Exploring the Surprising History of Black Henbane in Brewing

Craft beer today may pack a punch, but imagine drinking a brew so potent it caused hallucinations! In medieval Europe, that was a real risk. The culprit? A plant known as black henbane, or Hyoscyamus niger. This notorious nightshade family member was intentionally added to ales for its intoxicating—and sometimes frightening—effects.

Hyoscyamus niger -otherwise known as Henbane

The Strange Brew of Black Henbane

Before hops became the flavoring standard, medieval brewers often experimented with an array of herbs and plants, known collectively as “gruit.” Black henbane was a go-to ingredient in some regions. Its effects were intense: the plant could create a strong buzz, quicken inebriation, and even produce sensations far beyond ordinary drunkenness. For brewers, this meant happy (if slightly unhinged) patrons, thirsty for more. But the line between a good time and a hazardous experience was thin; just a bit too much henbane could lead to hallucinations and even dangerous health effects.

One peculiar trait of black henbane made it especially problematic: it causes a severe dry mouth. With every sip, drinkers grew thirstier, often downing pint after pint. For a 14th-century partygoer, that might sound ideal—until the hallucinations set in.

How Henbane Lost Its Place in Beer History

Henbane – Brittanica

By the early 1500s, the popularity of henbane-laced beer started to fade. Germany’s Beer Purity Law of 1516, or Reinheitsgebot, officially banned the use of ingredients like black henbane in favor of hops, which was safer, more affordable, and improved shelf life. Hops soon became the norm, and henbane was left behind, though not without lingering whispers of witchcraft and mysticism.

Since women often brewed beer, they were sometimes associated with the plant’s “magical” properties and faced accusations of witchcraft. In his 1827 Homeopathic Materia Medica, William Boericke even described the henbane experience as one of “mania,” highlighting its disturbing, almost diabolical effects.

Henbane as a Medieval Remedy

Henbane

While black henbane is best known for its wild effects in beer, it was also valued for its medicinal properties. Civilizations from ancient Greece to Persia used it in small doses to treat chronic pain, insomnia, epilepsy, and more. Although modern medicine has retained certain henbane compounds like hyoscyamine, it remains a toxic substance and should only be used under medical supervision.

The Safer—and Tastier—Alternative: Hops

Hops on the vine

Luckily, today’s brewers stick with hops, giving us beers that satisfy without the risk of hallucinations or worse. Curious about gruit ales? While they’re rare, a few craft breweries experiment with gruit-inspired recipes (minus the henbane, of course). It’s a fascinating throwback to the days before hops reigned supreme.

Next time you crack open a beer, raise a glass to hops and the steady hands of modern brewers. And if the idea of a henbane-laced ale has piqued your interest, remember: medieval brews were risky business. Hops not only bring bitterness but also a refreshing peace of mind—a perfect companion for today’s craft beer scene.

Cheers to history, mystery, and the safety of hops!

More Homebrewing Articles

• The Ultimate Guide to Homebrewing: Tips, Tricks, and Best Practices for 2024
• Brewing a Traditional Lithuanian Farmhouse Beer – Keptinis
• INKBIRD ITC-308 Product Review
• Book Review: The Homebrewer’s Garden: How to Easily Grow, Prepare, and Use Your Own Hops, Malts, Brewing Herbs (Joe Fisher and Dennis Fisher)
• The Beer That Had Medieval Drinkers Seeing Things – Exploring the Surprising History of Black Henbane in Brewing

Thank You For Reading

If you like this article, please check out our other many articles, including news, beer reviews, travelogues, maps, and much much more. We greatly appreciate everyone visiting the site!

Cheers.

Thanks again for reading everyone. Take some time to check out the site, we greatly appreciate it. We have affiliates and sponsors with Pretzels.com and Beer Drop.com, which can save you money on their products if you are interested. Check out our articles on them. Make sure to check out our beer reviews, brewery reviews, Amy’s weekly column, book reviews, hike reviews, and so much more.

