PHILOSOPHY
The vinyl booths may be cheap, but there’s no skimping on the beer, and the two-tiered tap row is a thing of organizational beauty. Neither college clown show nor meat market, this is a bar to love for one reason above all: almost everyone’s here for the beer.
KEY BEER
This would be the perfect place to drink Boulevard’s Long Strange Trip, a 9% ABV tripel that has a heady sweetness and a puff of delicate noble hop character.
BEST of the REST: IOWA
TOPPLING GOLIATH BREWING COMPANY
310 College Dr. • Decorah, IA 52101 • (563) 387-6700 • tgbrews.com
Home brewers Clark and Barb Lewey founded their “David”-size brewery in a quiet northeastern part of the state in 2009 “after months of dangerous experimental home brewing projects” that overtook their garage. Brewing three times a day on a half-barrel nano-system, the Leweys built up a local following, then graduated to a ten-barrel system, and quickly outgrew that as well. Today they’ve got a four-vessel, thirty-barrel system and state-of-the-art packaging gear, and a taproom open seven days a week. Look for clean, hop-forward ales, pungent double IPAs, and acclaimed barrel- and wood-aged beers like their giant-killer, Kentucky Brunch Brand Stout, a 12% ABV aged in bourbon barrels with coffee.
THE ROYAL MILE
210 4th St. • Des Moines, IA 50309 • (515) 280-3771 • royalmilebar.com
A glorious array of weathered, old wood tables, English breweriana, stained glass, a Union Jack, and London Underground signs help make this the unofficial “living room” of Des Moines, an ideal place for storytelling among old friends. Along with a stream of special firkin nights from top craft brewers like Colorado’s Left Hand and New Belgium, regulars gather inside (and out on a quaint brick patio) for hearty bites like English pork pie and bangers and mash, washed down with rare beers, including the delicately hoppy and refreshing Coniston Bluebird Bitter (4.2% ABV) from Cumbria, England.
MICHIGAN
Ann Arbor
JOLLY PUMPKIN CAFÉ & BREWERY
311 S. Main St. • Ann Arbor, 48104 (734) 913-2730 • jollypumpkin.com • Established: 2004
SCENE & STORY
Across the country, American craft brewers have followed Ron Jeffries’ quiet but confident lead, embracing tricky, Belgian-influenced techniques like the use of oak barrels and wild yeast strains that are lethal to beer in the wrong hands. He started his odyssey toward becoming one of the nation’s best brewers of Belgian-style ales around 1991 with the goal of opening his own brewery. By 1995, he had made a name for himself in Michigan’s emerging scene, and by 2004 he was ready to unleash his vision: a brewery dedicated to wood-aged artisanal beers. Trouble was, he hadn’t settled on a name.
On a warm, early spring afternoon with snow on the ground and ample heat in the air, Jeffries, who is tall and thin with the quiet, placid demeanor of an English Lit professor, thought of a name that encompassed everything he intended to do: Jolly Pumpkin Artisan Ales, a mishmash of concepts encompassing Halloween, pirates, his low-key, slow-paced Hawaii, and the kind of beer he wanted to make. He and his wife laughed. It grew on her. Jolly Pumpkin it was.
Today, Jeffries oversees operations of the original Dexter, Michigan, location (where a new pub was under way in 2011), a brewpub in Traverse City, and a brewpub in Ann Arbor, which has a lovely bar, roof deck, and full menu of beer-friendly cuisine, and a new pizzeria and brewery, which opened in Detroit in April 2015 with thirty-two beers on tap. It’s the only brewery in Detroit making a sour. Both the Ann Arbor and Traverse City locations have Jeffries’s beers on tap or in bottles, and both allow growler and bottle sales to go.
The beer that Jeffries has been brewing from the start is some of the most interesting and innovative in the country. These days it’s relatively common to hear about wood-aging experiments, sour beers, bourbon barrels, and the like, but Jeffries was the first modern American brewer to be fermenting all of his beer in huge wood fermenters from the start, which is incredibly risky—one runaway infection in a barrel and tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of beer can turn into vinegar. It’s not easy to grapple with wild yeasts, which can bore into wood and wreak havoc in a brewhouse, nor to bottle-condition the beer as if it were Champagne, but Jeffries doesn’t go around crowing about it. He doesn’t have to. The beers—complex, flavorful, original, by turns elegant and edgy—speak for themselves.
PHILOSOPHY
Traditional, small-scale production with deep, pleasing complexity as the ultimate goal. Not every experiment is perfect, but that’s part of the beauty of Jolly Pumpkin.
