Drinksgiving 10 - Days 4 & 5: That's a wrap!

We had a few random places left to hit on Sunday, which was our last full day in VA. On Monday, we'd be traveling back to good ol' PA. But for today, we were off to the town of Chesapeake, about 25 miles SW of VA Beach proper, to visit yet another brewery. Since he lived in Chesapeake, Kelly's friend Dave would be meeting us (if you've been keeping score, you may remember him from the other night as they guy who bought us a round at the piano bar). The brewery in question, Big Ugly, definitely gets an "A" for atmosphere. This place was colorful and fun, with friendly staff and a variety of interesting seating options. I mean, where else can you actually sit inside a full-size vintage VW Bus and enjoy a beer? Lookie here...

If you take that bus, you get there.

Sadly, the bus was occupied by three children doing whatever kids do these days (i.e. faces buried in their iPhones, oblivious to the outside world while mommy and daddy get drunk). And I would have sat in there if it wasn't for those meddling kids! Yes indeed, folks... once again, kids ruin everything. Man, it seems as though this blog deals as much with my disdain for children as much as it deals with beer. Hey, I'm middle-aged now, so it's only natural to be cranky about shit like this, right?

Now, on to the beer. The people here were friendly and talkative. I perused the chalkboard and opted for an IPA with an intriguing name - Leaf Peepers. Say it out loud, kids. LEAF PEEPERS. It's fun to say, isn't it? I thought so. This was yet another hazy, dry-hopped NE-style IPA with plenty of dry-citrus aroma. It was enjoyable but not mind-blowing, which seems to be the norm with the haze craze: a few winners, a few losers, and lots of "C" students in the middle. (That's my clever way of calling it "average.")

Inside Big Ugly Brewing Co.

I was really excited about my second choice, Goat Hanger. Anyone who knows me or follows me on Facebook is fully aware of my infatuation with goats. This imperial breakfast stout is a blend of Goat Locker by Young Veterans Brewing and Big Ugly's own Ape Hanger. To be honest, I never got the story straight about this beer. Is it a collaboration between the two breweries, or an actual blend of two finished beers? Either way, it was tasty but nothing special (save for the name, that is). Any beer with the word "goat" in it automatically gets bonus points. However, just like Whose Line is it Anyway?, points don't matter.

Pleeps hiding behind the haze.

While I wasn't really wowed by either of my selections, both were enjoyable and served their purpose. Dave's a friendly, talkative guy, and we enjoyed chatting with him about beer, Virginia, music, and what not. We sent him off with a few choice Tröegs offerings for he and his family to enjoy.

After an hour or so at Big Ugly, we headed to stop number two: Reaver Beach. Inside, I immediately detected a pirate theme. Its logo is a skull and crossbones with mash paddles as bones and an inverted hop as part of the skull's head. Beers with names such as Jolly Roger and Fire at Sea occupied the beer menu. I also was intrigued by the name of the brewery. Perhaps "Reaver Beach" was a nickname for Virginia Beach. After checking out the brewery's web site, I learned that a "reaver" is a plungering forager and one who takes by force (i.e. a pillager or plunderer). So that definitely fits with the pirate theme. With plenty of interesting selections on the board, we decided on a sampler flight of eight different, quite disparate beers. See?

Tower of Bones - DIPA with all Mosaic hops. Tropical and citrus notes.
Hoptopus - DIPA with 8 hop additions and tons of dry-hops.
Jolly Roger Pumpkin Porter - robust porter brewed with roasted sugar pumpkins, cinnamon sticks, whole nutmeg, and clove.
Fire at Sea - smoked coffee porter. 'Nuff said!
Navalis - Gose brewed with pink sea salt and lime zest.
Under the Black - brownie stout brewed with lactose, vanilla bean, and cocoa nibs.
Reaver En Noir - sour ale aged in oak barrels with Pinot Noir grapes.
On the Account - oak-fermented sour red ale aged in Madeira barrels for 16 months.

Of course Pleeps is honing in on the dark beers.

The sours seemed to stand out here again, with the two barrel-aged beers and gose at the forefront. The smoked coffee porter was also nicely done. With that said, it's probably one of those breweries that I'll forget about in a year or so. That's not a bad thing; it's just reality, especially when you visit as many breweries as we do. But the place was cool and the presentation was thoughtful, so it was definitely worth a stop. But, off to the next brewery.