As always, thank you everyone for reading! Leave your likes, comments, suggestions, questions, etc, in the comments section. Or use the Feedback – Contact Us – page, and we’ll get right back to you! You can also reach out to us at our direct e-mail address: thebeerthrillers@gmail.com

Thank you for visiting our blog. Please make sure to follow, bookmark, subscribe, and make sure to comment and leave feedback and like the blog posts you read. It will help us to better tailor the blog to you, the readers, likes and make this a better blog for everyone.

We are working on a massive project here at The Beer Thrillers. We are creating a map of all of the breweries across the United States. State by state we are adding maps of all of the different states with every brewery in each state. (We will eventually get to the US Territories, as well as the Canadian Provinces, and possibly more countries; as well as doing some fun maps like a map of all the breweries we’ve been to, and other fun maps.) You can find the brewery maps here:

• MAPS OF BREWERIES

We are also working on a project of creating printable and downloadable PDFs and resources to be able to check and keep track of all of the breweries you’ve been to. So stay tuned for that project once we are finished with the Brewery Maps of the US States.

You can check out our different directories here: Beer Reviews, Hike Reviews, Book Reviews, Brewery News, Brewery Openings, Brewer Interviews, and Travelogues.

Please be sure to follow us on our social media accounts – Facebook, Facebook Group, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Influence. As well as our brand new Tumblr page. Please be sure to also follow, like, subscribe to the blog here itself to keep updated. We love to hear from you guys, so be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you think!

You can now find us on our Discord Server here: The Beer Thrillers (Discord Server). We’ve also joined LinkTree to keep track of all of our social media pages, as well as hot new articles we’ve written.

The Beer Thrillers on LinkTree can be found here: The Beer Thrillers LinkTree.

We have partnered with an affiliateship with Beer Drop.com. You can check out that partnership and receive great discounts, coupons, and more here: Beer Drop. Going here and logging in and ordering will help you receive your discounts and coupons as well as help support our page. Thank you for helping to support The Beer Thrillers and to help us maintain the site and blog and to keep it running.

The Beer Thrillers are a blog that prides itself on writing beer reviews, brewery reviews, travelogues, news (especially local to the Central PA brewery scene), as well as covering other topics of our interests – such as hiking, literature and books, board games, and video games which we sometimes stream with our friends over at Knights of Nostalgia. We are currently listed as #5 on FeedSpot’s “Top 100 Beer Blogs” and #9 on FeedSpot’s “Top 40 Pennsylvania Blogs”. (As of August 2024.) Thank you for reading our site today, please subscribe, follow, and bookmark. Please reach out to us if you are interested in working together. If you would like to donate to the blog you can here: Donate to The Beer Thrillers. Thank you!

You can also check out our partnership and affiliation with Pretzels.com, where ordering pretzels and using our affiliate code – AFFILIATE CODE IS THEBEERTHRILLERS20 – will help you get wonderful pretzels and help us maintain and keep this blog running. Thank you!

If you would like to reach out to us for product reviews, beer reviews, press release writing, and other media – please contact us at thebeerthrillers@gmail.com. Thank you.

(Thank you for reading. The opinions, thoughts, and expressions of each article posted on The Beer Thrillers represents the author of the content and only themselves. It does not express the opinions, beliefs, or ideas held by The Beer Thrillers or any company in which the author themselves work for. Each piece of written content is written by the creator(s) listed in the authorial section on each article unless otherwise noted. Their opinions, comments, and words on screen do not represent any company in which they work for and / or are affiliated with or any non – profits that they contribute to. Thank you.)

Its that time yet again — it’s Amy’s birthday! Shhh… I’m smart enough to not say her age (…well, I wasn’t smart enough in this post last year – Amy’s Birthday, but thats besides the point). Please join me in wishing Amy a tremendous birthday!

