Our most recent brewing adventure took us to Harmony Brewing Company. Harmony Brewing Company is located in Grand Rapids, East Side neighborhood. This was our first trip to Harmony so we were not sure what to expect. Harmony is just down the street from one of our favorite brewing establishments, Brewery Vivant, so we were confident that we were not going to be disappointed. Harmony offers a completely different brewing style than Vivant and it is a very different atmosphere. Harmony is in a small building attached to a home. It is nicely renovated and has quite a unique character.
On this evening we arrived at 7:00 on a Saturday night and the place was hopping — a good sign. As a result we were very limited in terms of checking out the place and meeting the folks (note to self, not a good idea to try to do this on either a Friday or Saturday evening). Still we were able to get a couple of seats at the bar which necessary for our obligatory growler on the bar photo. Still we were able to take a few impressions away from our brief trip.
We were really impressed by the beer. Beth had the Gingerbread Man Holiday Brown (6.8) which was had a warm rich deep brown color. It had a nice hit of ginger and a warm taste to it. I had the Oh Be Joyful Cranberry Wheat (4.7), which was also nice. This beer is based on the Hefeweizen brewing style and it had a light fruity flavor. It had a wonderful rose color with a nice light citrus aroma. I would have liked a stronger cranberry flavor but what was there was quite nice. Personally I think this beer would be nice for a summer day on the beach. So this will be something I’ll keep an eye out for next summer.
The most interesting beer I had while visiting Harmony was their Caskaged Crossroads with Juniper Berries (7.2). Unfortunately there was little left and I had what was left on tap. So I was not able to enjoy the full effect of this beer, still I was truly blown away by the complexity of this beer. Similar to the Oh Be Joyful Cranberry Wheat this beer had a light color but the color was a bit more cloudy. This light cloudy color offered beguiling complexity of aromas and tastes. This is definitely one I’ll look forward to trying again.
Since I missed the full effect of the Caskaged Crossroads with Juniper Berries I had to try one more for the night. The last beer was the Winter Nights Winter Warmer (8.5) which was by far the stronger brew. But as the barkeep noted this beer was a step down from your standard porter or stout. It had the a typical color of what you would expect from a porter or stout but I found the aroma and flavor to be a bit more subtle. It did not have the typical malty or roasted aroma. Both the aroma and taste was mellower, a lot less bitter then I would have expected.
Along with this good beer we were able to try one of their Eastown Folk Funk pies. Wow was this ever a nice treat. You can tell the pizzas are hand made with fresh ingredients. In all we had a great time and are definitely looking forward to their new place in West Grand Rapids in the coming months.
