Bern’s Steak House isn’t shy about its fondness for whiskey. The Tampa landmark offers a well-stocked selection (as does younger sibling Haven), for one, and a collaboration beer with Pair O’ Dice Brewing Company keeps the dark spirit comin’.
Pair O’ Dice and the Bern’s Spirit Team have joined forces on Legacy 4, a bourbon barrel-aged imperial IPA more than three years in the making, which the duo plan to release this week. The Clearwater craft brewery took its Best Florida Beer Championships silver medal-winning beer, The Pit Boss Triple IPA, and aged it in a nearly 12-year-old Four Roses barrel. Four-plus pounds of hops were also used to pull off the smooth beer, billed as having “remarkable flavors and aromas.”
The label art even keeps it local, thanks to Chandler Shea Wilson, a young Bay area artist who worked closely with Bern’s owner David Laxer on many revisions before developing the three-headed Evangeline.
In honor of National Drink Beer Day (it’s a thing), Haven — which will carry Legacy 4 in limited qualities on draft alongside Bern’s — is set to offer a special promotion from 5 to 8 p.m. Thursday. Those who purchase a pour of the new beer receive a free mushroom and Appenzeller Swiss burger on a Jamison B. Breadhouse Bakes roll.
Seriously, how could you resist?
Locals can get their hands on 750-milliliter bottles of Legacy 4 at Bern’s, Haven or the nearby Epicurean Hotel, home to Bern’s Fine Wines & Spirits.
This article appears in Sep 21-28, 2017.