Next on the agenda was Young Veterans. As you might be inclined to guess, this place had an obvious military vibe, from the names of its beers down to the beer label artwork, decor, and web site design. As someone who works in marketing at a brewery, I always appreciate when a brewery ties everything together. Young Veterans seemed to "get it." (Although, what happens when the guys get a little older; do they change the name to Middle Aged Veterans?) All kidding aside, it was time to belly up to the bar and order some beer.

Enter another (shared) sampler flight, consisting of the following six beers:

Semper Fi.PA - single hop Citra IPA.
Jet Noise DIPA - brewed with lots of hops, apparently (couldn't find any additional details).
Private Plum - sour ale brewed with plums and hibiscus. Part of its new Pucker Factory series.
Tower Buzz - another Pucker Factory release; this one's a passionfruit sour ale.
MOPP4 - more Pucker Factory business... a sour IPA brewed with Falconer's Flight and El Dorado.
The Objector - yet even more Pucker Factory in the form of a sour IPA brewed with hibiscus.

Pleeps has taken flight!

It seems as though this brewery has found its niche brewing sours. I didn't really get to talk to anyone about their process, but I'll be the majority of these (if not all) were kettle soured. I didn't really have issue with any of the sours here. They were well-done and pretty tasty for the most part. I also dig the name of the sour series: Pucker Factory. Kudos on these beers. I'd like to see them begin a barrel-aging program if they haven't already.

The IPAs, however, were another story. Brewing sour ales on the same brewing system as other beers requires Anal Retentive Chef-like cleanliness and sanitation efforts, and I felt these two hoppy beers suffered from some kind of airborne bacteria or other souring agents. Semper Fi.PA and Jet Noise were not intended to be sour, but they definitely displayed characteristics of sour beers. With that said, based on the quality of the sour beers we sampled, I'd wager that these two IPAs would have tasted fine had they not been compromised by bacteria.

Inside Young Veterans' tasting room.

Brewslut and I are no strangers to Green Flash, our final stop of the day. I figure we'd end on a high note, given the reputation of this brewery and numerous past visits to both its San Diego facility as well as the experimental Cellar 3, just outside San Diego. I'd forgotten that Green Flash opened this East Coast brewing facility to accommodate growth in the Mid-Atlantic region. This seems to be a big trend lately with bigger West Coast breweries such as Sierra Nevada, Oskar Blues, Stone, etc. all of which now have East Coast facilities. Hey, if it means fresher beer for us folks on this side of the mighty Mississippi, then I'm all for it!

Green Flash... buildin' a wall!

But back to Green Flash. Outside, the courtyard was brimming with visitors drinking beer and eating grub from the food truck we were also about to hit up. It was another unseasonably warm day for November, and although it was just a tad chilly, the nearby fire pits helped take the edge off. We sat outside for a bit after getting our first round, then headed inside after we'd eaten. I forget what we got, but it was good. That I remember!

Inside, the tasting room and merch shop echoed those of the Green Flash brewery HQ in San Diego. The board was rife with Green Flash classics, selections from its sister brewery, Alpine, and a few choice nuggets from both the Cellar 3 and Genius Lab small-batch series. After immensely enjoying Cellar 3 on our last two trips to San Diego, I was glad to see a few of these limited elixirs made their way to the east coast. We dipped our toes into the selection in typical fashion - with hops. Brewslut liked the Spanish Trampoline, an IPA brewed for National IPA day (Aug. 3). This one boasted a tropical flair with notes of passionfruit and mango in the nose. I dug into a pour of Hard Count IPA, a collaboration with Nick Hardwick. Do you know who that is? Me either. It was OK, but not what I'd call a resume builder.

Inside Green Flash's right coast digs.