She’s had a very busy year since her last rotation around the sun. She’s given birth, further cemented her job, and written a lot of articles here for the blog, as well as done a lot of work for us behind the scenes. (And she’s been a pretty swell girlfriend too, not gonna lie. A great secretary and an even better girlfriend.)

So again, please join me in saying HAPPY BIRTHDAY to her. If you see her today, tomorrow, this weekend, or anytime before August 31st – please wish her a birthday. (And yes, I’m only giving you until the 31st, after that its no longer belated, its just late, and rude, and don’t even bother saying it.)

Taking a Look Back

Let’s take a look back at Amy’s articles she’s written for us here at The Beer Thrillers. Starting with her weekly column. After coming back from the pregnancy, she delved into writing us a weekly column, and we’ve been ever so appreciative of it. You can find her weekly column articles here:

• Brewfests with Anxiety (Amy’s original weekly column start)
• I’ve Missed Drinking (A Look at Non Alcoholic Beers)
• Beer and Pretzel Review: Legends and Lore (St. Boniface Brewing Company) and Garlic Parm Pretzels (Pretzels.com)
• Peanut Butter Eggs, Easter, Beer, and YAH Brew’s Shimmy Shake (Beer Review)
• Cox Brewing Company: Back to Their Roots
• Amy’s Day Off
• It Was All A Dream (A Visit to YAH Brewing)
• Just Another Weekend (A Hike at Saint Pete’s Trail and Hares Hill Brewing)
• I’m Pretty Darn Lucky (Happy Mother’s Day)
• Ready to Kick of the Summer
• Beer Review: Beer Devil IPA (Niagara Brewing Company)
• World MS Day
• Have you ever picked a beer based on the can art?
• Happy Father’s Day
• What is Your Summer Time Go To Beer?
• Holiday Weekend and Bomber Bottles
• Baby’s First Ffej
• We Can’t Always Be a Glutton Right? – Perfect Portions and Allusion Brewing Company
• Beer Review: Pocono Punch (Barley Creek Brewing Company)
• Getting Sworn In: A Sneak Preview of Sworn Brewing
• Beer Review: Tropical Stout (Troegs Independent Brewing and Windy Bridges Brewing LLC)
• RAR Brewing Brings the Nostalgia with Muppets Out of Order Series
• You can find all of Amy’s articles here: Amy’s Archive of Articles.

Thats quite the list right there… but wait…. there’s more!

Beer Review: Sorbetto 40 (Ever Grain Brewing Company)

Let’s start off with her first article, dated November 17th, 2021. Miss Amy loves her Sorbetto series by Ever Grain Brewing Company, and she wanted to kick off her articles with them. A quick excerpt:

“There is a secret part of me, well not so secret anymore, that is OBSESSED with the sorbetto line. Maybe a little obsession with the yinzbetto line. The Sorbetto series was the line of beers that got me through quarantine and coincidently celebrating my 40^th birthday over quarantine as well. The thrill of a new sorbetto announcement STILL tickles my fancy.”Beer Review: Sorbetto 40 (Ever Grain Brewing

You can find her article here: Beer Review: Sorbetto 40 (Ever Grain Brewing Company) by Amy Wolfe.

Beer Review: Missile Toad (Ever Grain Brewing Company)

Did you know that Amy loves Ever Grain Brewing Company? Yea… its not really a big secret that she’s a huge fan of their brewery and their beers. Her second article here for The Beer Thrillers blog was a second Ever Grain Brewing Company beer review; this time Missile Toad. Dated on December 22nd, 2021.

A quick excerpt:

“When this tasty season treat came out last year when we were all stir crazy from quarantine I went on a long, long adventure with my friend the Missile Toad. I am normally not a fan of the grapefruit notes in my beer, but this triple IPA holds up with a high ABV, very light straw color and a not so boozy taste.”Beer Review: Missile Toad (Ever Grain Brewing Company)

You can find her article here: Beer Review: Missile Toad (Ever Grain Brewing Company) by Amy Wolfe.

