Robin Shepard
Brewmaster Scott Manning
Beer is now flowing at Vintage Brewing’s new Sauk City location. Over the weekend, the new brewpub hed a soft open allowing its staff to fine-tune the operation. The brewpub officially opens January 8.
The new Vintage Brewing Company brewpub is located at 600 Water St. in Sauk City, along the west bank of the Wisconsin River. It takes full advantage of water views with numerous windows, two floors of restaurant seating and three outdoor areas. It also has a banquet hall that can hold 250 people.
The brewery itself features a new 30-barrel brewing system from Quality Tank Solutions based in Oconomowoc — three times larger than the current 10-barrel brew kettle at the Vintage on Whitney Way in Madison.
Unlike many other brewpubs, the brew kettles here are out of sight in the building’s basement. The tops of the five 90-barrel fermenters can be viewed behind glass in the northwest corner of the building, but most of the actual brewing equipment is below the main dining room floor. “That was by design,” says brewmaster Scott Manning. “The river is the focal point and we don’t want stainless steel getting in the way.”
Brewing at the Sauk City location is still a couple months away. In the meantime, Manning and his team of brewers at the Whitney Way location are supplying beer for that location, Sauk City and Vintage Spirits and Grill near the UW-Madison campus.
Walking inside the new Vintage there is a large square bar, similar to the look of the brewpub on Whitney Way. Its wood top was commissioned from local Amish craftsmen. There’s an intricate system of kegs and hoses connecting a large walk-in cooler in the building’s basement to the bar’s 40 taps. For the soft opening, Manning was serving 37 different beers.
Manning plans to continue brewing at the Madison location, where he’ll make limited and experimental batches. He’ll use the new Sauk City brew house for his mainstays like McLovin Irish ale and its Great American Beer Festival medal-winning Scaredy Cat oatmeal stout.
The food menu in Sauk City is similar to the Whitney Way offerings; it includes wraps, burgers and entrees like fish tacos, steak and potatoes, grilled salmon and broasted chicken.
The new Vintage is likely to become a destination brewpub, one that caters to locals but draws in beer tourists with its range of beers, cozy wood-and-brick interior and beautiful setting. The $6 million brewpub is what one might expect to find in a much larger city — even when combined, the population of Sauk City and Prairie Du Sac is just over 7,300.
Manning and his family and some of his business partners grew up in the Sauk City area; the walls of the new brewpub are decorated with vintage photos of his family and the community.
Vintage Spirits and Grill at 529 University Avenue opened in 2002. The brewpub at 674 Whitney Way opened in 2009. From 2013 until fall of 2017, Vintage also ran the Woodshed Ale House in Sauk City; however, that business recently closed with the opening of this new brewpub that’s only a couple blocks away.
The phone number for the Sauk City location is 608-370-8200; hours are 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Mon.-Wed., 11 a.m.-midnight Thurs.-Sat. (kitchen closes at 10 p.m.) and 9 a.m.-10 p.m. Sun.
