By Cyote Williams

The History Channel says beer was likely introduced in the Middle East by the Sumerians roughly 5,000 years ago. Since then, the beverage has seen its fair share of changes and adaptations. Taps around the world feature lights, darks, stouts, sours, ales, lagers, porters and pilsners.

In Des Moines, residents are treated to a wide and growing range of craft beer options. The boom started in the late 2000s and lasted into the 2010s. In 2006, the U.S. had 1,460 breweries. By 2021, the number rose to 9,247. During that time, and before that time in the case of at least one local brewpub, several award-winning brewers opened their doors and poured Des Moines residents a glass of craft beer.

We wanted to know where these brewers got their start, what their process is like, what kind of food they serve and what makes them unique. Four breweries made themselves available for interviews: Big Grove Brewery and Taproom, Confluence Brewing Company, Court Avenue Restaurant and Brewery Company (CABco.), and Exile Brewing Company.

The origins
“Des Moines’ original craft brewery,” as they claim it, is Court Avenue Brewing Company.

“Technically, I believe Raccoon River (Brewing Company) opened a little bit before us, but they've been gone for a long time now,” CABco. General Manager Bob Trader said.

Scott Carlson opened CABco. in 1996 after purchasing the nearly 150-year-old building in 1993. The building was damaged by the flood of 1993 with 19 feet of water on the first floor, but the spirit of what it would become was hardly dampened. CABco.’s impact on the brewing scene in Des Moines is now clear.

“Court Avenue Brewery was very integral in the legislation of being a craft brewery, so without what we did in the beginning, there are not 15 to 20 breweries around town right now,” Trader said.

One of those other breweries is Exile, which opened in 2012 and is owned by RJ Tursi, who was influenced by beers across the pond. A conversation with his dad convinced him it was time to get the ball rolling on a brewery of his own.

“There was really not a craft beer scene in Des Moines, or really even in Iowa, at that time. There were just a few craft breweries. I had spent some time in Europe and really had my eyes open to all the great beers that were over there,” Tursi said.

Confluence's early days came from MacGyver-like experiments by owner John Martin and high school buddy Sean McClain, who tried to craft a drinkable raisin almond beer. Through the help of another friend's parents, they made their first batch. How did it turn out?

“Not great,” Martin said. “It wasn't anything at all, really. It just made carbonated water.”

Martin eventually learned the tricks of the trade through books and magazines, and, with the help of startup money from his wedding gifts, he bought the necessary supplies to get started in 1995. Fast forward to 2012, and Confluence was open.

Des Moines attracted the eye of Big Grove in 2022, which opened its original location as a small brewpub in Solon in 2013. The brewery expanded to Iowa City, then Des Moines and now Cedar Rapids.

Head Brewer Payton Raso got his start with the company at the Iowa City location and has since risen through the ranks to be in charge of the Des Moines location’s brewing operations.

“It has been a bit of a rocket ship, but we’ve always been focused on the quality of the product. The quality of the beer, quality of the food, quality of the people, making sure that we get all of those things in line and make sure that every single restaurant brewery that we open is set up for success,” Raso said.

Taking an idea from the back to the tap
Each of these breweries has its own concoctions. While their drinks are unique to the machines they come out of, the process is different for each. CABco.’s beers are made with the original equipment the brewery was built with. This can be a challenge for Head Brewer Dustin Strawn, but he welcomes it.

“Our system has charm, is what I like to say. There is a benefit to being able to control everything myself. It's like I'm one of those musicians playing the piano, pulling a string and a symbol crashes, there’s a flute in place somewhere. As a brewer, it is very hands on,” Strawn said.

Strawn has a “bank” of ideas. Inspiration has come from places like seltzers, food or traditional cocktails.

“When I was a home brewer, I probably had two notebooks full of ideas. Most of them haven't seen the light of day. Not all of them are winners. You cast a wide net, and you’re going to catch something,” Strawn said.

