Wrecking Bar Brewpub in Atlanta

I recently had to go to Atlanta for work and what does that mean? It means I find somewhere sweet to eat dinner the first night! After a little research on BeerAdvocate, I settled on the Wrecking Bar brewpub because I love brewpubs and it had quite a few positive reviews. Turns out it was also two blocks from my friend's apartment so that worked out real well.

After a long cab ride from the airport followed by a short walk, I arrived in the Little Five Points area of the city and the Wrecking Bar. Nice looking place, smallish bar with about fifteen seats. A decent number of tables too. Not a ton of people were there when I walked in around 6 but it was a Tuesday and it did fill up during the few hours I was there though. The first thing I did was order a flight which came with six of their nine or so beers.

Bell's Special Double Cream Stout

Even at 100 degrees, I still like drinking my stouts and barleywines. I guess having A/C will do that to you. Last night I drank a bottle of Bell's Special Double Cream Stout, an american stout.

Really pleasant roast nose with a hint of tartness or dark fruit or something in the back. Nice body, thick for a 6% stout. A creamy, milky start with smooth roast following and a light licorice flavor to finish. The latter actually disappeared as I drank more with the roast smoothing out even more and some chocolate coming out. Really nice beer that just got better as I drank more. Bell's is so good.

Bell's Kalamazoo Stout

Bell's has quite a few stouts in their lineup but they are all slightly different in more than just name. Which, well, makes sense since it would be dumb to make the same beer and just name it differently. The Kalamazoo stout is an American Stout made with brewer's licorice.

Mild roast in the nose with a hint of the licorice bite. It's not as strong as pure licorice, but it's there. Flavor basically followed with the licorice notes along with an almost smoky flavor. Not much roast really as it is overpowered by the brewer's liquid and smokiness but that's not a bad thing. Made for a unique combo that you don't find in other stouts and was a nice change of pace as a result.

Trip to Moe's

The other great part about visiting Lee, Massachusetts is the chance to go to Moe's Tavern. It's a smallish bar just off main street that has a varying tap list, great bartenders, and a nice drinking environment. One of the things Jo and I really like is that the owner, Josh, replaced his small high top tables with tall picnic style tables that seat eight plus people. It makes the bar much friendlier and easier to hang out. The only thing Moe's doesn't have is food but you can bring any food into it so it's not a big deal.

When we arrived, I saw the Maine Beer Company Mean Old Tom was on draft and since I haven't found it in Philly yet I figured I'd order it. Mean Old Tom is an American Stout aged on vanilla beans.

Sixpoint Diesel

I opened a can of Sixpoint Diesel last night, a hoppy American stout.

Pleasant citrusy nose with a hint of roast in it. No bitterness just citrus goodness. Quite inviting. Remarkable body for a 6.3% stout. Started with some more nice citrus followed by an amazingly creamy roastiness. I imagine it was hoppier fresh and maybe more bitter but I don't know. I'll say the middle flavors were probably lessened a bit with the hops fading so I don't think it'll continue to age well but right now it's quite tasty. My last can should still be good if I drink it soon.

Williamsburg AleWerks Coffeehouse Stout

I've written about the Williamsburg AleWerks Coffeehouse Stout out of the bottle before but never on draft. They will probably end up being pretty similar though I'd guess. The Coffeehouse Stout is a coffee milk stout.

Very clean coffee nose. It's strong but not overpowering or sharp. Very inviting. Taste followed with a nice coffee flavor and a bit of creaminess smoothing out all of the sharp edges. Incredibly easy to drink and just really good. I wanted to find a bottle of Cafe Royale which is this aged in bourbon barrels but never managed unfortunately. I bet it's really quite good considering how nice the base is.

DuClaw Naked Fish

I had picked this one up in Virginia since we don't get DuClaw in Philly. Naked Fish is a chocolate, raspberry stout.

