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.

House Beers at Farmer's Cabinet

Jo had some stuff to do this past Sunday, so I decided to head to the Farmer's Cabinet for lunch and to try some of Terry Hawbaker's new beers. I've mentioned him before, but if you don't remember Terry used to brew at the Bullfrog in Williamsport and moved to Philly to brew for the restaurant. While they had planned to create a brewery in the restaurant itself, it turned out to be impractical for a number of reasons and so the owners bought a brewery down in Virginia instead. Of course, the one they bought turned out to be a disaster, but Terry put a lot of work into cleaning it up and it's finally starting to produce results. Delicious results.

I started with a glass of the Roggen-Son, a saison brewed with rye.

Light rye nose, more sweet than spicy. Started with some rye spiciness, then a nice sweetness, and finished dry with a little bitterness. I really enjoyed the mix of sweetness and rye spice and thought this was pretty great.

Emelisse Rauchbier

As part of Yard's Smoke 'Em event, they offered to fill a growler with a beer of our choice from whatever was left at the end. Since the New Holland kicked just before I made a decision, I went with the Emelisse Rauchbier.

Since you can't see it, the beer poured a dark brown color. Not much carbonation but that's a result of the growler fill. Smelled like a sweet wood stove, incredibly smoky. Had a large burnt wood flavor followed by some caramel sweetness and finished tasting smoky. Unlike some smoked beers that taste of bacon, this was more campfire. If you enjoy the flavors, it was pretty fantastic but it's definitely going to be a polarizing beer. I enjoyed it though and since I was drinking it, that's what matters.

Smoke 'Em If Yous Got 'Em

Last Friday, Yards held their third annual smoked beerfest named Smoke 'Em If Yous Got 'Em. Yards gathered around 20 different smoked beers of all different types plus a ton of different smoked food made by professionals and novices. Let me just say it was fantastic

This was my approach to the Yards building with the tents in front of me housing the novice bbq people. The only unfortunate thing was that it just started raining as I made my way to the building. However, Yards thought of everything and put all the beer pouring stations inside of their brewery so we wouldn't get wet. Hurray for Yards!

Jose Pistola's does Smoke!

Another great event at Jose Pistola's last Friday.  They had three smoked beers and three smoked food specials.  When I entered it smelled fantastic in there as they had just thrown some smoke chips on a stove downstairs and the whole place had a nice haze of smoke.  Really set the mood for the event.  The three smoked beers they had were: Aecht Schlenkerla Oak Smoke (I think it's their Eiche), Weyerbacher Fireside Ale, and Left Hand Fade To Black Vol. 2 (a smoked baltic porter).  Since it was a work lunch I obviously couldn't drink too much (stop laughing) but I did try two of them.  I swear I only got the second because the chili I ordered was so damn spicy I needed something to pair with it.  Adam warned me and then laughed at me when I kept saying how spicy it was but man.