Best Meadery SUPERSTITION DOWNTOWN 1110 East Washington Street 602-368-3257 superstitionmeadery.com Recently, we took a friend who had never tried mead to Superstition Downtown, the local outpost of Superstition Meadery. She was unfamiliar with the beverage, which is fermented honey mixed with water and a host of optional ingredients including various fruits, herbs, and spices. She left a mead fan. Superstition Downtown makes it easy to explore the different types of meads: They offer predetermined or build-your-own tasting flights, one-ounce pours that give you several sips to figure out what you like. We love the Invisible Smile, a fruity mead made with apples and peaches; the Amante, a Belgian dark strong mead with notes of coffee and cinnamon; and Tiki Fruit, a lighter mead made with pineapple, coconut, and vanilla. Best Cidery CIDER CORPS 31 South Robson, #103, Mesa 685 South Gilbert Road, Gilbert 480-993-3164 cidercorpsaz.com Downtown Mesa is slowly becoming a real hot spot for craft beer aficionados, with breweries sprinkled throughout the Main Street corridor. But Cider Corps offers something a little different. This spot functions very similarly to a brewery. There’s a patio with picnic tables, a large, slightly industrial space with lots of taps on the wall, board games to play, and tables for friends to hang out and grab a cold one. But here, the beverage of choice is made from apples. Brothers Josh and Jason Duren opened the cidery in 2017 with a recipe that squeezes all the flavor from the fruits they use, without much sugar. This means the ciders are packed with flavor, but are very different from the cloyingly sweet grocery store alterna- tives. Over the years, the menu options have expanded way beyond simple apples, to include mango and rosehip; passionfruit, orange, guava, a mix in the tropics known as POG; and black tea, lemon, and peach. The cidery pays homage to Jason Duren’s service with the U.S. Marine Corps, something that’s reflected in the decor of the cidery and the names of the cider, including Mango Foxtrot, Private Palmer, and a special release series of Cider Bombs. On a hot day, try a single flavor or colorful swirl of frozen and refreshing cider slushies. 226 BEST OF PHOENIX 2022 | WWW.BESTOFPHOENIX2022.C0M | SEPTEMBER 29, 2022
