B2A2: Grizzly Peak

There is a category B2A2 has been skirting since the first entry, and twelve entries in it is time to name it. Not the smash burger from a James Beard kitchen. Not the build-your-own counter at a sixty-year institution. Not the farm-sourced restaurant that applies sourcing philosophy to the patty, or the wood-fired brewery where the sear comes from oak. The category is simpler than any of those: the neighborhood brewpub, the place that has been at the corner of Washington and Ashley long enough that people drive past it without thinking about whether it belongs on a list like this.

Grizzly Peak Brewing Company has been part of Ann Arbor's food and beer landscape long enough to be taken for granted. That is its own kind of credential, and it is the credential the series has not tested yet.

This is entry twelve.

The Burger

The Grizzly Peak burger is a pub burger. Single patty, enough thickness to hold up to the beer it was designed to accompany, not trying to be anything it is not. I ordered it medium and it came back medium, with a sear on the outside that had some color and a center that was still pink and giving. That is a consistent kitchen doing its job.

The build is traditional. Cheese melted properly, not a slab dropped on at the end. A sauce that was savory and present rather than sweet and obvious. Greens that were there as part of the construction rather than a garnish somebody remembered to add. The bun had enough structure to survive the full meal, which is the detail this series has noted over and over: a burger bun that loses its form by the second half is a kitchen that does not think about the bun. This one held.

The patty tasted like a kitchen that respects the base material. Not the way Grange respects it, with a full supply-chain argument behind every bite. More like a kitchen that knows how to handle beef and handles it the same way every time, because it has been doing this long enough that the muscle memory is there. The portion is generous for the price, which comes in somewhere around $14 to $16, a few dollars below where Sava's lands and at the lower end of the range Jolly Pumpkin was running.

The fries that came with it were seasoned, hot, and correct. Grizzly Peak is not a fry destination. The fries knew that. The fries were fine, which at a brewpub with a burger on the menu is the right relationship between the side and the main.

The Beer

This is the entry where the series has to acknowledge something it has circled around since the Jolly Pumpkin entry. A pub burger ordered at a brewpub has a natural pairing built into the transaction. You do not need to decide between a cocktail program and a wine list and a short beer menu. The house-brewed ale is the answer, and the question is only which one.

Grizzly Peak runs a rotating lineup of house-brewed beers. The wheat beer, when they have it, is the easy pairing: low bitterness, some body, and enough carbonation to cut through the fat without overpowering the meat. An IPA works differently, the bitterness picking up where the sear left off, giving the burger's crust something to contrast against. I had a glass of something on the malty side, an amber or a red, and found it did what a malt-forward beer is supposed to do next to a burger: it made the fat taste like fat, which is a good thing, and it rounded out the meal without competing with it.

The point is not which specific beer you order. The point is that a brewery that makes its own beer and puts a burger on the menu has already answered the pairing question, and the answer is available in a dozen directions. This is not the La Roja pairing that made the Jolly Pumpkin entry memorable. It is less specific, less dramatic, and more repeatable. Which is the point of a neighborhood brewpub. You come back because it works, not because it surprised you.

Where It Fits

Twelve entries in, and B2A2 now has a picture of how Ann Arbor handles beef. The top of the series has not changed: Echelon holds the technical benchmark, Jolly Pumpkin holds the wood-fired argument, Grange holds the sourcing argument. Sava's earned its spot in the next group by applying full-service kitchen discipline to something it was never primarily known for.

Grizzly Peak does not compete in any of those lanes. The burger is not trying to win a series. It is trying to be right for a specific moment: the moment when you sit down at a brewpub, the glasses are cold, and the burger arrives having been made by a kitchen that has been making burgers long enough to do it without incident. That is not a backhanded description. It is the description of a place that understands what it is.

The honest ranking: Grizzly Peak lands in the middle of this series and belongs there. Below the kitchens that are making an argument, above the entries where the burger existed because the menu needed one. This is a pub burger at a pub that has earned the right to have a pub burger on the menu. Blimpy earns its place through decades of technique and an institution that has outlasted almost everyone else. Grizzly Peak earns its place differently: by being the neighborhood brewpub that has been right at the corner of Washington and Ashley for long enough that the burger has had time to get consistent.

If you have been walking past it to get to somewhere newer, the walk was worth it. But so is stopping.

This is part of our ongoing series. Read the full tracker: Best Burger in Ann Arbor (B2A2): The Running List.

Grizzly Peak Brewing Company is at 120 W Washington St, Ann Arbor, MI 48104.