NHC Day 3: 4 More Michigan Breweries!

Day 3 of our trip to Michigan for the 2014 NHC started way too early in the morning for me!  Sj and I had to grab coffee and head down to a different hotel lobby and meet up with our second bus tour group.  This group was a little bigger and was going to take us to four of the bigger breweries in Michigan.  No problem, we had done 6 breweries yesterday, we could handle four more!

Our first stop was to be at Jolly Pumpkin in Dexter, Michigan, about a 2 hour drive from Grand Rapids.  The brewery has only recently moved locations and does not currently have a tasting room at the brewery itself.  We were actually to be their first official tour and since they were still working on things they did not want us to take pictures.  As a result I have no visual proof I was there, but plenty of good memories!  Since they were not able to serve us beers, our tour guides poured us small samples (for a $5 fee) into plastic cups.  Anyone who has had Jolly Pumpkin beers before knows that they are quite effervescent and combined with a moving vehicle and small cups this process got messy!  We sampled some foamy cups of these great sour and wild ales as the bus continued the trek to the small town of Dexter.  When we arrived in town our bus suddenly slowed as it neared a low arched stone bridge.  Wait a second...there was no way we were getting the bus through that!  With images of our bus stuck under a bridge like Winnie the Pooh stuck in the honey tree, we waited to see what would happen.  At this point a huge line of cars was stuck behind us and there was no where to go.  One of our tour guides hopped off the bus to go under the bridge and scout out how far away the brewery was--if it was close we could all walk while the bus driver figured things out.  It wasn't that close!  Eventually one of our tour group jumped off to start directing traffic and give us room to reverse.  A kind stranger stopped his car and offered to lead us through some back roads (some unpaved dirt!) to the brewery.  This was shaping up to be an adventure!  But time was wasting and there were breweries to visit!

Finally we arrived in an out of the way industrial park.  The brewery is not incredibly well marked at this point, but we figured it out!  Jolly Pumpkin actually shares a building with the North Peak Brewing, separated into separate halves to decrease the chance of cross contamination with wild bacteria.  Right away we were taken in two separate groups, ours led by owner/brewer Ron Jeffries, and the other by another of the brewers.  The large building is very industrial and utilitarian--not the most photogenic (even if I could take pics!) of breweries I've been to.  The number of wooden barrels and mish-mash of foedors, however, was amazing!  Ron was quiet and somewhat soft spoken, but was one of the most informative and educational tour guides I have ever had.  I learned a lot about his sour beer production techniques and history in a short period of time.  Having recently been to Belgium and The Night of Great Thirst sour beer festival, this was really a cool tour!  The brewery opened in 2004 and was the first brewery to use the "Artisan Ales" moniker.  It is the only brewery to use only all wood fermentation.  Our tour actually took longer than expected, but trust me, no one was going stop Ron from telling us all great stories of the early days of craft brewing!  He gathered several cool beers for us to sample on the bus and sent us on our merry way. 

Ron Jeffries telling us tales!

We tried several of the beers, including some from North Peak, on the longish trip to our next brewery.  My favorite by far was the La Roja which I haven't had in years since Jolly Pumpkin stopped distributing in Minnesota.  This is a very tart and complex version of a Flanders Red, that tastes more like the expensive and rare  Rodenbach Vintage ale than the sweeter Rodenbach Grand Cru.  One of our poor tour guides ended up getting "bus sick" from walking back and forth trying to pour us beer.  While on the bus our tour guide got word from Dark Horse that their power had just gone out--trouble just kept haunting this trip!

Eventually we arrived at Dark Horse Brewing in Marshall, MI.  I've been a fan of Dark Horse beers for years and was very excited to check out this brewery.  Luckily the power had returned and our quest for beer was not stymied!  Our tour was large and the tour had limited size, resulting in us splitting our group in half.  Sj and I, as well as Denise and Ron (a really nice couple from the Twin Cities) found ourselves in the brewpub first.  The space is small, with reclaimed doors as tables and tons of old posters on the walls.  Classic folk and rock music played over the loud speakers.  The entire low ceiling of the pub was lined with multicolored ceramic mugs, giving this place a close, but homey and rustic feel.  I wish I lived close and could have my own unique mug here!  While waiting for our tour I had some really good chili and sipped on the hoppy Smells Like a Safety Meeting.  I'm sure there is a good story behind the name for that beer!

