For our Sixth Brewer of Christmas, a while back I sat down and interviewed Ryan Kavanagh of Heights Brewing. You may remember that I posted an interview with his wife Shawn a month or so ago. I ended up interviewing both of them on the same day and saved Ryan’s interview for our 12 brewers of Christmas segment. I am just curious, over the last month did the title Emperor of the Kitchen catch on for Shawn?
Ryan was introduced to home brewing about 12 or 14 years ago, he couldn’t remember the exact date of his first homebrewing experience. It started with Ryan casually sitting around with friends on a Friday night and mentioning that he was thinking about giving homebrewing a shot. One of his friends Tom had recently started homebrewing about 6 months prior and had Ryan come over the following afternoon for a brew session.
For his first brewing experience Ryan and Tom brewed a Red Ale on a system that was acquired from Cap N’ Cork during that brew session. When they were done, Ryan said “That’s it? We just made soup. That was the easiest thing I have ever done.” After a few weeks of fermenting and conditioning, Ryan was able to taste his creation and from there, he was hooked.
Ryan then proceeded to dive into the brewing world head first, he went out and acquired his own homebrew system to practice his craft, and he joined various homebrew clubs to gain more knowledge about brewing. He was planting the initial seeds to become a professional brewer. His first job in the brewing industry was as an Assistant Brewer at Draught Horse Brewery in New Hudson, Michigan. This is where he began to really cut his teeth in the brewing industry, and he began to formulate plans on opening his own brewery one day.
I asked Ryan what his inspiration was for opening a brewery. He replied with the fact that he had worked at Costco as a key holding manager for 18 years, and if he was working that hard all the time, he would prefer to do it for himself rather than making someone else a ton of money. He had also turned down a full ride scholarship to the Art Institute, and he loves creating things. Thus brewing beer allows him to be creative and share his unique creations with the world.
A couple of questions that I asked him during the interview included why did you pick the name Heights, and why did you pick Farmington as the location for Heights? He chose the name Heights because in 1974 Oakland County, to distinguish itself from Wayne and Macomb County, changed all of their city names that ended in Heights to Hills. Ryan wanted to bring the Heights back to Oakland County, so he named his brewery Heights Brewing.
The reason for Farmington as the location for the brewery, when Ryan and Shawn were in their initial courting phase with each other, he lived on the Eastside and Shawn lived in Canton. They would meet for dates at Farmington Brewing Company, where they became lifetime mug club members. This was the halfway point for them to meet up and get to know each other. Since they had fond memories of visiting Farmington during their dating days, Farmington was the perfect location for them to be able to continue their story.
So what kinds of beers can you expect to see on the menu when you visit Heights? Ryan has a fondness for brewing darker styles of beers such as Porters, Stouts, and Browns. At almost all times there will be a couple of darker options for those of us that don’t recognize dark beer season. Dark beer can be enjoyed year round, and I will argue with anyone that says otherwise. Even though Ryan is a little more wary of brewing Lagers, he has started to get more comfortable with the idea of brewing them, and Heights has a few of them on their menu now.
When asked about what the response has been to Heights Brewing so far, Ryan replied with an astounding positive reception. The City of Farmington and the people love it. There have been a few people that questioned whether the city needed another brewery with Farmington Brewing Company right around the corner, but he assured me that the two feed off of each other and has created a nice little spot in Downtown Farmington for craft beer hounds.
One of the last questions that I asked Ryan was about possible expansion plans if the brewery keeps going along its current trajectory in the future. I know that this is a sensitive subject at the moment with the amount of breweries that are seemingly getting in over their heads with expansion plans. Ryan assured me that any expansion that takes place in the future will be contained within the walls of the current brewery and that they will not be pushing their luck by getting over invested into making the brewery bigger than it will become organically.
If you are looking for a great brewery, run by even better people, I suggest that you stop by and check out the art that our Sixth Brewer of Christmas, Ryan Kavanagh is creating at Heights Brewing in Farmington. One of their 24 taps will have something that is sure to please your beer drinking palate. Estrovia!
#drinklocal #holidaybeer #cheers #beer #beerlovers #craftbeer #michiganbeer #brewery
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