Better Late Than Never - Our Trip to Wisconsin Dells in September

The Corner Pub? Does anything good really ever served at the Corner Pub? MGD, Bud, but wait! This Corner Pub brews their own beer and has a chef trained from the Culinary Institute of America. The Red was good and the Porter was pretty good. I tasted the smoked porter... interesting. A sip was probably enough but it was good.

We also visited The Grumpy Troll in Mount Horeb. We visited it twice. The first day we ate nachos and coupled them with the Vegetarian Black Bean Chili.
I tried Erik the Red and Tony had the Maggie IPA. We saw the Imperial Stouts being served around the bar and decided we should try one at the bar for dessert.




















While we sat at the bar sipping our Stout, we discussed some of the unique beers on their menu. They had a jalapeno flavored beer called Slow Eddie.

I am not much of a jalapeno lover but this was a tasty beer. On the way back to the hotel we both noticed a little delayed "heat" in our throats.

The Slow Eddie was so good we decided to come back the next day on our way home for another lunch and a growler to share with Rick and Steve (two of our best beer aficionado friends).

The Livery 4th Anniversary Festival

How do you celebrate your 4th anniversary in business? With 16 beers on tap and the Fabulous Thunderbirds in Concert!

It was an awesome night in Benton Harbor, MI on August 15th. Our ticket got us an all you can eat buffet of pulled pork, burgers and brats, corn on the cob, potato salad, watermelon and baked beans.

After we gorged ourselves on food and had a few beers (specifically the McGilligans IPA, the Herb Superb Black IPA, and the Double Paw IPA) we headed to the upstairs bar for the band.

I had no idea the T-Birds were that great of a band. I knew they had a couple of hits but they play can really play the blues.

There were only about 60 or so people in attendance so it was an intimate event. The band hung out after the show to sign autographs. I'd recommend checking them out if they are ever playing near you.

Vermont... who knew?

I went to Burlington, Vermont for a work thing and is our tradition, I checked beermapping.com to check out the microbrew situation.

Burlington itself had three microwbreweries so Tony had to fly out and join me for the tail end of the trip.

The Vermont Pub and Brewery was the first place I visited. I went the very first night in town and sampled their Bombay Grab IPA. Tony went one night while I was working and drank so much IPA, he finished the keg that night (whoo hoo!). He had wings and a burger and said the food was very good.

We returned later in the week and tried a few samples. We really love this picture since it shows off the great color differences. Left to right are Handsome Mick's Smoked Stout, Dogbite ESB, Forbidden Fruit (raspberry), Burley Irish Ale (Red) and Grand Slam Baseball Beer (summer blonde). Each beer was good but our favorite was the Burley Irish Ale (Red). It was delicious with a light roast flavor. Although the raspberry looks very pink, it was lightly flavored and not sweet. This was my first smoked beer and it was quite interesting. I could see drinking it while eating cheese or making it into a BBQ sauce.

South Burlington is home to Magic Hat Brewing Co. The tour was somewhat overrated but it lead to the free sample bar so it was worth it. The place is dark with quirky lights and signs but interesting. Did I mention they gave out free samples? We tried almost everything they had on tap that day including Single Chair Golden Ale, Lucky Kat IPA, The #9 Apricot Ale, Belgian Chocolate Stout, Wacko and one of the Odd Notions. I found a nice t-shirt with the logo in the gift shop and Tony got... wait for it... a magic hat.

On to The American Flatbread for dinner. The experience was all around fantastic. We each had an IPA to start. My TLA IPA was similar to the 3 Floyds Blackheart in my opinion (on the right). Tony had the 2G Double Dry Hopped TLA IPA cask conditioned.

I tried another Vermont local, Lawson's Finest Chinooker'd IPA. Tony had the Berkshire Lost Sailor IPA, also on cask conditioned. Both were very good.