After dabbling in hops for our first beers, we did a complete 180 and dove headfirst into the Cellar 3 tanks. Brewslut enjoyed her Ideal Sauvage, a Belgian-style dark ale aged in red wine barrels with Brettanomyces. Pretty tasty, I thought. However, once I put my glass of Sepia Frumento to my lips, I knew I'd made a sound decision. This cask-conditioned bourbon barrel-aged barleywine brewed with orange zest and cherry was everything I anticipated... and more! I feel sorry for beer lovers who simply can't get into the nuanced layers of a nicely executed barleywine. Sure, they're challenging to manage when planning an all-day drinking excursion. But... DD, baby! Kelly to the rescue. Not only was I able to savor this liquid gold, but I also decided it was in my best interest to order a pour of something I'd overlooked on the board the first two times around. This would be Cosmic Ristretto, a Baltic porter with espresso from the Genius Lab series. While not as mind-blowing as my previous beer, this was well worth the addition of a mere 8.2% ABV thrown on top of the 13.5% of the barleywine. Not gonna lie to you, but I was feeling pretty mellow after that one-two punch. While all of the beers were enjoyable, I could have bathed in the Sepia Frumento. Seems like barleywines won big time on this trip (thinking back to Gorgon, the amazing barleywine from Coelacanth as a top-tier beer as well). And with that, folks, we ended our trip on a high note.

However, there's always a fun postscript to the majority of our trips, which often comes with the car ride back to PA. I'd been wanting to visit Strangeways Brewing in Richmond for the last several years, which honed into my radar range back when Mike Hiller (proprietor and brewer of the now-defunct Bavarian Barbarian in Williamsport, PA) started brewing there. I was glad to see Mike continue on with brewing. To be honest, I never quite understood why BB never got much love. I know Bullfrog was right down the street and already had a decade under its belt, but this was several years before the recent craft boom where towns even smaller than Billtown can accommodate multiple breweries. I always thought that BB's marketing was amazing (for example, its labels resembled Soviet propaganda posters, while its tap handles were forearms gripping huge battle axes). I know, right? Awesome! Sadly, Mike closed the brewery's doors back in 2012 or thereabouts, and Bullfrog has since occupied the brewing space in an effort to expand its sour beer program.

But more on Strangeways in a bit. First, a slight detour.

When we were heading home on Monday through Richmond, I managed to guilt Brewslut into a quick visit to a local record store. When we parked the car, we noticed a Mellow Mushroom across the street. We'd been to a few locations before (it's a well-established chain largely found in VA and neighboring states to the south), and we knew they always featured a nice, well-curated craft beer selection with a focus on local breweries. So, we made an executive decision to stop in for lunch and a beer.

Musical montage at Mellow Mushroom (nice alliteration, eh?)

After reviewing the vast beer selection, I opted for a flight (a rarity for me at such an establishment). But with a great selection of local beers, my curiosity to try a few beers from unknown breweries prevailed. Here's the low-down on my flight:

• Zombie Killin' from Three Notch'd Brewing Company - supposed to be an imperial black IPA, but I got some sour ale instead. They had two Three Notch'd beers on tap, and I'm pretty sure the bartender poured me the wrong beer. The one I received wasn't very enjoyable. 
• Red Army from Trapezium Brewing Company - a red IPA
• Rum Pumpkin from Hardywood Park Craft Brewery - imperial pumpkin ale matured Caribbean dark rum barrels. This sucker was so God damned boozy!
• Mochaccino Shake from Kindred Spirit Brewing - golden ale brewed with lactose sugar, coffee and vanilla beans, and cacao nibs.

Unfortunately, nothing really jumped out at me in this flight. The most enjoyable one of the bunch was the Mochaccino Shake. The Red Army was non-descript, the Rum Pumpkin was way too hot, and the [INSERT BEER HERE] from Three Notch'd simply wasn't good. I should have just had a Victory and have been done with it. But I like trying new local breweries when we're traveling, so no harm, no foul. Food for thought: Our salads for lunch were killer, though. Anywho, onward and upward.

Finally got to Strangeways!

