Arizona is bursting with delectable modern meaderies, here are 3 of the best

From msn.com/en-us

Drinking wine or beer is fine and dandy but here's a little secret: mead is all the rage. If you're unfamiliar with this alcoholic beverage, said to be the oldest of its kind, here's what you need to know. Mead is gluten free and is made with three simple ingredients including water and yeast. The key, however, is honey, which is ultimately responsible for the libation's flavour profile. That said, meaderies are popping up all across the country including in Arizona. This is no coincidence. 

The Grand Canyon State is abundant in wildflowers that, with the help of bees, produce the sweet stuff. As mead maker Carvin Wilson explained to Wine Enthusiast, "Where honey comes from is the terroir of mead, and there's nothing quite like desert wildflower honey in Arizona." Simply put, indulging in a glass of mead the next time you're in town is a must. Arizona's meaderies brew distinct varieties and flavours. From sparkling to fruity and chocolatey, there's mead for all tastes and preferences. 

Nevertheless, this is not the only feature that makes Arizona's meaderies worth visiting. Oftentimes the meaderies provide a dreamy atmosphere, only adding to the experience. Are you in? Through research and reviews, Islands has narrowed down the four best modern meaderies in Arizona, where you can sit back, relax, and enjoy your nectar of the gods. 

Tap into your inner Viking at Drinking Horn Meadery in Flagstaff

©@rob422m/Instagram

The historical rumors are true; Vikings did, in fact, love mead. On that note, you can imbibe in a Norse-themed setting at Drinking Horn Meadery's Mead Hall. This one-of-a-kind establishment is located in Flagstaff, about two hours away from Phoenix, on the iconic Route 66. Drinking Horn Meadery presents seasonal creations such as prickly pear, acai, and coffee mead, among many others. If you can't decide, choose a mead flight. And as its name suggests, drinking horns are available for purchase, allowing visitors to truly immerse themselves in the environment.

But what's a good drink without an equally amazing meal? Although Drinking Horn Meadery does not have a food menu, their website states that nearby eateries, like Lumberjack Pizza and Pato Thai Cuisine offer delivery and can be enjoyed onsite. With plenty of tables and seating available, this place is ideal for groups who want to drink, eat, and be merry. Likewise, there are weekly events to partake in while drinking your mead, including trivia nights. 

Drinking Horn Meadery has a near perfect rating on Tripadvisor, Yelp, and Google. "Excellent selection of locally fermented mead from local and raw honey in Flagstaff!," states a Tripadvisor review. "Travel back to the past in this meadery! They really go all out in creating what I think is Viking vibe, sans the lighting," reads a Yelp review. At the time of this writing, Drinking Horn Meadery is open daily at 11:00 a.m. 

Drink mead with a view at The Meading Room in Sonoita

©@natureloverinaz/Instagram

Sonoita in Southern Arizona is about an hour away from Tucson, a UNESCO city of culinary excellence. Well-known for its wineries, this rural community became home to The Meading Room in 2019. Uniquely, this small business is run by a mother and daughter, Barbara Christianson and Kylie Daniels. Visitors to The Meading Room can expect classic and sparkling mead, as well as cider. Revered on Untappd are Space Cowboy, featuring raspberry blossom honey, and Old No. 9, made with hatch green chiles. 

In an interview with Visit the Sky Islands of Arizona, Daniels stated, "It took so much work but it's so important to us to use only fresh, natural ingredients." However, the quality of the mead is only one part of the equation. Top-rated on Yelp and Google, users on both platforms commend The Meading Room's bucolic scenery. "They have events throughout the year, but it's also a perfect way to spend a quiet Saturday sipping mead and looking out at the hills (and sometimes horses and cows across the road)," wrote an individual on Google. 

The Meading Room hosts markets, dance parties, and more, so be sure to check out their events page on their website before your visit. If you prefer to drink your mead indoors, Yelp reviewers say that there is plenty to keep guests occupied including games. At the time of this writing The Meading Room is open daily at 11:00 a.m.

Superstition Meadery in Prescott is the OG of Arizona meaderies

©@cgrimes87/Instagram

Formerly a mining town, Prescott is a mountainous Arizona gem surrounded by national history. Given its past, it might not be surprising to learn that this destination once was inundated with saloons. Indeed, the Gold Rush spirit is still alive at Prescott's Whiskey Row. In modern times, the city has become closely associated with mead thanks to Superstition Meadery. This watering hole was founded in 2012 and is said to be the first meadery in the state, undoubtedly contributing to this age-old beverage's popularity. 

Visitors who enter the award-winning Superstition Meadery will discover a sophisticated space with rustic allure where they can savour eclectic mead flavours. Popular on Untappd are Peanut Butter Jelly Crime and Straw Berry White, featuring vanilla and white chocolate. Superstition Meadery, which also produces cider, offers flights, as well as one ounce tasting cups (perfect for those who want to try more than one mead). In addition, visitors can pair their drinks with delicious tapas.

