After more than three years in the making, it looks like Spent Grain Brewpub is getting closer. Owner and brewmaster Eric Lamkins hopes to be tapping beers in early 2027. The unique concept takes its name from the remaining grains leftover after the brewing process.
Eric Lamkins
“It’s not going to be your standard brewpub,” Lamkins says, “It’ll be a brewpub, with dining and a lounge area, that will only feature our own brewed beer.”
As it turns out, Spent Grain is the second brewpub to open in Arlington Heights. O’Grady’s Brewery & Pub opened in 1995 on Golf Road in Arlington Heights, before closing in 2000.
Spent Grain Brewpub is located at 17 N. Vail Ave. in downtown Arlington Heights, in a space that once housed Bangkok Cafe. Lamkins and his wife, Heather Henkel, also own Kilwins Ice Cream shop, located nearby at 16 W. Campbell Street. Consequently, they feel they have a pulse on the beat of the community.
The couple plans to feature 12 taps — as well as four experimental taps — ranging from a light beer and a pilsner, to two IPAs and even a peanut butter stout that Lamkins says took more than seven years to perfect.
Spent Grain’s custom-made bar will seat 14, with 26 seats in the dining room and more than 30 seats on couches clustered in different lounge areas. Its windows overlook Vail Avenue, including one that is a garage door that will open in the warm, summer months. A double-sided gas fireplace also will add warmth to the brewpub setting.
Lamkins has been a home brewer for 30 years — and a beekeeper — but increasingly he began seeing the appeal of a locally owned brewpub, that would help build community — both with residents and other home brewers.
“I want to keep the focus on community,” Lamkins says. “I want to work with the Arlington Heights Art Guild to feature local artists’ works, that would rotate quarterly.
“We’ll have a TV, but we’re not going to be a sports bar,” he adds. “I want to focus on the social side of it, be a part of the neighborhood and fostering community.”
Beyond the beer, Spent Grain will feature a whiskey wall, with as many as 40 different whiskeys, as well as a high end wine collection, reflecting Lamkins’ former days working at Tuscan Market Wine Shop.
The brewpub also will offer a unique menu, with items using some of the spent grains from the brewing process, including appetizers and flatbreads, soups, salads and sandwiches, such as a sloppy Joe mixture on a spent grain biscuit and an “adult” grilled cheese.
“We’ll have a little bit of everything,” Lamkins says, “without being repetitive with anyone else in town.”
Lamkins has encountered countless delays since the Village of Arlington Heights granted the couple a special use permit to allow for a brewpub at the site, two years ago, but its opening now is in sight.
“Excitement is building,” Lamkins says simply.
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