Troy City Brewing serving up fresh brews in Fall River

FALL RIVER – As 2019 edged closer, Keith Carvalho and Mike Ferreira raised a pint of beer in toast to their new establishment: Troy City Brewing.

The Fall River natives opened Troy City Brewing Dec. 21 on the ground floor of the building housing the Narrows Center for the Arts.

Unlike a bar, it’s a tasting room serving only the brewery’s ultra-fresh craft beers. Last week, the craft beer lineup on tap featured a mix of lagers and ales: 4 Corners amber lager, Troy German pilsner, 7 Hills New England IPA and Ironworks Porter.

Facing out to the courtyard on the eastern side of the building, Troy City Brewing is a warm and welcoming establishment with a long bar and several large communal tables for family and friends to hang out as they sample the brewery’s beers.

Instead of TVs lining the walls, there’s a bookcase stocked up with board games for people to gather together over in the cozy taproom. “We wanted it to be like the kind of place you’d see in Germany,” said Carvalho of the laid-back taproom atmosphere. “We’ve seen 30/40-year-olds coming in with their kids.”

In an interview following their first weekend open, Ferreira said the overwhelming response from customers stopping in at the new brewery/taproom “was awesome.”

“We’re really happy with the turnout with the local scene,” said Carvalho, adding he noticed a lot of people meeting and greeting friends they haven’t seen in a long time. “It was really nice to bring that together.”

Carvalho’s interest in beers started as a home brewer 12 years ago. In 2017, he took on a professional brewing role as head brewer at Shovel Town Brewery in Easton before deciding to open his own brewery in his hometown. Craft beer fans will find a range of four to 12 beers on tap, they said, as well as a variety of their beers for sale in 32-ounce cans called crowlers.

With a philosophy of using fresh ingredients and unique recipes to create his beers, Carvalho said they want to keep it small and local with fresh batches on tap every week. He also plans to do barrel aging, a process in which the brewed beers are placed into whiskey or rum barrels for a six-month-to-a-year aging process. “It extracts all the whiskey or rum flavors from the oak,” said Carvalho.

Ferreira, who owns Avo’s Feast restaurant in the Flint section of the city and the Avo’s Feast food truck, said they will likely have some type of food down the road at the taproom. He and Carvalho met as kids through St. Michael’s Church in the North End of the city. Though they didn’t imagine going into business together back then, they found their individual backgrounds and interests complemented each other perfectly in the new business.

Located in a former mill building space that was once a short-lived nightclub, they spent the past year obtaining their federal and state farmer’s brew licenses and refurbishing the interior and bringing it up to building codes with new electric and HVAC. “We’re producing something, so it’s still a working mill in a sense,” said Ferreira.

Hours are Thursdays, 5 to 8 p.m.; Fridays, 5 to 8 p.m. and Saturdays, noon to 8 p.m. Hours may change depending on the beer supply; check the Facebook page at www.facebook.com/TroyCityBrewing.

Email Linda Murphy at lmurphy@heraldnews.com.