On the menu is baked brie with sourdough bread, spinach artichoke dip, and charcuterie, among other things. Unsurprisingly, Superstition Meadery is beloved on Tripadvisor and Yelp, where reviewers applaud the service and setting. "Dozens of meads of all varieties and a knowledgeable staff to explain all the differences between them," states a Tripadvisor review. On Yelp, a reviewer summarized it perfectly, "Superstition makes some great stuff." Open daily, Superstition Meadery is located in the basement of Prescott's Burmister Building. 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/travel/tripideas/arizona-is-bursting-with-delectable-modern-meaderies-here-are-4-of-the-best/ss-AA25zh1F#image=1

Miami, Arizona: Meading of the Minds celebrates one year rooted in community

From silverbelt.com

Meading of the Minds, what has quickly become a Miami staple, recently celebrated its one year anniversary. Owner Christa Jennings shared what it means to be a business owner in a flood zone, the goal of becoming a community hub, and the direction the business is headed.

Many know Christa Jennings—formerly Christa Linblad—as the face behind many new events in Miami. She is behind Last Saturdays in the Hole, Open Mic night on Last Fridays, the Climb on Second Sundays, as well as a leader on Trashy Thursdays. Whenever something new comes up in Miami, chances are she is either the sole leader or a strong force behind it. “We want more people to know about Miami.”

Using the movie Cars as a metaphor, she explained that Radiator Springs was thriving until a freeway was built to bypass it. Once the freeway was there, no one needed to stop in. Miami—more specifically Sullivan Street—is like Radiator Springs. The freeway passes by all that it has to offer. Instead, she wants Miami to be known as the place to stop for a bite, a flight, and a relaxing rest while people make their way over to Show Low.

Despite all that she does for the town, her driving goal behind Meading of the Minds is not strictly wealth generation. “I just want it to sustain itself, have it be a place where people want to come…I want to help everybody.”

She currently works a day job in the medical field as a project manager, helping offset the costs of a new business while providing for herself and her son. Many new businesses take years to reach profitability, though her goal remains simple: sustainability. With a keen eye for advertising, an understanding of how to foster community, and a natural flair for shared space, that goal feels within reach.

With local goods, live music, a revolving menu of mead and cider, and her strategic marketing skills, the business has drawn people from all over town, earning a calm crowd of chatter and joy. “I like making something that others can enjoy,” a sentiment she shares that applies to the place of business, as well as the flavours of the mead.

                               Christa poses behind the available flavours at the Mead hall    Courtesy of Trinity Murchie

Involved as a homebrewer for four years, Christa recently invested in more 16-gallon fermenters to keep supply flowing. This is welcome news for locals who know limited-edition meads fly off the shelves and who have long awaited the return of favourites. Some limited editions can take up to six months to ferment, while classics—such as the aptly named OG—take about two months. Ciders, on the other hand, take only four to six weeks.

Each of the six 16-gallon fermenters can produce roughly 65 bottles of mead, which are then split between flights, bottles, and pours in the mead hall, as well as a growing venture into distribution. Dirtwater Springs in Apache Junction currently carries Meading of the Minds bottles, and Bella’s in Superior—among others—has expressed interest as well. This step supports the sustainability of the mead hall, which Christa plans to keep running as long as possible.

Newer to town and unaware of the flood plain Miami rests in, the floods did not scare her away from calling the Copper Corridor home. If it floods again, “we’ll just clean up again,” she explained nonchalantly—a testament to her love for the town. She elaborated further, sharing that “this place is a community, people help each other.” Shortly after the flooding, she witnessed people who openly don’t like each other helping one another—the very definition of community. “You can’t find this in the Valley. I lived in an HOA and still didn’t know my neighbours.” It is in this contrast that Miami comes into full focus.

With the lingering threat of rain washing away hard work once more, Christa still keeps her pricing as low as possible. For many recipes, pricing reflects about $2 per ounce, while limited editions—with pricier ingredients—reach closer to $3. Ingredients for mead are not cheap. A five-gallon tub of honey can cost upwards of $225, enough for only two batches, before factoring in juices and other fresh ingredients that drive flavour and demand.

Since ciders are significantly quicker to make, fans should keep their eyes out for new flavours. The next release, expected toward the end of February, is called The Poisoned Well. The cider features an antioxidant-rich blend of raspberries, cherries, blackberries, acai, strawberries, and more—packing a punch of joy.

Valentine’s weekend also saw a chocolate raspberry limited-edition mead. When limited runs sell quickly, they earn strong consideration for a return. The popular caramel berry—despite requiring a six-month ferment—will eventually make its way back into rotation.

