May Zombies

After taking about a month off since our last blog, we are back with new food and new beers. This week's date night began at El Bait Shop (as many of our date nights have over the course of the last 22 months). The lady ordered one of her summertime favorites, a Shiner Ruby Redbird and I decided to try something new, a Rogue Good Chit Pilsner. While she enjoyed hers, I tried to figure out what the brewer dropped into mine. A dirty sock perhaps? Rogue makes some great beers but this one wasn't one of them. Next the lady ordered a Bell's Two Hearted Ale, another great choice. I moved onto a Breckenridge SummerBright Ale and took strike two. Beer Advocate gives it a C and I agree. Not a good beer. It was time to give up the disappointing new beers and move on to an old and trusted favorite so we both went with a Bell's Oberon and headed out to eat. Our plan was to hit Capital Pub and Hot Dog in East Village to use our Groupon but we somehow ended up at Zombie Burger + Drink Lab instead. This was our second visit to Zombie Burger. The first time the food was wonderful but the crowd was young and loud and we felt like we were WAY old. This time the crowd was sparse and we were able to sit at the bar. Zombie Burger has a great beer selection of both bottle and tap beer. We both went with a Goose Island Fleur draft. Delicious beer! We ended up ordering a Trailer Trash Chickenburger and a Walking Ched double tap zombie burger with fried mac and cheese as the buns. If that didn't clog our arteries enough, we got a side of garlic bacon + blue cheese fries. Now it's time to hit the treadmill and run 28 miles to burn it all off.

Thanking our Forefathers for our Freedom and their Beer Recipes

75th Street Brewery-KC

Brat and Cheese Pretzel-Flying Saucer-KC

Now that we are back from our adventures, we thought we would do a second blog this week to mention some of the great food and beer we tried but didn't mention the last round. To save a little money on airline tickets, we flew out of Kansas City.  KC also is home to a great little brewpub we had heard about and were eager to try. We programmed our GPS (codename Sally) and found 75th Street Brewery without any problem (hunh, it was on 75th Street...). We ordered a pound of Belgian style mussels and some garlic pub fries and washed it all down with a Possum Trot brown ale and a Good Hope IPA, and we split a Royal Raspberry wheat for dessert. We left with a new growler for the collection filled with the Good Hope IPA.  We learn so much from bartenders and the guy at 75th Street recommended we try out McCoy's Public House (aka brewery) near the KC Plaza and Westport areas.  It took a little work (i.e. we had to ask directions...twice.), but we finally found it.  Clearly, it is a favorite spot for the locals because the patio was packed at 3:00 ish in the afternoon and they had some good beer on tap.  Finally, we headed north to the Power and Light district to a place called the Flying Saucer. With 75 beers on tap, it still paled in comparison to our beloved El Bait Shop with 105 tappers but still respectable. We each ordered a brew then a sampler of ciders (even we get tired of beer), and brat and cheese pretzel (also recommended by the bartender at 75th Street Brewery) and enjoyed a warm spring evening on their patio with some tasty libations.

Honey's.  Notice the Pella Windows going in next door

Yum!

On the last day of our Philly vacation (well, Steph was working), we hit the subway and headed north to visit an eclectic little restaurant called Honey's Sit 'n Eat. It bills itself as "some of the best Southern Jewish food you will ever taste". Once we saw bacon and sausage mentioned on a menu of a "Jewish" restuarant, we this became a 'must' stop for us. The restaurant is located in a little artistic community on the edge of a pretty dicey Philly neighborhood (although we were comforted by the fact the condo next door was installing Pella windows), but it was worth the stop. We devoured banana and pecan french toast and enfrigolatas (egg, choizo sausage, sour cream cheese, doused in black bean puree), all washed down with some strong black coffee.


We next walked six blocks to the taproom of Yard's Brewing Company located near the banks of the Delaware River. Yard's is a fairly large brewery and their beers are available all over Philly, but we really wanted to visit their taproom. It did not disappoint. We ended up spending almost three hours sampling all of their beers and chatting with the bartender. By far the most interesting beer brewed by Yard's is their Poor Richard Tavern Spruce which was originally  brewed with spruce needles during the 1770's because hops and barley were not available in New England. It had a distinctive pine flavor but was surprisingly refreshing. Yard's also offers several other beers brewed with recipes from revolutionary times. We downed a bowl of their bison chili (made bison fed expended grains from the brewery), grabbed another growler filled with the Brawler Ale for the collection and hopped the subway back to our hotel.

