Alto Cinco has been a favorite neighborhood Tex-Mex joint for more than 15 years. It offers extremely fresh and innovative dishes like the catfish burrito, shrimp and black bean pizza, and staples like tacos, homemade salsa and guacamole. But what may surprise many people are the five rotating taps of local, regional and national craft beers.

The restaurant supports local beer and usually has one or two brews like Southern Tier (N.Y.), Sly Fox (Pa.) or Dogfish Head (Del.) on rotation at once. Alto Cinco recently hosted a tap takeover with Dogfish Head, meaning all five taps had guest kegs of Dogfish Head’s award-winning, off-center brews. This week’s selection is a jaw-dropper of harder-to-find and extremely high-rated brews from across the nation.

Following the seasons and new releases, Alto Cinco has Great Divide’s (Colo.) Oak Aged Yeti, an Imperial Stout (9.5 percent alcohol) aged on oak chips. This is a robust and alcoholic stout with great vanilla sweetness and roasted coffee notes. Next is Sierra Nevada’s (Calif.) Tumbler Autumn Brown Ale (5.5 percent alcohol) with its roasted and mildly smoky caramel and nuttiness. For variety, the restaurant also offers Firestone Walker’s (Calif.) Nectar IPA (6.8 percent alcohol), with a mildly piney and citrusy nose and a whopping 60 International Bittering Units. These units, or IBUs, measure hop presence in beers. Beers with less than 20 IBUs have little to no hop presence, while 20-45 is the most common range. More than 45 IBUs denote heavily hopped and quite bitter beers.

Keeping with the theme of heavy winter beer, Alto Cinco also has Southern Tier’s (N.Y.) 2X Stout (7.5 percent alcohol), featuring sweet milk chocolate flavors rather than strongly roasted coffee bitterness. It’s a good option for drinkers wanting to try a high quality, entry-level stout. Lastly, Alto Cinco throws a curveball with Sly Fox’s (Pa.) O’Reilly’s Irish Stout (3.6 percent alcohol). Typical of UK and Irish session beers, it has low alcohol content and a light mouthfeel — a descriptor for density — with mild chocolate and coffee notes. It’s a good example of the style, but it’s not extremely popular domestically.

The best part of the five rotating taps is Alto Cinco’s introduction of growlers, 64-ounce glass jugs for at-home consumption of its delicious draught beer. Alto Cinco started selling growlers in August, part of its busiest season.The bar is usuallypacked, so being able to take out food with some great beer makes sense, said one bartender. Go try one for yourself, but remember: Open a growlerwithin 7-10 days and consume the beerwithin 1-2 days after opening it. Alto Cinco’s cost is $5 for a glass growler and $12-$15 for the fill. See youat Alto Cinco. Cheers!

—Compiled by Lucas Sacks, staff writer, ldsacks@syr.edu