Kuracali

What a place! We came as two couples. Asians who love good food, drinks and company. This place serves no food, so called ahead, got the owner’s consent to bring in food, and we showed up to test this unique place. We all ordered flights of beer and sake, and we’re not disappointed. You can feel the effort the owner puts into this place. We love new places to check out their efforts. Great «welcoming» atmosphere, a range of interesting beers and sake, and very reasonable prices. Love this place.

Chuck was a super duper dope dude!!! He holds conversations with you and explains everything from point A to part B! Definitely recommend this place!!!

Randomly stumbled across Kuracali on Unilocal as i was looking for breweries in San Marcos. Came here on a Friday night and found it tucked away in a commercial building. Since all he other businesses were closed there was plenty of parking. Walking in was a little odd since there wasn’t that many people there. However once we sat own we were greeted immediately by Ilija. I saw that they were both a brewery and a Sake place. They are definitely the first in the area that does both beer and sake. Their tasting room is kind of small which was the only downside.
They had 6 different beers on tap. We did a flight of all 6 beers. There were two that i liked the most. Their Raconteur Porter that was aged in wine barrels and the Captain of Industry which was on Nitro. It was nice to have Ilija explain each of the different beers and what goes into making them. He definitely has a passion for beer.
After drinking some beer we went to the other side of the bar to taste some Sake. Since the good ol’ state of California has some ridiculous laws they are only allowed to serve beer on one side of the bar and sake on one side of the bar. They only had 4 Sakes available when i was there. They had a ginger, cloudy, dry, and fine pressed sake. The ginger was crisp and had a very clear ginger flavor. The cloudy was sweat and tasty. The dry was a dry sake taste and the fine pressed was very smooth and dangerously good. They did mention that in the next few weeks there will be some more flavors of sake. So i am excited to go back and taste them.
Besides drinking the beer and sake it was a very good visit. Ilija was extremely personable, friendly, and knowledgable about the beer and sake. I will totally come back in the future to enjoy the sake and beer!

Very unique place. Came here because it was a sake place and not many other places have sake along with beer. I plan on coming back very often. Owner is very cool and will engage in an kind of conversation that you have.

First time but not the last. Chuck is a welcoming host, the ginger sake is off the charts, and the beer selection is a refreshing change from the over hopped marketplace. While small you won’t be disappointed. Bring your buddies and check it out.

Chuck is amazing and was so generous with his process! He was willing to talk about his brewing and was looking for feedback! We will definitely be back!

Bomb experience! It’s like hanging at a buddy house that craft delicious beer. Illiad is a super cool and knowledge in beers. Awsome experience. Will be a repeat customer.

First off this is the one of two sake breweries in California according to the owner and he was the first. The other is in San Francisco. So hurry up and go try this place out. The sakes sit around 19 percent.
They are going to be constantly brewing flavored sake so you can def drop by and continually try new things.
They are also a beer brewery. Good beers. Good range of stuff. They did not have any IPAs which in my book, is perfectly fine. They have good flavor sin their beers. Their beers are also unfiltered.
If not anything, the owners are cool people and definitely worth a drop by to chat and try what they have being brewed.
Definitely one of my more favorite breweries. They are small and can’t accommodate too many people but worth the trip out either way.

Great place! Devoted owner, excellent saké and beer. We happened upon this place looking for a stop on a mini brewery crawl – this’ll definitely warrant a repeat visit.
I don’t even like ginger, but the ginger saké here is so good! The wine-​y edge and starchiness of the base saké melds wonderfully with the ginger, for an overall sweet and complex experience.
Kanpai!

Amazing sake and nanobrewery!
Pros:
(1) ginger infused sake
(2) nigori sake
(3) no frills
(4) chill workers
Cons:
None
I only tried one of the beers, I think it was the wine barreled aged ale (or something like that). It was pretty good. It was sort of nice to be honest to go to a place in San Diego that had beer, where everything wasn’t an IPA.
The sake was hands down the best. I tried a ginger infused sake and also a nigori sake. Amazing, I know nothing about sake. But I do know that both of those drinks taste pretty good.
If you want a place that has a million options, in a fancy place, with a bunch of snooty beer snobs… This probably isn’t your place. But if you want a simple place to try new and different drinks, you’ve come to the right place.

Amazing Sakai! Amazing beer! And even better service! Chuck is the man! The mad scientist behind everything!

Great place. great company.great sake. good beer too. this is the first (and currently the only) craft sake place in San Diego county. and one of the first in the USA. try the Sake. even if your a beer or wine drinker. try this Sake. its better than any Sake youve ever had. im sure of it. what else can I say. we’re all critics on Unilocal.it’s worth the trip!

Small place that’s found on the back road b/​w San Marcos and Vista. There are ton of breweries in the Vista area so this place is a little isolated but definitely worth stopping by for a couple tasters. The beers are good but you’ll want to come for the sake. The owner, Chuck, is awesome to talk to and you ought to take some notes as he passes on his knowledge of beer and sake on to Kurcali’s visitors. I highly recommend checking this place out!

We really enjoyed the inaugural sake tasting this weekend. There were only sweet sakes available this time, but the owner is working up some dryer ones. As it was, the sweets were very good (and I normally don’t care much for sweet sake). I can’t wait to see what comes next!
4 stars this time around just because the selection is very limited (two sakes and two beers on tap). This is pretty understandable with the business being as young as it is, though, and the owner has said there are more coming.
If you haven’t been to a lot of microbreweries, just a heads-​up that this is in a warehouse area and can be easy to miss.

The saki came out today and is great. Friendly atmosphere and Chuck is enthusiastic and super friendly!

Got to try the sake that came out today. I’m not a sake drinker (came along to see a friend), but I was pleasantly surprised. The owner is really friendly and helpful and the tasting pour was substantial. I’ll be back for sure!

Kuracali is a great new craft nano brewery here in San Marcos. In my humble Unilocaling opinion, this place is a snapshot of Craft Beer as a whole and everything we love about it. This is a one man show for the most part and he is doing it all out of a love for craft beer and spirits. If you are looking for a tap list of 27 different beers or if something like mismatched taster glasses bothers you, then this might not be our stop. If you want good drinkable beer and a decent conversation with someone else passionate about beer, then come on in!
Right now he has 1 – 2 beers on tap with another one or two being made. The Saki is still about a month away (And boy I cant wait to get in there to taste some!). Saki takes much longer to make and has an almost entirely different set of rules governing the sale and comsumption verses beer (Saki is actually considered a wine or spirit I recall)… So look for a slightly separate Saki tasting room in the coming weeks as well as bottles to start showing up in local sushi bars hopefully soon after.

Excellent small bar experience. While this place is in its infancy the «anecdotalist amber» is a sign of good things to come. Bartender is knowledgeable, friendly and ready to serve. Come to this place immediately.