Since our summer vacation plans had been thwarted by the 'Rona, I've amassed a surplus of vacation days at work. With that in mind, I decided to take off on Friday so we could get an early start. After much deliberation, we decided to begin our day at a recent favorite of ours, Shy Bear. Prior to this fantastic brewery, I'd always thought of Lewistown, PA, as "the town with the Electric Ave. exit sign." Now when I think of Lewistown, the first thing that pops into my mind is Shy Bear.
We arrived about ten minutes prior to the 11 a.m. opening time, but we noticed the door was already propped open. So we did our whole mask rigamarole, grabbed our phones and monkey, and headed inside. We were hoping to sit inside, as it had recently rained and everything was sopping wet outside. Plus it was kind of muggy for the late morning. Not surprisingly, we were the only people there except for staff. We were promptly seated and greeted by a varied beer menu bosting a plethora of styles and flavors. I was immediately drawn to a - wha-wha-whaaaaat?! - Lichtenhainer, a rarely seen, antiquated style that's about as common as tripping over a T-Rex femur in your backyard. But it would have to wait, because I wanted to prep my palate with something a bit more, well, not smoky and sour.
For my first beer, I opted for Sunset at the End of the World, a delicious sour IPA hopped with Sultana, Lemondrop and Southern Cross for a pungent tropical bite and a hint of sour pucker in the finish. This was a great way to kick off the day.
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| Pleeps enjoying Sunset at the End of the World. |
Meanwhile, we ordered a nacho stack, which is now in the running for "best nachos ever." Except for the omission of guacamole, the ingredients served as a laundry list of everything I want on my nachos: delicious chopped chicken, pico de gallo, green onion, sour cream, beer queso, thin sliced fresh jalapêno, and cilantro. These are served in a cylindrical vessel to optimal topping dispersal. OK, I think I just made that up, but it sounds pretty cool. Seriously, these nachos are freakin' amazing!
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| We had the place to oursleves. |
So, back to the beer I was really excited to try - Eldritch. If you are unfamiliar with the style, Lichtenhainer is a pale beer brewed with lightly smoked malt and exposed to a lactic acid bacteria infection, which gives the beer its sour finish. If you don't care for sours and hate smoked beers, then a Lichtenhainer is definitely not for you. Personally, I love them, so coming across one on tap is a rare treat for me. (Feel free to brush up on the history of this long-forgotten style if you so desire.) Of course, Eldritch is no plain old smoked sour. The addition of key lime puree and meco chipotle peppers gives this beer an depth of flavor that is both exotic and delicious. The key lime bolsters the acidity with a hint of sharp citrus, while the chipolte peppers really help coax out more smokiness. With all of this, the balance was exquisite. I absolutely loved this beer.
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| Pleeps loves Teku glasses! |
While we were enjoying our visit, Jason, one of the owners, walked by and recognized us after we'd met he and his wife at Covered Bridge a few months prior. We chatted about beer and his coffee company, Rich Coast, which is right across the parking lot from the brewery. We actually decided to each get a cup of the house roast since we'd only gotten a single cup in thus far. It was very good, so we decided to head over and pick up some single serve bags to-go.
After chatting with Jason for a while, head brewer Roger also came out and sat with us for a good 20 minutes. Roger used to be the assistant brewer at Pizza Boy a while back, and had the opportunity to climb the ladder to brewmaster at Shy Bear. And let me tell you, he's absolutely killing it. He was also stoked with the way the Lichtenhainer came out (as he should be), so we geeked out over that for a bit. He also gave us a taste of a still-fermenting Peach IPA that he recently brewed in collaboration with Robin Hood Brewing out of the Bellefonte/State College area. Turns out a friend of his recently was hired as Robin Hood's brewer, so we'll definitely have to revisit that brewery, as we weren't impressed the first time we visited several years ago. Even in its "green" state, this beer was absolutely delicious. It was so tasty that I would have bought a 4-pack of the unfinished beer to take home!
There's really nothing more I can say about Selin's Grove that I haven't already said. I mean, it's my favorite brewery. If you've never been there, stop reading, get in your car, and drive there now (unless, of course, you're reading this at 1:25 a.m. and they're closed). Seriously, I can't sing enough praise for this place.
