Joey Cardaccio, service manager at Slackwater Sandy, joins Utah Beer News for another episode of our 3 Beers with Joey video series.

Each month, Cardaccio will chat with us about three new or noteworthy beers worth checking out. Here are the three beers selected for April 2021:

• Solarized Yuzu Double IPA (Odell Brewing Co.)
• Barrel-Aged Pentagram Dark Sour (Surly Brewing Co.)
• Quarantine Dreams Hazy Double IPA (Revision Brewing Co.)

About the Utah Beer News Virtual Taproom

Utah Beer News conducts 15-minute video interviews with brewers, breweries, and everyday imbibers. These brief conversations are recorded virtually. They are uploaded the same day (or the next day) to the Utah Beer News YouTube channel.

Instead of the more in-depth interviews and brewery histories typical of the Utah Beer News Podcast episodes and Brewery Profile articles, these bite-sized conversations feature so-called “newsy” information. We talk about new beer releases, upcoming events, and general happenings in and around Utah’s craft breweries.

If you’re a brewer or brewery representative — or even an everyday imbiber with a story to share — and would like to participate in an upcoming episode, please fill out the contact form.

Slackwater Sandy Transcript (April 2021)

The following is a slightly edited transcript of our conversation. And here’s a previous article we wrote about Slackwater Sandy.

[Tim Haran]

Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining Utah Beer News for our latest in one-on-one conversations with brewers, breweries, and everyday imbibers. I’m Tim Haran, founder of Utah Beer News. And my guest today is Joey Cardaccio, service manager at Slackwater Pub & Pizzeria in Sandy, Utah. Welcome, Joey.

[Joey Cardaccio]

Hey, how are you doing, Tim?

[Tim Haran]

I’m doing alright. Thanks again for taking the time to talk with Utah Beer News.

As you might remember, last month we visited with Joey for the first time and he gave us the scoop on three cool, new local beers available at Slackwater in Sandy.

And as I had hoped, Joey’s back.

This is something we’re looking to do at the beginning of each month to talk about three new or interesting beers that he’s got available at Slackwater.

So he’s got three standing by but before we get to those, just maybe give people an update on what you guys have got going on for the month of April there at Slackwater.

[Joey Cardaccio]

Yeah, so we’ve been kind of getting back into normalcy over here. We’re pretty busy. I have a tap takeover scheduled for Wednesday, April 28 with Squatters/Wasatch. What we’re going to do is feature four of their beers from 5 o’clock to close for $4 a pint.

I know we’re going to feature their new mango IPA, which is delicious, and their Strawberry Blonde. But I haven’t nailed down the other two yet, but we’re going to feature those for the evening for 4 bucks. It will be pretty good.

There will be reps here handing out swag and talking about the breweries and things like that. So that’s on the 28th of this month. It’s a Wednesday night. Come out. It’s going to be a good time.

And then, like usual, we have our monthly specials. This month’s theme is kind of like an Indian kind of theme. We’re featuring a spicy vindaloo sauce. It’s really, really good. We have a salad, we have wings, and we have a pizza. They all have the vindaloo sauce, different types of corn, tomatoes, vinaigrettes, and they’re all really, really good. The wings are my favorite. Really, really good stuff.

[Tim Haran]

I’ll tell you what, my go-to there now usually is the Tikka Masala pizza. I just absolutely love that and we’ve had the wings, too with that sauce and it’s amazing, so Indian themed for April, that sounds pretty cool.

[Joey Cardaccio]

Yeah, if you like the Tikka Masala, then you’ll probably love the pizza we’re doing this month. Pretty similar.

[Tim Haran]

Cool. Alright, well, let’s talk about beers. I’ve got my beers. After you talked about SaltFire last month I went out and got Master Control Program, their hazy.

While I’m drinking this, let’s start with your first one. What do you have for us?

[Joey Cardaccio]

Last time we talked we did three locals. I wanted to do three newer ones that we just got in but they’re out of state beers.

One of my favorite breweries, Odell. Fort Collins, Colo. Their new Solarized. This is a double IPA, 8.5% ABV, really, really nice. This is probably my favorite beer right now that we have in the fridge.

Citra hops, another experimental hop they use, and they use Yuzu fruit puree, so it’s a double IPA with Yuzu fruit puree. I never knew what a Yuzu fruit was before I had this beer. So it’s got like grapefruit and mandarin orange and lemon zest notes to it. It’s really, really, really citrusy. Really nice. And it’s dangerous because it’s over 8% but it drinks like it’s 5.5%. You could crush a couple of these really quick. Yeah, it’s called Solarized. Really nice beer.

[Tim Haran]

Odell does a lot of good work. I like that brewery quite a bit.

[Joey Cardaccio]

They’re definitely in my Top 5 favorite breweries.

[Tim Haran]

So would that be considered maybe a juicy double IPA then?

