“I’m not interested in hazy things,” said Mike Karnowski, cofounder and brewer at Zebulon Artisan Ales in Weaverville, North Carolina near Asheville. If that puts him at odds with hazy IPAs, which in recent years pretty much took over the craft brewing world, it may also put him at the head of a trend—back toward more traditional beer styles.
For a recent special event with English beer historian Ron Pattinson, Karnowski and his wife, Gabe Pickard, touched up their tasting room to resemble a World War II era pub, and served up eight beers with recipes from the 1940s.
Karnowski is not alone. Both Dave Byer of Diatribe Brewing in Asheville and Mike Baer of Guidon Brewing in Hendersonville brew a hazy IPA. Byer said, “We try to have something for everyone, but I do lean more toward classic styles.” Baer, married to a German, emphasizes German styles: “I like to brew inside the box.”
Hazy IPA lovers need have no fear; plenty can be found around Asheville for the simple reason that the place is teeming with craft breweries. Every beer style one can think of, and probably a few never imagined, are on tap. There are so many breweries and events around that the 2024 Asheville Beer Week lasted ten days. And while Asheville is the magnetic center, there is a radiating number of breweries (more than 90) at all points of its compass.
Guidon is south in Hendersonville, as is the Blue Door Bottle Shop & Beer Hall. Tom MacConnel, who has written close to 4,000 beer reviews on the Beer Advocate website, was having a sip from one of the Blue Door tap beers when asked for his impressions of the local beer scene. He said, “I retired here for it.”
A wee bit north of Hendersonville in Mills River is one of the original microbreweries – when the term was still in vogue – Sierra Nevada. The eastern outpost of the Chico, California brewery, Sierra Nevada is micro no more, the third largest U.S. craft brewery in production. Its brewery here is a state of the art, purpose-built masterpiece. Tours are a major draw and the onsite restaurant and tap room are usually packed. Two other major breweries, Oskar Blues and New Belgium, both of Colorado, also have local outlets.
East of Asheville in Nebo is the Fonta Flora farmhouse brewery that specializes in using locally-sourced ingredients and frequently uses its own produce in boldly experimental beers. “Sierra Nevada Pale Ale was probably my epiphany beer,” said co-founder Todd Boera. “I quickly thought, this is better than my dad’s Michelob. That, along with Orval [a classically funky Belgian Trappist beer], had me interested in wild stuff from the get-go.”
To the west, Sylva has three breweries, including Innovation. “Best brewery in town,” said one patron, unsolicited. Innovation generally has 20 of its beers on tap; it also brews Paws Pilsner for nearby Western Carolina University’s sports teams, the Catamounts.
(Fittingly, Sylva is also home to the American Museum of the House Cat, an off-the-beaten path destination for sure. But for anyone fond of felines, it’s worth the stop to see an astonishing array of cat-inspired artwork and tchotchkes.)
Downtown Asheville itself is a beer crawl walker’s paradise. Its various neighborhoods all have their own vibe and breweries with one – or two – seemingly on every block. In the South Slope, for example, Burial, Wicked Weed, Green Man, Twin Leaf, Catawba and Asheville Brewing among them, entice locals and tourists alike.
Birdies & Brews
Naturally, this all sets up great for the beer-loving golfer, as there’s a ton of great golf throughout North Carolina, public and private. In the west, those looking for a private retreat can climb the hills in Sylva to the Balsam Mountain Preserve (BMP), a member-equity club with a stunning Arnold Palmer-designed course, and residential units being constructed by the David Southworth Company.
“It’s like living at a park that has a golf course,” said one resident, sixty percent of whom don’t even play golf at BMP, but simply luxuriate on its 4,400 acres – 3,200 of them under a conservation trust. There are 40 miles of hiking and riding trails, and a full bore equestrian center. And at the Summit House restaurant, a lively craft beer list to be sure.
When the housing builds out to its maximum of 354 families BMP will become fully private, but until then, there’s a dip-your-toe-in-the-water program, leaving a few open tee times available to the public after 1 p.m. Wednesdays through Saturdays.
The Palmer course is gorgeous, climbing at times to more than 5,000 feet in elevation. Harrison Minchew, who worked for Palmer from 1982 to 2008, became the lead designer for the project because, he said, “No one else in the office had the experience I did in such hilly and mountainous ground. I knew what to do, but it was still challenging.”
That’s easy to see early on, as the par-3 third hole drops some 75 feet from tee to green. It’s a thrill ride, and the course rarely lets up on the pedal after that. “Arnold, Ed Seay and myself all thought the fourteenth tee was the best view on the course,” and with the Blue Ridge Mountains in full splendor as a backdrop, it’s easy to see why.
The course is no pushover, with a slope rating of 144 from the 6,011-yard “Palmer” tees; from the 4,626 forward red tees the slope is still 130. “It’s a good course to move up a tee for sure, not one to move back on,” said Minchew. The 6,784 tips play to a 152 slope and will surely take a toll on one’s ball supply.
Players may have an easier time of it at a Donald Ross classic, the Grove Park Inn course in Asheville, where the back tees are 6,055 yards and the slope is 125. The course has been around in some fashion since 1899, when Willie Park Jr. and others were credited with a layout called the Asheville Country Club. But Ross fashioned it into the Grove Park course in 1926. (Just to keep things confusing, he’d complete the Country Club of Asheville course some two miles away two years later.)
The Grove Park course deteriorated through the years, but in the early 2000s Kris Spence worked to restore the original Ross vision, and it’s since been rated one of the country’s best resort courses. If easier than Balsam Mountain, it’s not really easy, as tight fairways and tricky, hard-to-read greens play defense on the par-70 track.
But, it’s a joy to play what feels like classic design in a compact setting, with the grandeur of the Omni Grove Park Inn and Sunset Mountain as frequent backdrops. Walking in the footsteps of players like Bobby Jones, Nicklaus, Hogan and other hacks like Henry Ford and Barack Obama also elevates a round. Obama played the course in 2010 and left behind a set of clubs on display in the hotel’s Presidents Lounge, taking note of the ten Presidents who have stayed there.
You don’t have to stay to play at Grove Park, but it’s a great pairing. A historic landmark that opened in 1913, the Inn has been an oasis for notables of all walks and the myriad hallways are festooned with their portraits—like F. Scott Fitzgerald, who stayed two summers while writing The Great Gatsby and waiting for his wife, Zelda, to recover at a nearby sanitarium.
Recover from the golf round at the Omni’s Edison Craft Ales & Kitchen, with its wonderfully diverse beer selection. One can survey Asheville’s local beer scene without moving from the indoor or outdoor seating, the latter conveniently overlooking the golf course, and ponder a thirst-quenching trip that has been exceedingly well-played.