For Tursi and Exile, the beginning years came with their own set of challenges.

“The early days were a big learning process, for sure. We worked a lot with my mentor on our early recipes and styles and all that stuff. He made sure that we weren't making a lot of mistakes in those first couple of years, and then, as we got our feet underneath us, we started experimenting,” Tursi said.

Tursi and the other breweries are similar in making sure they brew the correct amount for a new beer. Some beers are specialties and limited-time releases, while others could go on to become one of the brewery's staples.

“It depends on what we want that beer to be. Do we want it to just be a taproom release and on draft? Do we want it to be a wider draft release? Do we want it to be a limited release in a package, or do we want this to be seasonal or have this going all year round? Depending on which one of those you're looking at, the process is going to be more or less intense,” Tursi said.

John Martin has a spreadsheet with ideas he tinkers with from time to time. He says they have come from different people over the years.
“I really didn't know much about Belgian beers, but other people here wanted to brew those. So, you say, let's research that and figure out how to make an authentic Belgian Quad or a Dubbel,” Martin said.

Last year alone, Confluence brewed more than 105 different beers.

“It starts with an idea, and then you just flesh it out and keep working on it. Some of these recipes are a little tougher than others,” Martin said.

Raso at Big Grove says they like finding holes in what the beer supply looks like in the area.

“We're looking at what's missing in the market, or, conversely, what is the market really liking that we haven't made yet? How can we jump on something like that?” Raso said.

Since Big Grove has multiple locations, each with different brewing capabilities and staff, a lot of collaboration happens, from the ideas to the size and scale in which they want to brew a beer.

“I'm nowhere near the size of Iowa City’s (location), but I'm significantly larger than Solon in terms of how many or how much beer I can produce at one time. Also, my equipment here is a little closer to Iowa City’s,” Raso said. “There are a lot of open dialogs. Very rarely is the word ‘no’ ever said. If I have an idea, I'll pitch it. And, usually, the response is, ‘Yeah, go for it. That sounds awesome.’ ”

Pour me a glass
The ideas and experimenting are aplenty, but what do each of these breweries do best?

CABco. says two of their beers come to mind when posed this question. Siesta, their Mexican lager, and Pointer Brown, an English brown ale, are fan favorites. The CABco. team says they will be entering Pointer Brown into the World Beer Cup this year.

Speaking of Mexican lagers, Exile is putting their version, “Maria,” into its permanent rotation. The beer started out just inside of the restaurant, but Exile customers made their voices heard. After conversations with Fiesta Mexican Restaurant, a favorite of Tursi’s, they asked if Exile could brew them another batch. Tursi agreed, much to the restaurant's enjoyment. He says Fiesta helped them with the branding of Maria as well. Exile’s current and longstanding favorite is “Ruthie,” a gold lager.

“We're hoping we can do what we did with Ruthie, with Maria. I think the reason why we've had so much success with Ruthie is because Ruthie brought in non-craft beer drinkers, people who weren't previously craft beer drinkers that tried Ruthie and made it their go-to beer,” Tursi said.

For Confluence, Des Moines IPA is their staple. Martin says he has been making the beer as a home brewer since 2006. Other beers he mentioned like their Capital Gold and Farmer John were also homebrews.

“I had a footprint already as a home brewer, and I just developed it into a large-scale batch. And then after that, it was just like, what else?” Martin said.

Big Grove’s Easy Eddy, a New England hazy IPA, has a large fanbase across the state. One of their more recent creations that has been gaining popularity is the Citrus Surfer, a citrus wheat beer that Raso helped develop.

“The concept a couple of years ago was, how do we make a really good American wheat beer that is drinkable all year round, but especially crushable in the summer? You don't have to bring a knife and a bunch of citrus fruit with you when you're drinking it. You can just crack it, and it's all in there with you,” Raso said.

Raso said Big Grove brewed several different test batches with different fruits, put them on their tap line, and had guests give them a try. He added that another Big Grove brewer, Keaton Scott, also had a big hand in the development.

