One of the first craft brewers in Michigan my wife & stumbled upon was Arcadia Ales in the early 2000's. Sure, we knew about Bell's, but this was a special find in Battle Creek. Kool old building in downtown Battle Creek. Near the river walk & downtown. One beer that stood out was Whitsun Ale. Had similar taste towards Oberon, but better! More citrus involvement. Was one the first places we had "wood fired pizza". Good stuff in neat atmosphere. Later they expanded to Kalamazoo. Much bigger. Cafeteria style food dining room. NIce little park nearby with kayak ramps. We thought this was a bold move with expansion, Anybody here with any experiences with this place or beer?
Oh yeah, I have great memories there. Arcadia in BC (where I live) is where I started my learning process about craft beer. They had a great line-up of beers and I was in there most every Friday night for dinner and beers, plus many other random days. Beside the great beers they had great food beyond the wood-fired pizzas. I've never seen any brewery with Osso Buco on the menu, and just about all their week-end special dishes were approaching gourmet status. The bbq was great too. The building in BC has been vacant since they left, and is an eyesore downtown now. Arcadia had a good thing going in Kzoo but financial issues caused their downfall. They probably over-extended themselves when they built that big building, and the banks caught up to them. There's another restaurant in there now but I've never been there. I heard once that the brewing equipment is still there in the big part of the building and that a contract brewery operates it. I don't know the details to this either but Shorts Brewing obtained the rights to some (all?) of the beer recipes, and I'll guess that a half dozen of the beers appeared on the store shelves of places that I go to, but the ones that I bought weren't the same, and not very good. That's been 5-6 years ago (?), and I've never seen any of the beers since. But that's why if you look up Arcadia in the BA closed breweries database it shows Short's address in Bellaire, MI.
I am a big fan of Shorts beers, especially Soft Parade, I bring a 12 home after a vacation in your state. Also on Short's mailing list. I have yet to see any of Arcadian brews mentioned. Would like to try Whitsun if it was available. I brewed a clone of it a couple years back.
I don't recall if Whitsun was one of the re-brewed beers. The London Porter was one of them that I bought, and I was very disappointed. And if Shorts did the brewing in Bellaire I was double disappointed because they can do better. (I wonder if they used the brewing equipment in Kzoo?) At one time they were my favorite brewery when they were turning out all kinds of experimental beers, many of which are now standards. I haven't been impressed with recent new beers which seem to emphasize Michigan ingredients (good for them for doing that), but nothing exciting.
They had a place in Lansing, either covid killed it or the no parking and just the awful state of anything in Lansing. IIRC someone told me years ago that they had an issue with a brewer killing yeast. Not sure if that was true or not. Like Dark Horse, if they kept it together they'd have been in it for the long term.
At least Dark Horse is still there to be enjoyed, and it's still an experience to go there. But, yeah, it has changed a bit and doesn't seem to draw the raucous crowds that it used to get. There was one or two years that The History Channel followed the shenanigans that occurred at Dark Horse in a series show. That topic came up earlier in this forum somewhere above. I think it was decided that the show was long enough ago that you can't find the videos online anymore. But then maybe someone provided a link on You Tube or some other video source.
the show is called DARK HORSE NATION and can be watched on youtube. must purchase but you can watch free clips HERE
The owner was a big fan of the Ringwood yeast. It was part of the breweries taste profile. It could also produce beers with lots of Diacetyl if not managed correctly. Ringwood is a very hardy yeast and can be top cropped for hundreds of generations. If someone killed that yeast there was some animus involved. A new pitch could be bought from one of the yeast suppliers.
I went to the place in Lansing one time. Disappointing food, regular price for smaller than pint pours, and charged me $0.49 per sample. I didn’t know about the sample price until I got the bill.
I never visited the place although it was on my list to do so. I believe that was a 'franchise' situation not owned by Arcadia. If I recall correctly they carried Arcadia beers exclusively, and may have also had the BBQ recipes. I don't know when they closed, but think they stayed open for a while after Arcadia closed. They must have gone off-contract and carried other products to be able to stay open.
Ah, Arcadia. I mostly miss their Sky High Rye. It was my go to after Founders quit distributing Reds Rye.
Jaw Jacker was one my favorites. It was my go-between spice ale before GLBC puts out it's annual Christmas Ale. JJ was a little lighter in body n spice. I remember a clove, cinniamin nutmeg flavoring in JJ.
