Craft Beer News

Dallas' 10 best breweries for 2020 keep the craft beer flowing

Beer is the main course.

Freetail Brewing

The year 2020 has not been kind to the Dallas food & beverage industry. With the coronavirus keeping customers hunkered down at home and state laws that seem to change every day, it's a nostalgic trip to recall the days when you could drop into your favorite spot and grab a drink and a bite.

It's those days that CultureMap Dallas celebrates via its annual Tastemaker Awards, honoring the best in local food and drink.

For the 2020 edition, things will be different: Instead of a gathering, we'll bring the party to your home with the Tastemaker Awards — Virtual Edition, which you can read all about here.

Now begins our editorial series, with entries we'll post over the next few weeks, lauding candidates for best chef, best restaurant, and best rising star.

To determine the nominees, we drafted a panel of judges, consisting of former CultureMap Tastemaker Award winners and local F&B experts, who helped narrow down the list to 10 finalists, then voted to crown a winner.

One fortunate thing about craft breweries is that, despite COVID-19, most are able to keep producing — and we're able to keep buying — their craft beer.

Here are the best craft breweries of the year:

3 Nations Brewing
Launched in 2015, 3 Nations is the brainchild of Gavin Secchi, whose family owns Ferrari's Italian Villa. The brewery resides in a cool building, a former grain storage shed, in downtown Carrollton, where they're doing adventurous beers such as Crazy Pale Ale and Mango Smash IPA. Their taproom is currently closed but they have a robust curbside program where you can order online, then swing by their south side entrance from 12-8 pm, and pick up a 6 pack or two.

Bankhead Brewery
Brewery in downtown Rowlett is from chef Kevin Lefere and brewmaster Chad Moshier, who took over as head brewer in September. Moshier has been making beer for more than a decade and oversaw a brewery operation in California before relocating to Texas. Their selection is extensive with 16 of their own beers on tap, including a Belgian pale ale and a Vienna-style lager.

By The Horns Brewery
Brewery in downtown Mansfield was launched by Twisted Root founder Jason Boso, and features brewmaster Justin Meyer, following the German style he learned while training in Bavaria, Germany. The decor in this one-time gas station is classic Boso, combining vintage elements with Texana-style fixtures such as cow horns. An adjacent taqueria offers tacos on site. They're temporarily closed but you can find the beer at Boso properties including Truck Yard Dallas, Colony, and Houston.

Celestial Beerworks
Brewery and taproom in the Medical District specializes in New England-style hazy IPAs. Founders Matt and Molly Reynolds make beautiful-looking and beautiful-sounding beers that follow an ethereal, outerworldly theme with names like Illusion, Crepestellation, Odysseus, Andromeda, and Electromagnetism. The taproom is closed for visits but you can hop on www.celestialtogo.com and/or head to the taproom between 2-7 pm to buy their beers in a crowler format.

Manhattan Project Beer Company
Brewery with acclaimed beers is from husband-and-wife Karl and Misty Sanford, and friend Jeremy Brodt. who opened their taproom at 2211 Sulphur St. in December 2018. The facility has 16 beers on tap, including rotating specialty brews, plus a beer garden and space for live music. Unusually for breweries, Manhattan Project Brewing Company is open mornings: 7:30 am Monday-Friday, and at 9 am on weekends, when they serve coffee from Edison Coffee of Flower Mound. They also introduced a food program in 2019.

Martin House Brewing
Since opening in 2013 in an idyllic spot on Fort Worth's Trinity Trail, Martin House has acquired a legendary status, with brews and an approach that stand out from the pack. They've released many acclaimed beers, but perhaps none surpassed the buzz generated by their two pickle beers, released in a clever partnership with Fort Worth pickle company Best Maid.

Oak Cliff Brewing Co.
The first craft beer brewery in Oak Cliff sits in Tyler Station, a creative mixed-use complex, where it has 10 original brews on tap. Founder Joel Denton is a third-generation Oak Cliff resident who began brewing in his garage in 2007. The brewery does lots of experimental releases, including cult faves such as Mango Chile Paleta Weisse and Cucumber Lime Paleta Weisse. In addition to operating the brewery, they also operate a distributorship and distribute their beer throughout DFW. The taproom is currently closed, but you can order online.

Oak Highlands Brewery
There isn't a brewery in town more neighborhood-centric than Oak Highlands Brewery, founded by Brad Mall and Derrin Williams, homebrewers who left corporate careers to launch OHB. Brews such as DFDub and Freaky Deaky are not only highly likeable, they're readily available across the Metroplex. Their commitment to their community extends from yoga on Saurday mornings to brisket competitions to Friday night fish fry events. They're open 5 days per week for to-go & curbside pickup including six packs, crowlers, and growler refills, and their parking lot is open for tailgating.

On Rotation
Small batch brewery and craft beer taproom in East Dallas features 40 taps featuring both their own experimental flavors along with rotating guest taps that provide a little something for everyone. They're located next-door to Cane Rosso, and allow you to order a pizza and bring it inside. They're a returning champ, having won for best brewery in 2016.