The flatbreads are worth mentioning as well. I built my own with garlic oil sauce, corn, black beans, caramelized onions and Vermont goat cheese. Tony had organic tomato sauce, nitrate free pepperoni and sausage, onion, green pepper and cheese. The flatbreads were out of this world.

The next day we hit the road and went to The Alchemist Pub and Brewery in Waterbury (home of Ben and Jerry's). The beer gods were smiling on us the day we visited The Alchemist because they had five IPA's on tap. Tony told his good friend Steve that he had "found his final resting place."

Left to right are: Donovan's Red, Holy Cow IPA, Pappy's Porter, Celia IPA (gluten free, hence the name), The Crusher Double IPA, Rapture Dark IPA and Rapture Dark cask conditioned. Simply because of the amount of IPA's, this was our favorite pub. The atmosphere, staff, beer and customers were all what you'd want from a great pub. The Holy Cow IPA was my favorite with the most citrus flavor and Tony really liked the Rapture. The Celia was okay but had a honey and clover flavor which didn't really taste great. The young lady next to us, though, loved it and was thrilled that the had a gluten-free beer since she is a celiac.

We heard that The Bobcat Cafe in Bristol had decent beer and fantastic food but we were not hungry enough to order any food. The beer selection on the day of our visit was not to our liking. The IPA and ESB were not in stock so the hoppiest thing they had on tap was the Pilsner at 3.85% ABV and a mere 39 IBUs. I tried the Baltic Porter which actually was delicious. It had that Russian Imperial Stout flavor going on. The sign was cute, though.

Last, but certainly not least, we headed to Three Needs back in Burlington. We had heard lots about it from everyone we asked. We heard that the beers were hit or miss but that the clientele and the atmosphere were worth checking out. I think we were there a little too early to get the full effect but it was interesting.

Our trip to Burlington was fantastic. The beer, food and sights were great. Lake Champlain is beautiful and the town really does a lot to take advantage of the lake shore. Downtown Burlington is worth a visit. The town is very dog-friendly with water stations on the street and many stores posting "dogs welcome" signs.

Milwaukee, Wisconsin

There's more than cheese in Wisconsin. We visited four microbreweries on our 24 hour visit to Milwaukee. We walked over to the Water Street Brewery - just a few blocks from our hotel. A new twist on the much revered beer can collection, they had entire walls of beer cans. There were actually three panels just like this one. The beers weren't as impressive as the wall. I tried the Pale Ale and Tony tried the Maiback. I thought the Maibock was too sweet but Tony said it was just not as hoppy as advertised. The beers were all very similar in taste. The wings were good.


We headed to Lakefront Brewery. We knew it was just a brewery and not a pub but we read about the famous tours. The place was packed! The tours run every half hour and seem to always sell out. We got there just as the 6:30 tour was taking off but had to wait for the 7:00 tour. We met a great couple of kids who were going to school locally and let us sit at their table. We had a great time talking to them. Mark, our tour guide was a hoot. We got four tastes along the way and got the full tour. It is worth the stop.


We ended the evening at Stonefly Brewery. We ate dinner there and Tony tried a few of the beers. (I was done with beer for the evening). We decided to split appetizers, salad and dinner.

The most interesting appetizer was the deep fried bacon. It was served with a homemade stout mustard. We split the spinach salad with chick peas, goat cheese, black olives and tomatoes. It was delicious!

Apparently the thing to eat in Wisconsin on a Friday night is "the fish fry." Every place had "the fish fry" as the Friday night special. Well, we had it and it was incredible. The fish was so fresh tasting and lightly battered. It was served with hot apples and these unbelievable celery root mashed potatoes. It think this is my new favorite fried fish. If you go... ask for Becky. She was our waitress and was wonderful!

After a great night sleep and a workout (working off the deep fried bacon!) we went to the Milwaukee Ale House for lunch.

We tried the beer sampler and the chips and salsa.

