Micro Beer Finally Comes to North Texas Tongues

shannon | July 25, 2012

Parched? You bet I am! Our central air conditioning has been out for a week, and we’ve been surviving by sucking cool air off a back porch window unit and blowing it down the hallway through the house. I have found my cool spot, much like a dog digging a hole, in the living room on the hardwood floor, and that’s where I have been sleeping for days.

Sleeping on a hardwood floor definitely gets one in touch with their inner selves, adjusts the spine, neck and innards which have become a little soft from sleeping on a comfortable mattress. It’s probably 85-degrees by the time local news ends, and with a variety of fans rumbling through the night, maybe 70 by dawn.

No wonder the topic of beer is front and foremost during another Texas July – I’ve been sweating it all out on a nightly basis, and feel pretty much completely flushed (extremely healthy) and cleansed through sweat.

So when two new craft brews, I hesitate to use “breweries,” sprouted in the past several months here – north of Dallas-Fort Worth – I was aware of them, but now I am acutely focused on them like the bottom sip in a pint glass. Armadillo Ale Works (Okay, I know it’s not the greatest name) is bold enough to actually put the Denton name on their logo, which is more than I can say for most of the bands from Denton that made it big. And they even have some good artwork to draw somebody like me into the foam. According to the website, their goal is to “get out of Bobby’s parents’ garage and into our own space, buy some brewing equipment that’s just a little bigger, and get approved to distribute our beer.”

As I am coming to learn, that last part is the “catch” to micro brewing in Texas. Apparently our Texas State Representatives, and I use the word “Representatives” with reservation, apparently they have thrown up some road blocks to the proliferation of Texas micro breweries. Rather than carry another torch in my already scorched hands, take a look at Open The Taps, and their efforts in “bettering the craft beer environment in the state of Texas for craft beer drinkers.”

The second local on the budding scene is The Independent Ale Works, and they appear to be in their infancy stating, ” Independent Ale Works is a work in progress and will soon be a functioning nanobrewery.” I love it when new (to me) words like “nanobrewery” pop up. So we are talking smaller than a “micro” I assume. These chemists have such a sense of humor! All I want to know is what these “nanos” taste like.

Both Armadillo and Independent have placed a lot of their social networking efforts into facebook, and you can certainly find and/or “like” them there. I suggest you follow these guys, and see where they weave to. If I can get my hands on something bottled, canned or otherwise contained, it will certainly be worth a followup.

PS – Our A/C is working just in time for the hottest weekend of the year. Heaven help us all.