might be surprised how many know of the brewery’s well-made English ales and German lagers. (The name McFleshman’s is a combination of Fleshman’s surname and that of his wife’s, which is McCoy.)
Fleshman took up homebrewing in college and honed his skills making English ales. At the time he was living in his thesis advisor’s basement. The advisor was from England and craved a well-made pale ale. Fleshman ended up paying for much of his room and board with his beer.
McFleshman’s opened in 2018 in a century-old building in downtown Appleton, originally built as a dairy. Fleshman’s English-style IPA, Tall Mask, has become his most award-winning beer, and is a great introduction to McFleshman’s. It has a spicy hoppiness, a firm backbone of malt, and an inviting balanced bitterness.
Several of the brewery’s most popular brands can be found in Madison, in six-packs of 12-ounce cans (Woodman’s, Hy-Vee). Periodically, select brews will appear on draft at Madison’s taphouses like Garth’s Brew Bar, the Malt House and BarleyPop Tap and Shop, among others.
Also available in the Madison area in six-packs are Pirate’s Cove, a German helles lager; Something Amber, a Vienna lager; and Public House Pint, a dry Irish stout.
Harder to find in Madison are McFleshman’s White Horse porter, and 547, a strong West Coast double IPA.
McFleshman’s also packages a handful of limited seasonals in 16.9-ounce bottles. Among my picks are Triple Debaucherye, a strong doppelbock aged for nine months in rye whiskey barrels, and Vantage Point, a bourbon barrel-aged imperial stout.
If you go to Appleton to experience McFleshman’s firsthand at 115 S. State St., and I highly recommend it, the taproom atmosphere is like stepping into a warm welcoming corner pub somewhere in England or Ireland. The front room has a leather sofa and living room chairs, creating a library feel. Old photos and musical instruments adorn the walls. The backbar features beautiful stained glass and nearly two dozen taps, including several hand-pulls for cask-conditioned ales. Outside, a beer garden more than doubles the overall capacity and plays host to Lagerfest every October.
The brewery itself is located behind the bar and is based on a 10-barrel brewing system that is optimal when producing about 1,400 barrels a year; this year, Fleshman expects to top 1,700 barrels. He was self-distributing until last spring, when he started going through a distributor, which allowed for more of his beer to reach Madison and elsewhere. The growing interest in his beer makes keeping up with demand a challenge, says Fleshman. Even so, he’s considering adding a second taproom — Madison, Milwaukee and Sheboygan are possible sites.