Whether you are a lover of music, camaraderie, activity, or good honey wine, stopping into Meading of the Minds offers more than a drink. It offers a glimpse of a business built carefully, by someone choosing to stay—choosing community, even when life asks a lot. In a town that understands rebuilding, Meading of the Minds stands as a place where things are still being made, slowly, with intention, and with heart.

https://silverbelt.com/stories/meading-of-the-minds-celebrates-one-year-rooted-in-community,100314

New meadery to offer nectar of the gods in Tucson, Arizona

From tucsonweekly.com

David Woods recently strolled into Cartel Roasting Co. to discuss his new meadery, Brillé Mead Co.

Over a cappuccino, he said starting a business and his hopes for his fledgling meadery, which will open to the public in January.

Brillé is inside the former Dillinger Brewing Co. on North Oracle Road. It is one of only a handful of meaderies in Arizona, and it will share a space with Mosaic Brewing Co.

Woods, 27, described Brillé on his website, noting his vision “is firmly rooted in my experiences growing up in an orphanage in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Adopted by a loving American family in 2009, I’ve spent over a decade away from my place of origin. Yet, with each passing year, my connection to my heritage deepens and widens.”

While living in Arizona, Woods started making Ethiopian mead, called T’ej, at home. Woods uses hops in his mead, along with Arizona honey, spices, fruit and Ethiopian-origin coffee beans. He ferments his meads in stainless steel tanks for three months.

He said that the meadery’s name, “Brillé,” is derived from the Ethiopian drinking vessel called “Berelé,” the round drinking flask customarily used to serve T’ej.

“I wanted to make something from home,” said Woods, who also is an engineer at Raytheon. “Why not use the platform to share a little bit about my culture?”

His 750-milliliter bottles – the same size as a standard bottle of red or white wine – will retail between $25 and $30. Woods also will sell other flavours of mead by the glass and bottle.

Mead, which originated 20,000 to 40,000 years ago, has been referenced in ancient Greek history as a gift from Aphrodite, earning its nickname as the “nectar of the gods.”

Mead doesn’t actually fit into the categories of wine, beer or liquor. It is made by using a traditional fermentation process – but instead of grains or grapes, honey is used.

“It’s an alternative to beer and wine, and depending on the day, it can be better than either,” Woods said.

                                                          David Woods (Owner) with Ababa (drink)

Not all mead is sweet, however. The flavour depends on the type of honey used, other ingredients and fermentation time. Mead can range from sweet to dry, and still to sparkling. The longer the fermentation time, the drier the mead and the higher the alcohol content.

Woods described his mead as having “a lot of flavour with a hint of sweetness.” He’ll offer varieties that range from dry to semi-sweet.

About a year ago, Shanna Nelson was working at Dillinger as an assistant brewer when she met Woods. Nelson now works at Borderlands Brewing Co. and considers Woods a friend.

The 26-year-old describes the taste of Woods’ mead as “earthy and herbal, and sweet but not too sweet,” and sometimes likes to mix it with seltzer.

“I think it’s an exceptional product,” Nelson said. “Most mead is one note, and that note is very sweet. I really appreciate that it’s more complex than a traditional mead in an American sense. I think it’s so interesting.”

Some studies assert that mead contains health benefits because it contains honey.

It’s true that honey boasts anti-inflammatory, antibacterial and antioxidant benefits. In addition, the fruits, herbs and spices that are sometimes infused into mead can have health perks.

Alcohol causes inflammation, however, and mead’s 4% to 20% alcohol by volume might cancel some of the touted benefits.

Mead also can have a positive impact on the environment, because mead encourages the preservation of bees. Climate change, deforestation and chemical-heavy agricultural practices are killing off scads of bees, so every little bit helps.

Of course, starting a business by yourself is no easy task. Woods is quick to note that he had help getting started.

“It’s a matter of leveraging what’s around us,” he said. “I’ve gotten a lot of support.”

(Submitted)

Ababa Mead.

About a year ago, Woods was able to leverage space to brew his mead and serve customers at Dillinger Brewing Co. Eric Sipe, Dillinger’s owner at the time, had met Woods through someone at the UA Arizona. When Woods proposed sharing the brewery’s space – and shared some of his mead – Sipe jumped at the idea.

“I instantly said, ‘Yes,’ with no hesitation,” said Sipe, who opened Dillinger seven years ago. “I allowed him to use as much of my space as possible.”

Last year, Sipe sold Dillinger to the owners of Serial Grillers, who have renamed the North Oracle Road brewery Mosaic Brewing Co. The Serial Grillers Restaurant Group also owns Transplant Pizza and Craft, A Modern Drinkery.

“He’s got all the right ideas, the product is great,” Sipe said. “He’s got the traditional Ethiopian style, which might be the sweetest. He’s really doing a good job of making Southwestern flavours.

“Plus, he’s a super, super likable guy.”

Sipe is confident that Brillé will be a success.

