Cocktail Week – Grand Rapids starts on November 11 and runs through November 22.
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — The first ever Cocktail Week in Grand Rapids begins on Wednesday.
Experience GR said 29 area restaurants are participating in Cocktail Week GR and serving up signature Michigan-made cocktails.
Participating local restaurants will offer two Michigan cocktails and a shared-plate appetizer for $25 or less, as well as menu items paired with Michigan-distilled spirits.
Cocktail Week runs from Nov. 11-22.
Cocktail Week GR is similar to Restaurant Week, however it’s centered around the drinks. It also coincides with with the annual Wine, Beer and Food Festival at the DeVos Place Convention Center happening Nov. 19-22.
24 Hour News 8’s Tom HIllen spoke with the owner and the general manager of Long Road Distillery in Grand Rapids — one of the businesses participating in Cocktail Week.
There is an added sense of connectivity when we frequent the places that reside within a few miles of our home. When a business puts down roots in the neighborhood where owners and workers and goers live, a deeper sense of community grows. Long Road Distillers, located in Grand Rapids West Side, is more than the city’s first distillery, it a place where people commune together over unique, handcrafted cocktails. Owners Kyle Van Strien and Jon O’Connor call the West Side Grand Rapids neighborhood home; the elbows of guests lean on the dark wooden tables in the dining space, wearing them down with story; the bartenders behind the bar craft a unique drink of homegrown flavor. It is as much about the spirits being consumed as the souls in the room.
Long Road honors the journey, respects the craft, and takes no shortcuts. Their story encompasses the local community. At Long Road their ingredients come from Michigan, from the places they know and places that resemble home. Whether it be wheat, corn, rye, fruit, or cider it has a Michigan label. They are, as Van Strien shared “highlighting what we have available.” Long Road is an in-house distillery, making everything on location. They are perfecting the art of draft cocktails, stepping out, doing new things, and embracing the long road.
We are delighted to have Long Road Distillers joining us at Fork Fest this week Thursday, October 22. They will be on site with their draft Gin and Tonic, as well as Teta’s Lemonade (vodka, lemon, lavender syrup, rose water). Stop by their bar and give one of these a try!
Interested in learning more about Long Road? Sign up to take one of their tours. Or stop by for a midweek dinner and drink. They are open seven days a week and house a delicious food menu. They also recently expanded their upstairs space which can be rented out for private events, wedding receptions, and corporate events. Find out more at longroaddistillers.com.
Local First of West Michigan, Mallory Huizenga
A local distillery has launched its Michigan distribution.
Long Road Distillers in Grand Rapids launched two of its spirits into statewide distribution this month.
The distillery’s gin and vodka are now available to all restaurants, bars and retailers in Michigan.
The distillery opened in May, and distribution is coming right about when co-owners Kyle Van Strien and Jon O’Connor expected in their timeline.
“We wanted to make sure we could meet demand here and work out our kinks,” O’Connor said. “A lot of times, distillers go into distribution and can’t satisfy demand. They get an initial launch and can’t provide more.”
Van Strien said one of the most common questions from a restaurant group is, “If we run a featured cocktail at our three locations, will we run out?”
Now, Van Strien said that assurance is possible and within the first week, The Winchester in Grand Rapids had a cocktail menu featuring spirits by Long Road Distillers.
Van Strien added that several other local businesses will carry its products: Donkey; Siciliano’s Market; Rishi’s International Beverage; and Essence Restaurant Group.
“To see some of the places we respect so much have our products . . . it’s a lot of fun,” Van Strien said.
O’Connor said they welcome restaurant and bars to bring in owners, managers and staff to show them the manufacturing process.
“We encourage other folks to reach out,” O’Connor said. “We love to host potential partners. We want to educate people on what makes our products different and what’s unique about it. The more people we talk through the process, the better.”
A local distillery has opened up an addition.
Long Road Distillers just opened its upstairs, The Rickhouse at Long Road, at 537 Leonard St. NW.
Event space
The space holds 160 people and is available for special events and general overflow on the weekends.
The space rents for $100 an hour for a three-hour minimum and a $500 food-and-drink minimum on weekends. The weekday rate is considerably cheaper, said Kyle Van Strien, co-founder, Long Road Distillers.