Since Strangeways was our only brewery visit of the day (well, there would be one other quick stop), we decided to split a huge sampler flight. There were close to 30 beers available on tap, and after all, it did take us a few years to get here. Who knew when we'd be back? So we decided to go big, then go home. Check out this flight of epic proportions:

• Palooza - NE IPA brewed with a pilsner/wheat malt base, loads of oats, Azacca, Cascade and Pacifica hops for notes of mango, passionfruit and pear
• It Gose... - notes of lemon, dewy grass, hay and coriander. 
• Wake Me Up Before You Gose - Gose with lacto, Brett, fleur de sel (French sea salt), coriander, and ginger 
• Überlin - tart Berliner Weisse featuring a dry, fruity funkiness thanks to wild Brett claussenii yeast fermentation
• Red Sangria - sour Berliner Weisse brewed to mimic sangria wine
• Turning Torso - farmhouse ale fermented with a variety of yeast and brett. Galaxy and Huell Melon hops lend a fruity, floral nose with a funky finish.
• Virginia Peanut Butter Cup - chocolate peanut butter stout
• Reindeer Fuel - coffee & vanilla imperial stout conditioned it on 10 pounds of Counter Culture coffee and rich bourbon-soaked Madagascar vanilla beans 
• Ape Armageddon  - Brandy barrel-aged imperial stout
• Thistle Killya Scotch Quad - Scotch Ale/Belgian Quad hybrid aged for a year in Macallan Scotch barrels
• Hop Howler - flagship IPA brewed with Citra, El Dorado, Jarrylo and Pacific Gem hops. I decided to add this after the fact because I really wanted to buy a shirt with this label. I tried it. I liked it. I made the purchase. 

All the dark beers are front and center... where they should be.

OK, that was a lot. And you know what? Not a bad beer in the lot! The Palooza was quite enjoyable, as were the various stouts, especially Reindeer Fuel and Virginia Peanut Butter Cup. The tart beers were also really well-done. To be honest, this place exceeded my expectations. Mike has definitely honed his skills over the years, and overall I was super impressed with Strangeways. 

Self portrait of me tasting beers at Strangeways.

The staff were extremely friendly and talkative, which we always appreciate. Mike was also kind enough to leave us a few bottles, one of which was unlabeled and the other was an imperial-something-or-other. I can't wait to dig into these with some friends. We, of course, reciprocated with a selection of Tröegs, which we always have in tow. Pleeps was obviously a big fan of this place, what with the monkey mascot and all. They became fast friends, and Pleeps is already asking if we can go back. We just might be back later in January... you never know!

Pleeps LOVES this place!

It's customary for us to end a trip at Pizza Boy when we travel homeward via I-81 N. This time was no different. I got to try a new version of Hazelton Native, a dank, hazy - dare I say NE-style - IPA, which was tasty. I also had to get a pour of the newest batch of Magic... Under Where?, originally brewed for my annual Ffej of July extravaganza. You can never go wrong with that beer. I mean, after all... it's a solid beer with a dumb name.

There you have it, folks. Another Drinksgiving in the bag. We've got lots of beer traveling to do in 2018, so stay tuned to your friendly neighborhood Pour Travelers blog to see where we're headed next. Until then...

When's the next trip?!

San Diego 2017 - Part 3: All roads lead back to OB

Our day began with a visit to 32 North. I didn't remember visiting there two years ago, but as soon as we walked in, I remembered the place. Turns out our last visit occurred shortly after they opened in 2014, so they hadn't been open a year. I remembered not being completely sold on their beer, but I liked the place. Seems as though the last two years were kind to them, as their space grew to accommodate more tanks. Those tanks are churning out some pretty tasty beer these days.

I started the day with a pint of Best Coast IPA, the brewery's flagship IPA. This particular version was cask conditioned with whole cone Simcoe hops and served via beer engine. It did not disappoint. They bill this as a "throwback to classic IPAs" and I definitely agree. This took me back to a decade or so prior when we'd first visited San Diego and sampled a variety of West Coast IPAs for the first time. The mouthfeel of this beer was pure cask bliss, soft and supple with a sweet Simcoe nose of citrus fruit and pine sap. It even looked great in the glass. This one was meant for the cask!

My view from the bar at 32 North.

Brewslut grabbed a pour of Mighty Mouse, a session IPA brewed with more than 2lbs. of hops per barrel, giving it an invigorating hop aroma. It was pretty solid overall, but I was digging the Best Coast so much that I kind of shrugged it off. We completed our visit with a pint of Hello, Darkness, an oatmeal stout brewed with local Nomad Donuts coffee and served via nitrogen.

Pleeps loves his stouts!

