I've been doing a lot of traveling, half of it's been for work, the other half for family. A couple weeks ago I went to Arizona for a family trip and I was able to stop at a couple breweries on the way home. I didn't make the journey in order to try new beer so I don't have a lot of great information about the breweries, the beers, the brewers, etc. I was simply passing through quickly and I took some photos and a couple notes.
I found myself in Scottsdale, Arizona, which for me was actually kind of an exciting place. We drove past hills and mountains covered in cacti that were 20+ feet tall, the
Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art was a great art venue, there were all sorts of plants and animals that I haven't seen before, quail running around everywhere. But, on the bad side, mostly everything was in a strip mall, a very Southern California flavor, and I
read here that Scottsdale has the highest concentration of pollution in the air, above Los Angeles and Bakersfield. Yikes!
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| Papago Brewing |
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| Inside Papago is a cozy pub atmosphere, thirty taps, and a fridge full of bottles |
Anyway, I was able to stop at a little place called
Papago Brewing. There's not too many beer places in the city, and people had recommended that I actually go to Four Peaks Brewing, but after seeing Papago's ranking on Rate Beer I decided to go there. Besides, later that night I happened to drive by Four Peaks and it looked like the kind of chain Sports Bar/Restaurant that I try to avoid. Papago contracts their brewing out of two breweries, one in Phoenix and Oak Creek Brewing in Sedona. They had 30 beers on tap, many that I haven't seen in Colorado Springs, such as Bear Republic's Imperial Belgian Rye IPA, Green Flash le Freak, and a Ballast Point Imperial IPA. I ordered a number of Papago Samplers. They switch their beers out with every keg, so they don't even have their own normal line up although they do have a couple beers that are on more regularly than others. I like this model for a brewery.
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| Samples at Papago Brewing |
This brewery was really fantastic, the beers were experimental and a lot of fun to drink. The most style bound beers were the tasty Belgian Strong Ale with notes of orange and banana, and the El Robusto which was a Porter with light roast and a thin body. They also had a Coconut Coffee Stout that was delicious, a Vanilla Mandarin Wheat which was refreshing but a little too Fruit Loopy to me, an Irish Coffee Milk Stout and a fantastic Barleywine, super cloudy appearance, aged in rye whiskey barrels, strong on citrus hops, with a bitter and dry finish. I really enjoyed these beers because there was a range of the normal to the not-so-normal. Some of the beers were crisp and clear in appearance, others were cloudy and thick, some were restrained, others were playful. I enjoy a brewery that plays around like this.
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| Beaver Street Brewery |
A few days later I found myself at
Beaver Street Brewery in Flagstaff, Arizona. The town was really cute and we were staying at a really great, cheap little hostel about two blocks away. I ordered a pint of the Cascadian Dark Ale because, hell,
I'm from Cascadia and I like to see how these CDA's compare to the homeland CDA's. Also, I find it really interesting when a brewery that isn't in the Pacific NW comes to call their beer a CDA and not a Black IPA.
