Arizona’s craft-beer story started twenty minutes away, in a Tempe creamery that became Four Peaks, and for a long time Scottsdale was where you drank beer rather than made it. That changed in the 2010s. The city now has a production brewery under a street in Old Town, a brewpub with Great American Beer Festival medals on the south end, and a handful of rooms that take Arizona beer seriously. This is where we’d send anyone who’d rather have a pint than a margarita, which in this city is a minority worth serving well.
The breweries
Goldwater Brewing Co. is Old Town’s own production brewery, family-owned since 2015 and named for Arizona’s most famous political family. The taproom sits below street level on Scottsdale Road, which is why locals call it the Draft Mine, and it pours a rotating fifteen to twenty taps of small-batch and barrel-aged releases that have won at the national festivals. It’s the first stop, the one with the best beer, and the least touristy room in the district.
Fate Brewing Company is the south Scottsdale anchor: an 11,000-square-foot brewpub on lower Scottsdale Road that pairs festival-winning house beers with a scratch kitchen and wood-fired pizzas. It’s the family brewery, the after-Greenbelt brewery, and the one where the beer list and the food are equally the point. The patio in October is a reason to live in South Scottsdale.
The Airpark and the north. The industrial blocks around the Scottsdale Airport are where the newer breweries have opened, in warehouses with garage doors and dogs on the floor; the roster changes, and the current standouts have been winning state awards. Ask at any taproom which of the neighbors is pouring that week. OHSO, the Valley’s nano-brewery-and-distillery chain, has a north Scottsdale room that’s the most dog-friendly bar in the city and runs a brunch that locals plan around.
The rooms that take Arizona beer seriously
Craft 64 on Main Street is the pizzeria with thirty-plus Arizona craft taps, and its wood-fired pies, made with housemade mozzarella, have earned a place among the country’s best. It’s the best beer list in Old Town that isn’t a brewery, and the best pizza in the district by a distance.
Brat Haus is the European-style beer garden under the trees: scratch bratwursts, poutine, soft pretzels, 28 craft taps, ping pong and giant Jenga, a dog-friendly gravel patio. On a February afternoon it’s the best outdoor drinking in the city.
Sip Coffee & Beer House is the hybrid, espresso by day and craft pints by night on the same worn couches. Cold Beers & Cheeseburgers does exactly what it says with a deep list and thirty TVs. The Vig in McCormick Ranch has a lawn-games backyard and a tap list that leans local. Culinary Dropout at the Waterfront is the big-patio group hang with a good draft board.
The Ale Trail
Experience Scottsdale, the city’s tourism office, runs a Scottsdale Ale Trail passport that ties the breweries and beer houses together with stamps and a prize at the end. It’s aimed at visitors, it’s free, and it’s a genuinely good way to see the south end of Scottsdale Road, the district and the Airpark in a weekend. Pick it up at any participating taproom.
Across the line
The Valley’s serious beer is a short drive away. Four Peaks in Tempe is the origin story and the Kilt Lifter is the state’s beer. Arizona Wilderness in Gilbert and downtown Phoenix brews with Arizona-grown grain and is the state’s most ambitious brewery. Wren House in Phoenix’s Coronado neighborhood is the one beer people fly in for. Each is twenty to forty minutes; the day-trip note has the Verde Valley wine version of the same drive.
What the heat does to beer
- Lagers, pilsners and Mexican-style lagers win from May to September. Every brewery on this list brews one, and the crisp, low-alcohol beer is what the patios pour. The hazy IPA at 8 percent in July is a decision you’ll regret at the second one.
- Drink inside in the afternoon, outside after dark. The patios are misted but they’re still patios. From October to April, reverse it.
- Hydrate like it counts, because it does. One water per beer in summer is a rule the bartenders will enforce if you don’t. The monsoon manual has the rest of the summer physics.
- Growlers and crowlers travel badly. A can filled at the taproom and left in a car at 140 degrees is a can of hot beer. Bring the soft cooler.
- Happy hour applies. Most taprooms discount pints in the 3-to-6 window, and a few do it all day midweek in summer.
The crawl
Start at Fate on the south end with a pizza and a flight, ride or drive the Greenbelt north to Old Town, go underground at Goldwater, walk to Craft 64 for the pizza you didn’t finish at Fate, and end at Brat Haus under the trees. Four rooms, one road, and the whole argument that Scottsdale beer exists, which it does.