Quay Street Brewing Company of Port Huron, Michigan

I said I’d talk about local breweries first. I lied. Over the weekend, I visited Port Huron with Amy, on a bit of a last minute date day. Port Huron is about 45 minutes to an hour north of Detroit, and is a beautiful water front town rich in history. It’s an absolute pleasure walking around the city, especially when the weather is cooperating. The people are friendly, and there are several wonderful places to hangout. One of those wonderful places is of course Quay Street Brewing Company.

Quay Street Brewing Company is on Quay Street, and sits right on the Black River in downtown Port Huron. If you’re visiting the place in the summer, I’d recommend taking advantage of this and finding a seat outside on the patio overlooking the river. The beer is extra tasty when you’re overlooking the water. Yes, atmosphere helps the taste of beer. Don’t question me. Our server was friendly and informative about the beer, and the prices were more than fair. We got the sampler with eight beers (served in 5 oz. glasses) and their homemade root beer for $8. Even the pint glass was only $4 (not that the typical $5 is all that different).

Now, I mentioned in my introduction a couple weeks ago that I’m not here to be a critic. I don’t believe all beer is made equal, but each hometown brewery does have something to offer. The beer at any brewery is far better than the swill you find in a vortex neck bottle, a silver bullet can, or from the supposed ‘king of beers’. Quay Street offers a smaller selection than many Metro Detroit area breweries, but still gives you a good enough selection to enjoy. They have six beers that are featured in their main rotation, then a variety of seasonal beers.

On the lighter side of the spectrum, Quay Street brews a beer they call the Michigan Cream Ale. Apparently they base this beer off of a beer that was made by the C. Kern Brewing Company back in 1911. The brewing company was based in Port Huron, and marketed their beer as “Positively pure from drugs or poison”. The beer was marketed as a healthy beer, and won a Gold Medal in Paris at a beer competition. Yep, you can read this all from the menu. The beer itself is light, simple, and plain. Not bad plain, but aimed at the person you drag to the brewery who’s afraid of craft beer. This beer is a good introduction to the world of microbrews.

Sticking with the lights, Quay also offers a Raspberry Wheat. Quay Street says flat out that this is for the non-beer drinker. Like the Cream, there isn’t much in complexity, but unlike the Cream, the Raspberry Wheat is far from plain. It’s one of the thickest Raspberry Ales I’ve ever seen. The beer is opaque, and has a very strong raspberry taste to it. Amy described it as the best she’s ever tried. It was sweet, and went down well. If you enjoy a light fruity beer, I’m sure you’ll enjoy this. Great summer alternative to the Shandy trend.

Beer served with a lemon? Yep, it’s time to talk about a straight up wheat beer. The Quay Street Wheat is an unfiltered wheat beer. Many of you who have made home brews have had unfiltered beer before, but for those who haven’t don’t be afraid of the beer. It won’t harm you. If anything, you’ll actually be getting health benefits from the beer, as the unfiltered yeast will provide you with vitamins and nutrients that a filtered beer will lack. And it’ll give you a whole pallet full of different tastes and smells. The Quay Street Wheat has a rich vanilla and banana smell. It’s light, but has a decent body to it. Overall a pretty good beer, similar to many German Wheat Ales.

Half-way there. The Blue Water Pale Ale takes its name from the Blue Water Bridge. The beer has a reddish color to it, and a bit more of a hoppy taste. It’s darker than I would have anticipated, but it’s also hoppier than some of the pale ales I’ve tried in the past. Not IPA hoppy, but hoppy enough to satisfy many beer drinkers who like their beer with a little bite.

Quay Street has two beers that are really dark in color. The first of which is their Nutting Better Brown Ale. It’s dark. It’s smooth. It’s crisp. It goes down very easily, and is very easy to drink. More complex than the lighter beers on the menu, it has a malty taste, and has an aftertaste of nuts (it is a nut brown ale, so this shouldn’t be too surprising). This was one of the beers I’d probably order a pint of, as I usually prefer the darker beers.

The other beer I would’ve ordered a pint of is the Black River Stout. You know, I say it every time I have a microbrew Irish stout, and I’ll say it again; Guinness sucks. I had a friend text me once to complain about my destruction of Guinness for him. One you have a good stout, filled with all of the complexity it can offer, you realize that Guinness really is bland. There’s just not much there. The Black River Stout from Quay is an Irish stout that will again ruin Guinness for you. And that’s a good think. Right when you sip from this beer you’re going to taste the dark chocolate. Chocolate. Who doesn’t like chocolate? Let it sit in your mouth and you’ll get a hint of coffee as well, but this stout really is strong on the chocolate taste. Not a sweet chocolate, but a slightly bitter dark chocolate. It really works well in this beer. It isn’t thick like many of the Imperial stouts, but it is easily the darkest and heaviest beer on this menu. And it’s delicious.

So that’s the six beers that you can find at Quay Street all year long. We visited in August, which meant we were treated with two more seasonal beers. The first one I tried was their India Pale Ale. Similar in color to their regular Pale Ale, the IPA was hoppy and strong. I was surprised when Amy told me she thought it was pretty good, since she usually doesn’t like anything too hoppy. It was a fairly typical IPA, and that isn’t a bad thing at all. The other seasonal beer was their Pilsner. Pilsners always make for a good summer beer. They’re light, crisp, finish well, and can be enjoyed by beer drinkers and non-beer drinkers alike. This Pilsner was just that. Great for sitting outside in the sun with.

Now, for you Michigan beer lovers, there is one more place of note. Just around the corner on Main is Lynch’s Irish Tavern. The place has an awesome atmosphere, tons of cool decorations (their lamps are imported from the streets of Dublin), they feature live music and comedy regularly, and they have a full menu. I’m not really Irish, but even I could appreciate how cool the bar was. It’s a new bar in Port Huron, but they feature a wonderful selection of Michigan beers on tap or in a bottle, and all at a reasonable price. Not a brewery, but I always love giving a quick shout-out to those who support our local breweries. Port Huron is a great town to find many Michigan made beers. So enjoy.