Brouwer’s celebrates its 10th anniversary today the same way it has celebrated barleywine, hops, weekdays, and new releases for the past decade: lots of beer! This includes two specially brewed anniversary beers made in collaboration with New Belgium of Colorado and Reuben’s Brews, located in Ballard. Brouwer’s blog describes the two brews:

In honor of this 10-year milestone we have two very special beers to share with you. New Belgium was kind enough to open up their “wood forest” and allow us to blend a sour beer.  We had a great time hanging out with Eric Salazar, on a sunny December day in Fort Collins, where we tasted close to 20 different fouders. We came up with a 50/50 fouder blend we think everyone will enjoy, but this is a draft only offering.

The second beer was brewed at one of our favorite Seattle Breweries, Reuben’s Brews. Adam, Mike and Thor were great hosts and allowed us to sit in on the brew, on a sunny Monday in early March. This IIPA, appropriately named Gobsmacked (a British slang term for astonished) is a blend of Citra, Mosaic and Galaxy Hops, and it will have your lips smacking.

The numerous taps will also be filled with other anniversary beers from the cellar. Brouwer’s is open from 11 am until 2 am every day and located at 400 N 35th Street.

Seattle Weekly released its 2011 Best of Seattle winners and there’s a bunch of Fremont-based businesses on the list.

• Fremont Fair was named Best Festival.
• Lighthouse Roasters was named Best Coffeehouse.
• Via Tribunali was named Best Thin-Crust Pizza.
• Uneeda Burger’s Classic burger was named Best Burger.
• Brouwer’s won the Best Beer Selection in a Restaurant and also won the Best Beer Selection in a Restaurant fan vote.
• Revel was named Best New Restaurant.
• Nectar Lounge was named Best Hip-Hop Venue.
• Jive TIme was named Best Place To Buy Vinyl.

Agree with the choices? Feel like a Fremont business or event got hosed? Check out the full list of winners here.

If you happen to notice an influx of English, Irish, Welsh and Scottish accents in Fremont over the course of the next 6-12 months, you can probably thank the BBC for it’s story on Fremont that’s currently featured on their homepage.

The article is a rundown of Fremont for tourists who might be interested in stopping by on their trip to Seattle.

This neighbourhood, less than five miles north of the heart of downtown Seattle, continues its legacy of public art, everyday weirdness, and off-the-wall-events inclined towards nudity and costumes. Yet its popularity, soaring rent prices, new luxury condos, and inundation of high tech company offices have transformed it into something a tad different than its tie-dyed forefathers and mothers anticipated.

Fair enough.

They also name-check the Fremont Sunday Market, Hub and Bespoke, Flying Apron Bakery, Uneeda Burger, Brouwer’s Cafe, ETG Cafe and hey, this blog! The post itself comes courtesy of Lonely Planet, though with all of the Brits currently planning to visit us now, I don’t think we’ll be too lonely in our own little universe for long.

Some news, updates and happenings in and around Fremont to be aware of this week…

• Brouwer’s Cafe is hosting Bigwood Fest, one of the biggest 100% wood barrel aged beer festivals in America, gets started Thursday, December 2nd at 11am. Check out the many, many wood barrel-aged beers that will be available on tap.
• Brouwer’s also gets a shout-out for their food by Nancy Leson of the Seattle Times. She praises their Belgian-style mussels and frites dish as one of the seafood dishes Seattlites should know about.
• Seattle historic steamship, the Virginia V, will be hosting three holiday cruises in December, of which a portion of each will support Seattle-based non-profit organization Forgotten Children’s Fund. The ship departs from South Lake Union Park. Check Queen Anne View for more details.
• Woodland Park Zoo‘s 1-year-old female South African lion Adia is finishing up her 30-day quarantine and will undergo a full physical on Wednesday before being introduced gradually to the zoo’s award-winning African Savanna.
• A Child’s Christmas in Wales begins its run at the Stone Soup Theater on Friday, December 3rd. Dylan Thomas’ play run will be performed every Friday, Saturday and Sunday through the 24th. Tickets are $18, discounts are available for groups.