The Bruery Tasting Room

The inspiration

The Bruery began with Patrick Rue homebrewing in his own kitchen, driven by curiosity about how interesting beer could be¹ . That curiosity grew into a Placentia brewery founded in 2008, in the middle of the Great Recession, and it became one of Orange County's early craft beer innovators² . The house philosophy is taste over style: the team lets flavor, not category, guide every beer, drawing ideas from the culinary world, vineyards, traditional beer styles and even junk food¹ .

Who's behind it

Patrick Rue is the founder and a Master Cicerone, a title he earned after opening the brewery and building a team of like-minded brewers¹ . Barry Holmes serves as chief executive officer and has spoken for the brewery about its growth from a warehouse tasting room into a business that fills an entire Placentia industrial park² .

What to order

• Or Xata: a horchata-inspired imperial blonde ale that appears on the tasting room's featured lineup .
• Ruekeller Pilsener: a clean lager from the Ruekeller series when you want something lighter between big barrel-aged pours .
• A flight through the dark, barrel-aged specialties: this is where the brewery's experimental streak shows, so sample rather than commit to one glass .^2,1

Why you should try it

A tasting room inside a working brewery with rotating food trucks, trivia nights and bingo on the calendar is an easy, low-effort evening for anyone staying in Orange County³ .