Beer paired with golf to a T: Visiting state’s new brewery-owned courses

Decades ago, two Totas embarked on a bike ride through Rome that left them exhausted and hungry. They needed sustenance and to escape the Mediterranean sun.

Like an oasis in the streets, my uncles found near one of the ancient city’s train stations a magical restaurant named simply, Vino e Porchetta, or wine and roasted pork. They ate rich porchetta cut from a rotisserie and drank red wine from glasses shaped like jelly jars.

I have always remembered this story because it epitomizes the union of two perfectly complementary things. Rare are the places that package such joys, be them food or entertainment, under one roof.

I’ve never had my own Vino e Porchetta until I played a round of golf at Tree House Brewing Co. in Tewksbury. Craft beer and golf pair as beautifully as wine and roast pork. The two come together on courses everywhere, every day, but never in Massachusetts have they been combined quite like this.

I recently visited the state’s two brewery-owned courses, which will delight golfers around the country, whether they play with a disc or a ball.

Tossing discs at Oakholm in Brookfield

On a balmy afternoon one recent Sunday, Spencer Austin drove a golf cart up through one of Oakholm Farm’s fields. In the distance cattle grazed on grass growing on the edge of the woods.

In the back of his cart, Austin carried a clear plastic bin filled with multicolored discs, free for backhanders and side-slingers who want to try their skills at Oakholm Brewing Company's new 18-hole disc golf course.

Austin, who considers himself a decent player, designed the course, a project that began shortly after the brewery opened in 2019.

“We figured it would take us six or eight months to throw in a course,” Austin told me. “Three and a half years later we finally finished it.”

The brewery saw an opening for a new disc course after Rapscallion Brewing Co.’s course closed in Sturbridge.Austin has heard reviews calling the course a hidden gem amid a region filled with spectacular disc golf courses, including Leicester’s Maple Hill, considered in the sport as the best in the world.

“People come to this area to play disc golf now,” he said.

Oakholm’s course winds up a hill through the woods across the road from the brewery’s parking lot. Austin kept the course approachable for new or casual players, with enough little challenges to keep veterans entertained. It’s known as a pay-to-play course, costing $10 for a round or $15 for the day.

“We’ve seen it both ways where people will come to the brewery, and they say, ‘I never knew there was a disc golf course here,'" he said. "But then we’ve also seen disc golfers come here and say, ‘You guys have a brewery on site, too?’”

Teeing it up at Tree House Tewksbury

If the magazine Golf Digest ever ranked 19th holes, Tree House Tewksbury, a little less than an hour’s drive from Worcester, would easily crack the top 10 despite only being a nine-hole track.

What other clubhouse serves over 40 beers delivered fresh from one of the 100 best breweries in the world? And I’m not factoring in the cocktails made with its own spirits and coffee from its roastery.

The state’s first brewery-owned ball golf course began accepting tee times earlier this summer, a little over a year after the Charlton-based brewer announced its purchase of Tewksbury Country Club.

Tee times are limited to weekdays, and you can only reserve nine holes at the time of this writing. Tree House expects to lift those restrictions once it finishes its first full season managing a golf course.

My first round at Tree House came under all sun and blue skies. Only about a half-dozen other groups were out on the course during this picturesque late-July morning, allowing my playing partner and I to take our time and drink up the novelty and craziness of golfing at Tree House.

Eight years ago, we first visited Tree House in Monson and waited in line for a handful of cans and a couple growlers, filling out what we wanted in pencil on tiny pieces of paper. Now we were hacking our way around holes named after some of those very same beers, marking what we shot in official brewery scorecards with Tree House-branded pencils.

Putting aside the typical shot-by-shot anxiety, the round at Tree House offered one of the most relaxing golfing experiences I’ve ever had on a course. We got the sense that golf to Tree House was more of an accoutrement than a main course.

The starter – employee who sends you off on your round – didn’t lecture on pace of play and course rules. We walked the course with a breezy pace, although next time I’ll take one of the carts covered in Tree House logos.

We felt like we were at a golf course attached to a craft beer theme park, passing eye-catching human-sized metal beer cans and pulling pins with colorful flags bearing the names of our favorite IPAs, from “Julius” to “Green.”

After the fourth hole, a sign along the path exclaims, “BEER AHEAD!” It leads to a trailer between the fifth and seventh holes where you can pick up what you truly came for.

Instead of a cart, this trailer provides your refreshment at Tree House’s course. You can purchase up to three beers or canned cocktails while playing, which are poured for you into aluminum cans with golf-themed labels to prevent people from bringing cans onto the course. I kept mine as a souvenir.

The course itself offers lush fairways and a quick nine that for scratch golfers doesn’t present too much of a challenge. It would play like so many other hometown courses if not for the Tree House allure.

You finish the round in the shadow of the stately clubhouse topped with a towering cupola clock. Tree House didn’t make any drastic changes inside, merely polishing and adding onto what locals had already enjoyed at Tewksbury Country Club throughout its 25-year run.

After the round, we had the opportunity to order another three beverages in a grand hall; pizza, we were told, would be available Monday through Wednesday.

We took our brews up to the deck overlooking the ninth green, a short par three, and watched other golfers, feeling the same kind of bliss my uncles enjoyed scarfing down porchetta and guzzling wine.

You can book a tee time at The Course at Tree House Tewksbury here: https://treehousebrew.com/visiting-tewksbury. Learn more about Oakholm Brewing’s disc golf course here: https://udisc.com/courses/oakholm-disc-golf-lJqP.

This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: Beyond Beer: Oakholm, Tree House find success pairing golf and beer