Foreign Exchange Brewery hopes to open its new brewpub in downtown Aurora by the spring.
Ricky Cervantes, owner and master brewer for the business, said the spring opening is what would happen “in an ideal world.”
He was talking to aldermen on the City Council Public Health, Safety and Transportation Committee recently, which considers new liquor licenses in the city.
Committee aldermen unanimously recommended creating a Class C Specialty On-Site liquor license for the business, which is currently remodeling a building at Cross Street and Middle Avenue, just south of the Aurora Public Library.
The building is in an area near South River Street that is considered a hot spot for redevelopment downtown right now. Foreign Exchange is just down Middle Avenue from Company 251, a catering and event business, and just around the corner from a building where Endiro Coffee is beginning a roasting facility to compliment its coffee house and restaurant on West New York Street.
In late summer, Aurora officials began a study to see if the Middle Avenue and Cross Street area could qualify for a micro tax increment financing district.
Foreign Exchange is moving from its current brewery in Itasca to Aurora. For Cervantes, it’s a homecoming, because he was born and raised in Aurora.
His beer began as a homemade beer he gave out to friends from his house before it got too popular to stay a home brew.
Cervantes said he sells his custom brews under many names in four packs, distributing them to restaurants and bars throughout the Chicago region.
At the brewpub in Aurora, Cervantes said people will be able sample his different brews, and also get food. The brewpub will have its own kitchen, but is partnering with downtown restaurant Gillerson’s Grubbery, on West New York Street, to do the food.
“We’re building a kitchen which will be subleased to Gillerson’s,” he said.
Eventually, Cervantes plans to develop the top three floors of the brewpub building as residential units.
The full City Council will consider creating the new liquor license, but the city’s liquor commissioner, Mayor Richard Irvin, actually issues liquor licenses.
