Crust Brewing Bringing Tap Room, Pizza to Former Leader Bar in Irving Park
New Owners Plan to Maintain Old-School Tavern Vibe
IRVING PARK — A suburban brewery is bringing its take on pizza and craft beer to the former home of Leader Bar in Irving Park.
The former owners of Leader Bar, 3000 W. Irving Park Road, announced in January that the business would remain closed until March, when new owners are expected to take over. Those new owners are Crust Brewing, a craft brewery based out of suburban Rosemont known for its lagers and Neapolitan-style pizza.
"When Leader Bar reopens as Crust Tap Room, it’ll serve beers such as Crust’s Dough Roller, a traditional Vienna amber lager, and Lights Out, a mahogany-hued dark lager," said Bradley Cool, Crust Brewing’s director of operations.
The owners are done with minor renovations to the bar’s interior and could open Crust Tap Room as soon as March, he said.
"I love the bones of it," Cool said. "Honestly, it’s very similar to our location in Rosemont, there’s a lot of exposed brick, dark woods and big windows. The only thing in the dining room site we’re really changing is putting in a bunch of different accent lighting and just modernizing the look."
Beer will still be produced at the Rosemont location, but the variety on tap at the Irving Park location will be slightly different than what’s available at the brewery, he said.
"Our goal for the new location, and it’s not going to happen as soon as we open, is to get to 10 or 12 of Crust Brewing’s beers there," Cool said. "We’ll kind of have a pilot program at the taproom to try some new stuff there, at a smaller scale, before we make it in mass quantities for Rosemont."
Pizza, Not Neapolitan-Style
The new taproom will also feature about half the menu offerings of the Rosemont location, with one exception, Cool said.
"We are going to do Chicago tavern-style pizza at the taproom instead of the Neapolitan pizza we do here in Rosemont," Cool said.
The dough for the tavern-cut pies will still be fermented in-house at the Rosemont location, and it will be cooked at the Irving Park taproom in new Marra Forni deck ovens, Cool said.
"And we use our beer in the pizza dough, so our Dough Roller lager is called that because that is specific to the pizza that we make," he said. "Obviously, our footprint is tremendously smaller in the city. [The kitchen] won’t be as visible, but there’s a small pass-out window between the dining room and the kitchen guests can peek through a little bit."
Maintaining the Old-School Tavern Vibe
Once it reopens as Crust Tap Room, Cool wants to continue the old-school Chicago tavern vibe customers found at Leader Bar, he said.
"Leader Bar was a staple in that neighborhood for so long," Cool said. "But it’s been cool being in the space over the last month and a half. People knock on the windows to chat and everyone’s really excited to have someone new in town."
FAQs
- When will Crust Tap Room open? Late March
- What kind of beers will be available? Crust’s Dough Roller, Lights Out, and more
- What kind of pizza will be served? Chicago tavern-style pizza, not Neapolitan-style
- Will the brewery produce beer at the new location? No, beer will still be produced at the Rosemont location
- Will the menu be the same as the Rosemont location? No, about half the menu offerings will be available at the new location
