Oh, 'twas grand! The MBG and Metro Times put on a well-organized and efficiently run beer festival at Eastern Market yesterday. The Inaugural Harvest Festival comprised over 40 Michigan breweries and brewpubs with 203 (precisely!) beers to sample. The whole shebang was in an open parking lot, near Shed # 5 at the market, with the breweries set up under three tents. There were separate tents for food and a band shell. It was a wee bit cold and windy, but we were only rained on once, and it wasn't heavy. There was plenty of room under the tents for everyone to shelter from the rain, and I didn't hear any complaining. I stayed warm underneath about 4 layers of clothing on every part of my body thankfully, including the fabulous giant red fur pagoda that sat on my head.
Memorable beers for us were Arcadia's Cannon Ball Gold (5 varieties of Michigan-grown fresh-hop ale), North Peak/Northern United's Diabolical IPA (unfiltered version with 2/3 of the hops being Michigan-grown Cascades), Saugatuck Brewing's True Scot ale, Liberty St Brewery's House Mild Brown Ale, Big Rock's Red Rock Farmhouse Ale, Motor City's Pumpkin Ale (fermented with a Belgian yeast), Jolly Pumpkin's La Parcela and Bam with Juniper, Hopcat's "Sage Against The Machine" Pale Ale, Fort St Brewery's Bootlegger's Bourbon Porter, Right Brain's "Wicked Garden" beet beer (Wow!!-This was a crazy bright red beer that tasted like beets, but was light-bodied with a very dry finish. Quite something.)
My favourite of the day- Big Rock's farmhouse. Wow. Sour. Malty. Complex. I could have drunk a lot more.
Mr Cicerone's favourite- all of them.
Mr Diabolical - Mike Turriff
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