Upon or arrival, we were surprised to find a new beer on the menu - Blood Orange IPA. Owner and brewer Steve has recently been experimenting with fruit infusions in hoppy beers, and both Brewslut and I loved the recent Orange Mango Fat Cat NEIPA. This one is basically the standard IPA infused with blood orange juice. I enjoyed it quite a bit. The blood orange definitely provided more juiciness and a pithy bitterness that I tend to like in west coast-style IPAs.
We were also surprised to run into so many regulars this early in the day. One of our favorite things about the pub is the people who have become friends over the years. It really is a family. Speaking of new beers, I followed up the Blood Orange IPA with Sweet Hope Blueberry Ale , and excellent addition to its stellar fruit beer line-up. This purple ale in knee-deep in blueberries with a squeeze of refreshing lemon and a slightly tart, earthy finish. This reminds me of "Kriek Lite." I hope Steve and Heather continue to brew this one annually, because I love it. Fun fact: the name "Sweet Hope" comes from an old neighborhood in Selinsgrove dating back to the 1800s.
Since I typically get three cups of coffee in per day, I opted for a pour of Snake Drive Stout with cold brew coffee. An assertive, fairly bitter dry irish stout, this beer is not as thin and definitely beefier for the style thanks to copious amounts of black roasted malt. This beer is usually unveiled around St. Patricks Day, because legend has it that St. Patrick himself drove all the snakes out of Ireland. Man, I'm a fountain of knowledge today! Speaking of Cold COFFEE , the pub serves up some amazing cold brewed coffee from a nitro stout faucet. It's strong, aromatic and frothy, and you can enjoy it on its own or add to any beer for a shot of coffee flavor. The pub recommends a coffee porter or stout or coffee & cream with its flagship cream ale. They use an Organic Ethiopian Yirgacheffe roasted locally by Fresh Roasted Coffee.
I closed with the tried and true American Pale Ale, a classic take on the style that started the craft beer revolution. This beer features a citrus-forward hop aroma and sweet malt backbone with a vivid Cascade hop finish. The regulars' beer of choice at the pub is far and away the APA.
My apologies for the lack of photos. I never take pictures at the pub because I always get lost in conversation. We obviously came for the beer initially, but aside from the world class beer, we keep coming back because of the people too.
One place I'd been missing deeply through all of this has been Elk Creek. Although their cafe has been closed for several months, I recently discovered that they had opened a "Creekside Cafe," a makeshift beer garden behind the Millheim Fire Company just around the corner. Unfortunately, the weather wasn't cooperating, and it was looking like we were soon in for a downpour. So when we arrived, we quickly secured our beers, ordered a snack, and found a table under one of the large tents in the grass.
As anticipated, the beer selection was light. With that said, I was pleased to find Weather Rock IPA on tap, which I'd enjoyed a while back on one other occasion. This old school west coast IPA is on the malty side, but there's plenty of citrusy and grassy character thanks to generous additions of Cascade and Palisade hops. While I tend to gravitate to brewer Tim's English style ales, it's refreshing to know that he's not a one-trick pony and can brew other styles like pilsners, porters and IPAs competently. Come to think of it, I don't think I ever had what I'd call a "bad" or "flawed" beer at Elk Creek, which speaks volumes about why I love this place so much.
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| The Pleeps before the storm. |
Meanwhile, the sky was looking ominous so we decided to quickly get a second round. I opted for one of the aforementioned English-style ales, a simple Mild. Elk Creek's rendition of this classic malty English session ale definitely hits the mark with its hints of caramel, molasses and dark dried fruit. While I missed sitting inside at the comfy bar, it's always a pleasure to return back to Elk Creek for a beer or two.
It's also worth pointing out that I've noticed several new beers (many packaged in cans or bottles) from Elk Creek popping up on its social media channels. In addition to 6-packs, they also offer 25oz and 32oz cans/crowlers via curbside to-go as well as pre-orders and pick-ups at a few local farmers markets.
