These photos were taken Tuesday, October 11, day seven of my Craft Beer Tour 2022. As I mentioned in the last article, we headed back towards Ruth’s home in Grand Rapids so that I could hit up a few breweries in the area before I headed back to California. We visited Railtown Brewing Company in Dutton, Broad Leaf Brewery + Spirits in Kentwood, and City Built Brewing in Grand Rapids.

We started off the day by driving south a ways to Dutton, where we visited Railtown Brewing Company, a brewpub that opened in December 2014.

They have a 7bbl system, which offered 15 beers, a hard seltzer, and a cider on the day of our visit, with a nice variety of styles available. Being a creature of habit, I went with their Citra Warrior IIPA, Hophikers Guide to the Galaxy, and Harvest Smash ’22 their wet hopped harvest ale. All were solid, but I have to give the nod to the Citra Warrior as my favorite.

It is a nice space with friendly staff and customers; you will have a good time if you stop by.

Railtown Brewing Company is located at 3595 68th Street SE, Dutton/Caledonia. They open at 11:30 AM, Monday through Saturday. They have a nice food menu featuring munchies like cheese curds, salads, burgers, hoagies, and chicken sandwiches. They have cans available to-go.

After saying our goodbyes, we headed about 10 minutes north to Broad Leaf Brewery + Spirits in Kentwood, a brewpub that opened in 2019.

Broad Leaf is a nice, spacious location that is another brewery that includes a video arcade; I am guessing the arcade is a nice draw in the winter for those with kids.

On the day of our visit they had about 15 beers available on tap, as well as a wide variety of house cocktails, because, well they brew beer and distill their own vodka and gin. We were not going to be there long, so I had their Magnetic Nebula and Ruth had the Chromatic Shatter, both were solid pale ales.

The Broad Leaf Brewery + Spirits location we visited (they have two) is located at 2885 Lake Eastbrook Blvd. in Kentwood. They are open seven days a week, and offer cans to-go. Their food menu ranges from nachos and chicken tenders, to egg rolls, various chicken dishes and more.

As my brother-in-law was unable to join us on our adventure, I wanted to take him to dinner with us, so the three of us jumped in a car and headed over to City Built Brewing, a brewpub that opened in 2017.

The location is a renovated 19th-century building that had over $1 million put into it to install their 10bbl brew house and kitchen, along with seating for 180. The food menu is Puerto Rican cuisine and features things like tacos, shrimp, and braised beef, but with a Puerto Rican flair. I had the tacos.

They had about 20 beers on tap, as well as some hard seltzer, mead, and cider. I tried their Harvest Lager (wet hopped) and the Skull ‘n Bones IPA. I definitely enjoyed them.

City Built Brewing is located at 820 Monroe Avenue NW, in Grand Rapids. They are open daily until 10:00 PM and offer cans and food to go. We had a good time there, even if it felt a little classier than I expected.

And then it happened; the reason I am writing this three weeks after the fact. I woke up in the middle of the night feeling like crap. It is a good thing I was at my sister’s house, because she was in the medical field and later that afternoon I was in an urgent clinic.

If it was not for my photos and my Instagram posts I would not have been able to write about this trip because I was way out of it for what seemed like a week. Anyway, thanks Ruth for not letting me die.

So, while we were only able to go out for a week, we did manage to discover 13 new breweries, and an excellent craft beer bar. A downside of flying versus driving, besides the increase cost when you have to reschedule last minute, is that you cannot bring any beer home with you. Oh well, I have the photos. Cheers!

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