“He was literally growing up in an Ethiopian orphanage until he was 12,” Sipe said. “This is probably the easiest thing he has done in his life.

“As long as he wants to do it, he will be successful.”

Brillé Mead Co.

3895 N. Oracle Road, Tucson

520-449-6862, www.brillemead.com

https://www.tucsonweekly.com/tucson/new-meadery-to-offer-nectar-of-the-gods/Content?oid=35096450 

These 4 Taprooms Serve Arizona-Made Mead

From phoenixnewtimes.com

Saturday is National Mead Day, a holiday celebrating the nectar of the gods and the mortals who make it.

If you haven’t tried mead before – or if you've only seen it at a Renaissance festival – there’s more to the world’s oldest fermented beverage than its history.

A growing number of craft meaderies are popping up in Arizona and beyond, in an industry that has grown 650% since 2003, according to the American Mead Makers Association.

“It has definitely grown a lot,” says Superstition Meadery owner Jeff Herbert. “It’s a really exciting time to be a meadery.”

Herbert helms Arizona’s most recognized meadery, a project he's taken from hobby to career. He got interested in making mead after his wife, Jen, bought him a homebrew kit. They opened Superstition in Prescott in 2012. After their products rapidly collected awards and accolades, the duo opened a downtown Phoenix location in 2020.

Superstition Meadery's downtown Phoenix location occupies the restored Jim Ong’s Market building at 11th and Washington streets. 

Courtesy of Superstition Meadery

When asked about what people should expect when trying mead for the first time, excitement rises in Herbert's voice.

Superstition Meadery owner Jeff Herbert got interested in making mead after his wife, Jen, bought him a homebrew kit. 

Courtesy of Superstition Meadery

“The first thing you have to accept is you’re entering a whole new world of flavor that you’ve never experienced,” he says.

Much like craft beer or wine, there’s a range of mead styles, from traditional mead made with honey, water, and yeast, to metheglin, a variety made with spices like cinnamon, nutmeg, and clove. Meads can be sweet or dry, still or sparkling, quickly fermented or barrel-aged for several years. They range from a sessionable 6 percent ABV to over 20 percent.

Mead also reflects the place in which it was made. Just as terroir can impact the taste of wine, even year over year, the location and plants bees interact with can change the taste of their honey, and thus, the taste of a mead.

For those new to mead, Herbert recommends starting with a traditional style and a melomel, a popular mead made with honey and fruit. Traditional meads are simply made with honey, water, and yeast, and can accentuate the floral, earthy notes of the honey.

“It’s simple in that it’s less ingredients, but it can be very complex,” Herbert said. With melomels, Herbert likes those made with berries. Superstition’s most popular is Marion, with blackberry, raspberry, and blueberry.

For National Mead Day, Superstition offers no shortage of different flavours to try. But metro Phoenix is also home to other meaderies brimming with honey wine waiting for you to take a sip. Some are offering special releases to mark the occasion.

Superstition Meadery's Chili Ragnarok, a mead made with mango and Hatch red chiles. 

Courtesy of Superstition Meadery

Superstition Meadery

1110 East Washington Street 

superstitionmeadery.com

Sunday - Thursday, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.; Friday - Saturday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Superstition Downtown’s staff is getting into the spirit by dressing up in mead-related costumes, from Vikings to riffs on the imagery from Superstition's bottle labels. Any customer who does the same – here or at their Prescott location – will get 25 percent off any bottle or can of mead, which they can enjoy onsite or take home. In advance of the weekend, Superstition will release several special meads, including Chili Ragnarok made with mango and Hatch red chiles and Invisible Smile, a peach-flavoured cyser style, which combines apple juice and honey.

Scale & Feather Meadery owners, from left, Tamara Chaney, Ben Chaney and Amber DeGiso. 

Courtesy of Joey Tru

Scale and Feather

1050 North Fairway Drive, Building E, Suite 112, Avondale

scaleandfeather.com

Tuesday - Thursday, 4:30 to 8 p.m.; Friday, 4:30 to 9 p.m.; Saturday, noon to 9 p.m.; Sunday, noon to 4 p.m.

Scale and Feather will have two special releases for the holiday. Try the Fey Dark, a raspberry chocolate session mead, or the Knight of Everflame, an agave barrel-aged version of their award-winning Mantle of Whispers. It combines mesquite blossom honey mead with roasted Hatch green chiles and vanilla. Or, beat the heat in this medieval-inspired tavern with an orange blossom honey vanilla or raspberry flavoured mead slushy.

Owners Heather Hurst-Kline and Uwe Boer opened Celestial Artisan Meadery in Carefree in February. 