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Like Shy Bear the day before, we'd been looking forward to getting back to New Trail for quite some time. We enjoyed our initial visit very much, and even ran into our friends Dain and Jill from St. Boniface. We arrived shortly after opening time, and there were already a decent amount of people sitting outside. A parking attendant waived us in, and when we got out of the car the heat smacked us in the face. I was hoping for some inside seating, which in retrospect wasn't much cooler since New Trail is situated in an old warehouse and therefore doesn't have air conditioning. At least it was shady and not too bright.
We queued up for our beers and I spotted SOB Hill on tap. I'd had this American IPA before and enjoyed it better than the majority of its hazy NE-style beers. Brewed with a mixture of pilsner and caramel malts as well as wheat, this generously hopped west coast-style IPA features a combination of newer American varietals paired with some tried-and-true classics to elicit an abundance of citrus and pine with a moderate bitter finish.
I decided to follow up the west coast IPA with a pair of NEIPAs. It's hard not to, because New Trail makes so many of them. The first one, called Up the Creek, is a hazy IPA featuring oats and light caramel malts and hopped assertively with Centennial, Idaho 7 and Amarillo. This one was quite tropical with a hint of grapefruit pith, white pine and juicy apricot.
I followed it up with Rock Run, a hazy Double IPA brewed with a slew of oats and wheats and hopped with plenty of Amarillo, Motueka and Mosaic. This one boasted lots of mango and citrus. Both of these hazy beers had lots of hop flavor and low bitterness, with a soft, silky texture. With that said, I still prefer SOB Hill over these two... or pretty much ANY hazy IPA I've had from them thus far. Call me old fashioned. With that said, plenty of folks swear by them so they must be doing something right. As long as the keep brewing SOB Hill for geezers like me, I'll be a happy camper.
Brewslut also shared a bit of her Heliocentric: Berry Berry Lemonade, a collaboration with Foreign Objects and Discord (a subsidiary of Foreign Objects). The resulting beer is a tart ale featuring a wheat malt base and a profusion of raspberries, strawberries and lemons. This one was moderately tart with a prominent berry character and a slightly odd lemon note that stuck out from the pack a bit. Still, it was quite enjoyable overall.
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| ...and now for something completely different. |
Since food and beer are pretty much a requirement these days, we opted for a chicken taco platter with a hefty portion of rice and beans on the side, courtesy of the on-site taco truck whose name escapes me at the moment. On our way out, I picked up a 4-pack of Sunrise, a Baltic Porter brewed with coffee and vanilla. More on that later.
After spending some time at New Trail, we made the short drive northward to nearby Montoursville for a quick stop at Sonic Ascention Records. I decided to squeeze in a visit since we'd be checking out a new-to-us brewery in the same town... well, kind of in the same town... er... I mean, vicinity. More on that in a few shakes. This cool little record shop has a solid rock collection as well as an entire dollar bin room in the back, where I always find some great deals. This time around, I found bargains from Dusty Springfield to Joni Mitchell to Missing Persons, so I suppose it was a female vocalist kind of haul.
However, the impetus for this little excursion was to hit up a new place in Montoursville - at least that's what their mailing address indicates - Therapy Brewing. I'd heard good things about this new brewery that had just opened in May 2019, and the photos looked promising - basically a rustic wooden barn tucked away on a quite country road overlooking lots of trees. See?
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| Outside Therapy's century-old farmhouse. |
After we parked, we made our way down to the building. There were several people toting growlers and getting in line. Hmmmm. I guess folks are stocking up for a Saturday night at home. Nope. Sadly, we had missed Therapy's notification only 24 hours prior, announcing that it had changed over to growler fills due to the Governor's recent decision to require food purchases with alcohol sales. Since Therapy doesn't have on-site food, they were forced to limit sales to growler fills only. Thanks Rona! Luckily for us, we decided to throw a pair of growlers in the back of the CRV "just in case." Good thinking, Brewslut. So we took our places in line and decided what to get.
Brewslut had her eye on a milkshake ale called Creamsicle brewed with milk sugar, vanilla, and "an orange twist." I opted for Back 40 Porter - Toasted Coconut, a porter brewed with toasted coconut. But more on these beers later. Unfortunately, we didn't get to sample anything else while we were there. Sadly, this was a really quick visit, so we didn't really get to experiencing anything other than the building itself and the scenery. Next time, we'll be sure to stay extra long and soak in the atmosphere.