KEY BEER
Luciernaga (6.5% ABV) and Luciernaga Grand Reserve (7% ABV). With a hearty helping of exotic spices like grains of paradise and coriander, Luciernaga is an annual, spicy-tart Belgian pale ale arriving in summer, like the wondrous insect for which it’s named. It pours radiant, ruddy amber with a huge pillow of head. The Grand Reserve version is aged in bourbon barrels for fourteen months, deepening the flavors with curling, vinous notes of vanilla and smoke. And if those aren’t available, look for the superb Bam Biere, a farmhouse-style golden ale, naturally cloudy, bottle-conditioned, and dry-hopped (4.5% ABV).
Grand Rapids
FOUNDERS BREWING CO.
235 Grandville Ave. SW • Grand Rapids, MI 49503 • (616) 776-1195 • foundersbrewing.com • Established: 1997
SCENE & STORY
Like a lot of great American craft brewers, Mike Stevens and Dave Engbers started their dream company while working day jobs they couldn’t wait to quit, and with a giant loan from the bank. With beers that were balanced but frankly timid, they teetered on bankruptcy soon after opening the doors, so Stevens and Engbers decided to go all-in, releasing the sort of uncompromisingly bold beers that got them interested in brewing in the first place. After a remarkable turnaround, their brewery and airy taproom (a glorious space of weathered hardwood floors, tall glass windows looking into the brewery, and a polished, serpentine mahogany bar), is one of America’s top beer destinations. For several years, Founders has been burning up the awards circuit and, around 2009, became the fastest growing American craft brewery. Today it occupies an entire city block and just embarked on a $40 million expansion driven largely by a session beer called All-Day IPA, which is delicious stuff.
PHILOSOPHY
The stated credo: “We don’t brew beer for the masses. Instead, our beers are crafted for a chosen few, a small cadre of renegades and rebels who enjoy a beer that pushes the limits of what is commonly accepted as taste. In short, we make beer for people like us.” Good call.
KEY BEER
Founders’ KBS (Kentucky Breakfast Stout) is an 11.2% ABV brew released annually on the Saturday closest to the Ides of March (the 15th), an event at the brewery that draws hordes of beer fans. It’s got a massive quantity of chocolate and coffee and is cave-aged in bourbon barrels before bottling. And unfortunately, you’ll have trouble finding it outside the brewery. All-Day IPA is aptly named, and easier to come by. This grainy, citrusy, supersociable India pale ale of 4.7% ABV deftly balances three types of juicy, aromatic hops.
HOPCAT
25 Ionia Ave. SW • Grand Rapids, MI 49503 (616) 451-4677 • hopcatgr.com • Established: 2008
SCENE & STORY
With its seasonal outdoor patio, exposed brick walls, bare wood and pressed-tin ceilings, wooden floors and tables, and narrow, wrought-iron support columns, HopCat is inviting before you even get to the bar. Then there’s a series of inviting padded booths and tables and a loft-like seating area with couches upstairs. When you get to the bar, with its clover-honey-hued Italianate woodwork and mirrors and epic forty-eight-tap row (featuring a slew of Michigan locals, ten or more house brews, and 150 more bottles, not a macrobrew in sight), the hard part begins: What to drink? There’s at least one thing you must order from the food menu: their house beer-battered Crack Fries (entirely as advertised though quite legal and only $4.95).
In recent years, HopCats appeared like rabbits, w
ith six additional locations (Ann Arbor, Broad Ripple, Detroit, East Lansing, Grand Rapids, East Lexington, and Madison) opening in quick succession. But the real kicker was Hop-Cat announcing, late in 2015, a thirty- location, $25 million expansion across the entire Midwest (whoa!). Now that is a clowder of cats.
PHILOSOPHY
Experiment and learn. With beer education classes and an ever-changing list, HopCat is a benevolent master. The Crack Fries, however, own you completely. You are powerless to resist.
KEY BEER
Every great midwestern brewery from the nano-of-the-minute to massive regional heavyweights is represented, so take your pick.
Kalamazoo
BELL’S BREWERY ECCENTRIC CAFÉ
355 E. Kalamazoo Ave. • Kalamazoo, MI 49007 • (269) 382-2332 • bellsbeer.com • Established: 1985
SCENE & STORY
Larry Bell’s operation is a household name in these parts, but it started as a mere Kalamazoo home-brew shop in 1983 and sold its first beer—quite literally made in a fifteen-gallon soup kettle—in 1985. Bell, a self-described failed jazz musician and occasional radio broadcaster, had started the first craft brewery east of the Rockies and by 1993 became the first brewer in the state of Michigan to serve beer on-site at a brewery.
