Into the Valley of Lehigh rode the Pour Travelers: Part II

Sunday wasn't quite as ambitious as the previous day, but we still managed to get in three new breweries and make some other stops along the way. We kicked the day off at The Proper in downtown Quakertown. I must admit that I don't really recall much about this place, and I had to visit its website to jog my memory. "Oh yeah, that place!" I must have been excited to go to the Quakertown Flea Market... or the "Dirt Mall," as Andria called it. Well, there was a pretty awesome record store situated in there amongst the tchotchkes and other assorted bric-à-brac vendors. If anything, the people-watching here was delightful, and rivals one of my other favorite locales - The Tower City Carnival - where we saw a shirtless, skinny white kid with a tattoo across his stomach, which spelled out "Thug Life" in a pretty dope hip-hop font. Anyway, I found a stack of Little River Band albums for a buck each. Have you heard about the lonesome loser? Nope, because I win! 

Anyway... beer. Unfortunately, I couldn't really dig up more details about any of these beers other than their styles. Here's what I samples while visiting...

• I'm Walking Home - hazy IPA
• You Can't Fix Stupid - American IPA
• Rosario - Mexican Lager

I'd like to say that these were somewhat enjoyable, since I had a few half pours... but who knows? I'm usually not this forgetful so early in a particular day, so perhaps the beers were lackluster. I guess I'll need to visit again to make a fair assessment. 

We also swung by a place called Sage Alley for a one-and-done. I remember sitting at the bar here, and the place was screaming with assorted Memorial Day decorations and other patriotic flair. I do, however, remember enjoying my pint of Wise Crack, a West Coast IPA dry-hopped with Azacca, Simcoe, and Mosiac hops for a big citrusl and floral punch with a fair amount of that dry bitterness that's a signature of the style. I'm fairly confident this one produced some tasty hop burps, something I really miss in a world overrun by hazy IPAs. 

However, my favorite of the day was probably Yergey. I had a feeling that Yergey was someone's name, and I was correct in my assumption. Owner and head brewer Jim Yergey is in fact a retired chemist who decided to open a brewery in Emmaus, PA, back in 2016. We decided to sit outside for our first round because the main tasting room was pretty full. 

I rarely gravitate toward Scotch ales, but I couldn't resist Wee Love Scotch. Once I saw that it featured a touch of peat-smoked malt in the grain bill, I was sold. Big and malty, this tasty ale boasts notes of dark caramel, toffee, stone fruit and, of course, peat. 

I followed up the enjoyable Scotch ale with a West Coast IPA called Runners Reward . Wow, back-to-back westies at two breweries! Hop forward with tropical fruit and subtle cedar notes, this complex IPA also features splashes of coconut and a tinge of pine resins, then finishes dry and bitter, as it should.

After a pleasant visit to Yergey, it was time to head back to basecamp for additional drinking and other assorted festivities. (Saj knows what I'm talkin' about.) We spun some of our new vinyl acquisitions and got a few more rounds of karaoke in before hitting the sack. Stick a fork in another memorable Memorial Day weekend!

But that's not all, folks! 

On Monday, we realized we were pretty close to one of Freewill Brewing's tap rooms, but when we arrived we realized we'd miscalculated their hours and were over an hour early. D'oh! So we decided to head to nearby Round Guys, a brewery that's been around for close to a decade and we'd still hadn't visited. Back when they opened in 2013, one of the brewery's flagship beers was a Berliner Weisse (still is, actually). This was still a relatively unknown style to many beer-drinking folks. We'd stumbled upon this style a few years earlier while visiting Nodding Head in Philadelphia, a brewery generally credited to reviving the style in the U.S. Brewslut in particular immediately took a liking to this style and it has since become a favorite of hers, if not her absolute favorite beer style. We'd actually had Round Guys Berliner and, truth be told, we weren't too jazzed with it. With that said, we decided to test the waters with some other styles, so I opted for a flight of four beers across a broad spectrum of styles. Here's the lowdown:

• Desert Cruiser - German pilsner. Simple enough. 
• Professor Booty - NEIPA. Aaaaah, Professor... what's another word for pirate treasure? Four out of five professors say, "Well, I think it's booty!" 
• Rebirth of Cool - Collaboration with Back Yard Beans featuring Punch in the face Cold Brew Coffee blended with Round Guy's Russian Messenger Stout. "Messenger" stout? That's the first time I've heard of that descriptor for a stout. Must be some sort of Russian traitor. 
• Pagan Poetry - Quad aged in mead barrels. Rich, smooth, and dangerous. Hopefully that's a reference to the Bjork song of the same name. 

Nothing really stood out to me as above average, so we just stuck with our initial flights and hit the rocky road. Still, it was cool to get to Round Guys after so many years. Put another notch on my lipstick case, right? 

On the way home, we decided to hit up Collusion at its new site in Lititz. Easily my favorite brewery in York, PA, I'm glad they opened a new taproom half an hour closer to home. The new site is pretty bitchin'. While it doesn't have the same charm as the original site, I like the multi-level vibe of the Lititz spot. Plus it's got a stage in there, which I will hopefully grace with one of my various musical projects one of these days. 

Sniffing out some hops from down under, I opted first for a pour of Half Nelson, a pale ale with Nelson hops. Collusion generally does justice to hoppy beers, and this one didn't disappoint. I love the white wine fruitiness of this particular hop varietal, even though I'm a dry red wine guy all the way. Still, I think this flavor works well in the contest of beer more than wine, so hooray for Nelson. 

Up next was a hazy IPA called Been Jammin' that's hopped with Sabro incognito, HBC 586 and a touch of Eukanot and benefits from the addition of pineapple puree as well as toasted and also raw shredded coconut for a tropical twist. So, we've got lots going on with hops here, including the use of the newfangled "incognito" hops. If you're new to the blog, you might have missed my hop lesson during an earlier post. Essentially, it's an all-natural hop flavor product specifically designed to be used in the whirlpool. In other words, it delivers the impactful, variety-specific flavor outcomes brewers want, but without the process loss. So you lose unwanted vegetal flavors and gain the essential hoppy goodness of a particular hop variety. 

We finished up with a shared pour of a Lemon Lime Cheesecake iteration of Collusion's house DIPA, Homunculus. This was pretty God damned awesome, if you ask me. Even if you don't ask me, I'll tell you. I can't recall having too many "cheesecake" inspired beers in the past, but this one gets an A for effort... and flavor! Nicely done.

Well, that about wraps things up, doesn't it? All in all, it was a more-than-enjoyable long weekend in Lehigh Valley with some old friends, plenty of beer, and some other assorted shenanigans as well. We're already looking forward to another weekend at Joe and Andria's pad. Until next time...