Dark Horse is one of the more unusual breweries I've been to.  The pub itself is actually attached to a family owned store.  Outside there is a new outdoor biergarten, but it started raining the second we passed through that.  Next to the brewery are small buildings featuring a Harley shop and the General Store.  The General Store sold homebrew supplies, Dark Horse merchandise and skateboard supplies.  We eventually went on the tour for an extra $10.  There seemed to be a lot of unusual decorations (life sized Jack Skellington hanging over the bottling line, a fish tank table in the pub), and re purposed materials in use.  Everywhere there was something new to look at.

More than meets the eye!

We eventually ended up in a small but hot upstairs tasting room, where we had 6 samples included in our tour fee.  This was pretty cool since we were able to try some smaller batch stuff not on tap downstairs in the pub.  There was a disgusting cherry beer, but also an amazing maple aged brown ale and the bourbon barrel aged Plead the 5th Stout.  We chugged these down fast and headed back to our bus.  Overall this was probably my favorite brewery of the day, with a true independent spirit and vibe notable throughout everything these guys do!

Perfect timing!

Our next stop was back to Bells Eccentric Cafe.  This stop had been included on the previous day's tour so I'm glossing over it here!  Having had the two samplers yesterday we knew what beers we wanted right away.  I had one of experimental hop beers and Sj tried the Baroness--a Munich Dunkel.

As a finish to our tour we were dropped at Founders Brewing right in Grand Rapids.  With thousands of homebrewers converging on the city around now, the place was insane!  I was a bit disappointed that we didn't have any tour organized.  My thoughts on the tour for this day were less than perfect.  Now, while some of the issues (Winnie the Pooh) maybe couldn't have been foreseen, other things could.  I think that these tours would do well to include the price of the Dark Horse tour and the extra Jolly Pumpkin beer into the base price.  I don't mind paying, but I don't want to get nickel and dimed during the tour.  I also think that a longer stop midway for lunch would be ideal.  Trying to wolf down chili before our tour of Dark Horse was possible, but would not have been if I'd ordered something more complex.  Also I signed up for a tour of 4 places but could have walked to Founders from my hotel...Still a fun day and getting to hang with Ron, Denise, Wendy, Dave, and Mike Sutor was well worth it!

With the nutty crush of humanity and lack of seating at Founders, we decided to forgo the stress and just walked back to the hotel and had dinner across from our hotel at Z's.

Later we were invited to a small party upstairs at Founders by one of our friends and I did finally get to enjoy their great beers!  They actually had a special Juniper Rye ale brewed in collaboration with my friend Chris German on tap, and that was by far the best Juniper beer I've ever had.  I also really loved the smooth low gravity Oatmeal Stout and would love to buy some of that for drinking at home!  Founders is one of my favorite craft breweries and I really love what they do.  Thanks!

Super secret upstairs bar at Founders!

Up Next: NHC Day 4!

NHC Day 1-2: Michigan Bound!

This has been a summer of beer-related travel for me and I have found myself doing several long travelogues about my trips.  Hopefully this has been entertaining (and maybe educational if folks plan on going to these places...) and not just me sticking my tongue out at my readers!  Recently Sj and I drove to Grand Rapids, Michigan for the National Homebrewer's Conference.  The actual conference goes from Thursday to Saturday, but many people like us head there early for preconference events.  The location of the conference changes every year and this was the perfect excuse for us to finally visit the state of Michigan and try some of the state's fantastic breweries.  I've broken this up into days to give a feel for how the basic flow of the week was, including brewery visits, lectures, parties and other events.  I am not a lush...

Day 1: To Michigan!

Our first day started with a slightly late start (is anyone surprised?) but we were in the car and rolling before 11 AM.  We started from Waconia, MN and drove through Wisconsin, past ludicrous traffic around Chicago, through some terrible roads in Indiana, and arrived at Grand Rapids in just over 12 hours.  Driving my Camry hybrid we made the whole trip on just one tank of gas, coasting into town on fumes and having to fill up at the world's shadiest gas station.  We checked into our hotel and immediately headed out for food!