On our way back home from KC, we made a surprise stop at the Madison County Winery located 4 miles west of Interstate 35 in Madison County, Iowa. Madison County Winery is also the home to Twisted Vine Brewery (you knew there had to be a beer angle here, didn't you). We met the owner of the winery Doug Bakker. He was friendly and helpful even as our interests drifted from wine to beer. The Twisted Vine Brewery is a very small brewery run by three gentlemen who love homebrewing but didn't want the hassle and expense of opening a brewpub. The winery offered a spot because Mr. Bakker found while many women love wine, their husbands love beer. By offering both, he could get both women and men to the winery and all were happy.  Twisted Vine has six beers on tap and we sampled each of them. All were good but the Scottish ale was our favorite. So true to form, we purchased a growler of it, hence adding a third new growler to the growing collection, and in this case, a mini-growler which made someone VERY happy.  It should be noted the male half of this duo collects beer growlers and is happy to report he is up to 27 growlers and now........ one mini-growler.

Growler collection score!

Philadelphia Freedom

One of the joys of a vacation in another part of the country is the ability to try beers not available in the Midwest. Philadelphia is a first time stop for both of us and neither of us really knew what to expect. What is obvious is that Philly is a seriously large city on par with Chicago and much larger than other cities we have visited like Seattle or St Louis. It's also an old historic city which has forced us to each reach back to history class from our elementary school days and remind ourselves that Philly was once the original capitol of the early United States before it was moved to Washington DC. It's the city of William Penn and Benjamin Franklin. It's so different than growing up the Midwest where our history started about 1840 and basically involved homesteading farmland (yawn).

Phenomenal Philly Cheese Steak

But enough of history. This is a food and beer blog so on to the food and beer we go. One of the most important foods we wanted to try was an authentic Philly cheese steak sandwich. We have traveled enough to know the secret to finding the best foods is befriending a cool bartender and asking them. True to form, we found a cool Irish bar just a few blocks from our hotel called Moriarty's Pub. While quaffing $3 Yuengling lagers, we found what we were looking for in bartender Josephine. She said the best spot for cheese steaks in Philly was at Jim's Steaks. Wearrived at Jim's at 1:30 on Sunday afternoon and saw the line out the door and around the corner and while some would scowl at seeing such a line, we took this as indication we had found the best cheese steaks in town. Who knew a sandwich with basic canned cheese whiz and beef could be so incredibly good.  Two thumbs up for sure!

Bradley Yoder headed to the Amish Market

Another pleasant Philly surprise is the Reading Terminal Market which is located literally across the street from our hotel. Vendors serve up authentic Amish food from Lancaster County, fresh fish and seafood, fresh meat and sausages, baked goodies, flowers, vegetables and fruits.... it has it all. It reminded us of the Pike Street Market we fell in love with in Seattle last year. And of course, there is a little bar called Molly Malloy's who serves mostly regional craft beers from 22 tappers. We have tasted beers from Yuengling (which is ubiquitous here in PA but unavailable in the Midwest), Victory, Yard's, Copper Creek, Philadelphia Brewing.....just to name a few. Last evening we visited a highly acclaimed Belgian beer bar called Monk's Cafe and tried some tasty but rather expensive beers. We both had a Pliney the Elder double IPA from Russian River Brewing. This brew wins awards everywhere it goes, and while we agreed it was good, we both prefer Hopslam from our old friends at Bell's Brewing in Kalamazoo. We also finally hit our first actual brewery since arriving in PA. Nodding Head Brewery is a small brew pub located about 8 blocks from our hotel. The beer was average and the service was below average so we left a $1 tip for two beers and strolled onward just a couple blocks, and stumbled upon the Boilermaker Restaurant which had 40 beers on tap and no lights...just candles everywhere.  Very cool.  Now the beer quest continues.......

Who Doesn't Love Free Beer?