Karie Campion

Celestial Artisan Meadery

100 Easy Street, Carefree

celestialartisanmeadery.com

Tasting room reopens on Sept. 2

Celestial Artisan Meadery is the Valley's newest destination for honey wine, opening in February 2022. Their Carefree taproom is temporarily closed at the moment, but you can order their meads and ciders directly from the website or use their mead finder to locate stores, including Total Wine, that have it in stock. Taste the Tart Cherry Quasar or the Easy Street 101 Hard Cider.

Visiting Arizona Mead Company is like being in your homebrewer friend's basement. 

Allison Trebacz

Arizona Mead Company

6503 West Frye Road, No. 12, Chandler

azmeadco.com

Friday, 5 to 9 p.m.; Saturday, 3 to 9 p.m.

At Arizona Mead Company you can sip chilled meads from the bottle, along with kombucha and cider on tap. While they won’t be doing any special releases for Mead Day, they are open on Friday and Saturday, so you can tuck into their cosy space or order ahead and pick up.

https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/restaurants/these-taprooms-serve-arizona-made-mead-where-to-find-local-honey-wine-phoenix-14147916 

Superstition Meadery Is About to Elevate Downtown Phoenix Drinking

From phoenixnewtimes.com

One of the great unsung stories in local food and beverage is how much downtown Phoenix drink culture has grown in just the past few years.

Giant leaps forward have been made with openings like Sauvage (natural-leaning wines), Little Rituals (erudite, imaginative cocktails), The Theodore (tightly curated craft beer bar), and Arizona Wilderness DTPHX (brewing mastery from staple styles to experimental beers). Next month, the scene is set to spring ahead even further, and with a drink that might set Phoenix apart: mead.

Yes, mead. The “honey wine.” The boozy fluid straight out of Beowulf and King Midas and Viking longships. Mead has a bad rap in U.S. drinking circles, one that in many ways has been earned. Most mead is cloying and greets your tongue with all the tenderness of a sledgehammer made of sugar cubes. But wide-ranging Arizona craft drinkers know that mead can be restrained and eye-widening, just like beer or wine or sake.

Superstition Meadery — based in Prescott and a local craft favourite — is soon to debut a large indoor-outdoor restaurant and mead destination. Jeff and Jen Herbert, co-owners, are slated to open in the lavishly restored Jim Ong’s Market building at 11th and Washington streets, or specifically 1110 East Washington Street, next month.

“Our mission statement is to reintroduce the world’s oldest beverage to mankind,” Jeff says.

Since opening in 2012, when they rented 18 square feet from a Skull Valley winery in central Arizona, the Herberts have been doing just that, having crafted more than 300 meads. Some highlight the soul of the ancient beverage, honey, including wildflower, mesquite, ironwood, and other honeys, all sourced from Arizona until this year (as newly released canned “session meads” use Brazilian honey). Other Superstition meads sculpt and bend honey’s flavours via techniques like adding fruits and spices, or barrel aging. Just this fall, Superstition won six medals at the Mazer Cup, an international mead competition — the most of any meadery.

                                                Jeff and Jen Herbert, owners of Superstition Meadery. Chris Malloy

In a way, Superstition Downtown will shift the Arizona meadery’s public-facing locus to metro Phoenix, where the Herberts went to grad school (at ASU), and where Jeff worked as a firefighter, commuting from Prescott in recent years until retiring in December 2019.

“We have more customers in Phoenix than anywhere else in the world,” Jeff says. “Even though we have distribution in 26 states and to dozens of countries, almost everyone that knows about our company lives in Phoenix. And not just the Valley, but Phoenix specifically.”

Superstition Downtown will seat some 120 people, feature a wide-ranging mead-and-food pairing program, and have some 35 Superstition beverages when the doors open. Some of these will run through the 24 taps of the long, polished, L-shaped bar topped with wood salvaged from the splintery wake of a west-of-Flagstaff tornado. Most of the 24 taps will dispense meads, but some will pour ciders. (One Superstition cider, Blueberry Spaceship Box, is the world’s top-rated flavoured cider on RateBeer.)

                                                    Superstition's bar will have 24 taps of mead and cider. 

Chris Malloy

The new downtown drinkery has a pitched ceiling of exposed wood and rafters and, over an open kitchen, a lower overhang of ancient-looking-but-new tin. There is a lounge area of upholstered chairs and an ample patio outside. The wide-open kitchen will turn out a full restaurant menu, much from a wood-fired grill.

This food, eclectic and geographically varied, pulls from the Heberts’ world travels. Superstition has taken them all over. Their meads have been poured in places like Spain, Thailand, Japan, and a Michelin-starred restaurant in Norway.

Superstition Downtown will be, Jeff claims, the “only mead-and-food-pairing concept in the world.” Adolfo Heredia, best known for a long run as head chef at Tuck Shop, will captain the kitchen. The menu will come with many suggested mead pairings. Food-wise, there will be a tapas menu and a fuller menu. Starter boards laden with many small bites will come with, if you want, many mead pairings.

