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Photo by Olaf Growald
Deep Ellum Brewing Co.
Funky Style
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Photo by Olaf Growald
Deep Ellum Brewing Co.
Unique Taste
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Photo by Olaf Growald
Deep Ellum Brewing Co.
Great Flavors
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Photo by Olaf Growald
Deep Ellum Brewing Co.
Fun Atmosphere
Butting up against its planned opening date of March 1, the staff of Dallas’ Deep Ellum Brewing Co. did not know if it would receive the approval by then to open the doors to its new Fort Worth-based Funkytown Fermatorium. The 35-day government shutdown — noted as the longest in U.S history — was the primary issue for the new pub, says Brian Morris, Fort Worth’s innovation brewer. Like any business that sells alcohol, the Fermatorium required approval from the federal Tax and Trade Bureau to brew and sell beer.
To prevent the delay, the brewery found a loophole — giving away beer — and made the promise to serve their brews free of charge. Yet, adding to the hoops the brewery was having to jump through, the Fermatorium was also battling Fort Worth’s planning and development staff — who disapproved of the mural art, requiring the newcomers to reimagine their art into smaller pieces and start over.
The unfinished wall-sized “Deep Ellum Brewing” lettering and the smaller “FUNKYTOWN FERMATORIUM” lettering — in all caps — were not in compliance with the city’s sign laws, and both were considered advertisements that required a sign code variance — which could take between 60 and 90 days to receive. During that two- to three-month waiting period, the location became at risk of receiving fines, pushing the staff to paint over the mural.
Fortunately, good news came by way of its Brewer’s Notice receiving government approval during the last week of February, allowing the brewery to open its doors on its desired date. Nonetheless, the staff still stuck to its earlier promise, giving each guest two free beers during its first week open.
“To be completely honest, we had a more difficult time getting open in Deep Ellum, but luckily, we found resolution,” the brewers wrote on a Facebook post. “We were hopeful that would happen here.”
And it did. Today, the taproom-kitchen has a full menu of Fort Worth brews and an even fuller menu of American-inspired Italian food — with a variety of wood-fired pizzas and Italian-focused appetizers.
“I think we’ve really knocked it out of the park,” Morris says of the kitchen. “We have a little bit of a Texas flair — and, really, even a Fort Worth flair — on a couple of the pizzas.”
The kitchen also serves a brisket arancini appetizer — which is, essentially, a fried risotto ball with tenderized brisket in the center — and the favorable Deep Ellum elote tots — loaded Tater Tots dressed in cotija, Parmesan, mayo, corn, cayenne, chili powder and lime — which will be the only big food item coming over to Funkytown from the Deep Ellum food menu.
The two locations were created with two different concepts in mind, he says, and anything that is specially created for the Fermatorium will remain at the Fermatorium — food and brews.
This means any of the beers at the Funkytown location will not be distributed statewide in the same way as the Dallas Blonde and Deep Ellum Lager beers — though he says the location would consider serving beer to-go if the Texas legislature ever approved.
Meanwhile, Dallas beer lovers will have to make the trek across Interstate 30 to try the Fort Worth specialty brews — of the 16 taps on the wall, around half of them are Fort Worth-specific.
The Funkytown Brown is most approachable of the Fort Worth specialty brews for any beer drinker, Morris says. Though it took weeks of brewing and months of planning, the brew is only created of water, malt, hops and yeast.
“It’s a different flavor most breweries are kind of staying away from, so we thought we should try to put our hand out there and see how it goes,” Morris says.
He has also brought forward the Panhandler — IPA with a tropical fruit-heavy taste of pineapple, papaya and lemon, which was released in March as the first Fort Worth-only brew — as well as a strawberry cream ale — mixed with strawberry puree — released during the second week of April. The newest is an American wheat beer infused with tangerine puree that was released mid-April.
“We definitely like our fruity, citrusy-flavor profiles, so we’re going to try to play around with that for a little bit, whether that’s actually using purees or getting her hops to emulate some of those flavors to kind of tricking your brain into think there’s fruit in there, but there’s not,” Morris says.
The location is ever-changing, and even since April 15, there have been many changes to the taproom and the kitchen — which, officially, released its full food menu then.
“Our role here is to push our boundaries more than we’ve ever done before,” Morris says. “That’s a different kind of work for us in a sense, but we haven’t expanded much as far as our style goes; we haven’t tried too many crazy things. Innovation is a pretty, pretty simple thing here of just brewing some things we’ve never had the time before because we’ve always been so dedicated to brewing Blonde and IPA and trying to meet the market demand of those.”
Originally working during the night shift at the Deep Ellum location, Morris says he has really enjoyed coming over to this side of DFW to serve the people of Fort Worth — and it’s not just because he gets to sleep at night.
“It’s a pretty similar group of people that are attracted to us,” Morris says. “We get a large tourist crowd like we always have in Dallas, but we are also getting some pretty local Fort Worth people within walking distance, whether it’s the neighborhoods close by or an apartment complex. It’s been an incredibly warm welcome, and we’re grateful for sure. I don’t think we’ve really changed too much as far as the atmosphere we try to provide.”
He says the 100-person seating is like the Deep Ellum location, though the room is a lot more spacious — and the Deep Ellum patio has the upper hand on the Fermatorium’s outdoor space. The main difference between the two is that the Fermatorium is a bit more restaurant-focused.
Either way, when it came down to being able to please the people in Fort Worth, Morris says it was an easy task — and it has been very rewarding to be able to see the smiles on their faces as they drink the newest brews Deep Ellum has created.
“We’re offering something most, if not all, breweries are providing already, so we’re kind of just filling a different niche. But we wouldn’t have come here if there wasn’t a demand for it,” Morris said. “Between 80 and 85 percent of our product that was sold last year was sold within 100 miles. We like to think of it as a North Texas brewery opening its second location — not a Dallas brewery opening a Fort Worth location.”
“I think we’ve really knocked it out of the park. We have a little bit of a Texas flair — and, really, even a Fort Worth flair — on a couple of the pizzas.” -Brewer Brain Morries