The Downtown Lites Honey Ale was better than I expected. The Solomon Juneau was "good, very clean" according to Tony. The Pull Chain Pale Ale was, "good, not outstanding" according to Tony. Louie's Demise Amber was good, too. "The malts and the hops are kinda going back and forth. You can taste it. Its good." Tony said. The Session Ale was the Louie's Demise in a Bourbon Barrel. It was very good. The bourbon was very understated but good. The Sheepshead Stout was good, too. It was much more rich than most stouts are.

On the way home we stopped at the famed beer bar, The Map Room. It was typical small bar sized, with tons of beers in bottles and about a dozen and a half on tap. Tony tried the Bear Republic Racer 5 IPA and I had the Kulmacher Monchshof Schwarzbier (Black Lager). Both were delicious.

We finished by splitting a bottle of the Harpoon Leviathon Imperial IPA. We started slow at the Water Street but finished strong.

The Livery

We've heard so much about it... it is so darn close... and we had a beautiful Saturday with nothing more important than spending some time with each other and visiting Benton Harbor, Michigan's The Livery. We happened to be there on an historic day when their new sign was being painted on the side of the building.

It wasn't too hard to figure out what to drink. We met some regulars at the bar who helped us navigate our way to the beers we would enjoy the most.

We each started with one of the IPAs. Tony had the 555 IPA and I tried the McGilligans. While they were both tasty, the McGilligans was the big winner. From listening to others coming in and ordering - it must be a Livery favorite. (Sorry - no pictures of the McGilligans... they disappeared too quickly!)

We sampled a few others including the Paris Roubaux, the Synapse E.S.B. and the Dixie O'Flynn Stout. All were good but none compared to the McGilligans. (For descriptions of their beers - click here)

Just about the time we decided to order a Pile-O-Nachos, they took the 555 off the menu and put up the Jak Imperial Pale Ale.

The Jak was also delicious. "Very smooth and drinkable while also being very hoppy." according to Tony.

We met lots of great folks including Doug from South Bend (in this picture he was having a very in-depth conversation with a couple of kids at The Livery with their parents.)

And we also met quite a few people with ties to Northwest Indiana. Tony met a fellow Andrean H.S. alum and in the group pictured below, Brady (pictured far right)is a Highland H.S. alum. His parents still live in our fine home town.

Although we didn't get everyone's name, Marie took our contact information and perhaps she can fill in the blanks on the names.

Between the fantastic beers, great conversation, and our first ever Yodeling Pickle sighting, the day was a huge success. We're planning to go back for the Anniversary Party in August. Everyone said it was a party not to be missed!

Celebrate

This week begins the annual celebration of American Craft Beer. To find a list of events commemorating ACBW in your location, visit www.americancraftbeerweek.org and click on Brewery Events.

Celebrate with your favorite microbrew pint!

1st Annual Indiana Microbrewers Winterfest

The gang packed up, piled in and headed south for a two-day excursion to Winterfest.

In order to help support microbreweries in Indiana, we selflessly gave up a weekend to taste as many new brews as we could in the three hours we visited the fest.

Although the festival was over crowded (expected 1000 and got 2700), many booths were out of beer before we could try them, and the layout of the giant room at the Fairgrounds was very poorly planned, the six of us did have a good time.

Having learned much from our previous fest visits, we stopped in Lafayette and had brunch on the way to Indy. After checking into our rooms at the fabulous Crowne Plaza downtown Indy (thanks for the rooms, Bull!) we set off to enjoy the fest.



Our usual style of sticking together as a group and sharing tastes in order to maximize our tokens didn't work this time. With the extra large crowd (numbers, not lbs.) and the unevenly disbursed beer tables, we had to break into pairs in order to make it through the sea of buzzed beer aficionados.

After the fest we enjoyed a great dinner that evening at Harry & Izzy's, a few blocks from the hotel.
Although the fest was slightly disappointing, we were still grateful to be there and to get away for a weekend with our friends.