“We want people to use it, but we do anticipate to raise it as we see demand,” Van Strien said.
Cocktail classes
Long Road Distillers will use the space to host its first cocktail class next Tuesday.
The class is the first of many events Long Road expects to host in the space.
Cocktail classes will be an ongoing series for the distillery, said Jon O’Connor, co-founder, Long Road Distillers.
“There’s a heightened awareness in the country about cocktails, and it’s just starting to make its way to Grand Rapids,” O’Connor said. “We’re hoping to be a part of that transformation.”
While the first class will be a general overview of the history of distillation and cocktails, future classes will have a specific focus on different cocktails.
The class on Tuesday will be hands-on, as students will taste every aspect of the cocktails, from simple syrup and sugar to bitters and the spirits.
“This class will be history and structure, techniques,” Van Strien said. “We use many methods to craft cocktails and how to make better drinks at home. It will also require lots of tasting.”
Grand Rapids Business Journal, Pat Evans
During the prohibition era, people used to distill their own liquor in their bathtubs.
Long Road Distillery, the recently opened craft distillery on Grand Rapids’ West Side, is offering an unusual way to remember that slice of American history.
In conjunction with the Grand Rapids Public Museum’s opening of the exhibit “American Spirits: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition,” the distillery will release a “bathtub gin kit” featuring a bottle of Long Road vodka, botanicals for infusing, straining cloth, funnel, instruction card and commemorative bottle with specially designed label.
“Bathtub gin” was a phrase used in reference to any inexpensive, homemade liquor, not just gin.
Of course, distilling liquor at home is still illegal. Long Road features the first four legal stills ever in the city of Grand Rapids. The kit is designed to enhance the flavor of the vodka, the kit is also in the spirit – pun intended – of the 1920s era, when Americans used ingenuity to make their own alcoholic beverages, a trait in common with modern craft distilleries and breweries.
The kit is priced at $49.99 and for sale at the distillery, 537 Leonard St. NW, with $5 from each kit sold donated to the museum to support the exhibit.
“It’s a simple botanical blend included with the kit,” said Long Road co-owner Kyle Van Strien. “It’s not just going to cover up the flavor, because I think our vodka is exceptional. But it will enhance it, make it different and unique.”
The National Constitution Center’s exhibit, which opens Sept. 26, 2015 and runs through Jan. 17, 2016, will cover the temperance movement, the Roaring ’20s and the repeal of the constitutional amendment banning alcoholic beverages. More than 100 artifacts will be featured, including flapper dresses, prohibition propaganda, Al Capone’s guilty verdict and, of course, home equipment used to brew illegal beer and moonshine.
Related: Look back: Grand Rapids embraced both sides of Prohibition
Van Strien said the idea for the tie-in came when he attended a museum fundraiser for the exhibit, and inquired whether Long Road would feature the city’s first legal still. He and Long Road partner Jon O’Connor considered making a special sugar shine or corn whiskey in conjunction with the exhibit, similar to how Founders Brewing Co. created Furniture City Stock Ale for a museum beer exhibit in 2012. But they struggled to come up with a good, unique liquor, and faced time restraints in getting legal approval for a new formula and label.
So they decided to make the product interactive, and reusable. Van Strien said different botanical blends will be sold at the distillery, adding that people could go to the spice shop and use the kit to experiment with their own flavors.
“Honestly, it was easier for us to use an existing product, then have people do the alterations at home,” Van Strien said. “It’s a fun way to commemorate the period and it’s period-specific.”
Long Road opened in June 2015 and offers vodka, gin, whisky, apple brandy and more, made on-site. The distillery offers tours, cocktails and a farm-to-table food menu.
John Serba is film critic and entertainment reporter for MLive and The Grand Rapids Press. Email him at jserba@mlive.com or follow him on Twitter or Facebook.
The Grand Rapids Public Museum announced a collaboration on Thursday with a local distillery for a new exhibit that explores Prohibition.
“American Spirits: the Rise and Fall of Prohibition” opens on September 26.
