Nick Armitage designed his downtown Windsor craft brewery, Peculier Ales, with a baseline premise to release beers that his customers want.

Armitage recognizes brewing is a business. He can make wild and crazy beers, but people have to like to drink them.

His brewery is modeled after a Peculier, what an independently governed church parish in England is called.

“The Peculiers were parishes that focused on the community and didn’t deal with church politics,” Armitage said.

With that concept driving creativity, he pursues an independent and unique niche in the craft beer-making world, brewing a variety of beer styles, but puts Peculier’s unique spin on them.

So, it’s no surprise that Peculier’s new on-site kitchen, Comn Fare, is equally unique in the food concepts its employees hand over the counter to customers.

Peculier partnered with Windsor Mill Tavern to design a menu that would complement the brewery’s beer and enhance the Peculier experience.

Brad Nelson, the Tavern’s general manager, said he envisioned a menu that was modern yet playful.

“What we ended up with is beer garden bistro meets carnival fair. Plus, breweries are often known as being food truck venues, and we wanted to integrate those food concepts into our menu at Comn Fare, too,” Nelson said.

That four-pronged recipe translates to offerings that are fun to eat. And while the choices don’t quite rise to the level of Cooking Channel’s “gastronomic freak show,” “Carnival Eats,” there is certainly an element of showmanship of the sort you’d encounter on the fairgrounds.

What makes food unserious? It’s likely a factor of size, uncommon pairings and novelty.

There’s a ginormous soft Bavarian pretzel served with a choice of three dipping sauces, each meal-defining — pick the spicy pimento cheese spread for a starter, house beer mustard for a main, or stay-with-me-sweetheart cinnamon cream cheese icing if you’re planning on enjoying the pretzel for dessert.

There’s also gourmet Elote corn dogs slathered with avocado crema and roasted sweet corn served knife-and-fork style, street tacos, and Mex-Asian egg rolls stuffed with savory pork carnitas and cilantro lime slaw served with a sweet and sour dipping sauce.

All these provide the modern bistro twist. Beer-braised brats and beer cheese soup incorporate Peculier’s beer, rounding out the beer garden theme. On the carnival side, you can get your fill of carnival-style fried food with funnel cake fries, fried pickles and soft serve ice cream.

Not everything on Comn Fare’s menu is heavy or sugar-loaded.

A chicken Caesar salad wrap and cup of shrimp and sea scallop ceviche balances the fried options, providing choices for varied tastes.

All told, unserious food is what you’d enjoy at a brewery combined with things kids and adults enjoy munching on at a fair.

Nelson adds that one goal in designing the menu was to capture every demographic that comes into the brewery.

Peculier’s airy, raftered taproom opens onto a large, dog-friendly patio that often features live music backgrounded by a huge silo. The brewery attracts a wide swath of ages, from families with kids to grandparents.

The partners built out a huge kitchen inside Comn Fare, almost bigger than the one downstairs in the Tavern, with the plan that it will be used as a catering kitchen for The Windsor Mill Event Venue, which is situated adjacent to the brewery.

Comn Fare’s space offers more than a quick service pass-through window, although automated self-serve kiosks make ordering a breeze. But as with the variety of food trucks that have helped define the craft brewery industry since its inception, the space is multi-purpose.

In the morning, from 8 a.m. to noon, a coffee shop brews small batch LIMA Coffee Roasters beans. The brewery starts pouring beer at noon and the kitchen switches over to meal service.

Comn Fare also obtained a liquor license to serve cocktails and wine in addition to beer — and both the liquor and beer options show up in coffee concoctions.

Following the carnival theme, there’s also adult boozy snow cones.

While you’re waiting for your cone, marvel at the shiny stainless steel yet functional work of art resting on the coffee shop counter that’s used to grind the ice.

Because so many of Peculier’s beer styles are fun and playful — think of fruited sours like 3-0-Five Alive Fruit Punch and Dragon Orange Kinda Italian Ice, and the A La Mode series of ice-creamy, dessert-themed fruited sours like Blueberry Rhubarb Pie — it’s relatively easy to take a hard right into actual dessert (or cocktail) beverages.

After all, who wouldn’t agree that sipping a beer old-fashioned sounds like a reasonable alternative to being flung around on the Tilt-A-Whirl. Pulling in Peculier’s milk stout and imperial stout for double duty to make the cocktail’s simple syrup, it’s all hands on deck to make what might seem like common foods stand out in a most uncommon way.

Where: 301 Main St., Unit A, Windsor, CO 80550

Hours: Sun – Wed, noon to 7 p.m. | Thur-Sat, noon to 9 p.m. | Coffee shop open 8 a.m. to noon

Contact: info@comnfare.com | (719) 641-9545

What’s cooking: a fun mix of bistro, beer garden, carnival and food truck fare | coffee shop, cocktails, boozy snow cones, Peculier Ale beer cocktails and beer, wine | counter service, dine-in, take-out

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