I had heard good things about the HopCat brewpub and it has been rated highly in Beer Advocate and Ratebeer.  We made a quick walk through the darkening evening, seeing the bright yellow sign loom before us like a grinning beacon to beery goodness.  I love the black cat holding a beer logo for this place!  We were greeted inside by a large banner welcoming homebrewers--good to know that the town had been warned!  We were arriving late and the kitchen was only doing a limited bar menu, but we were so hungry that we didn't want to go looking for something else.  Besides, they had a huge beer menu!  They don't really do samples, but our waitress was great and brought me a taste of each of the house beers.  Those were mostly mediocre.  The Jerk beer had an interesting array of tropical and spicy flavors, but I wouldn't drink much of it.  The Blueberry Sour was quite disgusting (coming from a sour beer lover) with hot burning acid and enteric flavor.  I appreciate the effort, but ended up ordering a cask Oak Aged Hatter from New Holland.  It was only later that I noticed the huge bottle beer list on the back of the menu!  They had pricy but very rare Belgian beers on there for up to $40!  The bar food was decent, but not light!  I had the tasty but deadly (to my heart) Crack Fries with cheese.  I really liked the vibe in this place and the staff was great, but more as a beer bar than a brewpub.  After this it was off to bed!

Day 2:  6 Breweries in 1 Day!

Day 2 began with an awful early morning coffee from the ghetto Starbucks in the Courtyard Hotel.  One of the preconference events was a Michigan brewery tour, and we had signed up for it ahead of time.  We joined a crowded bus full of homebrewers and headed out for our first stop.  The bus tour was scheduled for 4 brewery visits from 10-6, making our stops pretty fast in order to keep a schedule.

Our first stop on this trip was the Old Mill Brewpub & Grill is located in the historic 1870 Sunshine Flour Mill building, at one point the second largest supplier of buckwheat nationally.  This is a newer brewery, located between Kalamazoo and Grand Rapids.  I love the use of an old building that is full of character!  The owner, Scott, was an incredibly energetic and dynamic tour guide.  He would often jump up on chairs, tables, and ladders giving his talk in a rousing voice from such precarious positions!  Honestly this guy reminded me a lot of my friend Tim Roets, who is opening his own brewery here in Minnesota soon.  The brewer, Phil was there as well, but was much more reserved.  The day we were there, they were just upgrading from a tiny 1/2 barrel brew system and installing their larger 3 barrel system.  They have a large banquet hall on the second floor that I'm guessing does well for events.  They cater and have a full kitchen as well--we did try a nice bowl of chili and a salad while there.   They had four house beers on tap during our visit including the humorously named Crazy Beaver Cream Ale, and a wonderful oatmeal stout.  We even got to tour the creepy old basement which apparently was featured on a ghost hunting TV show in the past!

Always a showman!

Second stop on our tour was Latitude 42, a newer brewery in Portage, MI.  This is in a large building with a huge bar and several seating areas.  I can tell this place was built with the intention of having room to grow and is able to fit large crowds of thirsty beer drinkers.  We were lucky enough to get a tour by brewer Scott Freitas, previously of Maui Brewing.  A bearded and friendly chap, he was kind enough to share brewing with coconut secrets with me!  A bit of Hawaii entered into the brewhouse with some tribal designs on the stainless and a stuffed bust of a hammerhead shark on the wall.  We had just enough time to order a beer sampler, but even by splitting a sampler each, Sj and I were not able to try all the beers they had to offer!  All of the beers were solid and nearly everything was dry and easy to drink, even the 9.7% Double Chin.  My favorite of their beers was the Island Fever coconut stout--light, smooth, with subtle coconut flavors.  The Mango Mama was not mango-y at all and not nearly as good as Town Hall's mango IPA of the same name.  We didn't have a lot of time here, but I enjoyed what time we had. 

Back on the bus we headed for the newly built  Arcadia Ales in Kalamazoo.  The freshly minted building didn't even have a sign yet, just the celtic knot symbol of the brewery.  The place was spacious with a long bar and plenty of high tables.  Garage style doors opened up onto a large backyard seating area and the weather was perfect for that on the day we arrived.  Somewhere, a ball got dropped since the one bartender didn't know that she would be dealing with a huge busload of  beer geeks.  Most of us were also high maintenance and wanted samplers, making for a long wait until we had drinks in hand.  While I waited for our sampler, Sj headed over the small kitchen where they were serving up some of the best BBQ ribs and pulled pork I have had outside of Missouri!

Best chandelier ever?