Superstition’s mead will still be crafted in Prescott, at a site removed from the Courthouse Square tasting room. The exception: a few potion-looking demijohns on shelves along one exposed brick wall, honey-light or darkly opaque meads-in-progress of absorbing flavours from oak spirals and chile peppers, fruits and coconut chips.

“We use whole fruit,” Jeff says. “We freeze fruit with liquid nitrogen. We use fruit juice. We use all different kinds of barrels, all different kinds of yeast. We don’t limit ourselves to any particular types of ingredients or process. We'll use anything available to make the best possible mead.”

That has meant spending $500 per pound on Tahitian vanilla or procuring small-batch bursage honey. It has resulted in meads like Peanut Butter Jelly Crime, which takes the sandwich’s exact flavors, or Berry White, a raspberry-and-white-chocolate mead that has scored a Mazer Cup gold medal, a mead considered one of the best anywhere.

Upon opening, many Superstition beverages will be available for takeout and limited delivery. Superstition will also be releasing its first wine, an orange wine of orange muscat and sauvignon blanc grapes.

Whatever mead's perceptions, the downtown Phoenix drink scene is about to get a honey-flavoured jolt when Superstition Downtown opens. Recently, this scene has evolved in so many directions. The next rung should bring Phoenix into truly new territory.

https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/restaurants/superstition-meadery-phoenix-downtown-jeff-and-jen-herbert-11500279 

Liquid Arizona: Superstition Meadery Carbonated Session Meads

From phoenixmag.com

Arizona’s preeminent mead maker is suddenly feeling bubbly

To know mead is to love mead. But therein lies the rub for Superstition Meadery owner Jeff Herbert and other producers of the venerable honey beverage: How do you get the masses to try it in the first place? Knowing that many consumers – especially young consumers – are unlikely to drink anything they can’t pull from an ice chest and guzzle at a pool party, Herbert shrewdly conceived a line of bubbly session meads as a gateway mead of sorts for the White Claw crowd. “These are definitely made for warm weather and should be served chilled,” he says of the canned beverages, which join his cast-of-hundreds line of bottled heavy meads. He walks us through his process.

                                                  Photo by Angelina Aragon

1 Creating a carbonated, low-ABV mead isn’t just a matter of adding water and CO2 to existing meads – doing so would “skimp on flavour,” Herbert says. Thus, he tweaks his brewing process to leave more “residual sweetness” as yeast converts wildflower honey into alcohol. 

2 Herbert adds other natural flavours to arrive at his 12 session styles. For Dune Bloom, he adds prickly pear juice to get that “beautiful desert terroir.” For Electric Sunrise, he ferments the honey with Sangiovese wine grapes to create a “pyment,” or grape-honey hybrid. And so on.

3 Finally, he dilutes the mead to reach his target 6-7 percent ABV and adds carbonation, for a crisp, naturally sweetened antidote to the summer inferno. “The bubbles balance out [the honey and fruit] so nicely,” he says. 

4 Other selections include mimosa- and Bellini-inspired sparking meads, and a soon-to-be-released mead-jito (read: mead mojito). Available online and at Herber’s brick-and-mortar Valley outpost, Superstition Downtown.

https://www.phoenixmag.com/2022/05/05/liquid-arizona-superstition-meadery-carbonated-session-meads/ 

The Meading Room offers sweet alternative in Arizona’s wine country

From eminetra.com

Combining honey with water and yeast produces mead, one of the oldest alcoholic beverages known to humans. Mead debris has been found in ancient Chinese pottery since about 7000 BC, with more examples from ancient Greeks, Scandinavians, Egyptians, and Celts.

This bold ancestral wisdom has been repackaged for the modern audience by Kylie Daniels and Barbara Christianson.

The mother-daughter team opened The Meading Room in Sonoita in September 2019. Christianson is a former Raytheon engineer and Daniels is an experienced winemaker with a degree in art from the University of Arizona. Their collective skills have created a venue with stunning views and savoury light meals.

The main building is surrounded by rolling hills and offers 360-degree views of the distant mountains. Daniels and Christianson worked hard to build a property to their liking. Almost everything is made by ourselves and all drinks are handmade in the production room.

The team wanted to stand out in the competition when they first considered starting a business in the Arizona wine region. According to Daniels, Mead was very versatile and Christianson had the skill to create interesting flavour combinations.

“You can add almost anything and create very complex flavours,” says Daniels. “We have created a” new fashion “that is a spin of the” old fashion. ” It is avocado flower, orange blossom honey, cherries, aged in barrels with bourbon and tempranillo ports. “

Their drink offerings change seasonally due to the availability of products from other local businesses. Daniels’ favourite mead is a breakfast club developed with locally roasted Brazilian cold beer. Christianson has developed the Hatch Green Chilies Margarita, which has a delicate balance of spicy and sweet flavours.