If there is one thing we love, it's free stuff. So this week we scored big. Our first stop this week was at Old Chicago where we held a little piece of paper giving us a free appetizer for simply answering a survey. It was also the night where you buy two beers and get one free. To make that deal even better, our waitress messed up and brought both of us another beer after our first one, since our plan was to share the free beer because #1) we are responsible drinkers and #2) because we are cheap.  Truth be known, though, #2 is actually #1 and #1 isn't always true. She apologized for messing up (yeah, shame on her--insert shaming finger wag here) and said we could have both for free. Our bill for an appetizer and four good craft beers: $9.75.  Win!  Of course we tipped her well and headed out for Costco, our new favorite date night stop, where we found that with our membership we can get a brand spanking new black convertible Camero for a discount.  'Nuff said.  Probably a separate blog topic in itself.

Our Rock Bottom grub and free beer.

We ended the evening at Rock Bottom for one last chance at the Fire Chief Ale before it leaves April 4. We each ordered a Fire Chief and decided to split a chicken sandwich. Then low and behold, the waitress set before us another Fire Chief ale. She explained she had made a mistake and had poured one too many. Rather than pouring it out, she said she thought we would enjoy it. Fantastic, since the bar was actually kind of full and she picked us!  We smiled and made a toast to the date gods and savored our last beer of the night. And left another nice tip, of course.

Our new beer of the week was a Lucky Bucket Lager from Lucky Bucket Brewing in La Vista, Nebraska. We honestly both thought Lucky Bucket was located in Iowa but were wrong [editor's note--for the record the "she" in this relationship suggested Nebraska during said discussion.  Just sayin']. Nevertheless, it was a nice hearty lager that went down smooth and easy.

Going to Court!

With temperatures in the upper 70's, we knew some patios would be open at our favorite spots in Des Moines, so we headed downtown this week. Even though we arrived pretty early, Court Avenue was already buzzing with lots of folks that had the same idea as us (and here we thought we would be the only ones...DOH!). The patio was overflowing with people at El Bait Shop but they have a large sliding garage-style door that they open up on nice days, so we were able to procur a spot at the bar right next to the open door with the warm sun on our backs. Ahhhh...

We started off with a Scrimshaw Pilsner from North Coast Brewing in Ft. Bragg, CA. and a Dig Pale Ale from New Belgium Brewing in Ft. Collins, CO.  We never used to be huge New Belgium fans since we like to stay with smaller breweries, but NB is making some really good beers these days and their Lips of Faith series is pretty impressive.  Anyway, both are lighter spring/summer beers that tasted wonderful, and if you are a newbie craft beer drinker, the Scrimshaw is a great choice; if you are a veteran craft beer drinker, Scrimshaw is a great choice too!  When it came time to choose beer #2, we asked for a recommendation from our favorite bartender at El Bait,  who informed us there was still a wee bit of Hopslam left . Hopslam Ale is a double IPA from Bell's Brewing in Kalamazoo, MI that earns very high marks and has become one of our seasonal favorites. It is served in a 10 oz glass, but packs a wonderfully big wheeee!

With the sun setting and a two-beer buzz, we decided it was time to eat so we found a great table in the patio area at Court Avenue Restaurant & Brewing Company. It was so enjoyable to sit outside in mid-March and watch the hustle and bustle of downtown DM while eating a couple delicious sandwiches and washing them down with a couple of their craft beers.  An Infatuation for Steph (Belgium style dubbel brown ale infused with raspberries) and Brad had a Belgian IPA the name of which is elusive right now.  



In keeping with the St. Patty's Day theme, our new beers of the week were Irish red ales. The first one was an O'Hara's Irish Red made by Carlow Brewing in Carlow, Ireland. The second was a Saranac Irish Red brewed by Saranac Brewing in Utica, NY.   Both were delicious.

Hitting Rock Bottom

Two mugs of Fire Chief Ale, please!

Since Team Vanstra was established almost 2 years ago, Rock Bottom in WDM has become one of our favorite watering holes on the west side of the metro (actually, it's our only watering hole west of the metro).  It is one of a chain of Rock Bottom brewpubs that are scattered across the country that are all owned by a large corporation that also owns Old Chicago (love their beer tours) and Gordon Biersch Brewery and Restaurants which we visited in Seattle in 2010. Normally we shy away from the corporate chains and try to support local businesses but Rock Bottom gives their brewmasters a lot of latittude in what beers to brew so you can hit one in Colorado or Illinois and they will all have different beers on tap. We appreciate this diversity. We also love the Rock Bottom Mug Club of which we are both members.

