This week we're looking into the increasingly popular realm of collaboration beers, specifically those between well-known and talented home brewers and an established commercial brewery.
In August, local Davie homebrewer Corey Artanis joined up with the Mack House to produce a star fruit and pink peppercorn saison, among other brews. The aspiring brewer has made a name for himself through local homebrew competitions, festival exhibitions including this years' Hunahpu's Day, and just being an all around nice guy giving away gallons of his culinary creations.
See also: Florida Beer: Maple Orange Imperial Caramel Cream Ale From Due South Brewing
"Corey always brings his bottles in for us to try at The Mack House during bottle shares," the Mack House's brewer Justin Miles told us, "and people loved the brews. Him and [Mack House front of house manager] Kyle [Hatfield] were talking one night and the idea for a collaboration just came up and we ran with it."
With a solid saison recipe foundation, the brewers decided to put together a couple of treatments, giving different flavors by manipulating what goes on in the secondary part of fermentation.
"I think it will be interesting for people to see how two different treatments change the beer."
This is a beer with a gathering of flavors: aromatic tropical fruit (not very citrusy though, more like mango and, naturally, star fruit) and a hint of spice on the nose. The flavor is quite juicy with some mild esters (a kind of pear-like flavor compound) but ends with some straight-up pepper and bitterness. The pepper really lingers after you drink, and it's one of the more apparent features of this brew. It's a combination of flavors that mix in a way where they work, somehow, even if they're on opposite ends of the spectrum... on second thought, maybe that's why it seems to work.
"I had fun," Artanis shared. "It's always nice brewing with other brewers. You get to bounce ideas off each other, share techniques and different tricks of the trade."
If it's lasted, of which recent Mack House produced beers have not for very long as of late, you can find the star fruit pink peppercorn saison on tap at the Mack House in Davie.
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Doug Fairall is a craft beer blogger who focuses on Florida beers and has been a homebrewer since 2010. For beer things in your Twitter feed, follow him @DougFairall and find the latest beer pics on Instagram.
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