The Kite and Key in Philadelphia. Photo: Kite and Key.

A weekly look at the draft selection in beer-friendly bars across the country.

Celebrating Independence Day is a big deal all over America, but especially so in the City of Brotherly Love where that famous Declaration was signed.

Want to up the ante? Name your bar after one of our best-known founding fathers. (Kite ... key ... Ben Franklin ... get it?) The popular Philadelphia watering hole Kite and Key seems on top of its North American of events, including our brethren to the north. Those stopping by for Canada Day will find a firkin of Yards Brawler, boasting a touch of maple syrup.

But the big event hereabouts is July Fourth, and Kite and Key will be pulling pints of -- what else? -- Yards Ales of the Revolution. Inspired by colonial beers or brewed from actual historical recipes, brews like the unique, rosemary-like Poor Richard's Tavern Spruce Ale or highly drinkable Thomas Jefferson's Tavern Ale are about as close as one can get to a taste of history. Kite and Key will be offering up Yards on tap throughout the Independence Day holiday weekend.

Superb chicken wings and the current Kite and Key draft list, after the jump.

The Good Beer Seal of approval. Photo: goodbeerseal.com.

Earlier today, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg officially proclaimed July to be "Good Beer Month." The declaration came at the request of a local collective known as "the Good Beer Seal."

Founded earlier this year by bar owners Garry Gillis (Burp Castle and Standings), Ray Deter (d.b.a.) and Jimmy Carbone (Jimmy's No. 43), the group strives to "recognize establishments that pride themselves on serving quality, craft beers." With only 15 recognized bars in a city of more than 8 million people, the Seal has yet to become the definitive icon for the city's best spots for suds, but Carbone admits things are still getting off the ground. "We really didn't expect the mayor to make the proclamation," he humbly admits.

For a nascent organization, receiving a mayoral decree after simply writing him a "nice letter" is quite a feat. Carbone believes GBS's support of programs for sustainable food and insistence that members have an "active community presence" was an important factor. "A lot of bars don't make such a good community impact," he told us.

Delicious on a 90-degree day. Photo: 21st Amendment Brewery

With summer spiking thermometers, few frigid beverages satisfy quite like unfiltered wheat beers, mellow and flavorful thirst-quenchers that drink as easy as fresh-squeezed lemonade.

But a great beer style is just a springboard for innovation, a belief held by Nico Freccia. About a decade ago, the founder of San Francisco's 21st Amendment Brewery was fooling around with home-brewed wheats. Since it was summertime, he tossed ripe red watermelon chunks into his fermenting suds. "I didn't think the flavor would come through very well because watermelon is mostly, well, water," Freccia said.

To his surprise, the experiment was a triumph. Within the cloudy wheat beer, the watermelon shone as bright as a klieg light in a foggy night, without mimicking a Jolly Rancher run amok. "It still tasted like beer," marvels Freccia. "I could drink several without feeling like I was drinking a Slurpee."

The Great Lost Bear celebrates their 30th anniversary this week. Photo: greatlostbear.com

A weekly look at the draft selection in beer-friendly bars across the country.

Last week, What's On Tap visited Portland, Ore., one of America's top craft beer cities. But there's another Portland on the opposite coast of the country that deserves recognition, in the great state of Maine. Despite a population that ranks 40th in the nation, the state manages to hold its own in the suds department, and is home to such well-known craft brewers as Allagash, Atlantic, Sea Dog and Shipyard.

Boasting more than 60 taps from more than 40 different brewers nationwide, perhaps the most recognizable brew-focused Portland watering hole is the Great Lost Bear. This week, on Sunday, June 28, the pub will be celebrating its 30th anniversary.

"We started adding micro brews in 1986. At that point we only had six beers on draft," says president and co-owner Dave Evans, explaining the transition to a focus on craft beers. The pub broke the 60 tap barrier about six months ago after adding some dedicated Allagash lines.

Evans insists that the Bear is more about having a great bar than about just having great beers. "We also have PBR in cans," he says. "We try to get every beer patron in the world, and we still sell more food than beer."

Photo: Jenene Chesbrough

Hop heads are hopelessly addicted to Humulus lupulus, the flowering vine whose cones lend beer its piney, floral and even marijuana-like aromas and flavors.

To sate hop lovers' jones, we turn to the West Coast. There, California brewers are engaged in an arms race to craft bigger, burlier double India pale ales like Russian River's wondrous Pliny the Elder, Stone's Ruination and Port Brewing's heavenly Hop-15 Ale (above).