Beer Review: Riff Mountain 7 (South County Brewing Company)

Another favorite of Miss Amy is South County Brewing Company, and her third beer review (and her third article) for the blog reflects that – with South County’s Riff Mountain number seven.

A quick excerpt:

I first tried this beer (the first iteration / the first version of it / the first variant of it) when kicking off my three – week furlough from my full-time job. Of course, I decided to kick off my work furlough, while celebrating still having a full-time job, by joining friends at South County Brewing Co. It was a wise decision. Riff Mountain took me on a smooth hop ride that was fitting to kick off a three – week furlough to disconnect from work and a global pandemic.Beer Review: Riff Mountain 7 (South County Brewing Company)

This article, dated December 28th, 2021, was her third article and her third beer review. You can find the article here: Beer Review: Riff Mountain 7 (South County Brewing Company) by Amy Wolfe.

Beer Review: Sorbetto 42 (Ever Grain Brewing Company)

A bit ironic (or just coincidence, or whatever term you want to use), but Miss Amy also reviewed Sorbetto 42. Perfectly timed here for her 42nd birthday. And as you can see, she really does love Ever Grain Brewing Company, and loves their Sorbetto series. This article was dated January 16th, 2022.

A quick excerpt:

There is a secret Sorbetto dance I perform when I see Ever Grain post they came out with a new Sorbetto. I might do a similar celebration dance for the yinzbetto series and Drippity announcements too. Since it’s so darn cold out, this dance was effective at also warming up my cold bones.

Yes, I’m still obsessed with the Sorbetto series. I just feel like Ever Grain gets me when it comes to this series. It was everything I needed in my life and well…. still need! The forty second one in the series does not disappoint! Check out my other Sorbetto review – Beer Review: Sorbetto 40 (Ever Grain Brewing Co.) or my other beer review from Ever Grain Brewing (Beer Review: Missile Toad)

(You can find other Ever Grain beer reviews here as well: All Together, Peanut Butter Udder One, Multiple Beer Review: Barrel Aged Barleywine, You Think Darkness is Your Ally?, 3rd Anniversary Bourbon Barrel Aged Stout, Cinn-a-Bunn).Beer Review: Sorbetto 42 (Ever Grain Brewing Company)

You can find her full article here: Beer Review: Sorbetto 42 (Ever Grain Brewing Company) by Amy Wolfe.

Brewfests with Anxiety

Amy’s next article was a departure from her beer reviews, but a big article that she felt very strongly about and (in my opinion) her best piece of writing. In it she talks about anxiety, panic attacks, and brewfests, and how to best combat the anxiety attacks at brewfests. This article came after we went down to the Cushwa 5th Anniversary Brewfest. Her article is dated January 23rd, 2022.

A quick excerpt:

I went to a crowded Brewfest and I didn’t have a panic attack.  This is huge. No, this is a massive victory for me, my anxiety, and feelings of inadequacy in social settings.

As an avid beer lover being able to attend a Brewfest and sample many brews is a mecca of the craft beer drinking lover.  Let’s be honest, when you are in a large crowd and can barely move even the social butterfly will feel some twinges of nervousness.

What often leads to a bad situation is I know I will feel less anxious if I drink more, thus often leading to a less than enjoyable evening.  Not to mention the “clean up” of an evening that I drank too much to mask my panic attacks.

I still remember one of my first panic attacks as a young 20 something.  I walked into my small, hometown bar.  All those parked in their regular spots at the bar and those enjoying an evening out in groups at tables all turned to look who just walked in the door.  I felt a tightening around my neck and I was able to inhale very little oxygen. Brewfests with Anxiety

You can read the full article here: Brewfests with Anxiety by Amy Wolfe.

Beer Review: Phantomania (Fourscore Beer Company)

Amy’s latest and most recent article was another beer review, again from another of her favorite breweries – Fourscore Beer Company out of Gettysburg PA. This one is dated March 9th, 2022. But have no fear, she has quite a few projects she’s working on her for the blog, and she’ll have new articles soon. (She’s also working on a much bigger project with Scarlet Emma in production, due to arrive November 22nd).