2 a.m. Burger.  Beef, hashbrowns, bacon, egg and cheese.

Other breweries have mug clubs but they charge an annual fee and don't give out free stuff like Rock Bottom. The Rock Bottom Mug Club is free to join and if you know us, you know we LOVE getting FREE stuff like hats and pint glasses. March is also the annual release of one of our favorite seasonals at Rock Bottom, the Fire Chief Ale. The Fire Chief Ale is an auburn-colored ale that is not too malty and not too hoppy.   A perfect beer for this time of year when our tastes start turning from the darker and heavier beers of winter. A portion of the profits from the Fire Chief Ale are given to local fire departments so that makes it even more cool. It will be on tap until April 4. Give it a try with a 2 a.m. Burger. which is half-price on Wednesdays!

Our new beer of the week is not really a beer at all. We recently tried a bottle of Oliver Bean Blossom Hard Cider. It is made by Oliver Cider Works which is located in Indiana and is owned by Oliver Winery which makes some very tasty wines as well. We have tried other hard ciders from places like Sutliff Cider Company out of Lisbon, IA and Vander Mill Cider from Grand Haven, MI and this one ranked right up there with the best we have ever had. And at 8% ABV, it also packed a punch. And because even Team Vanstra occasionally needs to take a break from beer.

Leap Year, Donuts and Lips of Faith

Team Vanstra decided to celebrate Leap Day and survival of another dreaded February on Wednesday by embarking on one of our occasional but extremely enjoyable all day adventures. We began the day by caffeinating ourselves at Saints Rest Coffee House in Grinnell with giant lattes. Then it was off to the Bass Pro Shop in Ankeny where a certain male member of the team was going to buy a new fly rod but became embroiled in indecision and ended up buying two shirts instead.  We also spent an unreasonable amount of time looking at the impressive hot sauce selection at Bass Pro.  If you love hot sauce, then you might want to stop in and check it out, but frankly any sauce named 'Fire in the Hole!' or 'Camo Ammo'or 'Flaming Bass' ... well, they just don't sound that appetizing.

Donuts and beer-Breakfast of Champions

But, we did manage to work up a thirst and a bit of hunger, so we made an inaugural visit to Uncle Buck's, the restaurant/bowling alley at Bass Pro where we enjoyed a Sam Adams Boston Lager and an order of steaming hot donut holes with raspberry jam.  We fondly referred to this meal as the breakfast of champions.

Then with a deep breath, mutual nod and a fist bump we headed toward...the West West Des Moines Jordan Creek area so we could check out Costco.  Bargains are bargains when you are Dutch, even if it means venturing into the abyss of the Jordan Creek area. Since neither of us were members (and the membership costs money), we decided to check out the store first. It's mindboggling how much stuff you can get at Costco that I've never seen anywhere else. Since we both suffer from situational ADHD, we walked around the store for an incredibly long time like two little kids in a huge toy and candy store saying things like "holy cow, look at this" and "OMG, I need one of those" until reason and sanity returned. We bought a membership and managed to get out without inflicting too much damage to our bank accounts, and look forward to heading back again in the spring.

Royal Mile

We then made a quick stop at Trader Joe's for some cheese and Two Buck Chuck wine and then headed downtown to our beloved El Bait Shop (which just won the City View prize for Best Bar and Best Beer Selection in DM) and found our favorite spot at the bar. We tried a new IPA from Hinterland Brewing in Green Bay, WI as well as several of our old favorites, such as the Bell's Two Hearted Ale. We finished off our day by walking to The Royal Mile (recently voted best downtown bar) and sharing an order of Shepard's Pie and Fish & Chips and admiring their impressive scotch collection (115 single malt scotches to be exact!).  We don't drink scotch but is was still impressive.  Planning now begins on our next all day adventure which will most likely be toward the Iowa City/Cedar Rapids area.

