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.......