PHOENIX unveils its first-ever branded brew with a major assist from PHX Beer Co.
If you can think up an interesting beer collaboration – i.e., a one-off release conceived jointly between two or more parties – it probably exists. Most collaborations are brewery-on-brewery deals, but there have also been numerous rock band collabs (Stone Brewing and Metallica), sports teams collabs (Boulevard Brewing Co. and the Kansas City Royals) and even hiking trail collabs (THAT Brewery and the Arizona Trail). So it struck PHOENIX marketing director Johann Warnholtz as perfectly within bounds to approach his friends at PHX Beer Co. about partnering on a magazine-branded brew this summer. “Johann came to us with a couple really creative ideas,” brewer Brian McNair says. “And we all decided collectively that an IPA was the best choice.” Ah, but an IPA with a twist worthy of Shyamalan.
“[Warnholtz] had a notion about a brown IPA, a Southwest IPA,” McNair says, noting that brown IPAs are not common, and the style is not recognized by the Great American Beer Festival (GABF). McNair’s challenge: turning the appealing idea into a drinkable beer.
Aiming to create a rich but not burnt-tasting IPA, McNair turned to chocolate malt, commonly used in stouts, which he cautiously added to a two-row base malt, with a little wheat “for a healthy foam.” His goal: “amber-colored, between an English brown ale and blonde.”
Hoping to achieve “a nice clean finish, not a lingering bitterness,” McNair used Galena hops in his boil, followed by Mosaic and Idaho 7 both as whirlpool hops and aroma-imparting dry hops.
Christening the beer “First Draft,” Warnholtz recruited PHOENIX art director Mirelle Inglefield to design the can art, whimsically punctuated with a folded piece of magazine paper to drive home the literary pun.
Finally, the brew went to press – i.e., the canning line – giving Valley beer fans a 6.7% ABV toasty-juicy unicorn that pairs nicely with chicken mole or dark enchilada sauces. “We love collaborations,” McNair says of the experience. “It’s a great way to try new things.”
PHOENIX magazine First Draft
Available at both PHX Beer Co. locations
phxbeerco.com
Beer of the Month
Mother Road Brewing Co.
Yum Yum Kitty Superhighway
Imperial Rice Ale/9.2% ABV/37 IBU
Keeping with a theme, this collaborative effort between Flagstaff’s Mother Road Brewing Co. and their good friends at Las Vegas-based CraftHaus Brewery is emerging as perhaps the most frantically consumed two-brewery beer in a summer full of such delightful digressions. Using a special patented yeast that unlocks dank aromas of passion fruit and guava, and adding actual mango, the brewers send this limited-run rice ale into the juicy-citrus stratosphere, with nary a cloying drop. Keep that I-40 love connection going, fellas. motherroadbeer.com