[Joey Cardaccio]

I would say it’s a juicy double IPA but it’s not crazy hazy. But I wouldn’t call it a West Coast either, obviously. So maybe it’s somewhere in between but it’s more a citrus-forward, a lot of that Yuzu fruit, I guess flavors that come out. It’s really, really nice. We’ve been selling a ton of it.

[Tim Haran]

Alright. Sounds good.

[Joey Cardaccio]

And then this next one that I’m pretty excited about. We just got a few new beers in from Surly Brewing, they’re in Minnesota. So we’ve got the Axe Man we’ve had before but then we also have like three other beers and I wanted to feature this one because this one’s really cool.

This is a dark sour. It’s called Pentagram. 100% Brettanomyces yeast is used in this. It’s aged in red wine barrels. It only comes in at 7% but it’s really, if you like sour beers, you’ll probably really like this. It’s super, super sour. It has a lot of sour cherry notes, tobacco, oak. It’s really good.

Everything I’ve had from Surly has been really nice. I’ve never had a sour from them before, so this is the first one, but it’s really, really good. It’s only 7%. Really nice.

[Tim Haran]

I think the only one I’ve had from them is Axe Man, so I’ll definitely check out those other ones. Pentagram sounds great.

[Joey Cardaccio]

And then we’ve had this one for a couple weeks. If you’ve been to Slackwater lately, you’ve probably had a Revision beer. They’re out of Sparks, Nev. We have a lot of their hazys. This is another one of their hazy double IPAs. It’s called Quarantine Dreams.

I’ve got to say, this is probably in our Top 5 and we have a lot of beers, but this is in our Top 5 best-selling beers right now.

This is 8.1%. It’s got Mosaic, Galaxy, and Samba hops. Really fruit-forward. Mango, pineapple, passionfruit. It’s pretty hazy. Again, double IPA, 8.1% but it doesn’t drink like an 8.1. It drinks more like a 7%, which I love.

[Tim Haran]

I’ve been really impressed with Revision. Starting with their label. I mean their can labels are out of this world. I love these. Seriously cool. Was it Cuddle Cloud Cuddle Kitten or something?

[Joey Cardaccio]

We have Cloud Cuddles and then there’s Kitty Has Claws. Two different beers. Both hazys but two different beers. They send a lot out to Utah but I think we’ve only gotten hazys, so maybe I’ll reach out to them and see if their distributor can send me some of their other stuff. I’d love to try something different. Their hazys are just killer.

[Tim Haran]

Well those sound like three delicious beers. I know you mentioned it briefly last month, but I mean, you’ve got 28 tap lines, 275 cans and bottles.

Where can people find out exactly what you guys are pouring, because I know you update it constantly.

[Joey Cardaccio]

The best place to do that would be on Untappd. So Untappd is an app you can download or go to a website on a desktop. It’s a free account you can use. If you type in Slackwater Sandy you can see our full menu. That’s the best way to access our most up-to-date menu.

I print it out for here once a week but I update it almost every day. The coolest thing about that is you can subscribe to us and that means that as soon as I add a new beer to the menu you get an alert sent directly to your phone.

So you know the second I get a new beer in the system. That’s the best way to get down here quick as soon as we get it.

[Tim Haran]

So if you subscribe, you could literally be the first person in Utah to have a beer that you bring in?

[Joey Cardaccio]

That’s what I tell people who subscribe. Oh yeah, we saw you got this beer on Untappd. I’m like, well you’re the first person to drink it because I haven’t even tried it yet.

[Tim Haran]

That’s what’s cool, too. I love talking to you about beer because these three, I went into this blind. I had no idea what beers you were going to select. It was fun for me because I like hearing about them without having any preconceived notions of what they might be.

Real quick run through the names and the breweries one more time.

[Joey Cardaccio]

This was the Odell Solarized double IPA with Yuzu puree. Really, really nice.

And then Surly Brewing from Minnesota, their Pentagram dark sour aged in red wine barrels. Really, really good. Really sour.

And then again, Revision from Sparks, Nev., they’ve got their Quarantine Dreams hazy IPA. 8.1%. Super nice. Super fruit-forward. Really good.

[Tim Haran]

Awesome. Cool man. Well thank you for giving us the lowdown on those three beers. I’m excited for April. I’m excited for April to come up. You guys have got a couple awesome patios and it’s just a great place to drink beer.

And then April 28, like you said, the tap takeover with Wasatch. That’s going to be cool. I’m excited.

I hope people are enjoying these because I want to get Joey on these every month at the first of the month to talk about beers he’s got pouring. I think it’s one of the better places in the valley to try new beers, to try interesting beers, whether it’s local or from out of state, out of the country, wherever.

Thanks for taking the time, Joey.

[Joey Cardaccio]

Yeah, you got it. Thank you. I appreciate it Tim.