The Bar Towel

admviolin wrote:I love the Ann Arbor brewpub. The food is great. The bottle shop has always been good there, but if you're in the area you might as well visit the brewery in Dexter. I haven't visited the new location, but the old one had less of a retail shop than the brewpub.

DeMarco wrote:Was just in Detroit for about an hour on my way to Cleveland. Jolly pumpkin is still great in an extremely gentrified area. Place was packed at 3pm on Saturday but the bar cleared out by the time I was gone. It usually has something to do with sports, but no Michigan games were being played on tv.

Hit up 8 Degrees Plato down the street. Awesome taps as they had both KBS and Odd sides Bourbon maya on. Bottles were great, though I chose to only pick one, which was hard.

Craig wrote: ↑Wed May 03, 2023 11:05 am Bottle Shops:
I only went to 8 Degrees Plato, but that place is amazing. Lots of stuff to pick from and the staff know their stuff. Pretty good selection on tap too.

Craig wrote: ↑Wed May 03, 2023 11:05 am I was just in Detroit for an extended weekend, figured this thread could use dusting off.

Breweries:

Detroit have a few, but honestly they're not as saturated as most places are these days. I gather that's changing in time.

Faisan was the standout place for me. They're pretty new and still finding their way a bit, but the beer was great. Tended towards lagers and Belgian styles, not a hazy IPA kind of place. Super friendly staff/owners too. Not in a terribly nice neighbourhood, but the space itself was fine. I don't think they had their kitchen up, or maybe they don't intend to have one, but people had outside food in there.

Batch Brewing was also very good. Lots of interesting stuff on taps, plenty of styles. They were having a German beer event so the menu skewed that way when I was there. Food was great, atmosphere was good, beer was some of the best I had there.

Eastern Market Brewing is right around the corner from the popular Eastern Market. They'll be super busy on Saturdays as a result, but I suspect much less busy other days. The beer was pretty good, but I didn't like drinking out of plastic cups much. Largerhouse is right around the corner and I liked the vibe in there a lot better, but the beer was better at Eastern Market.

Pretty much everywhere else I went (Brew Detroit, Atwater, Detroit Beer Co, Motor City Brewing) were not noteworthy. I had the impression the better beer to be found is a little further out, but didn't venture far myself.

Bars:

Hopcat is the best beer bar I went to. Collect was recommended to us, but we didn't make it.

Slow's BBQ had a very good tap list too, but I wasn't impressed by the BBQ which was a big letdown.

Barcade had a good list too, and is fun if you like arcades. The music was too loud to just sit and have a beer though.

Other than that, there wasn't really a ton of what I would call "beer bars". There are a whole lot of long-standing neighbourhood sorts of places that I would love to have checked out, but the buddy I went with wasn't really into it. Jacoby's in particular looked interesting, but I never made it in.

Bottle Shops:

I only went to 8 Degrees Plato, but that place is amazing. Lots of stuff to pick from and the staff know their stuff. Pretty good selection on tap too.

Other notes:

Detroit is a city that is at an interesting point. It's clearly fallen on hard times, but I would also say that it is now clearly on the upswing again. The downtown is pretty nice now and has some great architecture. Other areas are more hit or miss, but the places with lots of restaurants and such were pretty much all fine. I never felt uncomfortable walking around there, though it's not a terribly walkable city.

Like I said before, Slows BBQ was a letdown. But I went to Taqueria Lupitas for tacos and my God, those tacos. So, so, soooooo good.