However, pandemics will test their business strategy in just a few months after opening. Like most small businesses during the pandemic, The Meading Room had to be closed and the team wondered if they were going to make it in the wine country.

“One of the biggest hurdles I had was not following the huge social media yet, so when everything was shut down and I tried to push online orders, I had so much reach. I didn’t have it, “said Daniels.

Christianson and Daniels have renewed their business by expanding outdoor space and shifting focus from the inside. They landscaped a lawn courtyard, added aisles, built a poultry farm, a butterfly garden, and plenty of outdoor seating options.

Christianson said he changed the serving procedure to reduce the infection of the virus.

“After COVID, we switched to flights, so we put them on trays so people could take them out and separate them,” Christianson said.

With all these changes, The Meading Room is increasing its production every month to meet demand.

“Within the two years we’ve created, the demand in the tasting room was so high that we increased production five-fold,” says Daniels.

We also collaborate with locals to hold events in the courtyard. They recently hosted a Chilean festival where you can enjoy live music, roasted Chile and barbecues.

Christianson said he is planning a Christmas market during the holiday season and will host local Halloween games. The Patagonia acting group will play Heidi’s monkeys at 7 pm from October 28th to October 30th. The play is touted as a psychological horror and costs $ 10 at the door.

The Meading Room has had tremendous success during the pandemic, thanks to Daniels and Christianson’s swift business strategy.

“Both Kylie and I are very creative. I like to have fun coming up with new ideas and experimenting with different ideas,” says Christianson.

https://eminetra.com/the-meading-room-offers-sweet-alternative-in-arizonas-wine-country-on-the-menu-tucson-arizona/801430/

How this couple risked 'everything' to bring their world-famous mead business to Phoenix

 From eu.azcentral.com

When Jeff and Jen Herbert bought the historic Jim Ong’s Market building on Washington Street near downtown Phoenix, sunlight filtered inside through cracks in the red brick walls. 

The historic building was constructed in 1928 and once served as a grocery store for downtown Phoenix's Chinese community. Most recently, it was a dance studio before sitting empty for years.

Now, one of Prescott's most loved and sought after drinking spots has moved in.

A brand new kitchen has been fitted and will soon serve grilled octopus, Greek sesame pretzels, celery root gnocchi and Ukrainian cabbage rolls. But perhaps the most important thing on the menu is the mead, and lots of it.

The Herberts own Superstition Meadery, an award winning producer of the ancient honey wine based in Prescott.

"When we took the first huge step opening our tasting room in Prescott, we entered this world of risk and we haven’t left it," Jeff said. "But COVID introduced a level of risk that we’ve never seen."

Now, their new downtown Phoenix tasting room and restaurant will celebrate its grand opening on Nov. 7.

What is Superstition Meadery?

Superstition Meadery started in 2009 with a gifted home brew kit in "the shadow of Superstition Mountain," Jeff says. He fell in love with creating both beer and mead and while finishing his career as a fire fighter, drew up a business plan to open a brewery. 

 

"Every home brewer dreams of one day having a brewery," Jeff says. "And we had tried mead once at the Renaissance Fair out in Apache Junction but we didn't know anything about it."

Jeff studied anthropology at Arizona State University and always had an interest in history, religion and mythology, he says, so the concept of mead being one of humankind's oldest alcoholic beverages drew him in.

Eventually, after much reading and research, the couple set their sights on ancient honey wine and started making flavoured creations at a Skull Valley winery. What started with 18 square feet of rented space and four barrels of mead in 2011 grew to a company producing 6,800 gallons in 2016 for a downtown Prescott tasting room, a dedicated production facility and a company that sells mead around the world. 

"We never really thought that it was going to take off the way that it did as fast as it did, it was like overnight," Jen says. "People were like we need more, and I was like we need more space, we are going to run out, we don’t have enough to sell. It was a frenzy so we had rapid expansion."

Now, the company is growing again, expanding from Prescott with a tasting room in Phoenix. The renovated space features two options for bar side seating, one at the wall of meads and another facing the open kitchen. A patio hugs the eastern side of the building and a merchandise room sits at the back filled with t-shirts and bottles of mead to take home.

Here's what's on the food and drink menus 

Unlike the original Prescott tasting room, the downtown Phoenix location of Superstition Meadery is also a full restaurant compete with food and mead pairings. 

The Herberts hired chef Adolfo Heredia, who previously led the kitchen at Tuck Shop in Phoenix's Coronado neighborhood. Heredia and the Herberts worked together to recreate dishes the couple remembers from years of travel, inspiring an international menu. 

A large portion of the menu is dedicated to board-plated samplers perfect for pairing with Superstition's best-selling mead flights. Boards include traditional cheese and charcuterie options along with "Boards from the Fire," which feature honey shrimp, tandoori pheasant and soy ginger scallops among other options cooked on the kitchen's custom wood fired grill.

