Beers du jour

With two weeks to go, organizers of Chef’s Week PNW are finalizing plans to celebrate beer at their inaugural event.

Friday, April 1 will be Craft Beer Day , featuring offerings from at least 10 breweries and cideries from the region and beyond, including the public debuts of Young Buck and Little Spokane .

There also will be a Q&A panel discussion with local brewers and a homebrew contest.

When it comes to restaurants, says organizer Aaron Crumbaugh, “There’s so much more that goes into it than just the food. There’s the wine, the spirits, the beer. This is a celebration of food and drink, the story of where it comes from and the people behind it all.”

After wineries are featured on opening day March 30 and distilleries on March 31, beer tasting will run that Friday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at The Washington Cracker Co. Building downtown. For $10, you get 10 sample tokens.

Along with Young Buck and Little Spokane, both of which will be opening soon at the downtown brewery incubator , participating breweries so far include Iron Goat, Black Label, Chewelah’s Quartzite, Western Washington’s Wander and Propolis, and California’s Lagunitas. There also will be ciders from Spokane’s Liberty and the Olympic Peninsula’s Finnriver.

The homebrew competition will pit seven IPAs and seven stouts against each other. The winners in each category receive a $100 cash prize and will have their beers poured at the eight-course tasting dinner that closes the activities April 2.