Dano referred us to our next stop (although he hadn't been there yet). Thunderhawk Alements is a new kid on the block of the ever-expanding San Diego craft beer scene. Only open a few months, they are situated in a small industrial park in the midst of about a dozen other small breweries in the Miramar area. The name struck me as kind of odd for a brewery, but it was easy to remember because I once sat in with a country band called Thunderhawk for a few shows. True story! With about seven beers on tap, we decided to go with a sampler flight for four beers. Here's the low-down:

• Westworld - pale ale dry-hopped with Cascade and Chinook.
• Torreyana - saison brewed with orange blossom honey and ginger, and fermented with American oak.
• Electric Youth - Coffee pale ale with Pacamara beans. I couldn't help but get the Debbie Gibson song stuck in my head for a while thanks to this beer's name!
• Prince of Zamunda - chocolate stout with cacao nibs and Madagascar vanilla beans. This may very well have won the "best beer name" of the trip award... if such an award existed!

View from my barstool atThunderhawk.

For a start-up brewery, it appears that they're off to a great start! We enjoyed talking with one of the owners (unfortunately his name escapes me, although he reminded me of Tom Morello, guitarist for Rage Against the Machine). Rather than pick our favorite of the line-up, we decided to share a half pour of Over There, classic German dunkelweizen that was nice and roasty with minimal smokey character. Brewslut ain't down with smoked beers. This was a good interpretation of the style and stuck to the basics. I'd read about a big West Coast IPA called Punt Gun when I checked out their web site. Sadly, it was on recently but had kicked, so we wouldn't be trying it this time. The English major in me just loves the assonance in that beer name (plus I love using the word "assonance," so it's a win-win)!

Up next was a spot we visited many, many times in the past. However, on this particular visit, a new brewery moved into the premises. Since our last visit, Mikkeller had recently inhabited the old AleSmith brewery in Miramar. Yes, the renowned Danish brewery now has a tasting room in San Diego. And talk about a tap list! When we arrived, we were greeted to a veritable smorgasbord of interesting sounding beers. See?

Look familiar? 

Small pours and sample sizes were definitely appreciated, as we wanted to try an assortment of the beers available. I began my journey with Windy Hill, Mikkeller's interpretation of a hazy NE-style IPA with Mosaic hops. (Editor's note: I'm getting sick of typing hazy NE-style IPA... damn, there I go again!) Despite that fact, it was my favorite beer of the bunch. Hazy Hazemith was another hazy NE-style IPA we sampled, and yet another beer going after the "haze craze" with a clever name to boot.

20+ beers on tap at Mikkeller's tap room.

One of the owners of Thunderhawk mentioned Foggy Figures, NE style Black IPA with Columbus, Simcoe and Chinook Hops, so I had to try that one as well. I must admit that I hadn't yet come across a hazy NE-style black IPA in my travels, so this was a first. This one was pretty dank and roasty, and not bad in the grand scheme of things. Up next was Don't Call Me Ol' Fashion, a dark lager with raspberry, tangerine, cherry and vanilla sugar. Weighing in at 11%, we felt it prudent to get a sampler size pour of this sucker. Overall, this beer sounded better on paper, although it was still enjoyable. I think the flavor profile would have worked better in a lighter style such as a cream or amber ale.

There were a lot of high octane beers on tap in the 10% ABV range, which we unfortunately (albeit understandably) avoided in lieu of allowing for more quantity and thus more brewery stops during the day. Our last beer was a hoppy pilsner called Midwest Dream that was well-done.

Cool, colorful mural at Mikkeller.

Pure Project is located right next door to Cy's new Amplified location in Miramar. I'd read good things about this new brewery, which was not in existence during our last visit. They had plenty of variety on the tap list, so we opted for a shared sampler flight. Here's the deets:

• Sunset Crush - cream ale with organic strawberries and vanilla.
• Valle Pura Vida - blonde ale with ginger and orange peel.
• La Vie En Rosé - hibiscus saison with local honey.
• Evangeline - Gose brewed with 100% European barley, organic California grapefruit, organic coriander from Egypt and pink Himalayan sea salt from Salt Farms in San Diego.

FIVE... five beers... a ha ha ha haaaaa!

