Unfortunately, the reviewers here seem to be reviewing the attached pub, Horniblows, and not the Brewery itself.

Big Boss is on the verge of really breaking through to the craft beer drinker in Raleigh. Their three main beers are now available in grocery stores around the area.

The beers themselves are good representations of their respective styles.

The Kolsh is extremely light and fruity, and is a great, and much better tasting alternative to any Light American Lager.

The Belgian Blonde is definitely the best of their beers with a very pleasant fruity aroma and flavor.

Their brown ale is very solid in its own right.

They also normally have about 4-6 specialty brews on tap that are not available outside of the brewery. These also include cask ales, something you don't see in the South, let alone in the US.

Horniblows does need some work, but that is their bar. Not the Big Boss Brewery itself.

reviewed on: 2010-06-03 11:14:50

generaly a nice brewery with a shitty bar upstairs. the tours i have been to have been over packed and very impersonal. the beers they give you to taste are all too standard. again they put out some nice speciality beers that you cant get outside of there sht hole bar for 5$ a pint. but the brewers clearly know what they are doing and there marketing is fenominal, so... i would rate this one real high if they would get there high-end beers out there. bottom line-- its what the owners want it to be and they have done well with it (for the atmoshpere review i am averaging the very nice brewery with the dump bar)

reviewed on: 2010-03-04 10:32:23

The only beer to really talk about from this brewery would be the Helles Belles. It's a good, solid ale with high abv and a tad on the sweet side. They definitely have the branding thing down but they are seriously missing the ball game on a grand scale when it comes to their tap house; smoky, dirty, raw and often rude staff. Otherwise, the tour is interesting and then I'd head on over to Aviator for some real craft brews ;)

reviewed on: 2009-04-09 18:04:54

Small but upcoming brewery, they said they were expanding from 1000 barrels per year to 4000 barrels per year, which is a big jump for a small brewery.

Every second sunday (or something like that) they have a free tour of their brewery, complete with free beer samples for dropping by. They also have a bar upstairs with their entire seasonal and regular lines on tap. Bought a T-shirt and Glass from them for posterity's sake.

They had a large selection of beer styles, though they stuck to english or belgian ale yeasts and associated styles. Tried their three main beers, which were a blonde ale, a brown ale, and their german kolsch. All were really really good, pretty crisp and flavorful, with a yeasty/fruity overtone. I really liked all three, but the blonde ale was my favorite. It tasted like a really good weisse, which is my style of choice.

They also had some other flavors, notably a double IPA, seasonal styles (like a pumpkin beer), a coffee stout, and some other variations on the belgian ale. They didnt have EVERY beer imaginable, but (to show you) I was counting which styles they didn't have rather than the inverse.

Overall, great beers, if they sold down here, I would buy.

reviewed on: 2008-07-13 12:48:09