Our new beer of the week that we recently tried is from the Lips of Faith series of beers brewed by New Belgium Brewing in Ft. Collins, CO. This particular beer was called Super Cru and was brewed with Asian pear juice giving it a different but pleasant flavor. And at 10% ABV, we wisely choose to just share one bottle...actually a bomber, and only got kicked out of one state park doing it.

Peace Tree Brewing

Last night we traveled down to Knoxville, Iowa to visit our favorite brewery and one of our favorite date night destinations.  Peace Tree Brewing will be celebrating their 2 year anniversary on St. Patrick's Day in March. On this visit, were able to visit with Brewmeister Joe (who still happened to be in the tap room) about the specialty brews he is making for the St. Patrick's Day anniversary celebration. He said they were unveiling a dopplebock as well as a rye porter that's been aging in a Templeton Rye whiskey barrel for about 10 months.

Hop Wrangler and Templeton Imperial Stout

Blonde Fatale and Rye Porter

We celebrated this fantastic news with a Blonde Fatale for the lady and the last glass (literally) of Templeton Imperial Stout for me. Since Peace Tree's taproom doesn't serve food, they provide a book of local restaurant menus and  encourage patrons to order; almost all of the restaurants in town deliver to the tap room.  We have had sandwiches from Swamp Fox (love the fried green beans!) and pizza from Wacko's and Tasso's in the past but decided to go with Deng's Garden for some extra-spicy Chinese food. We washed it down with a couple Hop Wranglers. The wonderfully hoppy beer cut through the heat of the chili peppers and complimented the meal perfectly. As we were leaving, we set our calendars for our next visit to Peace Tree next month, probably for St. Patrick's day, so we have about three weeks to practice speaking Blarney!

 

Our new beer of the week was a Pride and Joy Mild Ale from our favorite Indiana brewery Three Floyd's in Munster. It was delightful but I only had one bottle, so we finished off the last Zombie Dust Pale Ale from the same brewery and a Farmhouse Ale from Brewery Vivant in Grand Rapids, Michigan (more on Vivant later...as a former funeral home converted into a brewery, it deserves its very own blog).

Flying Mangos and Fruited Beer

For those of you who know us well, then you know that Wednesday night is "date night". If we could offer any words of wisdom to couples, it's to never lose the romance and always find time to go out on dates. This past Wednesday night found us at our new favorite restaurant in Des Moines, The Flying Mango.  This family-owed restaurant, which is nestled in a residential neighborhood, was voted #5 in the top 100 restaurants in Central Iowa in 2011 and had been on our radar for awhile, but we didn't visit until several months ago. We have now been there twice and it's everything a great restaurant needs to be. This time we asked to be seated in the little nook they have that looks out on the street. It's one of the most intimate tables we have ever been seated at. The Flying Mango specializes in barbeque and Cajun dishes and they do them well. The prices are pretty reasonable and the service is amazing.

Bloody Mary lover's delight. 

The owners are Sue and Mike and they are there to make sure things run smoothly. Steph started with a Bloody Mary with two asparagus spears (which invariably lead to a discussion of what asparagus does to us later) and a grilled shrimp and Andouille sausage skewer.  A meal in itself!   I had an Anchor Steam Porter. This is one of my favorite beers to come out of Anchor Steam, Fritz Maytag's old brewery. The entrees we chose were prepared perfectly and owner Mike checked on us as we were finishing and he talked us into their Heath Bar bread pudding dessert. He also threw in two Mike's Special Coffees for free which included hefty shots of Bailey's Irish Creme. It was the perfect way to end a wonderful meal. We will be back again.  Reservations recommended.

Since this is a beer blog, I want to take a moment to discuss my feelings on "fruiting the beer". This involves inserting a piece of fruit in the bottle neck or on the rim of a draft beer. It usually involves a wedge of a lime, lemon or an orange. The cynical part of me believes the fruit is involved to cover up the taste of subpar beer but the fun side of me says otherwise. Summer beers can be greatly enhanced by citrus fruit. A ice cold Corona or Landshark with a wedge of lime or a Bell's Oberon draft with a wedge of orange on a brutally hot humid summer day is truly one of life's little pleasures. And if you don't like it, you can always throw the fruit at your friends.

