AZ Beer Week 2015
Ah, mid-February in Arizona.
The birds are chirping, the sun is shining, it’s around 80 degrees, and
everyone’s thoughts turn to love…of craft beer, that is!
Whee!
For one week (although it’s been expanding a few days longer
each year, it seems), Arizona celebrates local craft beer and brewing with a
slew* of events, including festivals, tappings of rare and unique brews, beer
pairing dinners, and other random gatherings geared at the craft beer
enthusiast. This is our third year
celebrating AZ Beer Week, and I thought I’d share what we’ve been up to over
the past 10 days or so.
Thursday, February 12th
We started Beer Week 2015 at our closest craft brewery (and
one of the newest in AZ, as well), Dubina Brewing. We’ve been to Dubina a handful of times since
they opened about six months ago,** and we’ve consistently been impressed with
their friendly staff, solid food and beverage offerings, and innovative spirit
that extends to all parts of the operation.
Dubina continues to upgrade their physical location at the corner of 67th
Avenue and Bell Road, notably adding a lounge area; they’ve also upgraded their
brewing system recently, thanks to some help from the folks at AZ Wilderness in
Gilbert.
The reason we headed to Dubina was due to the release of
their newest brew, their nitro milk stout.
Stouts, and milk stouts in particular, have to be one of my favorite
beers, and adding nitro to the equation only enhances my delight in a pint.*** While we were there, we also ate dinner,
ordering some favorites (their bruschetta and their chicken wings, covered in
their delicious hop sauce) and trying some newer (to us) items as well (the
bratwurst on a pretzel bun, which came with waffle-cut French fries). Chris also tried a pint of their new “Jade in
the USA” IPA (made with Pacific Jade hops) and an old favorite of his, their
“What Gose Up.” Everything was
outstanding!
Delicious!
Friday, February 13th
On Friday evening, we headed to a new (to us) location known
for craft beer and artisan coffee, Ground Control, in Litchfield Park. The folks from a great Flagstaff brewery,
Mother Road, were doing a “tap takeover” at Ground Control, and several of
their offerings were available. We ate
dinner at home before we went,**** but the food at Ground Control looked great
(we did end up splitting an appetizer of artichoke dip, and it was good); we’ll
have to schedule a dinner there in the near future.
As far as the beer list went, it was fantastic. Ground Control’s motto is “no crap on tap,”
and they certainly lived up to it. In
addition to the Mother Road offerings, the tap list featured Alesmith (San
Diego), Historic (Flagstaff), Avery (Boulder), Founders (Grand Rapids), and
many other notable craft options; while there were 20-30 taps on hand, the
restaurant also featured two coolers filled to the brim with bottles as
well. Our favorites of the evening were
both by Mother Road: Wooden Spokes #6,
an American pale, and Blonde Mother’s Milk, a blonde coffee milk stout.*****
My Wooden Spokes with
the Mother Road tap list
Saturday, February 14th
Saturday came along with the biggest event of AZ Beer Week,
the Strong Beer Festival. This is our
third year attending the Festival, and each year, it grows bigger and
better. In 2015, over 120 different
craft breweries were offering tasters, about half of those consisting of local
Arizona brewers. In past years, we’ve
attended with some different folks, but always our friend Jake, and this year, we
were excited that his wife Keeli would also be able to come; additionally, our
friend Matt and his wife Kristie were also joining us, so we had a fantastic
group!
Because the event is the Strong
Beer Festival, breweries bring out their high ABV (Alcohol By Volume)
options, most averaging in the 10% area, and we normally create a plan to
ensure we take in dinner and a movie before we try to drive home. This year, however, we had the thrilling
prospect of our own Designated Driver, as Kristie valiantly volunteered to
chauffer all of us home afterward.******
For the second year in a row, we purchased VIP tickets when
they went on sale months earlier, and this allowed us extra time to get in and
enjoy the Festival before the main gates opened. Although the VIP tickets are a bit pricier,
we find that they’re worth it; they also include other benefits like a free
lunch, a secured seating area away from the crowds, and a private set of
restrooms (well, private port-o-let’s).
As always, the Strong Beer Fest was fantastic; each brewery
seems to try to outdo the others, and the offerings are generally interesting
and flavorful. Like at any beer fest, we
had a few duds, but thankfully, they were few and far between. We headed out around 3pm, a few hours before
the doors closed, completely satisfied with our afternoon.
Jake and Keeli at
Strong Beer Fest
Monday, February 16th
Okay, so no official AZ Beer Week events on this day, but I
did make a lamb and beer stew for dinner with the local-est brew of all – our
own Hair of the Dog AZ Blue’s Sweet Stout!