Really strong and inviting nose. Lots of chocolate and raspberry, basically like those chocolates with raspberry filling in them, you know? Unfortunately the taste didn't follow anywhere near as strongly though it was still pretty pleasant. Mostly a little chocolate and then a light raspberry flavor in the finish. The body was a little thin but as a regular stout it wasn't terribly surprising. All in all, pretty tasty though the flavor could have been slightly stronger.

Regional Food & Drink in DC

We were in DC for a wedding and the rehearsal dinner was held at a place called Regional Food & Drink. Since we were in a side room for the event, I didn't see much of the place but it seemed nice enough. During the rehearsal part of it I mostly drank Great Lakes Edmund Fitzgerald, a porter, which is great so that was cool. After the dinner a bunch of us switched to the main part of the restaurant and got a table in the back. I didn't know what to expect as far as the draft list but it was actually quite god with lots of variety and decent enough prices. I decided to start with the Dogfish Head 120 Minute, an 18% monster IPA, since I wasn't sure if I'd find it on draft anywhere else.

A Night at Moe's

Just before Hurricane Irene, Jo and I took a short trip to Western Massachusetts to see her dad. It was supposed to be a weekend trip but we didn't want to drive home in the middle of the storm so we left early on Saturday. However, thanks to her dad's suggestion of heading to Moe's on Friday night after we arrived, I still managed to continue my tradition of always going there when I'm in town. Moe's is a really great bar in little old Lee, Mass. and if you are ever in the Berkshires you should be sure to stop there.

Avery at Kraftwork

Now we come to what turned out to be my second favorite event of Philly Beer Week. The London Grill dinner was my top favorite, but this night came pretty close. There were two reasons I found this event at Kraftwork so cool. One, the Avery draft list was quite amazing and I got to try a whole lot of them because of their awesome flight deal. And, two, they hired a group called the Olde City Sideshow who were pretty awesome. Kraftwork is located on Girard St. in North Philly. Decently large bar with tables ringing the room. Avery is a brewery out of Colorado best known for, hmm, probably their Joe's Pilsener but for me it's their super high octane beers like Mephistopheles, Samael's, and The Beast. Thursday's event was named "The Greatest Show on Earth", I believe, and some of the staff actually dressed the part which was cool. Nice to see a bar have an actual theme and then follow through on it.

When we arrived, there wasn't any room at the bar so we stood near a friend's table and I enjoyed a glass of Avery Dihos Dactylion, an American Wild Ale.

London Grill & Deschutes: East Meets West

Finally we come to one of my favorite (possibly the favorite) nights of Philly Beer Week, the Deschutes dinner at London Grill. However, lets back up about 45 minutes before the dinner started. Kite & Key was doing a Founders Brewing event (named F*CK Monday for Founders Unites Canada and Kentucky, clever) and advertised that they were going to be tapping Canadian Breakfast Stout. Since it is one of the beers that I really wanted to try at some point and is super rare, I knew I had to stop there before heading to London Grill. I arrived around 4:30 only to find out most people arrived at 4 and all of the placeholder cards for a glass were already handed out. Sucks to be me. Luckily, I had met a couple guys the day before at Eulogy and they offered up an extra seat at their table to me. This meant, when the waitress came around for who wanted what, she did her best to include me in the order. Fingers crossed, I just had to wait and see what happened. Waiting paid off as I got my first glass ever of Canadian Breakfast Stout!

Bella Vista takes over Devil's Den

Ahh, Philly Beer Week finally begins. I put up my schedule the other day and so far I've kept to it pretty well. While this post is going to concentrate on the Devil's Den event, my first beer of beer week was actually at the Kite & Key. It was the Troegs Scratch 42, Razzmadizzle, a chocolate raspberry dubbel as far as I know.