Back Pockets and Mad Houses

Recently we attended a brew festival in Coralville Iowa called Brrrfest. It was held at the Marriott Convention Center in the new Iowa River Landing development which is also home to one of Iowa's newest breweries called Backpocket Brewing. The brewery is currently under construction but is producing beer at another location so we were able to sample some of their products. When it opens later this year, it will be one of the largest breweries in Iowa and will also be the Iowa distributor of beers from Schlafly Brewing Company out of St Louis, Missouri. We have been fortunate to have visited that brewery also and have enjoyed several of their beers. I am assuming when the tap room opens up, they will be serving beers from both Backpocket and Schlafly, but I'm not sure. What I am sure about is the excitement of having another brewery option within an hour of our home base.

For our new beer of the week, we sampled a couple bombers of Madhaus Dunkelweizen which was released February 3 by Madhouse Brewing Company out of Newton, Iowa.  This is the first of the brewery's Venture Series, single-batch, seasonal beer.   Unfortunately while the beer is brewed in Newton, the taproom is located at the Jasper Winery tasting room in Des Moines. Both Madhouse Brewing and Jasper Winery are owned by the Groben family so you can sample both beers and wines on your visit there. The Dunkelweizen was a good beer but lacked the wow factor we were hoping for. It was still good enough that we hope to grab a growler of the Dunkelweizen the next time we visit their taproom.

Madhaus Dunkelswizen Bombers.

Drinking in The Library

Last night, Team Vanstra made our first visit to a recently reopened spot in Des Moines. I had not heard of The Library before because I think it was mostly known as a Drake University student hangout. It recently changed owners and is now a property of our wonderful friends at Full Court Press. They are the group who own El Bait Shop, Hessan Haus and Royal Mile (and a couple more) and I feel are mostly responsible for the revitalization of downtown Des Moines. The Library was much smaller than we imagined (as in five bar stools and five booths.  Max capacity maybe 35 people) and parking was an issue. I can't imagine ever trying to get in on a weekend night. But the atmosphere was cozy, the draft beer selection was impressive and the nachos were truly delicious. We both agreed we need to make a return on a warm summer night.... preferably when the college students are gone on break.

The Library Chicken Nachos and a Back Pocket Slingshot.  Not pictured, a Bell's Hopslam.

Monks and Zombies . . .

I am currently reading a book called Diary of a Part-time Monk by J. Wilson. It chronicles the author's experience last year of drinking only beer during the 46 days of Lent. Legend has it that many monks of the Middle Ages totally abstained from food but would drink water and rich vitamin laden beer to sustain themselves during that time. I'm enjoying the book but as much as I love good craft beers, it's not something I would ever wish to try. The same goes for home brewing beer. I want to leave beer making to the experts. There are so many wonderful beers out there that I couldn't possibly make one that was any better. Ours is simply a quest to try as many wonderful beers as we can in this short time we have here on earth. And if we happen to stumble upon a wonderful restaurant or fantastic recipe along the way, we will share.

We hope to try a new beer every week and write a short review. This week we sampled Zombie Dust from 3 Floyd's Brewery in Munster Indiana. It's not available in Iowa but we snagged a 6 pack during a weekend trip to Chicagoland. It had a nice burst of hops but it was not overpowering. A wonderful beer that will be difficult to get on a regular basis. Absence will make the heart grow fonder.

Super Bowl Sunday

Sunday night is family dinner night, but since most of our kids are teen+, most Sunday dinners consist of Team Vanstra and the princess.  Tonight's menu consists of baked and battered Parmesan cheese asparagus, Bell's Pale Ale Cheddar Cheese soup and a growler of Fire Engine Red from Court Avenue Brewing Company in Des Moines.

Crispy Parmesan Asparagus Sticks

Bell's Pale Ale Cheddar Cheese Soup

And our version.  YUM!

We've only just begun...

We've been told we need a blog to chronicle our brewery visits, and other miscellaneous adventures that almost always include drinking really good craft beer.  The other reason we need this blog is so we can remember where we have been and the beers we have tried.  We are almost 50...the old memory bank is not doing so well in the new information retention department.  It seems appropriate that our first blogpost include a picture of us at our favorite non-Iowa brewery...  Bells Brewery in Kalamazoo, MI.  Of course notice the Pikes Market Brewing, from Seattle, WA.   Just confirmation that we love breweries and we love beer...