Mike Witkowski
Head brewer
Mikerphone Brewing Company
Elk Grove Village, IL

The last really good beer I drank was…

I’m always drinking so many new beers and we’re always doing fun collaborations, so it’s hard to narrow this one down to just one or two. I live in Humboldt Park in Chicago, where Suncatcher Brewing opened not long ago, and they’re awesome dudes. I’ve been over there a few times and really enjoy their stuff, especially the Michigan Pale Ale when it’s on draft.

I really liked Riverlands’ Kayak pils. It’s so balanced, crushable and crisp. We did a collaboration with Hop Butcher recently, and I enjoyed Golden Trinity, their New Zealand pilsner. I had a chance to enjoy a few of those during our meetings and really loved how easy-drinking it was.

Old Irving Brewing’s burger of the week

What fellow Illinois breweries and specific beers have impressed you lately?

I’ve always been a fan of Old Irving Brewing. Trevor (Rose-Hamblin) does a great job there, and their food is to die for. And I always have to get at least one pour of Della, their kolsch — one of my favorites.

I’ve always been a fan of Old Irving Brewing… their food is to die for. And I always have to get at least one pour of Della, their kolsch — one of my favorites.

My other go-to kolsch when I’m at the store is Solemn Oath’s Lu. Their Logan Square taproom called Still Life is a fun spot, and we’ve been fans of Charolette’s (Solemn Oath’s director of operations) work since she was with us at Mikerphone. And their new brewer Dan Ray, who came up over from Brothership Brewing, is doing wonders with their West Coast IPAs.

Solemn Oath’s Still Life taproom in Chicago

What are you most proud of at Mikerphone?

I’ve been here nine years this June, and I would say our award-winning barrel-aging program is something we’re all proud of. It started off very small, and it was something I really wanted to get going when I started here. We grew it a lot over the years, and only recently have had to scale it back a bit because of the space the barrels require and the needs for the other beers we’re constantly producing, but they remain incredibly popular. Especially the Sir Blends A-Lot imperial stout, which has won gold at FoBAB and three golds and a silver at the U.S. Beer Championships.

We’re not resting on our barrel-aging accomplishments. We’re regularly tweaking the program and making sure we’re learning from what proper time and patience will do for the beer that’s in those barrels.

And we’re not resting on those accomplishments. We’re regularly tweaking the program and making sure we’re learning from what proper time and patience will do for the beer that’s in those barrels.

We also have had a lot of success with our original hazy IPAs, but we’ve managed to tweak them to make them even more delicious and flavorful, while also making ourselves more efficient and learning more about the process of hop extractions, utilizing different flowables and monitoring temperature and pH balance.

What do you have coming up that people should know about?

We have our 11-year anniversary coming up in late March and have two beers coming out that we’re excited about. First is a 13% barrel-aged brambleberry barleywine that will have blackberries and other goodies in there. It’ll be rich, robust, big-bodied and boozy. In other words, delightful.

Also, a bold 11% triple hazy IPA that has Galaxy, Experimental, Nectaron and Krush hops. This will have about double the amount of hops of our normal hazy lineup.

We always a lot of fun events going on at the Elk Grove taproom too. Follow us on social media for all the updates.