A quick excerpt:

There are so many things to unpack about this beer. I feel like I’m always on the hunt for the next tasty hazy IPA…and let me tell you I like them hazy!  That perfect Hazy IPA reminds me what it feels like when Homer has that drooling eye roll moment.

The tropical and citrusy aroma of Phantomania quickly took me away to a better place than central pa during a freezing rainy day!  It must be this fabulous hop combination.  It ends on a bitter taste, but it just cleanses that palate and you are ready for the next satisfying sip.Beer Review: Phantomania (Fourscore Beer Company)

You can read the full article here: Beer Review: Phantomania (Fourscore Beer Company) by Amy Wolfe.

The Amy Wolfe Archives

If you want to be able to check out the full archives of Amy’s writings (and where each new article will go when she’s written them and been tagged in them), you can check this out:

• The Amy Wolfe Archives

Happiest of Birthdays

I want to say thank you to all of you reading and wishing Amy a happy birthday. But most importantly I want to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Amy, and say how very much she is loved, appreciated, and valued. She is a tremendous soul, on top of being a wonderful mother, fantastic girlfriend, and great beer drinker, and a pretty kick ass girlfriend.

Cheers to Amy!

Happy Birthday!

Thank You For Reading

If you like this article, please check out our other many articles, including news, beer reviews, travelogues, maps, and much much more. We greatly appreciate everyone visiting the site!

Cheers.

Thanks again for reading everyone. Take some time to check out the site, we greatly appreciate it. We have affiliates and sponsors with Pretzels.com and Beer Drop.com, which can save you money on their products if you are interested. Check out our articles on them. Make sure to check out our beer reviews, brewery reviews, Amy’s weekly column, book reviews, hike reviews, and so much more.

As always, thank you everyone for reading! Leave your likes, comments, suggestions, questions, etc, in the comments section. Or use the Feedback – Contact Us – page, and we’ll get right back to you! You can also reach out to us at our direct e-mail address: thebeerthrillers@gmail.com

Thank you for visiting our blog. Please make sure to follow, bookmark, subscribe, and make sure to comment and leave feedback and like the blog posts you read. It will help us to better tailor the blog to you, the readers, likes and make this a better blog for everyone.

We are working on a massive project here at The Beer Thrillers. We are creating a map of all of the breweries across the United States. State by state we are adding maps of all of the different states with every brewery in each state. (We will eventually get to the US Territories, as well as the Canadian Provinces, and possibly more countries; as well as doing some fun maps like a map of all the breweries we’ve been to, and other fun maps.) You can find the brewery maps here:

• MAPS OF BREWERIES

We are also working on a project of creating printable and downloadable PDFs and resources to be able to check and keep track of all of the breweries you’ve been to. So stay tuned for that project once we are finished with the Brewery Maps of the US States.

You can check out our different directories here: Beer Reviews, Hike Reviews, Book Reviews, Brewery News, Brewery Openings, Brewer Interviews, and Travelogues.

Please be sure to follow us on our social media accounts – Facebook, Facebook Group, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Influence. As well as our brand new Tumblr page. Please be sure to also follow, like, subscribe to the blog here itself to keep updated. We love to hear from you guys, so be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you think!

You can now find us on our Discord Server here: The Beer Thrillers (Discord Server). We’ve also joined LinkTree to keep track of all of our social media pages, as well as hot new articles we’ve written.

The Beer Thrillers on LinkTree can be found here: The Beer Thrillers LinkTree.

We have partnered with an affiliateship with Beer Drop.com. You can check out that partnership and receive great discounts, coupons, and more here: Beer Drop. Going here and logging in and ordering will help you receive your discounts and coupons as well as help support our page. Thank you for helping to support The Beer Thrillers and to help us maintain the site and blog and to keep it running.