After twisting through the backroads of Montoursville and the surrounding area, we headed back to familiar territory - Northumberland County. Our next stop was the new Pineknotter Brewing Company, located just a few blocks from where Brewslut and I celebrated our wedding reception, The Front Street Station.
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| Outside Pineknotter in Northumberland, PA. |
When we arrived, the tasting room was already at capacity, and it was excrutiatingly hot outside. Much to our chagrin, all of the shady tables on the patio were also occupied. I shrugged and went back to the car to get my safari hat and sunblock. The reflective silver tables weren't helping, either. However, we decided to stay since we had gotten positive reviews from Deuane and Carolyn, and had also enjoyed some early beers two years ago at the Selin's Grove hops and vines festival. Thankfully, the server (also one of the owners) mentioned there was shadier seating out back under a tree, so we quickly took him up on his offer.
After the bombardment of hops at New Trail, I decided to easy back with something malty and opted for Illusion White, a tasty blonde stout with notes of vanilla, fresh roasted coffee, and mocha. I found this to be well done, so we were off to a good start at Pineknotter!
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| This is not an illusion. Actually, it is! |
I'd be remiss if we visited a brewery for the first time and didn't try its signature beer. In this case, it happens to be Knotty Juice, a hazy IPA with tons of tropical flavor. A strong whiff of juicy fruit greeted me, and I knew I was in for a treat. Turns out this beer is way more up my alley than most NEIPAs (at least the local ones), as it displayed a juicy, heavy-handed mango character. It also featured that smidgen of spicy pepper that's common with mango that I tend to enjoy. I was surprised to find that this beer gets all of its fruit flavor from the hops. Lots of breweries infuse beer with fruit and even juice to get the desired flavor. This one is all about the hop combo. I was pretty impressed with this one... and you know me and hazy IPAs by now. Wink wink nudge nudge, know what I mean?
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| Pleeps tryin' to wheez the ju-uice! |
Brewslut and I decided to share a pour of another IPA on the beer list. A traditional American-style IPA, Born on the 4th of July is more of an old-school "hop bomb" (remember that term, geezers?) IPA featuring three tried and true hop varietals: Columbus, Simcoe, and Cascade. To my surprise, I actually enjoyed Knotty Juice a bit more, although this beer was solid as well.
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| Pleeps posing at Pineknotter. |
During our visit, we were amused by a curious, young raccoon in the tree above our table. According to testimony from an older woman who witnessed the event, the little guy apparently jumped down out of the tree and grabbed a partially eaten container of beer cheese left behind by a customer literally moments before we arrived. This critter kept us occupied and entertained while we enjoyed our beers at a liesurely pace. Eventually, he jumped over to another tree, then the roof of the brewery, took a few sips out of the rainspout, and he was off on his merry way.
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| "You gonna finish that cheese?" - Rocky |
Speaking of beer cheese, we decided to order a soft pretzel with a side of beer cheese. I was beyond excited to find that Pineknotter orders its pretzels from the same bakery as Selin's Grove! Turns out the owners of Pineknotter are also big fans of the pub. So it goes without saying that the pretzel was fantastic. However, the beer cheese was pretty amazing as well! Rocky Raccoon wholeheartedly agrees. All in all, we experienced a wonderful first visit to Pineknotter despite having to endure the heat.
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| Pleeps concurs: "Drink Knotty." |
As we were heading to New Trail earlier in the day, we actually drove right by Jackass Brewing, our final stop of the day. I was surprised by the size and decor of the place. Like nearby Rusty Rail, it seemed like the owners had some serious monetary backing for this brewing endeavor. New to the area's craft beer scene, Jackass broke ground in May 2019 and had only just opened its doors on March 11, 2020... literally days before the COVID-19 shut-downs began. Talk about bad timing!