If you notice, the picture above shows five beers. However, when I consulted my Untappd check-ins after the trip, I only noticed four beers listed. D'oh! Brewslut seems to have also missed one, so the fifth beer here is a mystery. Perhaps Pleeps chugged it when our backs were turned. 

After spending some time at Pure Project, it was off to another new brewery. Longship Brewery opened its doors in June 2016 and joined the ranks of dozens of other small, hopeful breweries in the area. I'd gotten in touch with my old high school friend, Nicole, who'd been living in San Diego for several years now. We'd gotten together two years ago at Mother Earth for a beer after having not seen each other since high school graduation. Turns out her husband Jon is really into the beer scene as well, so he was happy to join us at a few breweries in their backyard.

Digging the fonts at Longship.

They arrived at the tail end of our visit to Longship. While we were there, we encountered a mixed bag of beers (including one that was unfortunately not enjoyable due to heavy diacetyl). Still, I enjoyed the Funeral Pyre, one if not the only smoked porter I encountered during our trip. The other beers we sampled were Topaz SMASH, a hazy (there's that word again) juicy IPA brewed with Topaz hops. Olaf the Stumbler (another awesome beer name) was the other. This dry, hoppy India Pale Lager featured tropical fruit notes, but if memory serves me correctly, this was the one that was flawed.

We also encountered an awesome, chill brewery dog at Longship whom garnered much of my attention. Sadly, I can't recall the mutt's name. But this is him.

Coolest dog of the trip... besides Stubby, of course!

Nicole and Jon joined us at Green Flash, another place that has blown up since we first started visiting San Diego. Their new-ish brewery and tasting room seems to keep expanding every time we visit. As you probably know, Green Flash acquired/joined forces (whatever you want to call it) with Alpine Beer Company, one of favorites of the old guard. Their hoppy beers used to be some of my absolute favorites. Sadly, beers like Nelson and Duet just don't have the same impact on me since Green Flash and Alpine became one entity. Of course, I always hate when people complain that "Nugget Nectar isn't as good as it was when they brewed it in Harrisburg," so I guess I can chalk it up to my ever-changing palate and not - as many would think - changes in beers' recipes.

Jon was talking up a new IPA called HFS. Brewed with Mosaic, Citra and Simcoe hops, I assumed this is an acronym for "holy fucking shit." It was good, but not that good! Brewslut opted for What's Golden IPA, a collaboration with Parallel 49 Brewing based out of Vancouver, BC, Canada. To quote the breweries: “We’ve matched a West Coast style IPA with techniques common to the newly popular New England IPA. Hop aromas of citrusy tropical fruit combine with a smooth and creamy mouth feel for a winning East-meets-West collab.” So there you go.

After a fun stop at Green Flash, we parted ways with Nicole and Jon and headed back to Dano's to regroup and plan our evening. Turns out we were heading back to OB again for another romp around Newport Avenue. Fine with me!

First up, of course, was PPOB. I never turn down an opportunity to stop here for a beer. On this occasion, I went with Same Hops Different, a... wait for it... hazy NE-style IPA. This particular one was hopped with Mosaic and Citra. Can't go wrong with those hops. This style has become so popular that even Pizza Port took a stab at brewing one. This was tasty as expected, but I'll stick with their West Coast style IPAs, which are some of the best out there.

Back at Kilowatt, it was packed. Cy and some friends were out at a nearby restaurant and ended up here at the same time as us, so we hung out for a bit. Luke was also working his shift, so we got hooked up. On this particular visit, I opted for the Red Wine Barrel Aged Wheat Wine, which I was eyeing up the other day. This rich, high gravity ale aged in red wine barrels boasted bready wheat and fruity yeast flavors. I enjoyed it, but not as much as the Gin Barrel Aged Tripel, which was phenomenal. During our visit, we enjoyed a pour of the Passion Fruit Green Tea Ale, a pale ale infused with green tea and passion fruit as the name would imply. I also tried the 250 KWH IPA, Kilowatt's flagship and best-selling IPA. This IPA features a bunch of rarely seen hops including Kohatu, Rakau, Southern Cross, and Falconer’s Flight to produce a melange of piney, floral, fruity and citrus notes. (Editor's note: Sorry for the lack of pictures for the last few paragraphs. I was too busy being social with, you know, actual people!)