The Beer Thrillers are a blog that prides itself on writing beer reviews, brewery reviews, travelogues, news (especially local to the Central PA brewery scene), as well as covering other topics of our interests – such as hiking, literature and books, board games, and video games which we sometimes stream with our friends over at Knights of Nostalgia. We are currently listed as #7 on FeedSpot’s “Top 100 Beer Blogs” and #8 on FeedSpot’s “Top 40 Pennsylvania Blogs”. (As of January 2023.) Thank you for reading our site today, please subscribe, follow, and bookmark. Please reach out to us if you are interested in working together. If you would like to donate to the blog you can here: Donate to The Beer Thrillers. Thank you!

You can also check out our partnership and affiliation with Pretzels.com, where ordering pretzels and using our affiliate code – AFFILIATE CODE IS THEBEERTHRILLERS20 – will help you get wonderful pretzels and help us maintain and keep this blog running. Thank you!

If you would like to reach out to us for product reviews, beer reviews, press release writing, and other media – please contact us at thebeerthrillers@gmail.com. Thank you.

If you would like to help keep the blog running soundly and smoothly, you may donate to us to help us keep the costs of the blog to a minimum. We greatly appreciate it. Thank you. (Clicking this link will take you to the page to make a donation. Thank you very much for helping us stay afloat!)

(Thank you for reading. The opinions, thoughts, and expressions of each article posted on The Beer Thrillers represents the author of the content and only themselves. It does not express the opinions, beliefs, or ideas held by The Beer Thrillers or any company in which the author themselves work for. Each piece of written content is written by the creator(s) listed in the authorial section on each article unless otherwise noted. Their opinions, comments, and words on screen do not represent any company in which they work for and / or are affiliated with or any non – profits that they contribute to. Thank you.)

For many locals, they’ve known about Official BBQ and Burgers for a while now. Unfortunately I only found out when Pizza Boy announced they would be using the little unassuming BBQ shack as their secondary location.

And now I feel like I’ve been missing out for quite a while.

You can check out their website, which lists menu, their about information, their services, their catering, as well as the new Pizza Boy beer menu here: Official BBQ and Burgers.

The new Pizza Boy bar at Official BBQ and Burgers is to the right as you enter with it being the counter for ordering your food as well (and opposite of pick-ups if you ordered your food by phone or to-go). They have twenty taps all set-up for Pizza Boy beer only. There is also a fridge by the entrance for non-alcoholic kid drinks as well as four and six packs of Pizza Boy beers.

The bar counter itself is large and with enough seating that it should provide enough space for just drinkers, there is also a row bar against the wall by the main bar where people can eat and drink as well. Plus their is a moderate sized dining room for families and people to get together and eat and drink.

On a busy night the dining room area will be cramped, but not too severely. When my family arrived roughly 6:30-6:45PM Friday night, the place was well packed, but not too the point of cramping (though we did snag the next-to-last table).

Opening night seemed to have a few hiccups and hitches. By the time we got there, Mac and Cheese and Brisket were sold out. And while in line, they took a phone call that got the remaining pulled pork until they could make more (which ended up taking roughly 25-30 minutes, even though they told us it’d be 15 minutes). But things happen and this can be expected for a “new” opening.

I say “new” because its not their first day, and its not an opening. The Pizza Boy bar located inside Official BBQ and Burgers was new and just going live, but the BBQ shack itself has been around for quite a while. Talking to a few locals/regulars, it seems like they’ve been doing ‘ok’ but never consistently busy or crazy packed; and hopefully the new bar with Pizza Boy’s marquee name will change that for them (it seemed to while we were there, though the place was empty when we left at 8:30PM). (They closed at 9PM).

While waiting for our food, I ordered my (first) drink; which was “Not My Style, But May Rate Anyway”. A delicious NEIPA from Pizza Boy.

Since I’m doing a ‘brewery’ / ‘secondary location’ / ‘restaurant’ review rather than a beer review, I’ll just give a glossing over details of the beer.