Based in San Marcos, Calif., Port Brewing is helmed by beer magician Tomme Arthur. Though the funky Belgian ales he brews under the Lost Abbey imprint are fabulous, we're happiest when he's hoppiest.

The Green Dragon in Portland, Oregon. Photo: mrzarquon/Flickr

A weekly look at the draft selection in beer-friendly bars across the country.

According to the past two weeks' worth of WOT, Portland, Ore., might be the most neglected What's On Tap city. And what neglect! Portland has regularly been regarded as one of America's top beer towns, snagging top honors in a recent online poll that beer legend Charlie Papazian put together.

This week, Portland's Green Dragon gets some much deserved attention. It was named after Boston's original Green Dragon Tavern, which was dubbed "the headquarters of the Revolution" due to the proclivity of many rabble-rousing Colonial American groups to congregate there. Proprietors of this modern Oregonian iteration promote relaxation, not rebellion, with a great draft selection that includes a number of hard to find brews, a chill atmosphere and a large selection of bar games.

Last year, the Green Dragon was purchased by Rogue Ales, but that hasn't changed its commitment to offering a unique range of beers. Assistant Manager Samantha Sugar (who calls herself the "Beer Gazelle") tells us the Dragon still aims for that "neighborhood bar appeal" with an always rotating selection of beers.

A Pittsburgh brewing institution is leaving Steel City.

Iron City Brewery officials announced Thursday the brewery would be leaving its home in the Lawrenceville neighborhood for greener pastures in Latrobe, Pa. Yes, the place where Rolling Rock was born.

The brewery's president, Timothy Hickman, called the announcement "exciting news." The brewers, well, not so much.

"Well, you finally did it," Dave Kelly, who retired last year after 34 years at Iron City, said according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "You managed to take a brewery that has been through the Industrial Revolution, the Civil War, two world wars, Korean War, Vietnam War and the Iraq war -- even the Great Depression -- [and] move it out of the city that has supported you since 1861."

A weekly look at the draft selection in beer-friendly bars across the country.

A giant thanks to all the Slashfood readers who responded to last week's call for shoutouts of favorite beer-friendly bars. We received a whopping 43 comments naming almost 50 watering holes in 19 states.

Beyond giving Slashfoodies a chance to chime in, What's On Tap's goal was to compile a list of new bars to draw upon for future WOT posts. We've already featured places like Chicago's The Map Room, Houston's The Ginger Man and San Diego's O'Brien's Pub (though they are always worth revisiting). It's also worth noting that WOT strives to vary metropolitan areas as much as possible. For example, San Francisco's Toronado received by far the most comments, but we visited SF suds relatively recently, so don't expect a Toronado post anytime soon. (For those who cry foul, remember, WOT isn't a list of the best beer bars in each city -- just an interesting choice. Sometimes it's more adventurous to go off the beaten path.)

Using that criteria, a lot of great pubs may be bumped towards the back of the queue, such as those in Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, Tampa Bay, Cambridge, Mass., and Santa Monica, Calif. After the jump, a list of bars you're likely to see in future WOT posts based on your comments.

Kyle Spencer, 23, and Xiao Yu, 24, are barely of drinking age and have been brewing beer for less than a year, but nonetheless wear their ambition, literally, on their sleeves.

"Brewing for a living is something we both wanted to do," says Spencer, promoting his nascent brand by wearing a gray, short-sleeved Beta Beer T-shirt alongside partner Xiao Yu. Despite his expert presentation, Spencer is nervous: For the first time his product will be tasted by "actual people who have beer backgrounds."

This kind of fledgling enthusiasm was par for the course at the Brooklyn Beer Experiment, a new cook-off in a city obsessed with cook-offs, part of the groundswell of our nation's craft-brewmania and a first from competitors turned co-organizers Theo Peck and Nick Suarez. "We were cook-off rivals," says Suarez, "and decided we could do this as well as anyone else could." Sunday afternoon at Brooklyn's the Bell House -- a space primarily used as a music venue -- more than 25 chefs infused their eats with beer, and local homebrewers like Spencer and Yu hawked their wares.

A weekly look at the draft selection in beer-friendly bars across the country.

For 20 weeks now, What's On Tap has taken a peek at some amazing beer-friendly bars from all across the country (and once, even beyond). Problem is, the US of A is massive and new brew-based establishments are opening all the time. So this week, What's On Tap is asking you, our readers, for your favorites.