Somewhere along the way, I grabbed an amazing vegan hot dog from a street vendor. By this time, I don't remember much about it other than it was the greatest thing I ever tasted. This happens quite often after I've been drinking all day. I can't tell you how many times I've had "the best INSERT FOOD HERE in my life" after a full day of drinking. At some point, we also stopped at another bar for a quick cocktail, however both Brewslut and I abstained and rested our livers, if only for a brief amount of time. Dano's girlfriend Jen doesn't drink beer, but she will imbibe in the occasional wine and mixed drinks. Fair enough, especially since she has to hang out with three beer geeks all night.

Our final stop of the evening was OB Brewery. This was our first visit to OB Brewery, as they were not yet open during our previous visit. Brewslut decided to follow the lighter path and ordered a pour of Long Time Coming, a straight up cream ale. Me? Not so much. I settled on Malicious Journalist, a dry-hopped DIPA hopped with Citra, Simcoe and Cascade. Unfortunately, I can't tell you much about the beers since I had them at the conclusion of a long, productive day of brewery crawling. But we did have an awesome view.

View from the rooftop at OB Brewery overlooking Newport Ave.

See? Great view, right? After a fun night bopping around Dano's old stomping grounds, we Ubered back to his place and, to be honest, I don't really recall much of what else happened that evening. Must have been fun, I suppose. Until next time, I'll leave you with this...

Another drunken selfie at unknown whereabouts.

San Diego 2012 - Part III: Smoke and a Sausage

Friday was a pretty light beer day (not LITE beer) in terms of actual consumption, because we decided to head up north to Harrah's Rincon Valley Center to see Cheech and Chong in concert!  Harrah's is a mammoth casino complex housed on an Indian reservation about an hour outside of San Diego proper.  I'd listened to Cheech and Chong's Greatest Hit compilation tape quite a bit back when I was a kid, and also saw several of their movies (my favorite being "Up in Smoke"), so it was kind of a "bucket list" decision... let's go and cross it off the list!  After all, when else would we get the chance to see these two comedy icons in the flesh?  

But first, we headed to Rancho's again for breakfast, then to Rite-Aid for some gym-related articles, and finally to the gym for our workout before stopping in at Pizza Port OB for their awesome lunch special - a slice of pizza, a hefty salad and a beer.  Today, I went with the Chinooki Pale Ale brewed with 100% Chinook hops.  The sign on the tap list was quite humorous and depicted the Snookie (from that God-awful MTV show Jersey Shore) Monster from a fairly recent South Park episode.  I got a kick out of it.  

 We had a bit of time, so we decided to check out a brand new brewery called Societe that just opened about six weeks prior to our visit.  We were surprised to find a fairly large brewery and tasting room situated in one of the many industrial parks that seem to house many of the San Diego breweries.  But the floor plan was so open, that they definitely have plenty of room to grow and expand.  Overall, I really enjoyed the vibe of Societe.  I get the feeling that they are trying to create a Victorian-style fictional town, given the names of their beers and images on their merchandise.  They only had five beers on tap during our visit, so we opted for a sampler, which included generous pours of all five beers.   Of the five beers, three were IPAs (The Dandy, The Apprentice and The Pupil) while two were Belgian-style ales (The Harlot and The Widow).  My favorite was, without a doubt, The Pupil, an IPA brewed with one of my favorite hop varietals - Nelson Sauvin.   In retrospect, Societe may have been my favorite of the "new" breweries we visited during this trip.  I look forward to returning to see what else they've come up with since this past visit.

Inside Societe's brewery

We milled around OB for a bit and headed back to Dano's to get ready for the Cheech and Chong show.  After chilling for a bit, we embarked on the hour-long drive to Harrah's.  The roads were quite Californian - long, winding mountainous two-lane highways that made me wish I was in the front seat (motion sickness, you know?).  We made it to the casino about an hour before the concert was set to begin, and we had to secure tickets and eat dinner.  Lucky for us, one of the restaurants in the casino was pretty dead, so we ordered and were served in about fifteen minutes.  We chose a steakhouse, not the best option for Brewslut and I, but we had very limited options. So we both inhaled our chicken Caesar salads and headed to the venue.  Overall, the show was great, with Chong's wife (extremely HOT wife, that is) opening the show and acting as MC throughout the night.  The duo performed many of its musical hits (Basketball Jones, Earache My Eye, Born in East LA) and a solo set from Blind Melon Chitlin.  And of course, they performed the classic "Dave" and "Let's Make a Dope Deal" skits, among others.  After the show, we headed back to San Diego for some much needed rest, as tomorrow would be a busy drinking day, indeed!