Fill my plate
Aside from Confluence, each of these breweries also has a kitchen. While each one of these breweries has a major dedication to the brewing operations, the kitchens kick out fantastic meals, too.

CABco. recently underwent a large change with its menu. One of the things that has not changed, though, is their approach to food, even with how the pandemic affected the food service industry.

“There are very few things that we don't make in-house. We make our own focaccia bread. We're making our own pizza dough. We make our own sauces. We make all of our dressings. Nothing's getting brought in and just poured out into a pan. Everything's got a recipe. Everything's unique to us,” Trader said.

Trader and Strawn agree that the wings at CABco. are worth a try and receive praise from locals to travelers.

Exile’s menu has grown over the years. What was once a small menu is now full-sized. When they release a special menu item, they keep track of how it has sold to potentially add to the next menu.

“Our burgers are the most popular thing that we have down here by far, and we grew our burger and sandwich selection quite a bit over the years,” Tursi said. “At this point, we don't change the menu too much, like maybe an item or two a quarter. We try to get that creativity on those monthly specials.”

With Big Grove having multiple locations, the menu stays mostly the same across each — but there is some diversity. Their most popular menu items, though, like the Giant Pretzel, can be found at each location.

“As a company, we’ve come up with kind of a recipe Bible that all of the locations can use or sort of riff on, but we have certain things that are going to be on every menu. If you go to Big Grove and you want a giant pretzel, we’ve got a giant pretzel for you,” Shauna McKnight, taproom marketing manager, said.

McKnight says the big three for Big Grove are the giant pretzel, the tap house burger and the tuna poke bowl.

Confluence does not have a kitchen. It’s something Martin and his wife have discussed over the years. An unconventional addition could happen in the future, but there are no certainties in place.

“It just keeps coming back to, let's not do food. We already have three businesses. Retail, production, sales and distribution. I'll say this. I think our business would do better if we had a really nice kitchen or something. I did save space up adjacent to the tap room for more retail. So, at some point, we might do more retail. I like making sourdough, and I think that would be fun to have a sourdough bakery. We could do pizzas,” Martin said.

What makes these breweries unique
Each of these breweries has its own way of doing things, from how they opened their doors, the beers they craft and the food they cook.

For CABco., uniqueness is built into the walls. With a 144-year-old building located downtown, it is challenging to find a more historic location to have a drink in Des Moines.

“We're focusing on our neighborhood. We want to be the place to go for people downtown. We want to hold on to who we are and hold on to the history of who we are but still keep moving forward, which is a very tough balance. You don't want to be a place that's stuck in time, but you also don't want to lose your history,” Trader said. “When you go out to eat, six months later, if I talk to you about it, you probably couldn't tell me what you ate or what you drank or how much it cost, but you do remember if you had a good time or a bad time. It's the experience, the vibe, the people that really sell the place, and that's our focus.”

Tursi separates what makes Exile unique in two.

“I would say that, on the brewery side, it's the lager beers. Then on the taproom and restaurant side, it's got to be hospitality service. You're never going to order off a QR code at Exile. You're never going to be asked to pull up the menu on your phone,” Tursi said.

With Confluence, Martin says it’s the people who make a difference.

“People work here because they love beer, and I think they love Confluence, too. I think they like working here, but they work here because they're passionate about beer, and they do the little things every day that you take care of to try to make that beer the best it can be,” Martin said.
The opportunities and his coworkers at Big Grove sprung to mind for Raso.

“I'm going to steal a quote from the owner of Lua (Brewing) when asked that same question about Big Grove. We just have the best damn people in the industry, and we consistently try and go out and find the best people in the industry, or we build the best people in the industry. Our retention rates are really high, especially on the brewing and kitchen side. The opportunities for growth here are huge. I think it fosters a lot of that passion, and that makes this type of work a career,” Raso said.