Pegasus City Brewery
Pegasus City opened in the Design District in 2016 and celebrates its Dallas roots, with its name honoring the city's iconic Pegasus red horse. Their beer lineup is extensive, although they're nearly as well known for their cool Art Deco packaging design. They're plotting a second taproom with additional brewing space in downtown Dallas' Dallas Power and Light building, but for now their taproom is closed. Order and pay online or over the phone, and they'll bring the beer to-go safely to your vehicle.

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Eco Warrior News

Dallas restaurants doing amazing little things for the environment

Southwest Airlines

Cute bamboo cup from Southwest Airlines

One unfortunate legacy left by the pandemic has been a huge increase in the use of plastics — setting back progress that was being made pre-pandemic.

Plastics are bad. They harm everything they touch: the environment, health, food security, and economies. But they're convenient, subsidized, and in some cases necessary.

Before the pandemic, a growing awareness had started to snowball regarding the negative impact of plastics, particularly plastic straws and single-use plastic containers — and it was significant enough to make the plastics industry very nervous.

"In the two years leading up to the pandemic, the public backlash against plastic was a major concern for industry leaders," says a story about plastics and the pandemic in The Guardian. "As a corporate executive remarked during an industry event early in 2019: 'We need to get the image of plastic in oceans out of the public’s mind. Otherwise, we could lose our social license to operate.'"

But then the pandemic came along, igniting mass hysteria about contagion, and suddenly, bans on single-use plastics that had been in the works were reversed in countries around the world: North America, Europe, Africa, and Asia.

“Overnight, plastics went from public enemy No. 1 to consumers asking for everything to have as much packaging as possible and to be single use," said one gleeful analyst for Shell Oil, who are a major plastics player.

The urgency of the plastics situation remains invisible to most people, lined up at the drive-thru for their coffee or Chick-Fil-A, piling up nearly 250 pounds of plastic waste every year. (That's what the average American amasses — more than any other country.)

But there are brave, pro-environment efforts being made by Dallas companies and organizations, big and small.

La Casita Bakeshop cup Revolutionary compostable cup at La Casita Bakeshop.Facebook

Dallas efforts
The Dallas restaurants and organizations listed below have taken steps to fight waste, even though it costs them money.

Plastic Free Lunch Day is November 22
Dallas ISD’s Food and Child Nutrition Services will participate in Plastic Free Lunch Day on November 22, to help reduce the amount of single-use plastic in school cafeterias.

Plastic Free Lunch Day was started by middle school students in Brooklyn. The initiative was such a success that it was adopted by all New York City public schools in 2022. The concept has since spread to public schools across the country — including Dallas ISD, which was the first in Texas to participate, when it joined up in 2022.

It creates an opportunity to educate students and the community on ways to positively impact the environment, including skipping plastic. Dallas school cafeterias will replace the plastic items they regularly use during lunch with biodegradable alternatives. (Plastic cutlery, cups, and straws will be available upon request for the crybabies.)

Southwest Airlines bamboo cup
Southwest Airlines Co., the Dallas-based airline, has introduced a new bamboo cup for inflight cold beverages, and a wood stir stick in place of a plastic stick. The airline expects the new items to reduce its inflight single-use plastics by more than 1.5 million pounds annually.

In July 2024, Southwest transitioned to a paper overwrap for its napkins made from 100 percent post-consumer recycled materials — fully eliminating plastic from this service item. The airline is making an effort to eliminate single-use plastics from inflight service by 2030.

La Casita Bakeshop compostable cups
La Casita Bakeshop, the award-winning bakery and cafe operation, recently debuted fabulous new cups that are 100 percent compostable, soil- and marine-biodegradable, breaking down naturally after 90 days, and made from natural materials.

"We are always trying to find ways to be more environmentally friendly and this is a big way we can," they said in their post announcing the new cups. "We just want to be proud of our paper trail and being a restaurant it's hard to do that."

Smoothie King biodegradable cups
Smoothie King, the Dallas-based smoothie chain, previously used styrofoam cups, but began testing a biodegradable cup in 2019. They now offer it as the default choice. They're using Vio Foam, specially made cups that biodegrade 92 percent in four years. They'll still accommodate whiny selfish customers who insist on getting a plastic cup instead, but their Vio foam cup not only helps the environment, it also keeps their smoothies cold a little longer.

Kate Weiser Recycle Box Program
Kate Weiser, the Dallas chocolatier, sells its gorgeous eye-catching bon-bons in a variety of boxes, from 4 pieces all the way up to 35 pieces. (OK, they'll sell them individually, too, but who goes to a chocolate shop and buys a single chocolate?) They have a program where you can bring your empty box to the store and get a refill and get 5 percent off. (Weiser amusingly calls it a "secret hack.")

Dude Sweet Chocolate freezer packaging
Dude Sweet Chocolate, the Oak Cliff chocolatier, has a next-level campaign in which they will accept cold-ship packaging you've received in the mail and re-use it. Say, for example, that you ordered an 8-pack of ice cream pints from Double Rainbow in San Francisco, and it arrived in a box with freezer packs and a foil liner. You can drop that packaging off at Dude Sweet's factory location at 1340 Inwood Rd., and they'll re-use it in one way or another when they're doing shipments of their chocolate. They'll take not only the freezer packs but the boxes, too.

Note: Whether you're putting it in the blue bin or the gray bin, your plastic is not being recycled. The best course when it comes to plastic, especially single-use plastic, is to not use it at all.

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