Immi­grant Son Brew­ery, Open­ing Soon in Lakewood

It has been near­ly two years since Andrew Revy announced his plans to open Immi­grant Son Brew­ery in Lakewood’s West End neigh­bor­hood. Dur­ing the best of times, open­ing a brew­pub is a com­pli­cat­ed endeav­or, but attempt­ing to do so in the midst of a pan­dem­ic is unimag­in­ably complex.

“The world doesn’t always coop­er­ate,” Revy says. “But it’s a huge relief to see the goal line for sure.”

That goal line is just weeks away, with a pro­ject­ed open­ing pen­ciled in for late Sep­tem­ber. For the past two years, Revy and the team at ARC-Form have been work­ing to con­vert the for­mer Constantino’s Mar­ket (and Nature’s Bin) into Lakewood’s first and only brew­ery. The 9,000-square-foot build­ing proved an ide­al foun­da­tion from which to build out Immi­grant Son, says Revy. Orig­i­nal fea­tures like sky­lights, exposed tim­ber frame­work, win­dows and even the grocery’s dairy cool­er all were retained.

The shiny 10-bar­rel brew­house is vis­i­ble from the din­ing room thanks to expan­sive win­dows. Brew­mas­ter Erik Luli has been busy brew­ing for weeks in order to open with a ros­ter of approx­i­mate­ly 20 beers. Clas­sic styles like pil­sner, sai­son, Kolsch, com­mon ale, IPA and stout dom­i­nate but will be sup­port­ed by sea­son­als and spe­cials. Those beers, and lim­it­ed can releas­es like the Zydrunas Ilgauskas col­lab­o­ra­tion PerZver­ance, also will begin appear­ing at select bars and restau­rants around town. Erich Lash­er, indus­try vet­er­an and own­er of the dear­ly depart­ed La Cave du Vin, will be run­ning a bar pro­gram that is sure to please beer, wine and cock­tail enthu­si­asts alike.

The lofty main room boasts cathe­dral ceil­ings, a 15-seat bar and plen­ty of high top and booth seat­ing. Addi­tion­al seat­ing can be found in an overflow/private din­ing space and forth­com­ing patio. The build­ing comes with a large 40-car park­ing lot.

Immi­grant Son is more than a catchy name; it’s the foun­da­tion of the entire project and it touch­es all aspects of the food and drink pro­gram.
“I’m a first-gen­er­a­tion Amer­i­can,” Revy explains. “My par­ents are from Hun­gary, who came here two weeks before the rev­o­lu­tion. So, I’m an immi­grant son.”

• Pho­to by Doug Trattner
• Andrew Revy

Exec­u­tive chef Rob Dip­pong has used that inspi­ra­tion to cre­ate a glob­al­ly inspired menu that draws on our city’s melt­ing pot roots. The John­son & Wales grad has his culi­nary sights set a lit­tle high­er than what one would find at the neigh­bor­hood pub. There’s a sec­tion of lán­gos, the clas­sic Hun­gar­i­an fried bread, with var­i­ous top­pings and treat­ments. Oth­er small plates include smoked and grilled whole wings, charred octo­pus with chori­zo and romesco, Kolsch-steamed mus­sels frites, and ched­dar-filled piero­gies with but­ter and onion.

There are East­ern Euro­pean sal­ads like the shaved cucum­ber and beet with dill and sour cream as well as clas­sic Greek and Cae­sar sal­ads. The “hand­held” sec­tion veers from tra­di­tion­al, like a smash burg­er with caramelized onions and Swiss, to the intrigu­ing, as in the case of the chick­en paprikash sand­wich on chal­lah. A full slate of entrees hits the mark with dish­es like wall­eye fish and chips, smoked pork chop with spaet­zle, wagyu steak frites, and bacon-wrapped meat­loaf and mashed potatoes.

Beer makes its pres­ence known through­out the menu, but espe­cial­ly in desserts like stout pot de crème, Hun­gar­i­an kremes with stout choco­late sauce, and choco­late waf­fles with stout choco­late sauce.

The week­end brunch menu is equal­ly tan­ta­liz­ing thanks to items like avo­ca­do toast, chimichur­ri omelets, banana pan­cakes, brown but­ter waf­fles, and eggs bene­dict star­ring that puffy Hun­gar­i­an lángos.

Revy has spent years work­ing on this project and he is quick to men­tion that the hard­est work is yet to come. Now that the build­ing and brew­ery are large­ly com­plet­ed, he is shift­ing his focus to the soft­er side of the busi­ness. Rather than go the route of many of his brew­ery brethren, Immi­grant Son will be a full-ser­vice estab­lish­ment with slight­ly more ambi­tious aspirations.

“It’s not your cor­ner bar, but it’s not your high-end white table­cloth place either,” Revy says. “It is about atten­tion to the entire expe­ri­ence. We place equal atten­tion to the beer as we do the food and the ser­vice. Great food and great beer can be ruined by poor service.”

Immi­grant Son Brew­ery is locat­ed at 18120 Sloane Ave. and is expect­ed to open in late September.

Source:clevescene.com