Episode 14: Eric Mitchell

LIFE ON TOUR  

Is there anything better than a frosty glass of beer after a game of golf? In our opinion, it’s pretty hard to beat the beer/golf combination. For this episode of Life on Tour, we traveled to Pinehurst, North Carolina, to catch up with Eric Mitchell, head brew master at Pinehurst Brewing Company, one of the only golf resorts with an on-site brewery.

“I don’t have to set an alarm clock, I wake up excited for something new every single day,” Eric Mitchell, Head Brewer at Pinehurst Brewing Company, stated from the historic steam plant turned brewery and pub. “I feel so blessed every day to call this my job. It’s simply a passion that I would do for free.”

After a tour of the spotless brewery and testing a few of the delicious offerings from the bustling, down-home restaurant, Eric, a veteran brewery of 10 years and a bronze medalist at the 2016 World Beer Cup, told us a bit more about his love for beer and brewing.

“When you have something that can be interpreted so many different ways, I mean it has to be a form of art,” Eric explained, the passion he has for beer evident in the way he explains the process. “You can literally give 1,000 brewers the same exact ingredients and you’re going to get 1,000 different beers. The way that you interpret every single recipe is so different between artist to artist, brewer to brewer. It’s amazing.

”Eric, who is not only passionate about beer but is passionate about giving his community a place to unwind and connect, explained what drew him to Pinehurst. “It was going to be a local neighborhood brewpub, which was something I really fell in love with. Just the idea of the local watering hole.”

Despite his success, Eric remains humble and approachable, pouring his energy into creating custom beers and tap lists to please patrons.

“In this industry, innovation has never been more important,” Eric explains. “The quickest way to move backwards is to stand still. I’m not trying to reinvent the wheel by any means. I just want to create what has been done as good as I possibly can… If all plays out maybe someone can draw inspiration from something we do here.”

For the record, we were inspired. Good beer has that effect on us.