New spots often begin as the hottest.
Going out to a newly opened bar, restaurant or club during its first few months can be a fun adventure. You get to say you went there “when it was still cool.”
A new spot has taps that are clean and flowing, seat cushions still full and butt-cheek friendly, bar stools that don’t wobble, bathrooms that aren’t an environmental hazard and the main floor has yet to develop that sticky, gross, shoe-sole-licking layer of Friday and Saturday night’s sin, often punctuated with the faint but heady aroma of filthy mop water, that many dance clubs and bars acquire after a while.
So, yes, as the old song says, it’s nice to go to a freshly minted spot that is still so fresh and so clean.
The HiHO Brewing Co. in Cuyahoga Falls opened its doors during the first week of January and it still has that new brewery and hangout smell. HiHO was birthed by native Northeast Ohioans Jon and Ali Hovan, who after several years of teaching school in Colorado decided to ditch the Rockies and live the dream of opening a brewery back home.
The couple’s dream has manifested into a cavernous, 10,000-plus-square-foot brewery and tasting room with warehouse high ceilings and a wide-open floor plan. There is one very long bar where the staff scurries, and much of the rest of the room is a mix of high tables, low tables, big tables for groups, and a few large and silent televisions on a far wall.
Despite having an official room capacity of “a whole buncha folks,” the Friday night I visited, HiHO was packed with people trying a glass or a $5 flight of four of HiHO’s seven varieties of beers, which include a pale ale, Gorges Blonde and my favorite, the smooth and flavorful Ambitter.
For you beer snobs, be aware that HiHO’S brews are more subtle with nice yummy finishes than some other craft brewers’. If you are one of those IPA harlots who needs your beer to rabbit-punch your tongue and turn your palate into hop-drenched cardboard, there are other local brewers who will happily provide that particular style.
“I would recommend it for the atmosphere; everybody seems really happy and upbeat,” customer Dylan Castner of Cuyahoga Falls said. Castner was with his partner, Bryon Harper, and some friends who were trying out the small-but-effective menu.
The snack menu features food from local businesses, such as the Brewery Pretzel from Brimfield Bread Oven. I tried the meat and cheese plate, filled with a nice variety of cheeses (can’t go wrong with a good smoked Gouda or goat cheese), several fine cured meats and a couple of nice spreads with a warm baguette (or gluten-free crackers).
“I think the Falls needed a place like this. There isn’t a big place like this where everybody can go in the Falls. That’s a good thing when there’s a mixed crowd and this big open space,” Castner said.
“I haven’t tried the food but she says it’s like crack,” Castner said, pointing to tablemate and Bryon’s sister-in-law, Michelle Harper, who nodded in agreement between bites of her fluffy pepperoni roll.
“Yes, the pepperoni roll is definitely crack. It’s got a good flavor, it’s soft and warm, it’s the perfect comfort food,” said Harper, who doesn’t drink beer.
“It’s open and airy and friendly,” she said of the room.
Often, spacious, high-ceilinged, cement-floored rooms full of people enjoying themselves make for a murmuring, reverb-heavy atmosphere, but throughout the evening at HiHO, I never felt the need to yell or lean in deep to hear folks talk.
“You know how you go into most bars and you’re squeezing through and you can only sit so many places,” Castner said. “But here you can come with a group of people and have plenty of room rather than be constricted like you would at a smaller bar.”
Malcolm X Abram can be reached at mabram@thebeaconjournal.com or 330-996-3758. Read his blog, Sound Check Online, at www.ohio.com/blogs/sound-check, like him on Facebook at http://on.fb.me/1lNgxml and/or follow him on Twitter @malcolmabramABJ .