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| Outside Lewisburg's Jackass Brewing Company. |
After waiting for about 20 minutes for a table inside, we were seated at a hightop table for two near the bar. Our server was friendly and attentive (and masked... which is more than could be said for about 80% of the patrons during our visit). I should have known better than to open with a NEIPA, but sometimes I abandon good judgement for reasons unbeknownst to me. This was one of those times. The beer in question, Foggy Doo, was undrinkable. Yes, folks, occasionally we run into a beer that just should have been dumped down the drain. This was one of those times. Touted as a "traditional New England IPA with a spotlight on Citra hops," I struggled to decipher any flavors remotely suggesting an IPA. As a matter of fact, the dominating flavor (and Brewslut concurred) was wet cardboard, which is a common off-flavor found in beer caused by how the beer is aged. I won't bore you with the details of how beer can transform into a liquid resembling used bath water, but feel free to read up on your own. There will be no quiz following this blog post... I assure you.
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| Tap handles at Jackass. |
Foggy Doo promised aromas and flavors of lime, grapefruit, orange and mango. Cue that beautiful tumbleweed footage, Pleeps. Nope, not this time. Shame on me for making a NEIPA my first impression of a brewery. I should have known better. Thankfully, I went with an 8oz pour rather than the full pint.
Meanwhile, Brewslut was faring slightly better than I with her selection, Pink Rubber Duck . A light sour ale brewed with sweet cherries and lime, this one had a decent flavor but was very thin and only slightly tart. I wouldn't necessarily describe it as sour, but it wasn't undrinkable either. This one could benefit from more carbonation, a heftier body and smoother mouthfeel. Not bad, though, for a second attempt.
Since we were getting dinner, I thought I'd try and recover from my first mistake and order a second beer. I decided to keep things safe with Dumbass Porter (perhaps as an ode to my previous blunder). It's pretty hard to mess up a porter, so I was hoping for the best. This was a marked improvement over the NEIPA. Served via nitro, this porter was pretty solid overall with a roasty flavor hinting at chocolate and light coffee. It went well with my chicken and waffle sliders.
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| No bar seating during 'Rona's reign, unfortunately. |
Speaking of dinner, the food was delicious across the board. Brewslut enjoyed her poke tuna sliders, and we shared a heaping pile of seasoned shoestring fries. The food, ambiance, service and branding were all solid here. They just need to work on the beer. Also, some people I've talked to have an issue with the name Jackass, but I think it's all in good fun. I mean, donkeys are awesome (second only to goats in my personal pantheon of animal heirarchy). And with that, it was time to retire for the day.
Back at Campground, we cracked open a few cans and one of the growlers from Therapy to share with Kramer and Chu. Here's the lowdown:
Sunrise by New Trail - Baltic Porter brewed with Coffee & Vanilla. Brewed in collaboration with our friends from Sprinkled Sweet & Alabaster Coffee. We brewed this beer with a plethora of dark malts and aged it for a substantial amount of time on freshly roasted coffee from Alabaster and Madagascar Vanilla Beans from Sprinkled Sweet. It was brewed to compliment a very popular Ice Cream from Sprinkled Sweet aptly named Sunrise! Show Less
Passion Blaster by Shy Bear - This sweet and sour seductress will stimulate your senses. Saturated with passion fruit and silky milk sugar the tartness provides a supremely sexy symmetry. One sip and surely you’ll be under her spell.
Back 40 Porter with Toasted Coconut - Therapy growler. A silky porter brewed with a heaping amount of hand-toasted coconut to lend a sweet tropical flavor to this otherwise dark, roasty porter. While the body was silky, it was a tad thin. Also, the coconut came across as slightly artificial. It was pretty solid all around but not one of my favorite coconut porters. (Editor's note: We drank the Creamsicle growler about a week later and enjoyed it much more than the porter. While the aroma was strange at first, the flavor was unabashedly creamsicle with a swirl of orange and vanilla cream with very minimal hop presence.
We changed our plans on Sunday and stuck around Selin's Grove at Aunt Carol and Uncle Rick's to get in a few games of Minki Ball in the pool. We swung by the pub for a quick one - the tried and true IPA, one of my favorites - before heading to the pool, where I pounded a few cans of Naturdays, a strawberry lemonade version of... clears throat and mumbles... Natural Light. Hey, it's a great pool beer and actually tastes more like a juicy cocktail. Don't judge me!
We'd planned to hit the newly opened Hemauer in Mechanicsburg and check out Mellow Mink since we hadn't visited in a while. My nephew has been raving about their sours lately, so we need to get there pronto. I guess we'll have to leave it for another day. Until next time...
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