Weekend Roundup

I've been a mix of busy and uninspired recently, thus the lack of new blog posts. This in no way means that my life is not still completely ruled by beer. I went away for a quick trip to Anza Borrego Desert State Park this weekend with some girlfriends and returned to this in my garage.

No explanation from Reed, just a stack of cases of beer appear - like that's just a normal part of everyday life. Which it really has become at this point, and he and our beer loving friends are all quite spoiled.
On our way out to the desert we stopped in at Julian Hard Cider. I had spent some time at their booth at the Stone 15th Anniversary event last month; their cider is amazing, flavorful and dry. It's become part of the experience to stop and buy apple pie from Mom's on the trip out to Anza Borrego, and I wanted to check out the Julian Hard Cider storefront in Wynola as well and hopefully buy some Cherry Bomb. It's a cute little shop that looks straight out of the wild west (it was actually made using wood from old Julian buildings).

They'll sell you 2oz tasters for $2 (which comes close to setting off my rip-off alarm) and 22oz of their ciders, which you can also find in more and more bottle shops around San Diego. They did not, however, have the Cherry Bomb cider bottled and ready for sale yet (3 more weeks I was told), but we did have a taster which reminded me of its near-perfection. Cherry alcohol in general I find is prone to tasting either overly sweet or like cough syrup, neither of which is ok. Luckily this bucks that trend and my beer loving friends agreed that it is quite tasty and we need more of it in our lives.
Upon checking in at the cidery with Foursquare, I was presented with this summary screen.

This makes me very happy, especially when you consider that I've only been in San Diego for 3 out of the past 6 months. I think this shows a life well spent: traveling, quality drinking and the occasional movie with my husband.
I have some ideas for blog posts that require some research and that, frankly, is why they are not posted yet. I'll get to this soon, though not before next week. Sunday is my birthday. This coincides with the Great American Beer Festival and for awhile there Reed and I were talking about going out to Denver for it. Though not a difficult sacrifice on my part, this would have been further fodder for my self-imposed Beer Widow designation. I am not guaranteed to be at home or even on land for my birthday or holidays in general, I have been at work out at sea for Reed's birthday and our wedding anniversary in the past. So I decided to be selfish, and instead we're going to Las Vegas to party, relax, repeat. When I return expect to see posts about stupid laws relating to beer and a discussion on whether craft beer can be the great equalizer.

One of Us

Don't judge a liquor store by its exterior.

I was in Ocean Beach yesterday visiting a good friend. We walked to People's Co-op to buy some groceries for dinner and then stopped into the OB Quik Stop on Voltaire at Bacon. I had wandered into this place once before when I was in the area and starving; while I was waiting for my sandwich to be made I checked out the refrigerated beer section and was quite impressed with their bomber selection and made a mental note to tell Reed. So yesterday I decided to stop in and find something nice to pair with dinner; I had wine in mind. There is a full aisle of floor to ceiling wine bottles, all of which looked lovely. However, when we rounded the corner into the beer aisle we found this, and any thought of wine disappeared.

750mls of Duchesse de Bourgogne! I've never seen these on sale before, and to find it next to the assorted nuts in an inauspicious shop in OB completely blew my mind. If you've never had the duchesse before, it's a red ale that gets the balance between fruity and sour exactly right. Needless to say we bought one (why just one I have no idea) and it paired quite excellently with our gourmet grilled cheese sandwiches and homemade coconut chipotle corn chowder.
Apparently I am not the only one to notice the excellent selection here, as it has its own entry on Beer Advocate. Below is a quick picture I took of some of the bomber selection, as you can see lots of local breweries are represented. There are of course the standard MGDs and Bud Lights, but the shelf space taken up by macrobrews is the least I've ever seen anywhere.

As they say, everything we really need to know we learned in kindergarten. Don't judge a book by its cover. You'd never know this convenience store from any other just by pulling into the parking lot but the treasures that wait in its beer selection are really quite amazing, and a great find. I will definitely be back - especially since I just looked them up on Twitter and most of their tweets announce sales of 50% off wine and 22oz beers, sweet!

