The legal drinking age in Minnesota in the mid-1980s was 19 and minimum wage was $3.25 per hour, meaning the sophistication level and purchasing power for the gang growing up in Alexandria was severely limited when it came to adult beverages. Old Milwaukee, best served frigid and consumed quickly so as to not allow its temperature to drop below that state, was the beer of choice.
The sophistication and purchasing power did not improve much once a handful of the guys from Alex came northwest to what was then properly called Moorhead State University. The beer of choice, for reasons mostly having to do with economics, became Pfeiffer. Bottle Barn Liquors on 1st Avenue North in Moorhead sold cases of returnable bottles of Pfeiffer for, if memory serves, $4.99. Pfeiffer was best served even colder than Old Milwaukee, because if it approached anything near room-temperature the self-titled “Famous Beer” would taste what one expected skunk urine to taste like.
In fairness to beer swillers in the 1980s and ‘90s, even the best American brews at that time were nothing much to brag about. Miller Lite, Coors Light, Michelob Golden Draft and Budweiser were the usual choices. This was long before the craft beer, microbrewery revolution of the 1990s and 2000s.
Time for a couple of disclaimers: 1) I still quaff my fair share of Bud Lights, so I’m no beer snob and 2) I am by no means a microbrew expert.
But nearly three decades have increased my sophistication level and purchasing power just enough that every now and then I enjoy something other than the watery, mostly tasteless American beers. Which is why I was thrilled to discover Junkyard Brewing Co. in Moorhead. Color me late to the party. Junkyard began brewing last summer at its nearly undetectable location on 1st Avenue North (next door to Bottle Barn, interestingly enough).
If you haven’t heard of Junkyard, saying so will not offend owners Aaron and Dan Juhnke. The brothers from Hawley are just getting started and so far have depended wholly on one person telling another, telling another, telling another.
“We operate out of a little speakeasy, hole-in-the-wall type building,” Aaron Juhnke says. “We’re a real small brewery and we haven’t had a lot of media splash so I’m not surprised when people haven’t heard about us. But word of mouth is spreading pretty quickly.”
When Aaron says small, he means small. Junkyard is defined as a “nano-brewery,” meaning they brew beer in 50-gallon batches. The brewery itself is not much bigger than a large closet. Junkyard’s beers are sold in about two dozen bars and restaurants in the area (JL Beers in
Moorhead, Zorbaz in Detroit Lakes and the Hotel Donaldson in downtown Fargo, for example), but only one keg at a time. So when the keg runs out, it may be weeks before another arrives.
What Junkyard lacks in quantity, it makes up for in quality. It brews 10 different styles of beer, like Coachgun India Pale Ale, Whistle Wetter Double IPA and Ugly Ted’s Buffalo Brown Ale. The beers are bigger, bolder and full of flavor. There are no Bud Light equivalents.
“We’ve got a bunch of different stuff that keeps it interesting for people,” Aaron says.
Junkyard Brewing is open to the public Wednesdays and Fridays from 4-7 p.m. That’s when the Juhnkes offer free samples and you can buy “growlers” filled with your favorite Junkyard beer. A growler is a microbrew staple – a returnable 64-ounce glass bottle that can be refilled.
The brewery will move and expand sootn. The Juhnkes are renovating a bigger building on 1st Avenue, about a block east of their current location. The move will allow Junkyard to grow its production from 50-gallon batches to 210-gallon batches, and open a taproom where it can sell beer by the glass.
“We’re just trying to grow to a point where we can make a comfortable living from this,” Aaron says. “We’re not planning on getting too big.”
A growler, by the way, costs $15 to fill up the first time at Junkyard. Refills are $10. This is significantly more than an entire case of Pfeiffer cost in the mid-1980s. It is worth every penny.
Junkyard Brewing Co. is located at 1320 1st Avenue North. Its website is www.junkyardbeer.com.
(Mike McFeely is a talk-show host on 790 KFGO-AM in Fargo. Follow him on Twitter @MikeMcFeelyKFGO.)