Sunday 10th of October 2010 11:29:42 AM

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This shop was situated on a corner in downtown Wilmette. It's primarily a wine shop, but with one freestanding cooler holding a small collection of quality beer. Not even 50 different ones, but gems like Arctic Panzer, Flossmoor IPA, Rochefort 10, and a few others. Flossmoor was fresh, but I noticed the Dreadnaught was the old label from a year ago though :( A bunch of Unibroue, Southampton, and a few other six packs, with roughly 10-12 bombers/import singles. Rochefort 10 was $7.95, a little higher than elsewhere.

Service was really friendly and informative, the older woman that helped us may have been the shop owner, but that's just a guess. She mentioned that you can buy a bottle and drink it at the shop with no corkage fee, and that they were doing 4 wine tastings in the following week. The beer coolers were referred to as "weird beers", meaning not the usual stuff, which was true, but speaks to the unfamiliarity with beer here. There was a nice seating area alongside the windows, with black tabletops and settings including stemmed glassware.

Maybe with a little more beer geek traffic, they would expand their selection. As it is, it's a nice place to stop and have a beer and watch the world go by, but not much of a destination.