The delicious evolution of Sig Brewing’s food and beer keeps Tacoma wanting more

A memorable meatball is like finding a four-leaf clover in a field of grass. These days, especially in the fermented bounty of the Pacific Northwest, a remarkable IPA is equally rare. Luckily for Tacoma, both of these truths exist under one roof in the city’s historic brewing district.

At the barely year-old Sig Brewing Co., chef Hailey Hernandez has followed through on her promise to “not just creating, never settling, always trying to just be better,” as she told The News Tribune last spring. That commitment has birthed an ever-evolving menu of nostalgic foods with off-the-wall touches.

No visit to Sig mirrors the other, and for once, that’s not just desirable — it’s exactly what we need.

Last summer and fall, Hernandez served several styles of meatballs inspired by other comfort foods. The pot pie version molded ground chicken with carrots, celery and onions, drizzled with gravy and sprinkled with bits of pie crust; orbs of wagyu from Nicky Farms in Portland melted in your mouth with a sneaky umami from mushrooms and a veal demi-glace, complemented by crispy prosciutto, Dijonnaise and flaky puff pastry. Currently on the menu, the original marries pork and beef with the expected fresh tomato sauce, parmesan and mozzarella, but here they are finished in Sig’s Forno Rosso stone oven, heated to 810-degrees Fahrenheit.

There wild-yeast sourdough pizzas — the dough cold-fermented for a full three days before coming to room temperature for baking on Day 4 — also find their heat. Your everyday pie is the Spekemat, with pepperoni cups that hold little piles of grease in their bellies.

Others, as with an order of three deviled eggs, vary by the season and the chef’s whim, including that of sous chefs Evan Croshaw and Talyn Jorstad. Pies have featured everything from kimchi to butternut squash, Manila clams to al pastor — Sig’s take on the Hawaiian — and bright, citrusy olives marinated in-house with lemon, shallots, herbs and spices. Last summer, Hernandez got her hands on some Norwegian lobster tails, which she tosses in garlic butter before spreading the pie with a cream sauce, two cheeses and a squeeze of charred lemon. That one will soon return.

On paper it might seem fussy, but in presentation and in taste, these are great pizzas, perfectly cooked meatballs and must-order deviled eggs, made and served by people who are having a damn good time doing what they do.

According to Dante Hernandez, the chef’s husband and the brewery’s resident beer marketer (who wears many other hats), Sig is a place for “people who like beer and who don’t, people who like weird food and who don’t.” In other words, it’s a watering hole and a restaurant where guests have flocked for a multitude of reasons since the doors opened in mid-June. (The brewery had been wholesaling to taprooms and bottle shops since the spring, followed by limited takeout leading up to Pierce County’s summer restaurant reopenings.)

“We have the overlap of all of the communities here,” said Dante Hernandez, from “huge beer geeks” to brunch fiends and dessert seekers. “We wanna hit every note for everybody.”

That sentiment could not be clearer than in Sig’s line of seltzers made with real fruit. Remove White Claw from your mind — or let Sig destroy the memory for you.

Brewer Jeff Stokes, formerly of Matchless and Three Magnets in Olympia, had never tinkered with seltzer, but c’est la vie of 2020 and beyond. Sig’s are different, built on the clean foundation of fermented cane sugar. Honestly, calling them seltzer does little justice to the effervescent, quaffable, boozy smoothies they are.

The first, playfully called “A Complete Gimmick,” resembled a piña colada. A recent release known as “Purée” adds blackberry, blueberry and strawberry, and one forthcoming features guava, passionfruit and orange.

“We’re adding so much fruit that the beers are actually getting the consistency of the fruit itself,” said Dante Hernandez.

Stokes — currently working mostly alone in the seven-barrel brewery visible from inside the restaurant, which is adjacent to the open kitchen, the pizza oven and the long cement bar — also brews consistently drinkable ales and lagers. In early March, the tap list included a London dry porter, an apricot saison, a couple of IPAs and a Grisette, a Belgian-style farmhouse ale.

Though the fruit beers slam, they said, especially with Hernandez’s biscuit brunch, Stokes still keeps beers that need more time — pilsners take eight weeks, about twice as long as an IPA — in rotation.

SIG BREWING IS HAVING SO MUCH FUN

The brewery introduced itself to the region last spring with, of all things, a Key Lime Pale Ale, which rests with literal graham cracker crumbs and toasted coconut before being kegged or canned.

“You know, come out with guns blazing,” said Dante Hernandez, “otherwise people will forget about you.”

When restaurants were forced to shutter their dining rooms for a second time last year, in mid-November, the Sig creators not only yielded to the comfort-food desires of the pandemic era but wholeheartedly embraced them.

Chef Hailey Hernandez had been doling out laborious funnel cakes for dessert, but one day, with extra cream cheese, she concocted a cheesecake. It was bubblegum pink, smattered with those miniature rainbow sprinkle dots and ringed with dollops of cake batter-flavored buttercream, all atop a Circus Animal Cookie crust.

“Some people come in and just saw our desserts,” she said. “Crap, I guess this is our thing now!”

Sig Brewing Co. was founded by brothers Alex and Duncan Susag — the latter of whom designed and installed the restaurant’s concrete bars, tables and oven facade — and their cousin John Samuelson, now general manager. They hired Stokes and the dynamic Hernandez duo and let them run free.

Would they be here making crazy cheesecakes and fruit beers a-plenty without the trials of the past year?

“To be honest,” said the chef, a veteran of Marrow and Wilder, pausing, “probably yes.

“In this era, in this society, we have to take things so seriously. Why not just have fun with the things we can?”

SIG BREWING CO.

▪ 2534 Tacoma Ave. S., Tacoma, 253-503-6446, sigbrewingco.com

▪ Hours: Wednesday-Thursday 3-9 p.m., Friday noon-10 p.m., Saturday 9 a.m.-10 p.m., Sunday 9 a.m.-6 p.m. (weekend brunch 9 a.m.-1 p.m.)

▪ Food & Drink: appetizers, $7-$16, pizzas $14-$21, beers vary

▪ Details: walk-ins only at this time; brunch often sells out, so arrive early; takeout beer and food available online but limited