The only restriction? The locales must serve draft beer of noteworthy quality. Sure, a lot of great bars serve pitchers of PBR and nothing else, but save those joints for a list of Best Places For Boys' Night Out [Or Girls! -- Ed]. Extensive local selections and rare abbey imports are the kinds of things that make a bar WOT-worthy. (Also, though brewpubs are awesome for unique finds, for this post, let's try to stick to bars.)

Leave your favorite spots for sipping suds in the comments and check back later for a compiled list of our readers' top beer-centric watering holes. You may even see your suggestion featured in an upcoming edition of What's On Tap!

A weekly look at the draft selection in beer-friendly bars across the country.

The San Diego area has so many great breweries -- AleSmith, Green Flash, Port, just to pull a few off a list in alphabetical order -- that it certainly needs its fair share of great beer bars to showcase the local SoCal talent. They've got the goods. Perennial powerhouse Hamilton's Tavern always keeps a mighty draft list. Significant start-ups like Toronado's recent San Diego location offers tons of taps. Even Stone Brewery gets in on the action, featuring not only their own brews but favorites from around California and beyond.

Today, however, O'Brien's Pub gets the nod for a trend worth supporting: draft beer archives! Not only do they offer up their own "On Tap" link via their website, but patrons can also view a complete list of every brew they've ever had on draft ... or at least for the past few years. "It's everything we've ever posted on the website," says owner Tom Nickel, "but the site only dates back to 2007." Still, two years of beers is the kind of comprehensive compiling that What's On Tap nerds can get behind!

After the jump, a reprint of the most current draft list off their website.

Fret not, Southern beer drinkers: While the region's craft beer scene has gone and grown up, its fans (if a newly released documentary is any indication) show no signs of maturing.

"Beer Y'all," billed as "rock-and-roll road trip across North Carolina," follows a scruffy septet of wannabe homebrewers on a nine-day pilgrimage to 27 microbreweries across the state. Like any great epic, the film has a hero (the guy in Allegheny County who lets the travelers crash on his couch); obstacles (drunken ping-pong); encounters with inscrutable seers (brewmasters who mumble about keg conditioning) and a moral that inspired the industry crowd at last night's world premiere screening to hoist their pitchers in appreciation: Beer shouldn't be taken too seriously.

While the dudes filmmakers marvel politely at the tanks their hosts show off, they have little patience for academic discussions of wort and hops. They'd rather get drunk and watch "Lethal Weapon 2." They like to nap. It takes 48 minutes before anyone in the film mentions how the ales taste, which leaves plenty of time for backyard volleyball playin', lazy guitar pickin' and mongrel dog scratchin'. That's Southern beer, y'all.

"Beer Y'all" will be screening in parts of the Tarheel State this summer.

A weekly look at the draft selection in beer-friendly bars across the country.

Memorial Day marks the beginning of summer vacation season, so we turn our attention to one of America's largest tourist destinations, Las Vegas. Sin City has every indulgence one could ever hope for, and great beer is no exception. With a nice tap selection and an absurdly hefty bottled beer list featuring more than 900 possibilities, one of Vegas's best places to find rare brews is the Freakin' Frog.

Located across from UNLV's campus, Freakin' Frog may sound more aimed at college kids than tourists, but the bar is tailored to anyone looking for unique beers -- it boasts 900 bottles, 600 whiskeys, 300 tequilas and 15 taps. With an unassuming location in a strip mall a couple miles east of that "other" Strip, the Frog is a perfect alternative to the madness people associate with this desert city. "We're not a college bar," says owner Adam Carmer. "We're an intellectual, alcoholic coffee shop. We get people from all over the city, all over the country, all over the world."

Check out the Freakin' Frog's draft list after the jump.

Beer: It's not just for drinking anymore.

Sure, North Carolina's better known for pulled pork than beer, but Black Mountain's Pisgah Brewing Company crafts liquid delicacies more divine than any swine. Since 2005, this Asheville-area microbrewery (named after a local mountain) has fashioned small-batch organic wonders, like the crisp pale ale; the smooth, obsidian-hued porter; and, to your sobriety's enduring detriment, the Solstice.

The Solstice (sold in corked 750 ml champagne bottles) is a Tripel, a Belgian ale so-called because brewers employ triple the normal malt. This makes Tripels serious knockouts, with alcohol percentages that sky into double digits-sipping (Solstice is 9.5 percent). While inelegant Tripels recall jet fuel, the best, like Solstice, finesse the boozy jolt, creating a complex potion that's dangerously delicious.