It was delicious, if I do say so myself, and I’ve been eating it for
lunch for the rest of the week.
Blue!
Wednesday, February
18th
On Wednesday, we attended our first beer pairing dinner of
the week, at Wild Game, a local sports grill that specializes in unique food
offerings – nothing too crazy, though – things like rabbit sliders and wild
boar bacon. Wild Game paired up with
Mike Hess Brewing, a small craft brewer in San Diego,******* and Hess’
representative Mark was on hand to explain the beer and give us information on
the brewery. Some of the pairings were
more successful than others (the pairing highlight for me was the BBQ rabbit
slider with poblano slaw paired with the Claritas Kolsch-style brew), but all
of the food offerings were solid and the staff at Wild Game was wonderful.
To be said in a
Highland brogue: “oooh, bunneh.”
We really enjoyed the five beers we tasted from Hess,
although the standouts were the Kolsch and Umbrix, their imperial stout. Also good was the Solis Occasus, their west
coast IPA. We had the opportunity to try
batch #36 of the Solis, which was brewed to feature Amarillo and Simcoe hops;
according to Mark, Hess brews a new batch of Solis every few weeks and when
they do, they throw in a new combination of hops to see what flavors might
emerge. Cool idea, right? We’ll absolutely check out Hess the next time
we’re in San Diego, as their facility and tasting room seem like a great place
(from the pictures we saw), and if everyone is as nice as their rep Mark, they
should continue to do well.
Salut!
Thursday, February 19th
Another Thursday found us back at Dubina to taste more
special tappings, this time the West Valley collaboration saison and Dubina’s
barleywine. The saison was created as a
collaboration between a bunch of different west side breweries, including
Dubina, Peoria Artisan, Freak’n, Saddle Mountain, and 8 Bit (still working on
opening), and it was made with local lemon zest and oranges found near the
breweries. Overall, the saison was quite
good and the citrus flavors were well showcased.
Unfortunately, the barleywine didn’t quite live up to the
saison. The barleywine started out super
sweet and finished with some bittering that attempted to balance out all of the
sugar but didn’t completely succeed. In
speaking with the folks at Dubina a few months ago, they were really working to
have the barleywine come out with a super high ABV – around 16-18%. The eventual ABV was more like 13-14%, so we
think the overly sweet flavor of the brew might have been due to a yeast that
just couldn’t chew its way through all of the malt shoved into the brew. Unfortunately, they can’t all be stars;
however, we trust the folks at Dubina to make good beer, and we’ll absolutely
be back again soon!
Sunday, February 22nd
To celebrate the final day of Beer Week, we headed back to a
place I mentioned on the blog just a few months back: Gertrude’s, the restaurant at the Desert
Botanical Garden. Gertrude’s was offering
a beer pairing brunch, matching their delicious fare with brews from not just
one local brewery but three of the better known ones in this area, Four Peaks,
Papago, and SanTan. While we’d already
tasted the beer offerings many times each, we still wanted to try the brews
with the food being offered, as well as have a relaxing brunch in the beauty
that surrounds Gertrude’s.
The fountain in the courtyard at Gertude's
Truly, it was lovely. The food and beverage pairings were really on point - a fennel & arugula salad with Papago's Orange Blossom, a white shrimp ceviche with SanTan's Epicenter, and finally, an oatmeal biscuit brisket benedict with Four Peaks' Oatmeal Stout. Other than serving the stout at a lower temperature than they should have (very common, unfortunately), the food and beer were all great; of course, the setting is amazing, too, and we truly enjoyed the peace and quiet, as well as the outstanding weather we're currently having.
Overall, we thoroughly enjoyed our time during AZ Beer Week! We had great experiences hanging out with
friends and drinking amazing beer – some of our old favorites and some brand
new to us as well.
Later!
Amy
* A highly technical
term.
** The bartender, Dan,
now recognizes us. We might be
considered “regulars” at this point.
*** Most beer is
carbonated through a tap using carbon dioxide.
However, some brewers will carbonate their beers with nitrogen instead,
which produces a thick, foamy head when poured into a pint. Guinness is the best example of this, and I
think the flavor of a milk stout really works well with this technique. Left Hand (based in Longmont, Colorado) also
has great success with this on their milk stout. So many noms.
**** Trying to
minimize costs, as this was a lot of eating out for us.
***** How it’s the
color of a lager and has the taste of a coffee stout is mind-boggling to
me. MIND-BOGGLING.
****** Seriously,
she’s the bomb. I can’t imagine handling
all of us after that.
******* Um, guys, it’s ARIZONA Beer Week. Eh, we’ll drink good beer from anywhere. We’re not picky.
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