We had a pretty hectic itinerary planned for June 16.  First up was our daily visit to Pizza Port OB, followed by a stop at Ballast Point's newly expanded tasting room.  I was pleased to find that they beefed up the beer selection from about eight or ten selections to a whopping twenty-two taps, complete with most of the flagship and seasonal beers, as well as several one-offs and specialty beers rarely seen in PA.  We decided to get several samplers, as there was plenty on tap that we'd either never had previously, or wanted to drink again!  We opted for the Barrel Aged Piper Down (a Scottish ale), Three Sheets Barleywine, a special batch of Black Marlin Porter brewed with chipolte peppers, cocoa nibs and orange peel, Indra Kunindra (a curry stout brewed with cumin, cayenne, kaffir leaves, coconut and the aforementioned curry), and finally Barmy ale (brewed with apricots and honey).  We honestly could have stayed for another hour.  

So many taps... not enough livers!

 Aside from the beer, we also met a local fellow at the bar with whom we struck up a conversation.  When we mentioned we were both from Pennsylvania, he informed us that his cousin lived there, but in a small town we'd likely never heard of - Shamokin!  As you probably know, both Brewslut and I grew up in Shamokin and lived there until we graduated high school.  So it was quite amusing to meet someone three-thousand miles away who'd heard of little old Shamokin.

Up next on the agenda was a visit to a relatively new brewery called Hess Brewing.  I must admit that I'd never heard of them before, but I soon found that they had only opened in August 2010.  Hess has the distinction of being San Diego's first licensed nano brewery, meaning the are REALLY small (they brew in 1.6 barrel batches, or about fifty gallons per batch).  It appears that Hess has a penchant for brewing some pretty ballsy brews.  Of the four beers we sampled, the lowest ABV was 6.3% (a tasty coffee and cream stout named Grazias Induresco).  We also tried the Amplus Aeerba, a San Diego Pale Ale weighing in at a mammoth 11.3% ABV, as well as Ex Umbris, a rye imperial stout (9.8% ABV) and finally Solis Occasus, a DIPA with Meridian hops and weighing in at 7.7% ABV.  We were also feeling a bit peckish, and thankfully there was a food truck outside peddling European sausages.  Lucky for us, they had an apple chicken sausage with cheese and caramelized onions that was delicious and really hit the spot!

Next was our much-anticipated return visit to Alesmith.  If you may recall, they were closed the last time we visited San Diego, and needless to say, we were quite bummed out.  This time around, we made sure the tasting room was open!  Lucky for us, they had a killer tap selection and a recently expanded tasting room to boot.  We enjoyed the Yulesmith Summer DIPA, a double coffee version of the amazing Speedway Stout and also the standard version of Speedway.  It was pretty much elbow to asshole in the tasting room, so we decided to chill and sit on the floor and enjoy our own company rather than try to be sociable.  I also picked up the first of several brewery T-shirts at Alesmith, a cool black and gray all-over print design featuring the Alesmith brewery logo as well as their high gravity beer logos.

It's a bit too big for Pleeps, so I guess I'll keep it!

Just a hop, skip and jump away from Alesmith is Green Flash Brewing Company.  We'd visited once before during our inaugural trip to San Diego, but we were thrilled to find that they too have expanded their tasting room... and entire brewery, for that matter!  We enjoyed pours of the Double Stout, Le Freak, White IPA and Palate Wrecker, the two latter beers I'd never had before.  Green Flash makes some amazing beers, and it was great to see how much they have expanded since our last visit.  We also got talking to some folks who were in the process of opening a new brewery somewhere in California (if memory serves me correctly), so perhaps there will be another new brewery waiting for us on our next visit.  Check out some great pics, courtesy of Brewslut...

As if this day wasn't epic enough, we decided to make the 90-minute trek to Orange County to visit The Bruery.  But I will save that story for Part IV.  Until then... cheers!