Local Hangout: Blind Lady Ale House

http://blindlady.blogspot.com/

Blind Lady Ale House, or BLAH, is an excellent place to hold court: people can come and go, there's usually an open table and you can grab a quick pint or order 3 courses and a bottle of wine in a busy-without-being-noisy environment. The draft list is reliably diverse and exciting, a who's who of craft breweries both local and international: Alesmith, Victory, Ballast Point, Lost Abbey and Avery were all represented on my most recent visit. I was tempted by a large variety of whites, wheats, sours and lambics - and the menu still had plenty of room for beers my friends enjoy (imperial IPAs for example) and even a few pilsners and lagers for the spillover crowd from nearby Triple Crown or Rosy O'Grady's. The food is all tasty, organic, local fare including salads, cheese plates and pizzas, with such unconventional toppings as eggplant, egg and chorizo. We have been disappointed with the desserts and usually just cross the street to Lestat's for cheap takeout treats that will rock your world as long as you get out of there before all the artistic angst has time to overwhelm you.

A place where we can all be happy.

I've been accused of being a hipster for frequenting Blind Lady. I'm still a little unclear as to what the qualifications are - I am not overly pensive or artistic and, despite my best efforts, I can't seem to get Reed into skinny jeans or guy-liner. There are some seriously bro-friendly bars nearby, where Corona is often the classiest beer on the menu, which is how BLAH gets a reputation for beer snobbery. But this is a good thing, and it's not intimidating. Choosing from their tap list seems daunting, but I've always found the pouring staff to be friendly and patient, offering tasting notes and a quick splash if you need a sample before committing. I tried some different sours on my last visit and learned from the server about Flanders reds, a style of aged red ale, that I really enjoy. It's always great to have a whole new style opened up to me and this is one I'm surprised I didn't already know much about, considering it's described as the most wine-like of beers.
Blind Lady is where I first heard about the honest pint, though I have since seen it at many establishments in San Diego, including Hess Brewery. The glassware is marked with a fill line listing the volume, so you know it's not a "cheater" pint glass, like too many are. This is one of Reed's pet peeves - have you ever poured a bottle of beer into a supposed pint glass and noticed that it's basically full? Bottles are 12 ounces, pints are 16. That's quite a difference. You know what you're getting at Blind Lady, be sure to check the board as the pour volumes vary (0.5 liters for most, but some are 0.25).

Overall, Blind Lady is an excellent place to eat, drink and be merry. The proprietor is a brewer who used to work at Stone and has now started Automatic Brewing Company, which admittedly I know very little about. I'll have to take one for the team, find out more, and report back. BLAH is also a big part of the community and has a lot of events and tastings. It's a stop along the Drinkabout, which is something I keep saying I'll do but haven't yet. Clearly, there will be some followup posts about Blind Lady as it's a big part of beer culture in San Diego and in my life.

Local Brewery Spotlight: Alpine Beer Company

 

http://www.alpinebeerco.com

Spoiler alert: you will leave this place full, perhaps uncomfortably so, due to their vast beer selection and tasty barbecue. Some friends and I piled into the car for the drive out to the brew pub and tasting room in Alpine, which really isn't as far away as you think it is. Reed and I had been there once before and returned home with two growlers, one each since we couldn't agree. It seems there are not many Alpine beers that novices like me enjoy that my beer snob friends do too, and vice versa. The friends I went with focused their attention mostly on the large (even by San Diego standards) range of IPAs including west coast doubles and even a triple (Pure Hoppiness and Exponential Hoppiness, respectively) and a golden rye (the apparently excellent standby Nelson). If you've read any of my other posts you will know that, for me, hoppiness does not equal happiness. However, that hardly slows me down at Alpine; Reed ended up being the designated driver because there were so many things that I really enjoyed, especially the Willy Vanilly, a wheat ale made with vanilla extract.
Reed and I did both enjoy the McIlhenney's Irish Red and we all enjoyed the Token, an imperial hazelnut porter, which Reed reported got even tastier as it warmed up and the bourbon flavors emerged. Mine was already long gone so I couldn't confirm it, but we did buy some bottles of this limited edition release so I can test this out for myself. There were 15 beers on tap out of the 29 listed in their descriptive handout, and some that were not offered the day we went sound amazing. You can bet that I will be checking back to find out when they've got Ned (a red ale aged in red wine barrels!), Crazy Hazel (a hazelnut brown ale), Odin's Raven (a Russian Imperial Stout made with Hershey's syrup, agave, brown sugar and molasses!) and their barleywines Good and Great (which is Good aged in whiskey barrels).
There's is the most ingenious way of keeping tasters organized - you make a numbered list of what you want ($2 each or 6 for $10) and they bring out the 5oz glasses in a numbered cupcake tin. This is easy on everybody as you don't have to remember what you ordered or which is which and the server doesn't get harassed when you inevitably forget.