Now the commercial production is housed in nearby Comstock, Michigan, cranking out a wide array of beers 24/7 on a system that brews 1,500 gallons per batch, around 170,000 barrels per year—or five million gallons, double the output of 2005. The original brewery location in Kalamazoo is home to the Eccentric Café, with 130 seats, beer garden, and newly expanded, warehouse-size music venue. One really cool thing the brewery does? Host a home-brew competition and send the winner to GABF on the brewery’s dime. It’s a super communal idea that builds the tight community Bell’s has developed.
PHILOSOPHY
The official motto is “Inspired Brewing,” but Larry himself is a no-nonsense kind of guy, more focused on the business of brewing beer than flights of commercial fancy. Inspired by the successes of Sierra Nevada and Anchor, his goal was to open a brewery that made at least 30,000 barrels a year. Mission accomplished, and a whole lot more.
KEY BEER
Bell’s Expedition Stout is one of the early American versions of a Russian imperial stout, chewy and laced with flavors of black patent brewers’ malt, chocolate, licorice, and stone fruit (10.5% ABV).
BEST of the REST: MICHIGAN
ASHLEY’S RESTAURANT & PUB
338 S. State St. • Ann Arbor, MI 48104 • (734) 996-9191 • ashleys.com
With seventy-two taps and fifty bottled selections, this cozy and often crowded college bar with an unremarkable interior has one of the best tap rows in the state. The sponsors of a Michigan cask ale festival (held at the newer Ashley’s location, twenty-five miles away in Westland), Ashley’s is credited with bringing the level of Michigan craft beer appreciation up overall since 1983, when it first opened. There’s a rotating selection from the excellent Short’s Brewing Company in Bellaire, Michigan, which ought to be your first choice. In 2015, the founders were awarded the Ridderschap van de Roerstok der Brouwers in Belgium, or the Knighthood of the Brewers’ Mash Staff. The knighthood, bestowed in a ceremony during a massive three-day beer festival in Brussels, recognizes “individuals who have rendered loyal services” to the Belgian brewing profession. In other words, you’re in good hands.
ARCADIA BREWING
103 W. Michigan Ave. • Battle Creek, MI 49017 • (269) 963-9520 • arcadiaales.com
The centerpiece of Arcadia brewing company (established in 1996) is the impressive wood- and brick-sided brewing system visible from behind glass in the British-style restaurant and T.C.’s Pub in the back, where you can snack on wood-oven pizzas and pita bread with hummus. Take a free tour of the brewery itself most Saturdays at 1 p.m. (and please call ahead). Built by influential British brewer Peter Austin, it’s the birthplace of a wide array of ales, like the 7.2% ABV Arcadia London Porter, which is sweet and full-bodied with notes of cocoa and smoke. Arcadia built a second location in Kalamazoo in 2014.
BLACKROCKS BREWERY
424 N. 3rd St. • Marquette, MI, 49855 • (906) 273-1333 • blackrocksbrewery.com
David Manson and Andy Langlois launched Blackrocks as a nano in 2010 in a little yellow house on a quiet corner of Marquette. Wired into the local music and mountain biking scene, these fun-loving guys were so slammed so fast that a 3bbl pub system and 20bbl production system (housed a mile away in an old Coca Cola plant) weren’t far behind. Now they help host live music five nights a week, sponsor big bike races, and seem to have a grand old time. Try the 51K IPA, a dry, dank, 7% ABV citrus and pine bomb.
BREWERY VIVANT
925 Cherry St. SE • Grand Rapids, MI 49506 • (616) 719-1604 • breweryvivant.com
Built in 2010 around the striking chapel of a former funeral home—read: exposed beams, stained-glass, and Gothic-looking arches—Brewery Vivant was inspired by farmhouse breweries from Wallonia, the farm-dotted hinterlands between Belgium and France, where founder Jason Spaulding fell in love with the saison beers after selling his stake in New Holland Brewing Co., of which he was a founder. The Grand Rapids farmers’ market is close by, supplying the restaurant/pub and beer garden, too. Try the various saisons on draft or a can of Triomphe Belgian-style IPA (6.5% ABV).
OHIO
Cleveland
GREAT LAKES BREWING CO.
2516 Market Ave. • Cleveland, OH 44113 (216) 771-4404 • greatlakesbrewing.com • Established: 1998
SCENE & STORY
The first microbrewery in the state of Ohio since the last of the old-line companies closed in the early 1980s, Great Lakes opened in 1998 in a massive Victorian complex. With its antique 1860s tiger mahogany bar, beer garden with retractable canvas roof, and atmospheric rathskeller (or cellar bar), it’s a superb spot for an afternoon pint and a bite.