Beer: Not My Style, May Rate Anyway
Brewery: Pizza Boy Brewing Co.
Style: IPA – New England
ABV: 7%
IBU: None Listed
Untappd Write-Up: IPA w/ almond flour, coconut & lemon

This is a very bright yellow beer, with a very distinct hazy juicy IPA taste and feel with a powerful lemon kick to it. Not sure exactly what all the almond flour adds to it, because I don’t exactly taste almond, possibly because of how over-powering the lemon is (definitely in a good way, especially for me because I love lemon). Slight noticeable coconut but it is pretty subtle. A nice sippable beer with no ‘hop bitterness’ and really embodies the New England style IPAs that are more of the craze nowadays.

My Untappd Rating: ****.25
Global Untappd Rating: 3.81 (as of 11.30.19)

The salad came first, and everyone dug into that. The salad was massive, 5$, and as the menu said “NOT SMALL”. It definitely lived up to that. So while everyone chowed into that, I ordered my second beer which I started sipping just before our full meal came.

Beer: Visions of Yesterday
Brewery: Pizza Boy Brewing Co.
Style: Pale Ale – American
ABV: 5%
IBU: None Listed
Untappd Write-Up: (Blank)

This was a fine, well tasting, clear translucent pale ale. No frills, nothing super crazy going on. No adjuncts, no dry hopping, no late additions, nothing silly. Just a down to earth pale ale that was tasty and went perfectly with pulled pork, angus beef burger, and the green beans.

My Untappd Rating: ***.75
Global Untappd Rating: 3.60 (as of 11.30.19)

For a family of four, we got pulled pork, dozen wings, french fries, the salad, an angus beef burger, and the green beans. My daughters enjoyed trying out the numerous different BBQ sauces that were there, and they enjoyed their cream soda and root beer to drink theirs down, while I enjoyed my beers to wash my food down. The french fries were massive for a side. The wings were good with a smoked spiceyness to them even before putting on the sauces. The pulled pork was delicious. The green beans were absolutely amazing.

The food was absolutely phenomenal. I will say as a warning, for a family of four be prepared to drop a decent amount of cash. All told our meal was around the 100$ mark with the beers, the sodas, the food, and the tip. Obviously prices vary on what you order and how much, and the sodas do certainly add up as well as the beers. Most BBQ places are expensive or on the more costly side of things to begin with. And we knew this going in. This is no gripe, just a ‘heads up’ for those with larger families or those living on a budget.

The food is downright amazing though and well worth the costs. The time to receive the food took a while, but we are assuming hiccups with the increased volume of customers. The staff was amazing and downright friendly and talked with the girls and us and were very nice to us the entire time. The building was clean, the bathrooms clean, polished, the locals and regulars all friendly.

The four of us left full (belly aching full), happy, feeling good (especially me with the two beers in me) and with a ton of leftovers (which I am currently picking apart right now). We will definitely be back in the near future and most likely a lot of times after that. Official BBQ and Burgers is only about ten minutes from Hummelstown, two-three minutes from most of Rutherford, five-ten minutes from the outskirts of Harrisburg and fifteen minutes from Harrisburg itself, and fifteen minutes from Hershey and ten minutes from Linglestown. Its kind of ‘out in the middle of nowhere’ but its also an easy accessible drive from everywhere in the near area. Great secondary location for Pizza Boy, and one far closer for those in Hummelstown, Hershey, Linglestown, so this will make a great stop for many. And being so close to other breweries like Boneshire Brew Works, Newfangled Brew Works, Troegs Independent Brewing, Tattered Flag, and Iron Hill (Hershey) it can make for a nice easy stop for a nearby brewery tour. (Its about two minutes from both Newfangled Brew Works and Boneshire Brew Works).

Hopefully you all will stop in and check the place out. I highly recommend checking it out, and not just for the beer. Great food, great beer, great time. BBQ, Beer, Happy. (To go along with Pizza Boy’s other motto of “Pizza. Beer. Happy.”).

Cheers All!

-B. Kline