USA, IA: Wing Nutt Brewery planning to open taproom in Altoona

The city of Altoona is about to get a little nutty with the Wing Nutt Brewery planning to open a taproom in the city, The Des Moines Register reported on February 18.

Construction has begun on Altoona’s first brewery at 480 Center Place in Altoona, with plans to open as soon as this spring.

The idea of Wing Nutt was formed in August 2014 when Art Schramm, Andrew Frana and Molly Frana got together after Andrew and Schramm met at an Iowa Home Brewers Union meeting.

“One of us said we should have a brewery in Altoona and that is kind of how the whole thing started,” Schramm said.

“We talked about it half-jokingly and then every time we talked about it we got more serious,” Andrew said.

At the time Schramm was unaware that Andrew’s wife, Molly, also brewed. Now she is the head brewer of the Wing Nutt Brewery.

Molly’s background is in food science and she currently works with quality assurance.

“When Andrew and I met we decided to both start brewing together about six years ago,” Molly said.

Molly said that the brewing community has been really accepting and supportive of her and the Wing Nutt Brewery.

The trio started out by home brewing some interesting flavors. Unable to sell their product, they would produce their concoctions and give the drinks to friends. They attended AltoonaPalooza and handed out samples of their product.

Wing Nutt then decided it was the right time to find a location to brew and sell their beers.

“We talked with a lot of professional brewers before we started to have them talk us out of it and it didn’t work,” Andrew said.

The first step was getting their federal and state license to sell their beer.

“Once you turn in the federal licensing you lose connection with it so you have to hope it gets approved,” Andrew said.

They didn’t have any problems with getting their license, though, being approved on the first try.

Now the three of them are working to get their taproom ready to brew and sell to the consumers.

“There appears to be a definite uptick in excitement,” Schramm said. “We have been doing a lot of things lately to get the word out.”

The excitement is not only for the brewery being the first to grace the city of Altoona but also for the group’s unique flavors.

“We are definitely going to have a little bit of everything. We think what makes us different is we try to take more of the classic styles and give a little bit of a spin on them,” Molly said. “It goes along with our name as well we want to be different than everybody else.”

The trio uses their love of cooking to play with the flavors they put into their beer. One of their popular flavors is a lime infused wheat beer.

“We want to take a beer you would drink somewhere else and put a completely different spin on it,” Andrew said. “We will take a wheat beer and add a fruit or spice or herb.”

With a combined nearly 20 years of experience the group is ready for their taproom to be completed and to open.

“Once people found out what we were doing I think the support was there. We didn’t think the support was there until we started going to these local tastings and getting the feedback,” Andrew said. “It has been pretty cool to see the community embrace this.”

19 February, 2016