More beer to flow in Steel Valley
Homestead is getting a Mediterranean-flavored brewery and restaurant — complete with its own bowling alley — and later this summer or fall, West Homestead will welcome another new brewery’s taproom. Both will be on Eighth Avenue, the main drag that unites the two boroughs.
More than three years in the works, the Homestead brewery will be located in the former Levine Bros. Hardware building at 337 E. Eighth Ave. The original name, Trios Brewing Co., was challenged as a trademark violation by a Chilean wine company, so it was changed it to Enix Brewing Co.
It’s the project of brothers Victor and David Rodriguez, the latter of whom started two brewpubs in Madrid. Their grandfather was Spanish, but the Rodriguezes were born and raised in the U.S. and came to Pittsburgh to work for the family development company, A.M. Rodriguez.
Enix is the name of the street where their grandfather grew up in Andalusia, and now it’s the name of the brewery and restaurant, which will serve a range of Mediterranean-inspired fare.
“I do have Spanish citizenship,” David Rodriguez said as he and his wife, Lavinia Oancea, and their 2-year-old son led a tour of the unfinished space. He designed the spaces and beers for both Madrid brewpubs — Mad Brewing and Fábrica Maravillas — while living in Spain, on and off, over a decade.
They liked the sensibility in Spain, where families take their children with them to bars on weekends. So they’re going to encourage that by including a separate area for kids to play in the front of the building, adjacent to tables and the bar. There’s an outdoor beer garden in what had been a vacant lot to the west and, abutting that, an open kitchen with a wood-fired oven for everything from flatbreads to slowroasted meats.
The menu of small and big plates from Spain and its neighbors will be overseen by Sean Skerette, a Trinidadian who is coming from a St. Croix restaurant, Balter, that’s co-owned by a Pittsburgher.
The 15-barrel German BrauKon brewhouse arrived at the end of April. They hope to open with at least eight beers. Eventually, they’d like to offer 10 draft beers and two draft soft drinks, including a ginger beer. They’ll also be serving wines and spirits.
But the most unusual feature of this brewpub is the eight-lane bowling alley on the second floor, which the brothers bought. What had been Club Lanes has continued to operate as a league venue, but the brothers want to open it to the public. The building’s wow factor comes from the storefront’s huge arched windows and the exposed cast-iron columns that run from the top to bottom.
Mr. Rodriguez installed a four-tap system to dispense
some of his house beers upstairs. On the main floor, he’ll tap some small kegs to flesh out the offerings from eight serving tanks in the basement.
They expect to open sometime in July. Follow their progress on their website, https://enix.beer, and on social media.
Rogan Brewing Co.
The other new place to drink craft beer is the taproom of Rogan Brewing Co. in West Homestead. Longtime homebrewer Rick Morgan, a native of the nearby neighborhood of Lincoln Place, looked longand hard for a building in this business district and found one at 214 W. Eighth Ave., where he is building a taproom to serve pints and selling growlers to go.
He needed more space to do the brewing, so he rented a building in Duquesne where he will brew on a 10-barrel system he’s pieced together. He’s planning a wide variety of ales — “a little bit of something for everybody” — including a signature American pale ale made with rye and cracked black pepper.
The taproom, which he aims to open this summer or fall, will have a hockey theme, as does the name of the place. He explains that when he was a defenseman at Duquesne University, his friend and then-sportswriter Mark Madden wrote a story in which his last name somehow was typoed as “Rogan,” and from that dayon, Mr. Morgan had a new nickname.
All these years later, after his wife gave her blessing to open a brewery, their two grown daughters told him he had to name it Rogan.
Now a resident of Jefferson Hills and a veteran in the financial services industry, Mr. Morgan is starting up this new venture mostly by himself. He’s not planning to do his own food, but as many taprooms do, he’ll host mobile food vendors. “I want to be very symbiotic with all the Homestead restaurants.”
His website will be roganbrewing.com.