I had never tried their beers before, but had heard of them.  I really liked every one of their beers that I tried, but even with two samplers I couldn't try them all.  Talk about a large tap list!  Everyone loved Big Dick's English Old Ale.  My personal favorite was the Deliverance barrel aged double porter--huge and complex with a boozy but not over-the-top finish.  Later in the Michigan trip I tried their Scottish ale and would seek that one out if you can find it.

Our final official tour stop was Bell's Eccentric Café, just down the road from Acadia in Kalamazoo.  If you haven't tried some Bells beers you might just be a hermit living in a cave.  The café itself is a small tasting room with loads of old beer signs, posters, and tribal art on the walls.  The small bar serves up many Bells favorites like Two Hearted (way better fresh on tap here than when it gets to MN in the bottle).  They also have several pub only smaller experimental batches on tap.  Sj and I ordered two samplers and shared so we could try as many as possible.  Just like Latitude 42 and Acadia, we still didn't try everything!  My favorite at the time was the Experimental Hop 2014 number 2 that had a bright melon-like flavor and a light and refreshing session feel.  They also have a small kitchen to fulfill your eating needs., but I didn't get a chance to try that out.

Sj looking happy, and Tom looking thoughtful...

Just around the corner is the Bells General Store where they had homebrew supplies, beer and plenty of swag to sell us.  As usual on this jaunt, our time was fleeting and I had to almost run over here to grab a sign and some other Bells items before our bus left without me!

Our official tour was about over, minus the drive back to Grand Rapids.  The tour was fun and got us to many places, but I felt that we didn't have quite enough time in each place to really enjoy it.  I would have liked either hitting one less place or ending our trip later in the day.  One could order food at any place we went, but there was short time and no official longer "lunch time" so many of us were ordering food, getting it 10 minutes before we were supposed to leave and then snarfing it down fast.  Just a small quibble, but the trip was certainly worth it.

Brewery Vivant!

One of the other pre-conference events was a beer and food pairing "experience" at Brewery Vivant in Grand Rapids.  I had not signed on for this after being burned with a similar experience at Pike Brewing during the Seattle NHC.  At that one they charged $40, ran out of food and only gave us tiny samples of beers.  In retrospect (my friend Mike took part in this tasting and said it was fantastic) I wish I had done it!  A few on our bus were running late for this event and talked our driver into making a detour for them.  Sj and I decided to hop off there too and managed to get seated in a corner table for an early dinner.  Vivant is a newer brewery that focuses on Belgian styles of varying types.    The brewery is in an old funeral parlor and the bar is actually located in the old chapel, having a cool backdrop of stained glass behind it!  When we arrived my friend Chris was at the bar talking with a brewer and I got to spend a few minutes talking to them.

I really enjoyed the beers here, though some were better than others.  The Solitude was a very dry and pleasant Abbey style beer and I ended up buying a few cans to bring home.  Their flagship beer is the Big Red Coq--a hoppy Belgian ale.  Always fun to say the name of this beer!  We snacked on duck confit nachos as we worked through our samplers, reveling in the tastes and the surroundings.  Mike eventually finished his tasting outside and we all headed out for our hotel.

On the way home we passed very close to the centrally located Grand Rapids Brewing Co.  Could we really visit 6 breweries in one day?  Never one to pass up a challenge, I pushed to get us all inside and try out the beer.  This is actually the Midwest's first Certified Organic brewery and opened in 2012.  Only later did we find out that the owners of HopCat actually own this and two other local bars.  The place is huge and well appointed.  The clientele was mostly young and hip, frat boys, and some post-work suits.  The crowd was probably somewhat bigger due to the NHC folks trickling in but I don't think there were that many of "us" in there this evening.  The place reminded me a lot of a Rock Bottom, with a slick and well-planned out look and feel to it.  We tried a couple beers but had no room left for food.  Sj had the stout that was tolerable, but fairly watery.  I had the terrible plastic tasting maibock that I certainly did not finish.  Not my favorite brewery of the day for sure.

So six breweries in one day under my belt, it was time to head home for sleep and recuperation.  It was cool trying all of these places and only one was below par.  My favorite brewery of the day was probably Vivant, but Acadia was a close second.  I loved the passion of the brewer for Old Mill and the nifty old building.

Up Next: NHC Day 3--4 More Breweries!