Reed approves.

The brew pub is basically a bbq restaurant, with such staples as pulled pork, ribs and sweet potato fries, plus Alpine beers on tap. It is in east county so the average clientele is different from what I'm used to, what with the cowboy hats and pickup trucks, but we can all get behind the idea of well made beer, right? In addition to tasters, you can order pints and pitchers and they also do a bunch of mixtures which I find very intriguing. I had one that was their Mandarin Nectar (honey ale) and almond champagne that was fantastic and tasted like dessert. Other mixtures are of two of their beer varieties, for example there's the "Captain-n-Vanille" which is Captain Stout and Willy Vanilly and "The Red Head Bites" mixes Irish Red and Pure Hoppiness. 
Separate from the brew pub, but in the same building, is the brewery itself, where you can get small tasters for $1.50 and purchase 22oz bottles, growler fills ($10 for the glass, $10-13 for the fill) as well as goodies like t-shirts and pint glasses.
Many Alpine beers are on tap at the usual places (O'Brien's, Toronado, Ritual Tavern) so I'm unlikely to drive out to the brewery itself more than a couple times a year, but it is worth doing. I am really quite amazed at how many beers they make and distribute throughout the county, considering that the whole operation fits into a quaint little building out in Alpine. 

The gang, after a few.

Local Brewery Spotlight: Green Flash Brewing Company

http://www.greenflashbrew.com/tasting-room.php

I had never tried a beer from Green Flash before Reed started working there. I was missing out, it has by far the largest Melissa-friendly selection of any local brewery. It is also the creator of a few of my friends' desert island beers (if you had to drink one beer for the rest of your life, what would it be?). This is a place we can all be happy and carpools are carefully planned. Like most San Diego breweries they tend to get a little hop-happy for my taste, as in their popular West Coast IPA, which takes up 50% of their brewing operations, and the beer snob-friendly 30th St. Pale Ale. However, many of their beers are Belgian style, meaning an overall sweeter flavor due to the yeast varieties used. When San Diego and Belgian styles mix, as in their IPA Le Freak, my friends are huge fans but I dislike the flavor of hops more than I like the Belgian influences. Which at Green Flash still leaves me with plenty of options. In particular, I love the Belgian Brown (which they recently ran out of, making the growler in my fridge a hot commodity), Sugar Smack (a Belgian dubbel), Summer Saison and older barleywines. Reed remains suspicious of my love of barleywines, but has helped me determine that I only like them once they've aged a bit, removing that "sharp" flavor and replacing it with a smooth, savory, overall pleasing effect.
Green Flash's new digs are fantastic as well, the brewery and all its operations having recently moved to Mira Mesa. The tasting room is a large area sectioned off by wood bar-counters in full view of the brewing, aging, bottling and warehouse operations. It's a surprisingly intimate experience considering the sheer size of the place; you feel as though you're a part of this great achievement, the turning of solid ingredients into liquid awesomeness. I'm told that tours will be starting up soon, making a visit to Green Flash the best adventure into craft brewing you can get without a 3D simulator (though wouldn't that be awesome?).

Currently they're aging two different stouts (Silva and Black Freak) in bourbon barrels and barleywine in brandy barrels!

The prices are dangerously reasonable, with a 4oz taster of most styles for $1 and a pint for $4. Some are only 13oz pours, but that's for your own good as the ABVs quickly climb into double digits. There's also an outdoor area and usually a food truck parked outside to tempt you to stay all day. If you want to do a thorough tasting of what they have to offer, I highly recommend stopping by during a slower shift (earlier afternoons, Sundays) so that your server has time to give you tasting notes and offer suggestions. If you know what you want then busy times like Friday after work are fine, though you may be surrounded by men in polo shirts with phones clipped to their belts, a result of its location near the Qualcomm buildings I assume. But hey, that's better than having to trek up to Vista, which is where Green Flash started out. You can also take many of their beers home with you, bottled, kegged or in growlers ($5 for the glass and $12-17 for fills). They sell a huge selection of Green Flash gear, from growler cozies to beach towels to the usual suspects like pint glasses, bottle openers and t-shirts. I consistently see Green Flash beers on tap around San Diego, and we even saw it on sale in Japan, but you just can't beat a visit to the tasting room.