PHILOSOPHY
Proud and feisty. Raise a glass of Eliot Ness Amber Lager to the Untouchable himself, who drank here and might—just might—be responsible for some bullet holes in the bar.
KEY BEER
Burning River Pale Ale is a great name; unfortunately it’s also a reference to the worst days of the Cuyahoga River, once so befouled by coal plants on its banks that it periodically caught fire. But not to worry: there’s nothing remotely toxic in this beer. It’s a perfectly carbonated pale ale of 6% ABV with the mellow sweetness of British-style pale ale but the flash and brightness of an American IPA.
McNULTY’S BIER MARKET
1948 W. 25th St. • Cleveland, OH 44113 (216) 274-1010 • bier-markt.com • Established: 2005
SCENE & STORY
Ohio’s first Belgian beer bar set up shop in the center of the entertainment district, and stays open every day of the year until 2 a.m. The dark, alluring interior design is a feast for the eyes, simultaneously classic and futuristic, with red-trimmed windows against warm, earthy walls and jet black tin ceilings, elaborate paneling in other sections, and elongated Edison bulbs hanging over the curved main bar.
PHILOSOPHY
Meet the new boss: With brewery nights from the likes of Ommegang and Victory, a deep and mouthwatering list of gastropub fare, and a ninety-nine-label Belgian list, it’s safe to say the Cleveland beer scene will never be the same again.
KEY BEER
Look for the Caracole Nostradamus, a deliciously complex 9.5% ABV Belgian brown ale.
Columbus
SEVENTH SON
1101 N. 4th St. • Columbus, OH 43201 (614) 421-2337 • seventhsonbrewing.com • Established: 2013
SCENE & STORY
Seventh Son is located in the historically Italian neighborhood of 4th and 4th, constructed in a big, boomerang-shaped former auto garage with huge, roll-up doors, making it an awesome place to hang out on a sunny day. With a spacious tasting room and patio areas, head brewer Colin Vent and Co. create distinctive, experimental beers in a cool, clean setting with food trucks deployed at critical we
ekend junctures, like brunch.
PHILOSOPHY
“We wanted to start a brewery but we also wanted to create an environment,” reads the founders’ mission statement. “We believe that beautiful and vibrant surroundings will reflect and create beautiful and vibrant beer.”
KEY BEER
Vent describes his flagship, Seventh Son American Strong Ale, as a “a ruddy amber American Strong clocking in at 7.7% ABV. Grapefruit and stone fruit hop aroma and character are balanced by a rich, red malt backbone. A precise blend of seven hops go into the brewing and dry-hopping process including Nelson Sauvin, Mosaic, Horizon, Palisade, Citra, Willamette, and Columbus.”
BEST of the REST: OHIO
JACKIE O’S
25 Campbell St. • Athens, Ohio 45701 • (740) 592-8696 • jackieOs.com
This avidly experimental brewery founded in 2006 in the heartland has used ingredients such as black walnuts, maple syrup, lemon verbena, coffee, and pumpkins in their various one-off beers, and has collaborated with Hill Farmstead, one of the most talked-about breweries in the world. They’ve gotten seriously into barrel aging, and operate a farm outside of town. Look for Firefly (a 4.5% ABV amber), Chomolungma (a 6.5% honey brown ale), and rotating reserves. A canning line and big production brewery added in 2015 means Jackie O’s is going big.
RHINEGEIST
1910 Elm St. • Cincinnati, OH 45202 • (513) 381-1367 • rhinegeist.com
Rhinegeist translates to “Ghost of the Rhine” and refers to the historic, once brewery-filled, Over-the-Rhine Brewery District in Cincinnati, where in 2013 this juggernaut was constructed in the massive old Moerlein bottling plant, which dates to 1895. The timing could not have been better, as Cincinnati had largely been bypassed by the craft beer craze. Starting with 20bbl batches, Rhinegeist experienced pegged demand since day one, leading to some eye-popping changes. They’ve already launched a $10 million expansion, bought the 100,000-square-foot-plus building they were leasing, leaped to a 60bbl BrauKon system (the Mercedes-Benz SLK class of breweries), and built a 7,000-square-foot roof deck, just to name a few. Special bottle releases have drawn crowds of 4,000. Try the 5.2% Puma Pilsner and move up from there. Who knows just how high this ghost will get?
The Great American Ale Trail (Revised Edition) Page 28