The Great American Ale Trail - Christian DeBenedetti [101]
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 it’s named for. 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.
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 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, cranking out over 45,000 bbl annually.
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. By 2009 Founders was burning up the awards circuit and became the fastest growing American craft brewery.
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.
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, wood 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 48-tap row (featuring a slew of Michigan locals, 10 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).
PHILOSOPHY
Experiment and learn. With beer education classes and an ever-changing list, HopCat is a gentle and rewarding master.
KEY BEER
Burly Belgo IPA, from North Peak Brewing Company in Traverse City, Michigan, is a 6.5% hybrid of an IPA with a citrus rind pop and a classic Belgian sweet-and-spice combination.
HOP IN
There are more than sixty-five breweries in the state of Michigan now, far too many to list here, and at least a half dozen active hops farms supplying them. For complete directories, details on Detroit Beer Week, and info on annual festivals statewide, go to michiganbrewersguild.org.
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 15-gallon soup kettle—in 1985. Bell, a self-described failed jazz musician and occasional radio broadcaster, had started the first