Built where the fields meet the sky.

Great Lakes Bay Distillery sits on Melita Road outside Sterling, Michigan — a timber pole barn with a still inside, a smoker out back, and a patio strung with green lights.

The spirits are made the small-batch way: distilled from grain and cane, finished with real fruit, and bottled under the name of the moon they drink best beneath. Cherry, blackberry, apple, peach — if Michigan grows it, sooner or later it ends up in a jar here.

The kitchen holds up its end of the deal. Racks of ribs go into the smoker in the morning so they’re falling apart by dinner, and the bar turns the moonshine into lemonades, bombs, and whatever the season calls for.

Mostly, though, it’s a place to sit a while. Bring your people, order more than you planned to, and stay for the part of the evening when the sky and the string lights trade places.

“Phenomenal food and drinks!”

Facebook review

Come see for yourself →