If this guy serves you a beer, say hi to him for me.

The Things We Do For Love

My first love, the ocean.

If I am a beer widow then Reed is an ocean widower. Since I was a child I have loved the ocean and been drawn to it. Whenever possible, at home and when we travel, I am in the water swimming, snorkeling or scuba-diving. Reed turns purple and gets out into the sun long before I’m done. I volunteer at the Birch Aquarium at Scripps and my favorite thing to do is wander the hall of fishes and say hi to the cuttlefish, abalone and giant sea bass. I chose a job that sends me out to sea all over the world for 3-5 months a year. Even when I’m out for months at a time, I still find my peace each day by spending a quiet moment gazing at the horizon, where the water meets the sky.

It’s important to involve yourself with your spouse’s passions. Considering what Reed has had to say “yes, of course dear” to, it really is only fair that I reciprocate. He stays home and takes care of the bills, the pets and our life here in general when I get sent off for work – so I can smile and nod when he goes on about mashing and yeast varieties. And there’s perks for both of us in this, proportionate to our sacrifices. I have been pleasantly surprised by how many beers I do enjoy. I never would have spent time on this sort of research if it wasn’t done in support of Reed’s hobby/obsession. And in the past 15 months Reed has met me in Alaska, South Africa and Japan for vacations scheduled around my work trips.

Support Your Spouse: Oktoberfest in Tokyo.

And so it was with his sacrifices in mind that I said “of course dear” when he proposed the idea of a kegerator. A full-sized second refrigerator now lives on our back porch and will supposedly have up to 15 gallons of beer in it at all times – from now until eternity. It required a small monetary investment - the fridge on craigslist, a carbon dioxide tank and a kit of accessories - and a couple of hours of work on his part to drill the hole and plumb the whole thing. And you know what? I kind of love it. It looks professional and Reed plans to make a custom tap handle for it, some sort of family crest or something. I told him he should just get a Miller High Life one; it's our last name, not our favorite beer or anything - but I think he just can't handle the implications. A friend pointed out to me that any keg could go in there, like perhaps a cider. I know better than to hold out any hope of that, but I enjoy pouring beers out of our new addition - even if I won't enjoy drinking any.

Local Brewery Spotlight: Hess Brewing

http://hessbrewing.com/findus.html

I am quite partial to Hess Brewing, a self-proclaimed nano-brewery, and not just because they were the first to help Reed break into the beer industry. It's true that this is where he started as a volunteer brewing assistant, usually at 4am on a Saturday, but it's also true that this is just an excellent place to be. The whole operation fits into 800 square feet in a nondescript warehouse area between Miramar and Mira Mesa. During tasting room hours (Wednesday-Saturday) they have to roll the brewing tanks outside to make room for customers.
Certain Thursdays are deemed Tri-Tip Thursdays and involve some truly excellent barbecuing free of charge in the hopes that you'll stick around longer and sample the beers. Needless to say on Thursday, September 15 this is where I will be. Once a month they host the Friday Afternoon Club with a band and food truck; the next one will be September 16. In the few short months since it began, it's turned into quite the scene and is not really a good opportunity for a first visit. A better way is to show up on a normal day and pay $10 for an honest pint glass and 5 tasters of your choice (they had 8 taps on during my most recent visit). Two of these were the stout, one with nitrogen instead of the usual carbon dioxide connected to the keg. There was an obvious difference in appearance and taste, so if you like sweeter stouts I recommend the nitrogen.

CO2 versus N2

They are a San Diego brewery which means their pale ale is a triple, their stout is an imperial and their IPA is black. I'm relegated to the crisp kolsch and the vienna cream ale, which tastes like a pleasing mix of cream soda and brown ale.
Hess recently celebrated their one year anniversary with a special bottling of a belgian IPA, but usually the only way to take home their beer is in one of their awesome growlers. Mike Hess is often around and the same guy, Mike Skubic, is pretty much always behind the counter. They are present at the local festivals and during San Diego Beer Week, there is talk of expansion, and they are currently barrel aging for the first time, so I expect good things from Hess for years to come.

Taking some to go!