Long Road Distillers, on the city’s west side, has created a “bathtub gin” kit to commemorate the exhibit. It includes everything you need to infuse your own gin at home, and comes with a special prohibition-labeled bottle.
You can pick up the kit at Long Road Distillers. Doors there opened June; it’s the first craft distillery in the history of the City of Grand Rapids.
– WZZM 13, September 3, 2015, Link to page here.
When Mitten Brewing Co. was getting started in 2011, owners Chris Andrus and Max Trierweiler were a bit apprehensive as they attended the West Grand Neighborhood Organization Christmas Party.
They meekly told then-executive director Nola Steketee they were the guys opening the brewery on Leonard Street.
“She gave us a big hug and cried about how happy she was,” Andrus said. “Ever since then, we felt like we belonged and we haven’t forgotten.”
Steketee stepped down earlier this year, and the city’s second largest neighborhood organization is trying to regain its footing under interim executive director Robert Tolbert. So this weekend, several Leonard Street businesses are coming together to throw the inaugural WGNO Block Party, led by the Mitten. All profits will head to WGNO.
There is a suggested donation of $5 for admission.
“The organization needs the help financially,” Andrus said. “This helps give them a fresh start and some operating funds so they can continue the programs they’ve provided the neighborhood.”
The block party will be held noon-8 p.m., Saturday, in the parking lots of the Mitten and Long Road Distillers, along with a portion of Quarry Street north of Leonard, between the two businesses.
Both the distillery and brewery will be open, while Two Scotts Barbecue— from across Leonard Street — will be closed and only serving at the block party.
Andrus said WGNO has supported the brewery countless times, so it’s time to repay that generosity.
“We couldn’t have done it without their support,” he said. “They came to planning meetings on our behalf and spoke up for us; they gave us assistance with the city when we needed it.”
Mercantile Bank, with its headquarters on Leonard Street, is the presenting sponsor, with several other businesses with a west side presence supporting, including 616 Development, Open Systems Technologies, Westside Garage, Ferris Coffee and Nut, Downtown Grand Rapids Inc. and Rockford Construction.
Music will be performed from 2-8 p.m., by bands such as JOE, AOK, The Legal Immigrants, Shane Tripp, Boot Strap Boys and DJ Vinyl Fetish.
“This is great timing for this party,” Andrus said. “We’ve got three businesses rolling and it’s a great excuse to get together on something, close down the street and have a party that will showcase the hot corner we have going on here.”
– Pat Evans, Grand Rapids Business Journal, August 27, 2015
The city’s first distillery has set its sights on some big expansion projects.
Long Road Distillers went in front of the Grand Rapids Planning Commission last week seeking approval for three projects, all of which gained unanimous approval.
The planned expansions include a full kitchen, a rooftop deck and an expanded production area.
Owners Kyle Van Strien and Jon O’Connor have recognized the need for expansion since prior to opening earlier this year but mulled the details for the past sixth months before heading to the city’s planning panel.
Van Strien, who is also a member of the planning commission, recused himself from the meeting.
“We knew the space we have would never be quite sufficient if everything went as we planned,” O’Connor said. “As we continue to grow after having our second still installed, it increased our potential capacity. And to fully optimize our equipment, expanding is necessitated.”
Enlargement of the production space is crucial if Long Road is to max out its capabilities and hit the distribution market it desires. Van Strien said he expects the distillery’s products to begin showing up on store and bar shelves within the next two months.
Current production space is cramped with equipment as well as with full and empty bottles, barrels, grain and fermenting liquid.
An addition would free up some elbowroom, Van Strien said.
Adding on to the back of the building would take up three of the business’s parking spots, but would double the footprint of the current production space with an additional 1,200 square feet.
“We’re hamstrung in how much we can do. It’s tight,” Van Strien said. “(An expansion) would enable us to store both finished and product in process, as well as potentially expand fermentation capabilities so we can fully optimize our equipment.”
Also in the works is a full kitchen. Currently, Long Road utilizes a partial kitchen to serve mostly small dishes. The owners said the kitchen is limited and restricts potential business during lunch and dinner times.
