Going inside Pine-Strawberry’s THAT Brewery

The couple found that small tourist attraction towns benefited from a brewery. And we now have a product produced right here in Pine-Strawberry.

“Once they brought a brewery in it stabilized other businesses,” Tamara said. A brewery gives the community a destination and while THAT serves food, its main attraction is the specialty beer produced here in Pine, and sold all over Arizona, including other businesses in Pine-Strawberry.

So on a recent Saturday, Steve and a pair of volunteer brewing buddies met very early at THAT to create a special Mexican lager, tentatively being called “Saludos a Eso,” for the upcoming holiday Cinco de Mayo. Along with the standard 12 flavors they brew and sell in cans and kegs, they will brew about eight to 10 specialty flavors in limited batches throughout the year.

While THAT opened a larger brewery in Cottonwood to accommodate the larger brewing apparatus and amounts needed to meet the demand for their product, most of the specialty flavors are crafted here in Pine.

Steve started his morning at 6:30 a.m. on a Saturday, preparing for a brew. First thing was to get 255 gallons of water to a temperature of 165 degrees, said one of the brew buddies Mike Brandt. He and Greg Zimmerman are also hobby brewers and enjoy helping Steve with the specialty beers occasionally. The pair work for food and beer.

“Once the water has reached this temp, it magically changes names and is now called sparge water,” Brandt said. It goes into a mash ton, and through a very meticulous process grain is slowly mixed in to this sparge water, which now becomes wort and the grain magically becomes mash, and then we add the hops he tells me.

The parameters of heat, grains and hops will dictate flavor, sweet or bitter, the trio try to explain. “Basically, we steep the grain like you steep your tea,” Steve said. That ‘“tea” captures the sugar from the grain and this process will add flavor like a great stock base for your soup, he added.

“The grain steeps for about an hour, allowing the starches in the grain to convert to sugar and smells deliciously grainy and reminds you of oatmeal,” Brandt said. “The wort itself is a now dark sugar laden liquid.” That liquid is pumped into a tall kettle and brought to a boil. Here is where hops are added to create the flavor. This particular brew recipe would be similar to many commercial Mexican beers.

“After the boil is over, the wort is slowly pumped from the kettle through a set of chilled rings, cooling the wort and pumping it into yet another tall cylinder called a fermenter. Once all the wort is in the fermenter, the yeast is added.” Brandt said. “It is the yeast that eats all of the new sugar and the byproduct of all this sugar eating is what makes the alcohol that turns the wort into beer.”

This process will convert it into a Mexican lager for consumption and sale in about 45 days, just in time for Cinco de Mayo. Lagers take a bit longer and an ale only takes 14 days to ferment.

Today’s batch will produce about seven kegs. One keg equals about 120 pints, Steve said.

Most likely this specialty beer will not end up in a can, but more likely a keg and served on tap, Steve said. But a six-pack of THAT ales has led many a traveler to discover Pine-Strawberry and more.

“That happens a ton,” Tamara said. “The more people know THAT is here, the more they learn about our community, the more that come and visit.”

Giving back to the local community is also important to the Morkens and their staff. They are averaging over $8,000 in charitable contributions to local causes every year. Pine library received $2,400 last year and the Pine-Strawberry Fuel Reduction (PSFR) receives $4,000 to $6,000 annually by selling THAT beer at the Fire on the Rim event. PSFR keeps all the money. The beer is donated.

Large donations go to the Arizona Trail Association (ATA) as well — 5% of every sale of their custom Arizona Trail Ale goes to the ATA for trail maintenance and trail building. That is also a stop for the hikers of the Arizona Trail. They can mail a package ahead, with extra socks, snacks or other supplies, and pick it up at THAT as they continue on their hike across the scenic state of Arizona.

The production, the community participation and the good tasting product have created a unique business. Stop in at THAT Brewery and Pub at the south end of Pine on Highway 87 Thursday through Tuesday.