Absolutely Awesome Stout Tasting

Before attending the Troegs Splinter Black release, I was sent a message on BeerAdvocate asking if I'd be up for trading a bottle to a local in Philly.  I said if I got some extra bottles, we could work something out.  However, after seeing what he had to offer we both decided that instead of trading for more bottles to sit on our shelves, lonely and undrunk, it would be a lot more fun to get together and do a tasting where I'd bring a bottle of Splinter Black and he'd bring some stuff.  It may seem odd meeting up with a total stranger, but I'm an odd guy so it evens out.  We met up at The Belgian Cafe just before Christmas to ensure that neither of us was a crazy murderer and, after realizing we were both relatively normal (well, almost normal), decided to do the tasting some time in January.

We talked a bit more after Christmas and came up with the date of January 15th.  He invited a friend of his who also lived nearby and after a few more messages we decided to make it a stout tasting.  For this one, we were doing it at my apartment.  They arrived around 3:15 and, lo and behold, his friend Josh turned out to be one of the random guys we met on the way to the POPE during the Craft Beer Express.  I honestly couldn't believe the coincidence.  Just really random.  We quickly set out the six bottles on the table and couldn't wait to get started.

From left to right, we had: Olde Hickory The Event Horizon, Olde Hickory Hickory Stick Stout, Big Sky Ivan the Terrible, Surly Darkness (finally!), Troegs Splinter Black, and Dock Street Prince Myshkin.

Dinner at Resurrection Ale House

Jo and I went to Resurrection Ale House last night with some of our friends.  It was my first time there so I was excited to check it out.  It's a pretty small place, but it has a really nice wooden bar and it's very roomy.  Their beer list was pretty good, all decent craft offerings.  It wasn't quite as exotic as you'd get at Varga or Devil's Den, but that may just be a matter of timing since they change their drafts often.  Their food was pretty good and reasonably priced.  All in all, not a bad place, but if I'm going to head to South Philly I'd probably just go to Devil's Den or Hawthornes.

The first beer I had was Russian River's Damnation.  (Note: all the pictures are going to kind of suck since it was too dark for decent pictures.  Oh well.)

Damnation is a Belgian Strong Pale Ale.  It was a really cool golden color which doesn't come through real well in the picture but believe me it was cool looking.  It had about 2cm of bubbly, frothy head on it and smelled mildly of oranges and honey.  The first taste of it had similar feelings to the smell.  Hints of orange, honey, and other sweet flavors.  All of that melds together as you drink it and it's pretty satisfying.  Really good beer.

The second beer I had was Bell's Kalamazoo Stout.

The beer was a black color with a nice dark, brown head.  It smelled of roasted malts, coffee notes, and mild chocolate, exactly what you'd expect from a decent stout.  Initially, the roasted flavor jumps out at you and overpowers everything.  A couple sips in though and that mellows out as you get used to it and the coffee and chocolate flavors appear.  Note, that I don't think there's actually any chocolate or coffee used to make this stout, it's just that the roasted malts used in brewing the beer give off those flavors.  It's a cool effect in my opinion.

Finally I finished off the night with Dogfish Head's Punkin.

It was a nice, dark orange color (some would say brown but whatever) with minimal head.  I'm not sure why some beers have a lot or a little head, but it probably has something to do with the extra stuff used in brewing the beer.  Pumpkin beers generally have a ton of spices, like cinnamon, coriander, cloves, etc, and almost never have a lot of head on them so that's what I'm basing this on.  I could be full of crap but this is my blog so I can say what I want.  This pumpkin is no different than others as far as the smell goes.  Lots of spices although not overpowering at all.  It tastes similar to what you'd expect a pumpkin pie to taste like if the pumpkin taste took a huge backseat to the spices.  It was really drinkable since while the spices were there, they were not the only thing going on in the flavor.  Some pumpkins are just all spice and it gets old when trying to drink the whole beer.

Not a bad night at Resurrection and I'd be happy to go back again if a group of people were going, but I wouldn't suggest it as a place to meet up.  I will say there was a lot of room in the place considering its size which is a plus in its favor when comparing it to some other bars in Philadelphia.