Table of Contents
ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Crooked Run Fermentation will open its Del Ray taproom Friday, Aug. 28, according to signage posted in the window at 2003 Mount Vernon Ave.
The hand-lettered sign, photographed Friday evening, advertises "crispy lagers, hazy IPAs, fruit-forward sours" and what the brewery calls award-winning food. A decal on the adjacent window identifies the space as a Crooked Run brewery and taproom serving beer, wine and snacks.
The date is the first the Northern Virginia brewery has attached to the project publicly. Co-founder Jake Endres wrote in an Aug. 12 newsletter that the Del Ray opening is imminent, saying a new IPA released this week would be "on tap for the imminent opening of Del Ray."
That beer, called Top Gun, is what Endres described as the company's first hop-saturated IPA — a hazy style brewed with 16 pounds of hops per barrel, roughly double or more what a typical hazy IPA uses. Endres wrote that the ingredient cost makes the beer viable only for a taproom-focused brewery and that it will not appear often. The recipe leans on Citra, Mosaic and Nectaron in cryogenically separated and extract formats, he wrote, and he declined to detail the methods used to keep the bitterness in check.
Crooked Run signed its lease for the 800-square-foot space in May, later than the January target the company had originally set, and filed for an ABC license at the address in March, as the Brief first reported. Endres said in a July newsletter that the company had secured its building permit, which he called the biggest obstacle to opening on time. The storefront was previously home to Dolce & Bean, the neighborhood dessert shop that opened in April 2017 and won the Del Ray Business Association's Heart of Del Ray award in 2021.
Endres has said the Del Ray location will pour from a 12-tap draught system and serve an elevated bar menu made in-house rather than sourced frozen, with prep centralized at the company's Sterling facility. The signature item is a buttermilk- and hot sauce-brined, double-dredged chicken tender served with house-made hot honey mustard. The space is too small to carry the full pizza and wings menu offered at Crooked Run's Union Market location in Washington.
Co-founder Leland "Lee" Rogan, a former construction project manager, has overseen the build-out, which included constructing a walk-in refrigerator, repairing a significant floor sag with self-leveling concrete and retiling the space.
Crooked Run was founded as a nanobrewery in Leesburg in 2013 by Endres and Rogan. The company operates taprooms in Leesburg, Sterling and Washington's Union Market District.
The Alexandria Brief has reached out to Crooked Run Fermentation for comment.
Ryan Belmore is the founder and publisher of The Alexandria Brief, Alexandria's independent daily community news source.
The Alexandria Brief runs solely on reader support — no ads, no corporate owner. Become a monthly or annual supporter or make a one-time contribution.
6,200+ Alexandria neighbors get The Alexandria Brief free in their inbox every weekday morning. Subscribe here.
