OT: Battle of the Breweries
January 19th, 2018 at 10:27 PM ^
is a brewery that makes a lot of beers and their flagship is their Pale Ale (which is probably what you're referring to).
You're correct that Bell's Oberon, Sierra Nevada Pale Ale and I would add Sam Adam's Boston Lager were similarly considered "great" craft beers because they were among the few widely available/mainstream.
They don't really suffer from a perception problem now, though. They aren't actually great beers, per se. They were purposely made to be palatable to basic mainstream tastes at the time so as to be approachable. They were what I call "gateway beers".
Those particular brews are now considered mediocre by Americans because American tastes have evolved to realize that there is much better out there. Good beers have been available for hundreds of years (and were actually available in America prior to WWII), but almost no Americans appreciated them 20 years ago.
I do think that Sierra Nevada and Boston Beer Company (Sam Adam's) have a bit of a perception problem because they took that route of mass producing their flagships and became big brands. They both actually make some pretty good beers and have a huge range.
January 19th, 2018 at 6:00 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 7:27 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 8:13 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:04 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:44 PM ^
mmmmmm.
January 19th, 2018 at 6:09 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:09 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:14 PM ^
I work right across the street from new Holland and I'm not a huge fan.
January 19th, 2018 at 6:15 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:26 PM ^
such that they only do about a third of them well. Huma is solid and they have a couple other good beers, but grab a random Short's off the shelf and it's likely to be meh or worse (I know because I used to do this with mix and match 6 packs so I could try all their offerings).
They get too weird and chase variety at the expense of quality.
January 19th, 2018 at 8:22 PM ^
Soft parade for the ladies is always a good bet, even if you don't know who's at the party.
January 19th, 2018 at 10:10 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 8:36 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 8:59 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:17 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:20 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:24 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:28 PM ^
Informative!
I kind of love the irreverence of Brewery Vivant converting an old church to a brewpub. Almost sacrilege to do in West Mi. Interesting that they all went to a Christian college.
January 19th, 2018 at 8:29 PM ^
It was actually a funeral home chapel, but for all intensive purposes it feels, smells, and looks like what trappist chapel should look like, or some 18th century German church.
But on that irreverence topic, monks, sir, monks!
January 19th, 2018 at 11:07 PM ^
I stand corrected. Still, it was a former place of prayer.
And yes, Belgian monks are arguably the best brewers in the world, which is ironic/irreverant. I thought I read that the trappist monks don't consume their own beer and only brew(ed) it to sustain the monasteries?
January 19th, 2018 at 6:31 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 7:03 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:31 PM ^
Great guy
January 19th, 2018 at 7:13 PM ^
Excellent piece of trivia. You have just enriched my day. Thank you.
January 20th, 2018 at 9:36 AM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:54 PM ^
Went to Vivant this summer. Awesome atmosphere and they brew my kinda beers.
January 19th, 2018 at 7:17 PM ^
and farmhouse style guy as well. Love Brewery Vivant.
January 19th, 2018 at 8:25 PM ^
They have the best atmosphere of any brewery in Michigan. (My opinion of course). Beer is reasonable, but it takes you back almost to europe and its the furthest thing from a stripmall brewery in michigan.
January 19th, 2018 at 9:32 PM ^
I haven't been impressed with Vivant's beer. They seem like poor takes of Belgian style beers, and I do love my Belgian beer.
The brewpub does sound interesting though.
January 19th, 2018 at 11:33 PM ^
in my opinion, of course, the best in the world. They are the best because of hundreds of years of perfecting their style and they're very yeast forward and only Belgian yeast in that region can sustain the specific yeast strains they use. Even though we have replicas, they're still not the same.
So those styles are incredibly difficult to replicate at such high quality. I think Vivant does a pretty good job of it. They're probably only a tier below the Ommegang's and Allagash's in terms of getting close.
January 19th, 2018 at 6:19 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:23 PM ^
I'm a Michigan native living in Boston. I am NOT a New Englander by any stretch of the imagination, but the very best thing to come out of New England these days is the New England (hazy) IPA. M-43 from Old Nation is a darn good NE IPA ... as good as any I've had. It's the best Michigan beer in my opinion.
NE IPAs are just my thing though .... I think most Founder's beers are good but not great .. and Two Hearted is the one other MIchigan beer that I really enjoy.
January 19th, 2018 at 6:29 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:42 PM ^
saw that when it came out, but fruited IPAs are almost universally terrible and wouldn't really make it a classic NEIPA.
January 19th, 2018 at 6:53 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:56 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 7:51 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 11:27 PM ^
I'm one that has always hated IPAs. But I tried a NEIPA for the first time (Defloured by Witch's Hat in South Lyon, MI) a while back and had to have more. M-43 is very good, but a little overhyped, IMO (it has gotten a LOT of hype, and the price tag for a 4-pak reflects that). If you come back, try to get your hands on the following, ranked in order of my favorites... again, just my opinion.
Perrin (near GR) Cosmic Apparition
Witch's Hat Defloured
Witch's Hat This Guy (Imperial version of Defloured - 8% ABV)
I'd put M-43 here in my ranking
Wolverine (A2) Shore Storm
Rochester MIlls Juice Bigalow Hop Gigolo
Griffin Claw (Birmingham) Nawt A Cawp - the haziest of all of these
January 19th, 2018 at 6:28 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:48 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:33 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:34 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:38 PM ^
they're probably the most underrated (and I only say that because Odd Side is starting to get rated as highly as they should).
January 19th, 2018 at 7:20 PM ^
overall. I think they're more creative and interesting than the big boys (Bell's and Founder's), and do a much better job of executing that creativity than Short's.
Kuhnhenn's doesn't have the range of the big boys but they do what they do better than anyone does anything in the state (probably not a coincidence as they focus on what they do best).
Brewery Vivant has the best atmosphere at a brewpub.
I do think Bell's does really solid execution of a lot of styles such that their combo of offerings that are accessible and affordable is unbeatable (accessibility something that odd side currently lacks). Founder's is behind Bell's in this regard, IMO.
January 19th, 2018 at 6:38 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:50 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 6:50 PM ^
January 19th, 2018 at 11:38 PM ^
checks out.
Totally agree that Two Hearted and Hopslam are better than anything Founder's is doing in the IPA realm. All Day is super overrated (although I do have a 15-pack in my fridge for a party tomorrow because it's cheap and I don't mind giving it away but it's a (small) step up from Bud Light).
January 19th, 2018 at 6:50 PM ^