The proposed kitchen would be constructed in the back portion of a building at 539 Leonard St. NW, which also is owned by the distillery’s investment group and currently is occupied by Chicago Style Gyro. The gyro restaurant will stay in the building by consolidating its storage.
The project will add 1,200 square feet of kitchen space with cook-tops, hoods, walk-in coolers, dry storage and a dish-washing area.
A proposed rooftop deck will seat 60 people and have limited hours, O’Connor said. In the proposal, Long Road notes the deck is in line with recent projects by neighbors Mitten Brewing Co. and Two Scotts Barbecue.
Long Road expects its upstairs overflow seating area and event space to be finished by the start of ArtPrize next month and likely will host live music during the annual art competition.
O’Connor said because of the business’s alcohol use, any change must go in front of the planning commission. Instead of getting the projects approved one at a time, they sought to move them all through at once.
Van Strien said the projects will cost “a lot of money,” but the exact amount is an unknown at this point. He also said the projects aren’t imminent, and this is just a proactive move on the company’s part. The expansions will not be concurrent, and the first one won’t start until next spring. O’Connor said that’s because most West Michigan contractors are booked through the end of the year.
“Rather than go back multiple times, we thought we’d get it all done at once so, as funds become available, we can do them,” he said.
– Pat Evans, Grand Rapids Business Journal, August 14, 2015
While Long Road Distillers LLC just opened a little more than two months ago, the maker of craft spirits already plans to expand in Grand Rapids’ west side neighborhood.
The company will go before the Grand Rapids Planning Commission on Thursday, Aug. 13 with a special land use request to add 1,200 square feet to double its production space at 537 Leonard St. NW, as well as expand its kitchen.
For the craft distillery, the added production space will help it make the transition into producing enough product to start distributing its spirits, said co-founder Kyle Van Strien.
“This is making sure we’re satisfying the needs we have now and in the near future for production,” he said. “We just continue to grow. We’re going to two shifts (this) week for our production team just to meet demand. We’ve met demand from the front of the house … but as we go to distribution in a month and a half, we need to have enough room.
“With the amount of storage that we have and our production space, it can get tight. We hope to alleviate some of the strain on our production team.”
Demand from Long Road’s pub thus far has “exceeded our expectations,” Van Strien said. While the company expected to use 70,000 to 80,000 pounds of wheat in its first year as part of the distilling process, it used that much in its first three months of production.
“We’ve seen the demand in the front of the house,” he said. “To this point, we’ve been producing to meet demand, not for the long-term.”
The company has added fermenters to help the production crew keep up, and the second shift should also make a difference, Van Strien said.
The company plans to launch distribution with three spirits in the next month and a half.
“We probably could have had the supply to go into distribution this month or last month, but we don’t want to limp into this. We want to run full-steam into this distribution thing,” Van Strien said.
Long Road is also asking the city to allow it to add a rooftop deck to the neighboring building at 539 Leonard St. NW. The affiliated River Bed Investors LLC owns both buildings, according to county records.
Meanwhile, more kitchen space will allow the distillery to grow its food offerings and offer a “cohesive” menu, Van Strien said.
“Our menu is focused and great, but we want to become a place people go for dinner and an appetizer,” he said. “With an expanded kitchen, we can really blow up our menu with a full line of great food.”
As for the theme of the expanded menu, “we’re still coming up with what that might be,” Van Strien added. “We want it to be cohesive and fit with our cocktail program.”
The added kitchen capacity also will allow Long Road to use its soon-to-be-completed upstairs space for events and other special uses, he said. Adding the upstairs and the rooftop deck will expand the capacity to around 260 people, Van Strien said.
Long Road’s current street-level space seats 80 people.
The Grand Rapids-based distillery’s expansion comes during a period of explosive growth for spirits producers. The number of small distillers grew from 92 in 2010 to more than 700 last year, according to data from the Distilled Spirits Council.
The Michigan Craft Distillers Association said nearly 40 distilleries were in operation in the state as of last year, enough for the state to rank third in the nation for the number of producers.
– Joe Boomgaard, MiBiz, August 9, 2015
959 CHERRY ST SE
GRAND RAPIDS, MI 49506
PHONE: (616) 570-0131
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