Everyone’s favorite beer experimenters, Dark Sky Brewing is taking part in Flagstaff’s Lunar Legacy celebration.
“Next year it will be 50 years since we put human beings on that crazy satellite around the earth, the moon,” says Co-Founder, Nick Irvine. “We obviously wanted to be part of the celebration. Every month we’ll pick a beer and then through that month we give 10 percent of the beer sales of that specific beer to Lowell Observatory for their educational programs and all the awesome things they do there.
Irvine and his partners have been brewing since 2015 with the goal of pushing the boundaries on traditional tastes.
“It keeps us, both in the brewery and in life, excited and having a good time,” says Irvine. “These ideas come from a lot of different places. We might be inspired by another breweries beer that we’ve tasted and liked. We are also inspired by the culinary arts, you know a spice with a chocolate, a tart with a salty. And sometimes I don’t know where the ideas come from. We just have something pop into our heads and write it down on paper.”
Today Dark Sky Brewing has over 300 different recipes of beer and they don’t show any signs of slowing down.
“We’ve done 100 different recipes every single year for the past three years,” says Irvine. “We’re probably going to hit that for our fourth year, as well.”
All of these 400 brews boast unique ingredients from chocolate and coffee to passion fruit, cookies and cream.
“Our last beer was made with celery root, and that was an interesting ingredient that we’ve never used before,” says Irvine. “We do a Peanut Butter Jelly Time Beer that is peanut butter and either a raspberry puree or blackberry puree. And we have this new ingredient called Cassia Bark and it has a cinnamon flavor to it.”
Dark Sky Brewing is one of many breweries in the mountain town, but they truly set themselves apart by their philanthropic attitude and true connection to the Flagstaff community.
“We love this town. We love this community,” says Irvine. “We gave ourselves a goal of 20,000 dollars raised through fundraising this year, whether that’s supporting Dana-Farber cancer research, or for a customer that is in need. We feel that the community has given us this chance to brew beer for them, and we want to give back to that awesome community.”
As the Lunar Legacy celebration continues, we are looking forward to seeing all of the different, out-of-this-world flavors Dark Sky Brewing will come up with for their beers.
“For the month of October, it’s our Dunkelweizen,” says Irvine. “It is a very light, slightly pumpkin spiced, nice little taste of fall. So, come in and grab that one and know that part of your purchase is going towards Lowell and this Lunar Legacy celebration.”
Head over to Dark Sky Brewing and treat yourself (or a friend) to a beer that just may be as dark as our skies.