Cravings Bistro & Pub now offers craft beer in Benton Harbor

Kathy Jennings | Thursday, June 19, 2014

For folks in Benton Harbor, locally produced craft beer just got a little easier to find thanks to Cravings Bistro and Pub and its new brewer Pat Glenn.

Cravings, located at 1599 Mall drive was opened in 2012 and touts a menu featuring "a little bit of everything."

Glenn, who has been homebrewing since 1997 recently teamed up with Cravings owner Eduardo Pesantez to bring several of Glen’s recipes to the restaurant.

“I gave him a challenge, ‘you go get a license and I’ll brew your beer.’ He went and got the license so here we are,” Glenn says.

The two have been friends for a several years with Glenn giving Pesantez samples of his work on a number of occasions, but Glenn never thought his handiwork would go public until Pesantez opened Cravings and wanted a local brew option on tap.

“I hadn’t really planned on it, but a lot of people had talked to me about it. I had always been in the position that you turn a hobby into a job and all of a sudden it’s a job,” Glenn says. "With Cravings I’m still working on small batches, I have creative control. We’re just going to see how it grows, I really don’t have a vision for taking over the world.”

What the brewer does have a vision for having high-quality beers on tap year-round at Cravings. His first round of brews debuted June 12 as a large crowd turned out to sample six draught offerings.

Glenn intends to keep six or seven beers on tap at any given time with four or so as mainstays and the others being rotating or experimental offerings.

“The red ale and wheat ale are both going to be very popular,” Glenn says.

Besides the red and wheat, Glenn also served up an IPA, a cream ale, a black IPA and a porter with a stout being added to draught in the very near future.

For now Glenn is using the same one barrel system that he previously used for homebrewing and plans to be at Cravings once a week making up to 25 gallons of beer per session.

Fans of Cravings and Glenn’s beer can also join the mug club where a $50 buy in gets you a T-shirt, a credit card style bottle opener and 20 oz. pours for the regular 16 oz. price.

Glenn intends to take inspiration from the restaurant’s menu when brewing new beers and also hopes to team up with Pesantez to offer special beer and food pairings.

“He’s very talented in bringing flavors together and thinking out how things are going to mix, I’m excited about brewing with his influence,” Glenn says. "Once we figure out how things are going to go, we want to do a beer pairing menu where I brew some beers and he builds some dishes around those."

For more information on Glenn’s beer and Cravings Bistro and Pub visit here.

Source: Patrick Glenn, Cravings Bistro and Pub

Cravings Bistro & Pub now offers craft beer in Benton Harbor

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