Glen Echo Brewing a welcome addition to Wylie

All images © Brian Brown/Beer in Big D.

One year after initially announcing plans to establish a new brewery in Wylie, Glen Echo Brewing is now open and operating near the city's downtown district at 106 N. Birmingham St.

Reading through the company's website, you get the impression owners Steve and Debbie Schoenekase are all about craft beer, conversation and camaraderie. So, it's not surprising to find upon visiting that the couple has created a space exactly in line with those ideals.

An open and unified floorplan fills the interior of a 4,000 square foot structure occupied by Glen Echo, with the brewery's taproom flanked by the production area off to one side. The atmosphere exudes a chill vibe, with low lights and distractions at a minimum. Families can gather around a board game, but the brewery's projection TV will only emerge for special events.

Even the seating options (community tables, couches, booths) seem chosen to encourage patrons to come together over a beer. And indeed, they did just that during a soft opening this weekend. Among the steady stream of customers, a fair number of folks clearly knew each other beforehand, meaning Wylie residents made up a majority of the crowd. Naturally, this bodes well for a business looking to make a name as the local, neighborhood brewery.

As for beer offerings, Glen Echo is still dialing things in as it works to convert recipes originally brewed on a one-barrel setup to an advanced 10-barrel system. Once production is in full swing, look for upwards of a dozen house beers to be pouring on the regular.

Full pours and flights of up to six beers are available to enjoy in the taproom at Glen Echo.

To start, four beers (kölsch, amber ale, IPA, chocolate milk stout) and an orange seltzer are currently on tap. Of those, future batches of the IPA are expected to be hoppier, and while the chocolate milk stout will likely be a year-round staple, a "stoutier stout" is also in the works.

Add to those a bock, a hefeweizen, a non-alcoholic root beer and more to see how Glen Echo is working to build a portfolio favoring classic, everyday drinkers. That said, trendier brews will certainly surface from time-to-time as well.

Foodwise, Glen Echo stocks daily snacks in the form of a chips and salsa basket, which features a family-size bag of chips, along with either Smoky Red or Spicy Green Salsa from ZPalm Kitchen of Garland. Food trucks will provide plates on the weekends too, but patrons are free to bring in outside eats anytime.

It all makes for a welcome addition to Wylie, not to mention the North Texas beer scene as a whole, considering only a few breweries dot the map on the far eastern edge of the coverage region. One imagines craft beer drinkers local to the area will echo that sentiment as well.

An official grand opening is still to come, so follow Glen Echo's social media channels (Facebook, Instagram) for the latest information. Once regular service begins, the brewery will have hours Wednesday-Sunday. An important note, with parking not available on site (the concrete pad out front is for patio seating), drivers should seek out the free lot one block over and directly behind the brewery on N. Jackson Ave.