Handheld options include tacos and a variety of sandwiches, and both warm and cold salads are on the menu as well. For those looking to stay for a full dinner, the international theme continues with spicy Asian skirt steak, Catatonian fire roasted lamb and spiced duck to name a few entrees. 

Drink options include 24 meads on tap and five ciders. Flights of 12 one-ounce pours feature a variety of ciders, drier meads, semi-sweet and sweet meads.  A specialty flight will also be available, showcasing some of the small batch and one-off options.

What to expect on grand opening day

Each dish on the menu has a suggested mead pairing that either compliments the dish or is intentionally contrasting to boost the flavours. And for those who have visited the Prescott tasting room or tried Superstition's meads before, there are plenty of new varieties coming out.

"On opening day we'll have at least five, maybe 10, brand new releases," Jeff says. "It's more new releases in a day than we’ve ever had before."

Some new releases available on opening day include:

• Pistachio Grand Cru Berry, a blend of blueberry, strawberry raspberry and blackberry meads with white chocolate and pistachio.
• Sunrise Snorkel, a blueberry coconut mead aged in French oak barrels that previously held a blackberry cherry mead.
• Aphrodisia 22 and 23, two new batches of the meadery's Aphrodesia series. Twenty Two is made with cabernet grapes and Arizona honey. Twenty Three uses syrah grapes and Arizona honey. The meads are then aged for 2 years and reach over 16% alcohol.
• Ninth Mandala, a mead made in collaboration with Moksa Brewing Company that features raspberries, vanilla, pistachios and caramelized honey. It is then aged in Blueberry White barrels.

• Black Rose, an Arizona mesquite honey mead aged in multiple Four Roses Bourbon barrels over three years.

   

  The Black Rose is the longest-aged product Superstition has ever released, Jeff says, and it comes in at 20% alcohol by volume.

  "It’s goosebumps, it’s insane. It’s so good," he says, excited for customers and "mead geeks" to try it.

  Superstition has also recently delved into the world of grape wine. On opening day, the Herbert's plan to release their new orange wine made with muscat and sauvignon blanc grapes.

  "It has notes of guava and slate, it’s nutty and oxidized, it’s tannic, it’s everything orange wine is supposed to be," Jeff says.

  "And it would be perfect with the duck," Jen notes. 

  Superstition's core products Blueberry Spaceship Box cider, Tahitian Honeymoon vanilla mead, berry flavored Marion Mead, bourbon barrel aged Lagrimas De Oro and Desert Monsoon prickly pear mead will also be on the menu.

  'To risk everything, everything is on the line'

  On top of renovating a historic building, bringing their business to a new city and creating a new restaurant, the Herbert's have also faced the added struggles of 2020 while working to open their new taproom. 

  "We did some real soul searching like everyone in the world, for lots of reasons," Jeff says. "But we never slowed down."

  Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Herberts were forced to downsize from 29 staff members to 10 over the course of three days in what Jeff says was, "one of the hardest things we ever had to do."

  But they pushed ahead with the new location knowing that it would allow them to create jobs once again.  

  During the time when bars and restaurants were mandated by the state to close, Superstition relied on online sales and to-go orders from the Prescott taproom. They offered discounts, created a mead club and launched cocktail kits with their products. Staff members interacted with customers over social media and hosted tastings online.

  COVID-19 posed a different set of challenges while the couple was opening the new location. Electricians were hard to come by. Green bar stools were even more difficult to find, Jen says. Employees at City Hall had transitioned to working remotely, which impacted the permitting process.

  "We really had to learn how to work in a new system," Jeff says. The delays set back the opening, originally planned for the summer. 

  But silver linings are abundant, Jeff and Jen agree. Now, the restaurant will open with good weather. There are plenty of skilled servers and bartenders to hire. And customers, at this point, know the masking and capacity rules and are comfortable following them, Jeff says.

  The new restaurant will open at half capacity and offer seating both inside and outside on a patio decorated with a canopy of string lights. After such a long process, the Herberts are ready to open their doors, they say.

"You could probably say we are crazy for trying to do the first thing of it’s kind in an up and coming area in the worst year that we’ve all ever remembered. It’s crazy. But I think you have to be crazy to be an entrepreneur," Jeff says. "To risk everything, everything is on the line for Superstition Meadery and Superstition Downtown."

The new business opens on Nov. 4 for a soft opening while final details of the menu are worked out. The soft opening will continue through the week and the restaurant will be open from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. daily. The Herberts plan to celebrate the grand opening on Nov. 7.

Superstition Downtown

Details: 1110 E. Washington Street, Phoenix. superstitionmeadery.com/superstition-downtown-phoenix.

https://eu.azcentral.com/story/entertainment/dining/beer/2020/11/04/supersition-meaderys-new-mead-tasting-room-open-downtown-phoenix/3681193001/